My 60 gal build

[Tomchong22]

so i have finished cycling my tank about three weeks ago and everything is going good. i though i would post some pics and ask some advice on my journey to a reef tank. here are some pics of my tank right now:
anyways here are my specs.
60 gal dt - around 80 lbs of rock. (60 lbs are man made)
2 1/2 in sand bed( mixture of sugar grain,med grain, and Florida beach sand)
2 - snails
1- turbo snail
1-pencil urchin
2- false perc clownfish
1- 750 gph powerhead
1- 250 watt heater

10 gal sump-
about 6 lbs of live rock and a hand full of macro algae.
a section with a dsb about 4 in deep. viaAqua return pump.

lighting-
dt = Nova Extreme pro 48" t5 ho 8 bulb fixture( one of the ballast is out so 6 bulb) 4 blue bulbs, 2 10000k white bulbs.
sump = 1 40watt 6500k daylight cfl.

so far everything is going good. i do have a break out of diatoms and hair algae but i am not to worried about it since this is very common in new tanks. well here is my plan for a reef tank... in the center i plan on having 3 large feather dusters in the center to make a field of feather dusters. at the bottom of the tank i plan on having lots of mushrooms, some green star polyps, leather coral, toadstool, sponges, button polyps. middle to top i plan on having 2 clams, some hard corals idk what kind yet( open to suggestions) and some zoas.

as far as fish and inverts go i am at a stall. i would like to keep it tropical with lots of color and as many fish i can have. inverts i plan on having a peppermint shrimp, lots of crabs and snails, i dont remember the name but the blue reef safe starfish.

if anybody has any input on fish i should get or corals i should look at i am very open to it.

 

[Tomchong22]

Also does anybody know a good online site to purchase fish and corals from?

 

[Sarcothelia]

Liveaquaria is a real good site to order online. I'd order, but I'd rather not pay 30 dollar shipping for something I can buy at my LFS. If I was far from a fish store, like I assume you are, it's a good place if you live in the US.

 

[Tomchong22]

I'm not to far from a lfs( about half an hour) the problem is they are pretty overpriced. Such as for a green star polyp they want $60 for a small frag. Clownfish are $23... It just tends to get expensive. My other option is petco... But they don't always have the best quality fish( ones with ich, corals that are don't have enough light etc) if I'm going to put something in my tank I want it to be healthy not almost dead.

 

[Ibrahim]

Bluezooaquatics has pretty good corals and fish. Shipping is 35-40 but is free on orders 140 and more.

 

[Tomchong22]

Yeah I don't really plan on spending more then $140 each time I make a purchase. My lfs is moving to a new location soon so I am hoping they will be having like a move sale type of thing.

 

[Sarcothelia]

I usually spend exactly 130 dollars every time I go to my LFS lol. I've been adding a bit more live rock each time for a while though as well as buying maintenance "stuff" so that number will probably go down to 50 as I start going there solely for frags.

If bluezoo does free shipping for 140 that is pretty danged good because live aquaria requires 225 for free shipping. I stick with my LFS though because I never buy 140-225 bucks worth of livestock at once, though if it was a single or 2 pieces I would be tempted. To spend 140 dollars at once on coral you'd have to get some pretty big frags or some pretty rare corals.
_____

And ouch about the 60 bucks for a green star frag...how busy is the store? Would explain higher prices if it was slow business. At my LFS a 3" frag of Eupyllia is 20 bucks and a 2" frag of anything not extremely rare is 10 dollars. Somewhat large colonies on rocks are 40 dollars, so how large a frag is he charging 60 dollars for?

 

[Tomchong22]

See that's the thing he does not frag them.... So when you purchase them you I've to pay full price for the full coral. So depending on what he has in stock one day you could pay $40 for a really small frag or $40 for the same frag that is 5x bigger idk it is weird how he does his business. Although his feather dusters are only $10 so I am thinking on making a trip today to get three if them. The heads on each are about 4 in across

 

[Tomchong22]

Just went down and picked up a feather duster and a small frag of Toadstool from petco. So far they r looking good. Plan to have pics up soon

 

[Ricksreef]

so i have finished cycling my tank about three weeks ago and everything is going good. i though i would post some pics and ask some advice on my journey to a reef tank. here are some pics of my tank right now:
anyways here are my specs.
60 gal dt - around 80 lbs of rock. (60 lbs are man made)
2 1/2 in sand bed( mixture of sugar grain,med grain, and Florida beach sand)
2 - snails
1- turbo snail
1-pencil urchin
2- false perc clownfish
1- 750 gph powerhead
1- 250 watt heater

10 gal sump-
about 6 lbs of live rock and a hand full of macro algae.
a section with a dsb about 4 in deep. viaAqua return pump.

lighting-
dt = Nova Extreme pro 48" t5 ho 8 bulb fixture( one of the ballast is out so 6 bulb) 4 blue bulbs, 2 10000k white bulbs.
sump = 1 40watt 6500k daylight cfl.

so far everything is going good. i do have a break out of diatoms and hair algae but i am not to worried about it since this is very common in new tanks. well here is my plan for a reef tank... in the center i plan on having 3 large feather dusters in the center to make a field of feather dusters. at the bottom of the tank i plan on having lots of mushrooms, some green star polyps, leather coral, toadstool, sponges, button polyps. middle to top i plan on having 2 clams, some hard corals idk what kind yet( open to suggestions) and some zoas.

as far as fish and inverts go i am at a stall. i would like to keep it tropical with lots of color and as many fish i can have. inverts i plan on having a peppermint shrimp, lots of crabs and snails, i dont remember the name but the blue reef safe starfish.

if anybody has any input on fish i should get or corals i should look at i am very open to it.

The one problem you will see develop,especially when you start adding corals is the pencil urchin.I know they are cool to watch,I used to have one myself,but you will find that it will be constantly knocking over your corals and even moving your rock.Amazing how strong they are.
Other than that you are off to a good start.you could consider some lye tail anthias,Red velvet fairy wrasse,fox face rabbit fish,diamond goby,they will all get along together including with your clowns.

 

[Tomchong22]

I am thinking on returning the pencil urchin. My main question on them r do they snack on corals? I have heard that they might.....great list by the way. I will def look into them. Also is a flam angel reef safe? And will my tank(48" l x12" dx 24"x) Suffice for a butterfly fish?

 

[Ricksreef]

I am thinking on returning the pencil urchin. My main question on them r do they snack on corals? I have heard that they might.....great list by the way. I will def look into them. Also is a flam angel reef safe? And will my tank(48" l x12" dx 24"x) Suffice for a butterfly fish?

The pencil urchin will harm corals but mainly eats algae,but it is destructive moving around.In my experience the flame angel will start nipping on corals after awhile.Some people say they haven't had that problem with theirs,so I guess it is hit and miss. My understanding is that all Butterfly fish are not reef compatible.
Google Liveaquaria.com ,you will find good info there as far as compatibility of fish and invert and coral facts.

 

[Tomchong22]

The only reason I got the pencil urchin was for him to go to town on the hair algae that I got. And let me tell you... I have hardly any algae in my tank because of him lol. I do plan on selling him back to the lfs after I start getting more corals. Now I have been looking at getting a main fish for my tank... So far it is the fox face rabbit fish, or a flame angel fish.

 

[Sarcothelia]

My local petco actually has decent quality. By that I mean the fish/corals are taken care of. The guy who takes care of them has an 800 gallon reef tank. How he manages that on a petco employee budget I do not know, but he really loves the fish. He convinced his employer to dish out some extra cash for VHO lighting for the corals

So yea...not all petcos are terrible. He referred me to the LFS I go to now though haha.

Did you say he charges the same for frags of different sizes? If so I guess it's best to wait until he has a giant frag. Odd that he himself doesn't do any fragging though...it's pretty straightforward especially for some softies, sps.

 

[Sarcothelia]

Some angelfish are okay with reefs. They find the soft tree like ones unpalatable in many cases.

 

[Tomchong22]

My local petco actually has decent quality. By that I mean the fish/corals are taken care of. The guy who takes care of them has an 800 gallon reef tank. How he manages that on a petco employee budget I do not know, but he really loves the fish. He convinced his employer to dish out some extra cash for VHO lighting for the corals

So yea...not all petcos are terrible. He referred me to the LFS I go to now though haha.

Did you say he charges the same for frags of different sizes? If so I guess it's best to wait until he has a giant frag. Odd that he himself doesn't do any fragging though...it's pretty straightforward especially for some softies, sps.

There are two petco where I live... And man do they very. One is super bad.... And the other is not to bad. But yeah my lfs he does not really frag them. The only ones he does frag himself is Toadstool and button polyps.( charging $37 for a frag the size of a quarter.) I'm really thinking on just saving the money till I can do a bulk buy off a website to get free shipping. $140 - $250 can buy you allot of coral frags from an online store.

 

[Tomchong22]

Well I just picked up a Kenya tree the other day. So far everything is going amazing. I do have a question. I frayed some green star polyp from my friends tank. Well It has been in my tank now for about 4 days... it has not opened up yet. I do have significantly more lighting on my tank then my friend. Is this causing them to not open up?