Friend gave me an aquarium...

[NJHollwood]

About 6 weeks ago, a friend of mine gave me this aquarium. I was hoping someone could help me identify it. From what I could gather online, I thought it was a Biocube 29, however I purchased a cartridge filter (the packaging of which said it would fit several biocube models inlcuding the 29), and it didn't fit.

Either way, as you can tell, I'm very new to all this and have many, many questions. The salesman at Petco has been very helpful and has been guiding me through the process. First, he had me add sand, fill it with salt water, and leave it running for several weeks. The following week I purchased two live rocks. Two weeks later, I added three hermit crabs, and three damsels (I think...one is blue with a yellow tail and the other two are zebra striped).

My questions are:

-What kind of tank is this?
-What size?
-The hinges on the hood are broken, it also has one light out and I think one of the fans may not be running, where can I buy replacement parts?
-The water has been running a little warm, around 82-83 degrees and I have even gone as far as unplugging the heater. Do I need better circulation to get a more accurate reading? If not, what steps can I take to reduce the temperature?
-What can/should I stock this tank with? I was thinking about sea horses, but am very much so open to ideas.
-Is there anything I should do differently or can you offer any suggestions/advice?

 

[Wendy8184]

you will have to remove damsels to have seahorses

 

[TraumaDaumaReefs]

This isn't a Biocube 29, but an Aquapod 24. To fix the light get another bulb and if that doesn't fix it it may be the switch. For heat, there are fan retrofits that you could look into, or get a chiller.

 

[Jeremy S.]

I wouldn't recommend sea horses to a beginner. They are much more difficult to take care of then a normal fish. What are you water parameters looking like? Have you been testing your salinity and ph?

You're also going to need much more live rock. You'll want to add around 1lb per gallon.

 

[kdpuffer]

In this tank you could do seahorses but I would recommend not as they are very difficult to keep. I would also suggest taking the damsels back as they are mean little guys. You could house an oscelleris or percula clownfish and possibly even a pair. My suggestion is to do an anemone tank, just have a nice anemone (green or red bubble tips are nice and fairly common) and have a pair of clowns along with your cleanup crew (snails and crabs and possibly a cleaner shrimp). Before you do anything you need to make sure the tank is cycled. This is the process of building up nitrifying bacteria in the tank that convert fish waste into less toxic nitrates and nitrogen gas. You will need to get a test kit, the API saltwater master test kit is a good starter kit and affordable. This will test what you need to test to cycle the tank (ammonia, nitrites, nitrates). You will also need to fix up the tank and get your lights working fully aswell as keeping the water the correct temperature 75-80 degrees is usually ok. As for the lights most people use one daylight bulb (that's the white one) which is usually 10,000-15,000 k. I prefer the higher k bulbs as they are more white/blue as apposed to lower k have a more yellow color. The second bulb is usually actinic which is blue and this is what really brings out the different colors of things in the tank. Hope this helps some if you have more questions feel free to ask we are all here to learn and share what we have learned.

 

[obscurereef]

Petco employees usually don't have a lot of knowledge when it comes to reef tanks (or seahorses). IMO it isn't a store to go to for livestock or dependable advice. If you have a lfs that would be much better. Try asking around or look online for any stores that specialize in aquariums (fw and sw, etc). Even at lfs they can give you bad advice as some will sell you anything to an unknowing customer to get money. If I were you I'd just take out the heater all together and if the temp is still high you could make ice cubes by filling cups with RO/DI or RO water and putting them in the freezer. What water are you using? Do you have a test kit to test your levels of ammonia, nitrite, and nitrate? Remember, if there is evaporation, don't add saltwater, add freshwater (RO can work, but RO/DI is most preferred). RESEARCH also! Don't rely on Petco employees to guide you b/c most likely they won't be an expert on everything you're needing to know. There are some good articles on here to give you some basic info! And btw if you did go with clowns and an anemone, you'd have to wait 6-8 months until you added the anemone.

 

[Jeremy S.]

I have had the absolute worst experiences with petco. I only go to petco for chemicals an foods sometimes.