ideas for a 10 gallon

[VariableEnigma]

Hi. I have a standard 10 gallon glass aquarium that I'd like to re-start. (As of now, it just has water, some rocks, and sand from a local pond in it.) I'm considering both freshwater and saltwater options.

As for my saltwater ideas, I don't have many because I don't know a lot about saltwater tanks.

Can you give me some suggestions and/or scenarios for my tank? I need to know some of the basics about saltwater tanks. Thanks in advance!

 

[haus]

10 gal is small for a SW tank. Bigger is better, it keeps the water more stable. Size also greatly restricts the type of fish that you can keep. Also, I don't think that sand from a local pond would be a good substrate for SW ( I may be wrong on this - somebody else chime in if they know better :? ) Read as much as you can about SW before you get involved in it. It is greatly rewarding, but a lot of work.

 

[VariableEnigma]

I have a 20 gallon long and a 45 gallon, both of which are not being used right now. There are problems with setting those up, though. Firstly, I would need to spend even more money on new hoods. Being an almost-broke college student makes that harder. But the biggest problem is that I plan to move to a dorm or apartment within the year. I don't know if I will be able to have those tanks where I will be moving, and I don't want to leave yet another thing for my mom to have to take care of when I'm gone.

 

[TygGer]

I have a 10g s/w tank that I inherited from someone who moved away. It's overstocked with 1 clown, 1 yellow-tail damsel, 1 three stripe damsel and 1 coral banded shrimp.

This setup cost virtually nothing to start and maintenance is cheap due to it's small size.

Get rid of the sand and rocks you got from the pond if you plan on s/w. Either buy sand specific for aquarium use (I used silicate free Old Castle play sand from the local hardware stores when it was around) or go bare bottom. I don't have protein skimmer for this setup as it is FOWLR. The most expensive part will probably be liverock. You will need about 10-20lbs of live rock. See if you can buy some from local reefers for cheaper than lfs.

Buy a couple powerheads for water movement. I'm using 2 maxijet 400s.

And a HOB filter for mechanical filtration. Your regular NO lights will do fine and a heater.

As for maintenance, I do 2gs every week or two. But every week would be ideal for my bioload. You would need salt mix, a hydrometer or refractometer and either RO/DI or Distilled water.

Of course, the freshwater tank will be much simpler, but where's the fun in that???

edit: "Virtually nothing to start" is subjective. Let me clarify. It cost virtually nothing to start compared to my 72g s/w tank, but will cost a lot more than starting a 10g freshwater tank.