The Saga Begins!!

[SerLunchbox]

So I have officially taken the plunge.

Below are the photo's to prove it!!

So what i have is a 50 gallon tank, a Won Brother 2 Titanium heater, an aqua C Remora Pro with pre skimmer box, some power heads (hoping to get some SEIO 820's at a reasonalbe price), some Seachem reef salt and the pride and joy, my Sunlight Supply Maristar MH fixture ... a total of 578 watts. Inside ar 2 - 39 watt geissmann t-5 actinics and 2 - 250 watt 14,500K geissman DE MH bulbs. This is running off of a Blue Wave VII ballast.

I can't get over the clarity ... Already the tank is just about to start cycling and i am already hooked and probably will never go back to freshwater again ....

I am going to keep the tank a bare bottom tank (unless the wife tells me otherwise) ... WoW ... i am still in MAJOR shock.

 

[austinsdad]

Too late to turn back now. Oh yeah. We gotcha now!!

Is that a glass top or something? Temporary light feet too I presume.

Eric Borneman's Coral book might be a decent read while you're setting up to help decide on corals.

 

[MACATUA]

Cool, what are your stocking plans?

 

[FishFrik]

Already the tank is just about to start cycling and i am already hooked and probably will never go back to freshwater again ....

LOL!!! Nope there's no way u can go back! Ur now trapped in the SW madness!

Congratz on ur new tank. Very sweet setup. It beats mine

 

[SerLunchbox]

stock list will have the following for sure ...

i figure for inverts:
about 10 different snails for various tasks
a few starfish (depends on species) again for whatever tasks (the wife wants a couple)
a few cleaner shrimp and decoration shrimp

then there will be:

1 - clownfish
1 - kaudern's cardinal fish
1 - 6 line wrass
1 - purple frefish
2 - neon blue goies (cleaners that i just love)
1 - regular firefish
1 or 2 - watchmen gobies
1 or 2 - clown gobies

I am sure that i will be overstocked by that point, but i think that my skimmer should be able to handle it (since it is able to handle 125 gallons)

as for corals:

- Frogspawn
- white pom pom
- purple/blue riccordia
- a clam (i have the light for it ... so why not)

we will see from there.

 

[mp3z24]

you are going to be way overstocked. i would suggest cutting your livestock list at least in half. the skimmer will pull protein waste from the water, but it will do nothing for nitrate removal. with that large of a bioload, your water will foul quickly and your nitrates will go sky-high. also, im pretty sure that the clams will need high water quality.

also, you didnt mention anything about filtration. are you going to use live rock, or mechanical filtration?

for your clean up crew, you will probably need to add some hermit crabs to deal with algae. the 10 snails will not do much to get rid of hair algae.

what size heater did you purchase? you may want to consider adding a second heater to ensure that when one fails, you wont have to rush to buy a replacement. i used 2 150 watt heaters for my 55 gallon (won bros titanium heaters).

thats my $.02

~mike

 

[SerLunchbox]

Hi Mike:

I am going to be getting a HOB refugium (as soon as one comes around cheaper)

I have a 250W titanium heater and a backup 200W ebo if needed.

I refuse to add hermits. You can get other algae cleaners that do teh same job as hermits without the pain of them (knocking over frags etc) ...

Yes there will be Live Rock in the tank .... just waiting to get some right now from a person in my area who is getting out of the hobby ... will be getting about 40 lbs from him and then will get an additional 30-40 lbs from another person.

 

[austinsdad]

2 - neon blue boies (cleaners that i just love)

Would that be gobies? One of favorites too. My LFS stopped carrying them, Said they always lost'm 'cause they were too small. May have to mail order a mated pair.

 

[SerLunchbox]

LOL yeah ... They are all just my possibilities ... will see what i can handle as time goes on.

only adding 1 or 2 fish every 2 weeks or more ... just to ensure everything balances out properly

 

[melosu58]

You might want to have some Live sand. It dont need to be deep. It`s your tank. You make the call.

 

[EELectric]

Yeah sand just makes the tank that much more real. How about that buddy that's giving you the rock ask for some sand. HTH

 

[FishFrik]

I do not think u will be able to keep 2 firefish in a same tank. Other than that, ur stocking list looks good WITH the fuge that ur gonna add later

 

[SerLunchbox]

well, i have been told by my wife that i am allowed to keep:

1 - Cardinal fish
1 - Clown fish
1 - 6 Line Wrasse
2 - Green Clown Gobies

as for sand, it is all my wifes call. Again i will defer to a saying "Happy wife = happy life". Personally i pained the bottom of the tank a glossy white. I want to stay as bare bottom as possible given that it will be easier for detrius cleanup.

The glass top will be coming off as well ... it is just there since my legs for the light haven't come in yet. I want to put egg crating over top so that i don't have any jumpers

 

[FishFrik]

R u not allowed to get other kind of fish? Like tangs or butterfly? With that stocking list, u can add more fish later on

 

[SerLunchbox]

So long as they are reef safe my wife shouldn't have a problem ... but she wants to be part of the selection process.

 

[Feron]

Just a word of advice, take it slow.. resist impulse buys of livestock (and even I am guilty).
I'd even recommend spacing out the 1 to 2 fish thing until a good solid amount of establishment has happened with the tank.
Of course, that's my personal oppinion, to each their own
GL!
(and yeah, only one type of firefish is recommended unless added at the same time.. even then there could be territory disputes unless they were contained in the same tank at the lfs)

 

[SerLunchbox]

I'd even recommend spacing out the 1 to 2 fish thing until a good solid amount of establishment has happened with the tank.

That was my initial plan. My initial plan was let it FULLY cycle with LR and skimmer only for 6 weeks. After 6 weeks start adding some cleanup crews. Once they have established themselves for 2 weeks, then i will add the cardinal and clown fish. After that, it will be about 2 - 4 weeks before any other additions.

i DO NOT want to rush a reef tank or else i will be quite literally washing a lot of cash down the drain, and i do NOT want to do that.

Though now i do have one question ... i added my salt already (yesturday) and today i noticed that there was a "film" of sorts in the tank. I took out a cleaning pad (never been used one at that) and started doing a clean up ... turns out it was residue salt. Is that normal for starting out? I thought i mixed it very well, but i guess i was mistaken. How often will that take to get fully absorbed (refractometer had a reading of 1.024 20 minutes ago).

Thanks for all the kind words and advice!

 

[Feron]

It happens.. just allowing the pumps/powerheads to run will finish up the mixing over time.. I'd imagine the residue won't throw the SG off by much if at all..just keep an eye on it.

That's one of the reasons for preparing water change water 24h in advance - to allow the salt to fully disolve.

I assume the film was literally just a film and not particles you could feel per-se.
I noticed something very similar when I started my first salt tank.. was a mixture of the super fine salt and super fine stand stirred up by my dumping salt in the tank.. nothing to worry about and no doubt will end up in your filter to be cleaned out... plus you'll have to do a healthy WC before adding stock, so that'll remove a bit of it too.

HTH and keep up the good fight.

 

[SerLunchbox]

Yeah ... its jsut fine salt particles that won't absorb it seems. I have a LOT of water in the tank now (up to the brim) so i will just syphon off the excess salt when i go to add the LR later on in the week.

 

[seaham358]

Are you going to hang the light? You will want too loose the glass top and the plastic legs you have I can see them melting over time..