30 Gallon - Best reef friendly fish and clean up crew recommendations

[mrgster5]

Hi, I just set up a 30l from IM and have a few rocks and some corrals. I'm ready to stock some fish and clean up crew. I would love to know what you have in your 30-gallon bare bottom reef tanks.

 

[Tiki Reef Joshua]

Ohhhh... bare bottom nano is limited. Snails, a couple clowns and a blenny.

 

[Tiki Reef Joshua]

Maybe a small non-burrowing wrasse... nice tank though. I used to have a 30L like that.

 

[Acros]

I have 2x clown fish, 1x six line wrasse, 1x chalk bass, 1x tail spot blenny in my bare bottom 29g standard tank.

My six line is barely over an inch long and is not aggressive to anyone in the tank. For some weird reason, I can’t keep snails alive.

 

[Tiki Reef Joshua]

You could throw a fire fish or 2 in there. Cheap and pretty.

 

[Tiki Reef Joshua]

One cool thing about nanos is their simplicity. Your selections are limited but important... so you can go with higher end clowns and really nice firefish or blennys. If you had sand I would 100% recommend 2 nice gobies and a small conch. But you still have some good options.

 

[Jekyl]

Cleaner shrimp. My first addition and still my favorite.

 

[mrgster5]

I have 2x clown fish, 1x six line wrasse, 1x chalk bass, 1x tail spot blenny in my bare bottom 29g standard tank.

My six line is barely over an inch long and is not aggressive to anyone in the tank. For some weird reason, I can’t keep snails alive.

I've never seen a chalk bass at the lfs, do you mind sharing a pic of your tank. Thanks

 

[Acros]

I've never seen a chalk bass at the lfs, do you mind sharing a pic of your tank. Thanks

Here is a picture of my tank just after feeding. Chalk bass is hard to come by. They can be kept peacefully in groups. My next tank will have multiples of them.

 

[mrgster5]

Here is a picture of my tank just after feeding. Chalk bass is hard to come by. They can be kept peacefully in groups. My next tank will have multiples of them.

They are a neat fish, I will see if any are around me. Thanks

 

[Overbrook]

I have a year old 32g that became bare bottom over the fall (the best choice ever). 2 clowns and a flame angel (yes, some controversy) are doing great. If I started over again I think I'd just get one clown. One is always bullying the other. The aggression will come and go but it might not be something you wanna deal with. Also, I added a firefish a couple of months after the clowns and it was hassled by them and ultimately didn't make it. They didn't outright bite the fire, just kept it to a little outcropping and didn't seem to eat enough.

 

[MPrz59]

Hi, I just set up a 30l from IM and have a few rocks and some corrals. I'm ready to stock some fish and clean up crew. I would love to know what you have in your 30-gallon bare bottom reef tanks.

Sounds basic but I always start my new saltwater with a pair of clowns, also fire fish are great fish for that size tank as long as there's a cover

 

[mrgster5]

Here's what I ended up doing. The first fish I added was a court jester goby, 2 PJ cardinals, and a coral beauty. They were so peaceful together and the coral beauty and goby actually hung out together. Then a few weeks later I found some regular clowns and made sure the pair were smaller than my coral beauty so they didn't beat her up. They have gotten along great, no aggression by anyone yet. Yesterday, I added my final fish to the tank, a Falco hawkfish, and so far he has been very entertaining. I love all of them, except maybe the court jester goby and cardinals, they are pretty boring and mostly just hover. If I had to do it over, I would not have chosen them. Coral Beauty and the hawkfish are my favs, it's just too bad I had to move my cleaner shrimp to another tank for fear he would be a midnight snack to the hawkfish. Thanks for all the suggestions, I was really tied to whatever the fish store had in stock, I went every week for a month looking for just what I wanted, but had to settle on a few things. I would like to add a royal urchin if my lfs will ever get them in.