A NORTHERN CANADIAN EVO 13.5 - stefcold first reef tank

stefcold · Feb 21, 2020

A bit of background, always been an aquarist at heart. Like probably most of the users around here, I first started with some guppies when I was a young kid. Until I was a teenager and at that time I was able to get a pair mouth brooding African cichlid, pretty rare feat at the time. My LFS had to special order them. Took my first “time off” not having an aquarium, because of college and university.

A couple of years later, where I got a 10 gallon tank with cichlids again, that I upgraded to a 29 gallon Eclipse hood… I also at the same time “converted” the 10 gallon to saltwater with 2 damsels and a hermit crab, then cam my second “time off”, because of starting my family. No point in having a couple of tank when raising 4 boys all under 4 year old at the time….

So last year, 20 year later, I got my old 29 gallon tank going, again an African cichlid tank, but my MTS kicked in, a couple of months later, I had a 60 gallon planted tank mainly barbs with a couple of South American cichlids and a 6 gallon planted tank mainly stock with freshwater shrimps and a couple of cardinal tetra.

Then the saltwater bug it me again, after doing research for a month or so, I decided to go for it!!! So I bought myself a nice saltwater startup kit has a Christmas present, a Fluval EVO.

I choose the EVO because it will be easier to maintain, and also didn’t want to invest a ton of money just in case I wouldn’t dig the saltwater stuff… At the same time, I got 10lbs of CaribSea Life Rock and 20lbs of CaribSea Reef-Grade live sand.

My end goal, if successful, is to have a couple of clownfish with an anemone. I also would like to have some soft coral (mainly Zoas) and a nice center piece LPS, a euphyllia, availability will probably dictate if it’s a frogspawn, hammer or torch.

So I got tank a week before Christmas, I didn’t have the time to set it up, so it went under the Christmas tree.

Wife got me a stand as a surprise Christmas gift, probably because she didn't want the tank in the dining room

I did however started to “aquascape” my LifeRock, got 3 nice piece…

I also assembled the stand and got everything ready for water...

Now I have to decide with salt to use and if I can source RODI water locally.

JoshO · Feb 21, 2020

Welcome back, I'm in the process of setting my Evo up, be really interesting to see the route you take!

TriggersAmuck · Feb 21, 2020

Good start! If it is one thing I could go back and change it would be that I wish I had bought my RODI unit years earlier, just thinking back to all of the time lugging 5 gallon containers to and from the LFSs. And all the times having to make a last minute run to an LFS before heading out of town to make sure there was enough water for family members taking care of it. And thinking of the space taken up by having to have so much on hand to minimize drives. You get the picture.

stefcold · Mar 5, 2020

Ok, was too busy to post last week, the plan is to post as often as I can until I’m cough up as the tank was started around Christmas.

GETTING THE TANK WET

After doing a lot of research before getting my tank, I wanted live bacteria to cycle my tank and being in Canada, Dr. Tim’s product (particularly the one and only) are hard to get. Luckily, I had a planned “football trip” planned on December 22nd to go see the Steelers play the Jets in New York. Before heading back home on Monday, I made sure to stop by a LFS. I end up visiting Absolutely Fish in NJ, saw a bunch of fish my LFS doesn’t stock, pretty cool experience. I made sure to grab a bottle of Dr. Tim’s One and Only.

All my LFS had a Boxing Day sales, so I went on a hunt for the rest of the necessary items.

First, I went to one that had AquaForest products were 25% off, so I got a small bucket of their Reef Salt.

Then, I went to another one that had SeaPora RO water 50% off, got three 5 gallon buckets.

So now, I had everything to start the tank. I had the tank, the rock, the sand, the salt, the water and the nitrifying bacteria.

The next day, I started to prepare the tank for water, the first task was to “plug” that hole in the middle chamber. I used RTV silicone (that I had previously used to repair a leak in a small freshwater aquarium).

It was a pretty clean job, just wish it was black instead of clear.

Finally, I got the tank “wet”. I settled on a nice aquascape, then super glue the rocks, put in the sand. Being a newbie, I only had one “aquarium” 5 gallon bucket, so I would only mix a 5 gallon batch of saltwater, used a heather and a pump to get the water to 78F and make sure it everything was properly dissolved (usually for a couple of hours). Once the mix was ready I then poured it into the tank, believe it or not, I did that process 3 times.

So on December 30th, the tank was filled, the pump and heather were turned on and the clarifying packet from the CaribSea live sand was added.

Next post, cycling the tank, and first fishs!!!!