Big tank, little scape, tiny creatures

[Vanlife-reefer]

I’m about to start a new 170 gallon tank.

I’d love to make it a big tank with the aqua scape taking maybe 30% of the right side of the tank and focus on shrimp, crabs and other tiniest creatures in the tank.

Big tank - small animals.

Has anyone done it? Could I see your rank please?

 

[JumboShrimp]

I don't know if this is what you mean-- but I did 'this' once-- if it gives you any ideas.

 

[kizzy89]

I can see your idea, i like it personally. Add lots of small critters and a few small fish that stay towards the rockwork and maybe have a larger fish that stays out towards the open end? Or small schooling fish to fill the "empty" space. Awesome idea, i do hope you try this.

 

[ISpeakForTheSeas]

I've heard this concept presented a couple of times, and I think someone mentioned their friend doing it, but (IIRC) I haven't seen any pics of it actually done yet - trimma and eviota gobies are always the first things to come to mind:

Welcome to Reef2Reef!

Personally, I love the concept that you're looking at doing. Unfortunately, while there are a number of small inverts in the hobby, truly tiny fish (1" or less) that aren't gobies are actually pretty hard to come by in the hobby. So, personally, I'd look at fish that are 3" to 4" or less.

With that in mind, here are some fish suggestions that are 3" or less that aren't gobies (the common, tiny fish in the hobby are pretty much all gobies, so you shouldn't have any trouble finding a bunch of them):

-Barnacle Blennies
-Geometric Pygmy Hawkfish
-Pygmy Possum Wrasse
-Yellow Banded Possum Wrasse
-Six Line Wrasse
-Cardinalfishes
-Assessors
-Yellowtail Damselfish
-Dottybacks (these are known to be aggressive)
-Ocellaris Clownfish
-Whitespotted Pygmy Filefish
-Two Spot Bimaculatus Blenny
-Tail Spot Blenny
-Chinstrap Jawfish
-Coral Crouchers/Croucher Gobies (these are actually tiny scorpionfish, not gobies)
-Black and White Chromis
-Agile Chromis
-Black Bar Chromis
-Vanderbilt Chromis


Some basslets (typically the expensive, deep-water ones) would work, and Brotulids like the Dusky Brotulid (Diancistrus fuscus) could be fun too, but they're hard to come by (and I've heard they're extremely shy during the day, really only coming out at night). Depending on what else you put in your tank, you might be able to put some dwarf seahorses or similar in your tank too, but probably not.

For some inverts suggestions (all but one of these should be 1" or less max):

-Dwarf Hermit Crabs (Dwarf Red Tips, Dwarf Blue Legs, Dwarf Yellow Tips, Hidden Hermits, Dwarf Zebras, etc.)
-Acropora Crabs (Trapezia spp.)
-Porcelain Crabs (typically Petrolisthes or Neopetrolisthes spp.)
-Pom Pom Crabs
-Micro Brittle Starfish
-Aquilonastra Starfish (these are known in the hobby as Asterina Starfish, and often considered pests because they reproduce so readily and frequently in our tanks).
-Rusalty's (Aquaculture Nursery Farm's) Green Lantern Shrimp
-Bumblebee Shrimp (as a note for these guys, from all verifiable accounts, while they do inspect starfish and seem to feed off of something on the starfish, they don't seem to actually do any damage to the starfish, and they don't seem to actually eat them at all)
-Sexy Shrimp (these guys technically get up to 1 1/2")
-Chitons
-Shellback Crabs (Hypoconcha spp.)
-Skeleton Shrimp (Caprella spp.)

All kinds of "pods" (Copepods, Amphipods, Isopods, etc.) would work. Plenty of snails would work, as would some limpets if you can find them. If you're willing to feed phytoplankton regularly, then you could keep some bivalves (clams, oysters, scallops, etc.), barnacles, and or feather duster worms too, several of which would be small enough to meet the criteria.

I'm sure I've missed some suggestions, but this should be a decent start for you at least.