Biggest mistakes/regret

[KingAlee]

Starting this off… my biggest would be not learning my lesson after having MULTIPLE fish die from the same place to stop buying from there. I thought it was me every time, that I was possibly doing something wrong, probably wasted over $1,000 easily… This also being at the beginning of me joining the community it was very discouraging as I have had kept plenty of freshwater with ease. And to mention buying all of my freshwater from the LFS.

 

[Ocean_Queenie]

Thinking that everyone working in a fish store, (there are some very knowledgeable ones too) actually knew what they were talking about, especially back in the day, and with what fish would get along together! And bringing a Triggerfish home, was a bad idea lol

 

[dangles]

Going all-in on Aperture brands on my “forever” build. Neptune, AI and Ecotech, specifically…

There’s so much other good stuff out there, and a lot of it is LESS costly and MORE RELIABLE!

 

[jackson6745]

Trusting a calibrated refractometer. Garbage. The calibration fluids are all over the place and cheaper refractometer like sybon drift off immediately. If you’re going to use a refractometer use one like a vee gee that calibrates with rodi, or better yet a tropic Marin glass hydrometer.

 

[reefer37160]

The only regret I have is not starting this hobby sooner. I have had aquariums my whole life, but never got into reef or saltwater till 2018. I was always scared that saltwater tanks were hard to take care of. I have to monitor a few more things than freshwater, but I am still doing water changes, dosing, and maintenance like I would in freshwater planted tanks.

 

[hugopapi24]

Buying 2 radion xr30’s win I only needed one

 

[Reefer Matt]

Changing salt. :face-with-spiral-eyes::grinning-squinting-face:

 

[goosemans]

Testing too often, big waste of time and money

 

[Gumbies R Us]

Going too fast in the beginning and not noticing dinos sooner than I did.

 

[Flake]

giving in and letting my bf get the sea apple.

 

[Besieged]

I lost a koi to a too-large water change... I realized what I'd done only after I'd done it.

There's probably others, but that's the one that sticks in my mind most clearly, and comes up every time I do a water change.

 

[Elira_6301]

Testing too often, big waste of time and money

Agreed!!

 

[Elira_6301]

Changing salt. :face-with-spiral-eyes::grinning-squinting-face:

Agreed!

 

[liddojunior]

I switched to less water changes and more focused on dosing. It keeps everything way more stable. And switching brand of salt.

A few years ago I used to use some pro reef salt since my local petco sold it. And I did a water change and my corals struggled. And I was getting some like weird brown contaminate from the salt mix I was getting. I did ICP and had elevated levels of some metals.

I switched to Red Sea blue bucket and it’s been wayyyy easier to managed corals. Once a frag is stable and adjusted they do well in my tank.

 

[Elira_6301]

1st-Worrying too much about parameters. Started daily testing and but was driving me nuts. Finally cut back to 1x a week.

2nd-not dipping coral or macroalgae. I have had many outbreaks of aiptasia, but right now is by far the worst. Never again will Introduce anything without quarantine, treating or dipping.

3rd- overstocking fish! Bad idea. I wanted so many fish. But not enough room. Lost a lot of fish.

 

[liddojunior]

I think my most expensive mistake. I accidentally dropped a pair of tweezers into my sump. And I thought I lost it.

Eventually it rusted and poisoned my nems and corals and I couldn’t figure out what was wrong!
Now I only work with plastic tools if it goes in the tank.

 

[Pau Hana Reefer]

Biggest regret… not going with a larger tank.

 

[liddojunior]

1st-Worrying too much about parameters. Started daily testing and but was driving me nuts. Finally cut back to 1x a week.

2nd-not dipping coral or macroalgae. I have had many outbreaks of aiptasia, but right now is by far the worst. Never again will Introduce anything without quarantine, treating or dipping.

3rd- overstocking fish! Bad idea. I wanted so many fish. But not enough room. Lost a lot of fish.

Saltwater fish are so mean to each other. :crying-face:
They all want to be the star of the tank.

 

[Elira_6301]

Saltwater fish are so mean to each other. :crying-face:
They all want to be the star of the tank.

Yes they do. I had a bi-colored angel fish that was terrible. I actually had a dream he was back in the tank and I was like...what the heck!! How did he get back in there!?!?!

Nightmare fish!

 

[Uncle99]

Using Flatworm exit.

Killed a 6 year old blue and 5 year old wild caught yellow tang in 30 minutes.

While it was not directly the treatment, it killed the flatworms who when dying, were mistaken as food floating in the column.

Toxicity was huge.