chrisl3212003
Community Member
First saltwater tank 65 gallon any tips/advice welcome
First saltwater tank
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My first suggestion would be more rock. Looks like you're off to a good start though! What type of lighting are you using? And do you plan to add corals?
And welcome to Reef2Reef!
And welcome to Reef2Reef!
+3 more rock.
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chrisl3212003
Community Member
Looking to do more rock work not 100% sure on what fish I have 2 clown 3 urchin 1 sea star and a bubble tip and a sea cucumber
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chrisl3212003
Community Member
It is a zoo-med lighting not sure about corals i was told that they are hard to keep
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chrisl3212003
Community Member
First saltwater tank 65 gallon any tips/advice welcome
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chrisl3212003
Community Member
I would like to get a snowflake eel and maybe a brown octopus
MaxTremors
2500 Club Member
They won’t be compatible (with each other and with the clown fish).
A couple things. As others mentioned you need way more rock (like 15-20x what you have now). How long had your tank been set up? It looks really young to have an urchin (let alone 3), starfish, sea cucumber, and anemone, and with so little rock and such a young tank , the urchins, starfish, and cucumber are likely to starve (not trying to be harsh, it’s just the reality). You said that you were told corals were hard, but anemones are more difficult than many corals. I suspect your lighting is going to be insufficient for your anemone. What specific light do you have (or what type, what wattage, etc). Anemones require intense lighting. Also, do you have any power heads or wave makers in the tank? Anemones also need decent flow (should be in constant gentle motion).
Again, I don’t want to sound harsh, and I’m not trying to criticize you, but it looks like you kind of jumped in the deep end before learning how to swim, so to speak. Most of the animals you have need well established tanks with plenty of rock work. The urchins need plenty of rockwork (there needs to be surfaces for algae to grow on for them to eat). The anemone needs intense lighting and a mature tank with stable parameters. The cucumber needs a mature tank with plenty of planktonic bits of food in the water column for it to filter out. The starfish (guessing it’s a sand sifting star) needs a mature sand bed filled with microfauna for it to eat (copepods, amphipods, worms, etc), and even in well established tanks they still often slowly starve to death, sea stars in general don’t do well in home aquariums. My point being is that your tank is just not mature enough and doesn’t have enough rock work for these animals to survive.
In the meantime, I would get more rock asap (real live rock would be vastly preferable), feed the urchins some raw nori if they’ll take it, feed the cucumber some reef roids, phytoplankton, or zooplankton every other day (keep an eye on your nutrient levels), and try to feed the starfish some krill once a week. I would hold off on adding anything else until you have more rockwork and it’s settled in for a couple months.
Again, I really want to stress that I’m not trying to sound elitist or gatekeepy. I’m just concerned about the health of your animals. I don’t doubt that you were probably given bad advice somewhere (probably at the lfs), but your animals will starve to death in this tank if you don’t supplement their food and work on providing a natural source of food for them.
Uncle99
7500 Club Member
Buy test kits and become a water chemistry expert.
Put all 8 parameters in the slot and keep them there.
This will set optimum conditions for beneficial bacteria population grow, the foundation for a great reef system and lessens the ugly stage.
Put all 8 parameters in the slot and keep them there.
This will set optimum conditions for beneficial bacteria population grow, the foundation for a great reef system and lessens the ugly stage.
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chrisl3212003
Community Member
The tank has been running for about a month I bought the live rock and got it home to find out that that all of them were in the bag I didn't watch them bag up I just told the fish store that I wanted 3 live rock out of there tank no power head but a canister filter for a 150+gallon tank is 65 gallon i have been supplementing food for everything pretty much hand feeding and I do have a 120 tank I am looking at making a salt after I try to make this work I know I should have paid attention to the employee at the store lighting is
AquaSun® LED HO
Unfortunately I got a dealt a hand that I wasn't ready for i am trying to make the best out of the hand i was dealt And the fish store would not take anything back
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MaxTremors
2500 Club Member
I figured it was probably either bad advice from the lfs or something like what you explained.
Looking at the specs of the light you have, I don’t think it’s adequate for the anemone (it would maybe be okay for a while if you had rockwork that allowed it to get right up under the light), if you have the 48” version, its only 30watts of of low wattage LEDs, which is not going to provide enough PAR even for low light soft corals especially at the bottom of the tank, its more of a light for fish-only tanks. Most people would have at least 150 to 300watts of higher power LEDs for a 48” tank (usually 2-3 pendant/puck style lights). Reef lighting can be quite expensive, but there are some lower cost options. Though you’re probably looking at $300 at a bare minimum to get lighting that’s appropriate for an anemone. A couple black box viparspectra LEDs would be the absolute cheapest, though if you have the budget for something better I would definitely recommend it. A couple Noopsyche V3s would be the next cheapest I would recommend and a huge step up from the viparspectras (the Noopsyches are frequently on sale for 30-40% off). If you wanted to go with T5s, you might be able to get a fixture for a couple hundred bucks, but then you need to change bulbs every 9-12 months.
Danroo
Well-Known Member
You’re tank looks super clean, just need a good light/lights, few rocks and you’ll be set. The anemone is badly bleached. Filtration looks great. Sadly the hobby punishes you if you go cheap, but some people have made it worked.
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chrisl3212003
Community Member
Thank you and I don't know what you mean by bleached? It looks the same way I unfortunately got him about 2 weeks ago
Danroo
Well-Known Member
It’s tips are white if they aren’t turning brown it’s either bleaching or not doing well (just trying to survive). Two weeks is an ample of time for an anemone to jump back. I did an early experiment with my new tank and got a bleached anemone from petco last week it’s already halfway brown, probably more than that with a stock light from Fluval. I’ve upgraded my light to an ai prime for its longevity.
here’s the difference in a week.
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chrisl3212003
Community Member
Obsessed with fish
Well-Known Member
I have only just got my sw tank set up and I'm still a begginer in the marine hobby, but I'm very experienced in the fw hobby, not trying to be harsh or discourage you but I'm afraid your tank is not mature enough to add any more fish, the lion fish was not the best idea, aquariums need time.
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