Bob Wiley
Active Member
Hi all
I’ve been frequenting R2R more and more lately as we’ve been getting back into the hobby and finally made the jump from lurker to member. Here’s a little backstory of our experience and where we’re going from here…
We previously had a saltwater tank from 2002-2008. We knew nothing getting into the hobby back then. In fact it was a total impulse buy. We’d had a good day at the boat in Gary, Ind. and stopped into our favorite LFS in Chicago — Old Town Aquarium. They had a little (probably like 8-12 gallon) aquarium for sale, complete with 2 Ocellaris Clownfish, live rock, sand, everything. So we put our winnings to use and jumped feet-first into the hobby.
The good thing was that this tank was already set up. They just drained the water into some bags and sent it all with us.
The bad thing was that this tank was already set up. We just had to drop the rock, water and fish back in.
While it was literally like a Fast Lane pass to Saltwaterville, we didn’t ever have to learn about essential things like cycling, water testing, quarantining, what the different parts of the filter were and why they were important. We got all of the enjoyment out of owning a saltwater tank without having to put in any of the work to get there. Good or bad, we kind of carried that perspective forward throughout our time in the hobby.
We soon added our first new fish — a Domino Damsel (he was... not a good fish) — and then upgraded the tank to a 29 gallon. Over the years we had other ocellaris clowns and a cinnamon clown, a red firefish, a couple snowflake eels (at different times), a purple dottyback (another problem fish) and a scopas tang. There was also a chocolate chip starfish; an anemone; many CUC; and I think we had an emerald crab stowaway that lived until the dottyback decided it didn't.
At one point we made a 300 mile move in which we had 0 loss of life. I don’t know if it would have been advised, but we drained most of the tank into buckets, put the live rock in there, and left just enough water in the tank for the fish and eel. I put a bubbler in there to oxygenate the water and plugged it and a heater into the car’s cigarette lighter via an inverter. 6 hours later I was throwing the tank back together. Everyone was fine and lived on for years thereafter.
Ultimately we started a family and the tank began to fall into disrepair. When our kid got to the point of pulling herself up on objects, we knew the tank had to go (it was on a shelf stand from IKEA and was top-heavy). We just didn’t have the time to take care of it, nor a different place in the house to keep it. So we donated the fish to our LFS and tore the tank down.
Fast forward to 2020
My wife and daughter had been getting bettas over the past few years, but just kept them in a heaterless/filterless tank. So when the most recent one died, I said we were going to get a proper tank setup and looked at 10 gallon, AIO tanks with heater/filter/lighting/etc included. This quickly changed from a betta tank to a freshwater tank to a saltwater tank after a trip to an LFS which only carried salties.
I started doing research on small all-in-one tanks and came across the Fluval Evo 13.5. Loved the peninsula design and attached filtration compartments so we got it. Meanwhile, I started doing my homework on how to cycle a tank and get everything up and running. We put in 12lbs of dry rock and about 20lbs of Carib-Sea live sand. Mixed the water, dumped in some Fritz9 live bacteria, ghost fed the tank and properly tested with an API water test kit. We were cycled and ready to go. This was in February 2020.
It was at this point that I came across Humblefish’s post on quarantining. Needless to say, being so close to putting fish into a cycled tank, it was disheartening to read about how much further we had to go if we wanted to do things properly. But what was even more disheartening was reading through post after post of people first spotting a disease and then reporting back later how their tank had crashed and they were completely demoralized after losing $100s or $1000s in fish all because a disease came in with an unquarantined fish and wiped everything out. I did not want this.
So I told the fam that we needed to push pause on the display tank (basically just let it sit fallow, with ghost feedings here and there) and focus on gathering all the equipment for a proper quarantine setup, which would also serve as hospitals if any fish get sick down the road. I felt the pain and time of pivoting to quarantine-first would more than pay off should any fish ever get sick. I’d have the spare tanks. I’d have the meds. And more importantly I’d know what to do.
By mid-July we had all the equipment ready to go — a fish-only 10 gallon, bare-bottom tank; and a 5.5 gallon tank with sand and dry rock for CUC and invertebrates. I’m thinking of just keeping the invertebrate quarantine up and running after the 11 weeks are done so that I can always have backups on hand for when my DT CUCs die off as they are prone to do.
That's where we stand now. We have 5 fish in quarantine (2x mocha clowns, 1x purple firefish, 1x yellow watchman goby, 1x barnacle blenny) and a thriving invertebrate quarantine (10x turbo snails, 10x blue hermit crabs, 1x peppermint shrimp, 1x tiger pistol shrimp). The peppermint shrimp molted after 6 days so we moved it to the display tank (it's first occupant!). The fish are currently in the middle of ramping up copper treatments. I've noticed the firefish flashing and possibly some white, stringy poop from it and one of the clowns. Hopefully the meds I have on hand (Copper Power, Prazipro, Metroplex, Rally Reef) can remedy whatever these fish throw at me.
Wish us luck!
I’ve been frequenting R2R more and more lately as we’ve been getting back into the hobby and finally made the jump from lurker to member. Here’s a little backstory of our experience and where we’re going from here…
We previously had a saltwater tank from 2002-2008. We knew nothing getting into the hobby back then. In fact it was a total impulse buy. We’d had a good day at the boat in Gary, Ind. and stopped into our favorite LFS in Chicago — Old Town Aquarium. They had a little (probably like 8-12 gallon) aquarium for sale, complete with 2 Ocellaris Clownfish, live rock, sand, everything. So we put our winnings to use and jumped feet-first into the hobby.
The good thing was that this tank was already set up. They just drained the water into some bags and sent it all with us.
The bad thing was that this tank was already set up. We just had to drop the rock, water and fish back in.
While it was literally like a Fast Lane pass to Saltwaterville, we didn’t ever have to learn about essential things like cycling, water testing, quarantining, what the different parts of the filter were and why they were important. We got all of the enjoyment out of owning a saltwater tank without having to put in any of the work to get there. Good or bad, we kind of carried that perspective forward throughout our time in the hobby.
We soon added our first new fish — a Domino Damsel (he was... not a good fish) — and then upgraded the tank to a 29 gallon. Over the years we had other ocellaris clowns and a cinnamon clown, a red firefish, a couple snowflake eels (at different times), a purple dottyback (another problem fish) and a scopas tang. There was also a chocolate chip starfish; an anemone; many CUC; and I think we had an emerald crab stowaway that lived until the dottyback decided it didn't.
At one point we made a 300 mile move in which we had 0 loss of life. I don’t know if it would have been advised, but we drained most of the tank into buckets, put the live rock in there, and left just enough water in the tank for the fish and eel. I put a bubbler in there to oxygenate the water and plugged it and a heater into the car’s cigarette lighter via an inverter. 6 hours later I was throwing the tank back together. Everyone was fine and lived on for years thereafter.
Ultimately we started a family and the tank began to fall into disrepair. When our kid got to the point of pulling herself up on objects, we knew the tank had to go (it was on a shelf stand from IKEA and was top-heavy). We just didn’t have the time to take care of it, nor a different place in the house to keep it. So we donated the fish to our LFS and tore the tank down.
Fast forward to 2020
My wife and daughter had been getting bettas over the past few years, but just kept them in a heaterless/filterless tank. So when the most recent one died, I said we were going to get a proper tank setup and looked at 10 gallon, AIO tanks with heater/filter/lighting/etc included. This quickly changed from a betta tank to a freshwater tank to a saltwater tank after a trip to an LFS which only carried salties.
I started doing research on small all-in-one tanks and came across the Fluval Evo 13.5. Loved the peninsula design and attached filtration compartments so we got it. Meanwhile, I started doing my homework on how to cycle a tank and get everything up and running. We put in 12lbs of dry rock and about 20lbs of Carib-Sea live sand. Mixed the water, dumped in some Fritz9 live bacteria, ghost fed the tank and properly tested with an API water test kit. We were cycled and ready to go. This was in February 2020.
It was at this point that I came across Humblefish’s post on quarantining. Needless to say, being so close to putting fish into a cycled tank, it was disheartening to read about how much further we had to go if we wanted to do things properly. But what was even more disheartening was reading through post after post of people first spotting a disease and then reporting back later how their tank had crashed and they were completely demoralized after losing $100s or $1000s in fish all because a disease came in with an unquarantined fish and wiped everything out. I did not want this.
So I told the fam that we needed to push pause on the display tank (basically just let it sit fallow, with ghost feedings here and there) and focus on gathering all the equipment for a proper quarantine setup, which would also serve as hospitals if any fish get sick down the road. I felt the pain and time of pivoting to quarantine-first would more than pay off should any fish ever get sick. I’d have the spare tanks. I’d have the meds. And more importantly I’d know what to do.
By mid-July we had all the equipment ready to go — a fish-only 10 gallon, bare-bottom tank; and a 5.5 gallon tank with sand and dry rock for CUC and invertebrates. I’m thinking of just keeping the invertebrate quarantine up and running after the 11 weeks are done so that I can always have backups on hand for when my DT CUCs die off as they are prone to do.
That's where we stand now. We have 5 fish in quarantine (2x mocha clowns, 1x purple firefish, 1x yellow watchman goby, 1x barnacle blenny) and a thriving invertebrate quarantine (10x turbo snails, 10x blue hermit crabs, 1x peppermint shrimp, 1x tiger pistol shrimp). The peppermint shrimp molted after 6 days so we moved it to the display tank (it's first occupant!). The fish are currently in the middle of ramping up copper treatments. I've noticed the firefish flashing and possibly some white, stringy poop from it and one of the clowns. Hopefully the meds I have on hand (Copper Power, Prazipro, Metroplex, Rally Reef) can remedy whatever these fish throw at me.
Wish us luck!
