Getting ready to fire up my first Marine Tank, I have a few questions

[jdarland02]

I recently purchased a 13 gallon enclosure, 50 watt heater, and Quietflow 10 filter as well as some Caribsea Super Naturals sand. I've done some extensive research and I think I am about ready to go get some other supplies. I have decided to go dry sand and dry rock to prevent any instances of stowaways. I was wondering whether I should begin my cycle with the table shrimp method or can I do something like ATM Colony? Also, is it better to buy pre-mixed water or to mix my own? 5 Gal of water is roughly $14 where I live. I would be more certain about mixing my own but I only have access to distilled water rather than RoDi water so I wasn't sure how that would effect it. Last question, is 480gph for a powerhead too much flow for my size enclosure? Not looking at corals quite yet, just trying to get my ecosystem established with a pair of clownfish and a small cleanup crew. Thank you!

 

[Gobi-Wan]

I recently purchased a 13 gallon enclosure, 50 watt heater, and Quietflow 10 filter as well as some Caribsea Super Naturals sand. I've done some extensive research and I think I am about ready to go get some other supplies. I have decided to go dry sand and dry rock to prevent any instances of stowaways. I was wondering whether I should begin my cycle with the table shrimp method or can I do something like ATM Colony? Also, is it better to buy pre-mixed water or to mix my own? 5 Gal of water is roughly $14 where I live. I would be more certain about mixing my own but I only have access to distilled water rather than RoDi water so I wasn't sure how that would effect it. Last question, is 480gph for a powerhead too much flow for my size enclosure? Not looking at corals quite yet, just trying to get my ecosystem established with a pair of clownfish and a small cleanup crew. Thank you!

Welcome to R2R!
I like bottled bacteria. Every time I set up my quarantines I dump in bottled bacteria and add fish the next day. Now that said, I wouldn’t do that on a display tank with rock and sand. If you go that route just leave it alone after you add the bacteria. No lights, just let the filter run for a week or 2 and test for ammonia. There are cycling threads that go into better detail on testing if your aquarium is capable of converting ammonia to nitrate properly before adding livestock. Water- an RO buddie 4-stage filter is 60 bucks on Amazon. That will last you for a very long time mixing up water changes on a 14 gallon tank. So will a bucket of salt. Whether it’s worth the effort is your preference but it’s definitely much cheaper. And flow- 480 is probably on the high side for 14 gallons depending on what you want to eventually keep. Maybe 300-350 GPH total for soft corals, a little more if you want LPS, and 480 is probably in the SPS range for your tank. The flow rate of your filter contributes to the total as well. Hope that helps. Good luck!

 

[scott11106]

i concur with gobi-wan, water is the entire world and if you start off with sub-standard or even "ok" water you are building your ecosystem on that. i would up it a bit and get a RO-Di and save yourself a lot of trouble later. even if you have to delay the tank it would be with it., if you don't want to purchase that due to the size of the system i would purchase from LFS.

 

[jdarland02]

Thanks for the replies fellas. I think I will go ahead and go the bottled bacteria route and just cycle it for a few weeks with testing. What bottled bacteria would you recommend? I will also pick up some RoDi water and a smaller powerhead when I head to my LFS this weekend. I would get a system and definitely at that price but I don't have much space for one at this time, so buying may be the best option.

 

[Gobi-Wan]

Thanks for the replies fellas. I think I will go ahead and go the bottled bacteria route and just cycle it for a few weeks with testing. What bottled bacteria would you recommend? I will also pick up some RoDi water and a smaller powerhead when I head to my LFS this weekend. I would get a system and definitely at that price but I don't have much space for one at this time, so buying may be the best option.

Fritz turbo start is good and they sell it in a small bottle for smaller tanks.

 

[ShepherdReefer]

I recently purchased a 13 gallon enclosure, 50 watt heater, and Quietflow 10 filter as well as some Caribsea Super Naturals sand. I've done some extensive research and I think I am about ready to go get some other supplies. I have decided to go dry sand and dry rock to prevent any instances of stowaways. I was wondering whether I should begin my cycle with the table shrimp method or can I do something like ATM Colony? Also, is it better to buy pre-mixed water or to mix my own? 5 Gal of water is roughly $14 where I live. I would be more certain about mixing my own but I only have access to distilled water rather than RoDi water so I wasn't sure how that would effect it. Last question, is 480gph for a powerhead too much flow for my size enclosure? Not looking at corals quite yet, just trying to get my ecosystem established with a pair of clownfish and a small cleanup crew. Thank you!

Hello and welcome to the R2R channel. There are many answers to your questions and I am sure you will receive other's opinion. I feel the beginning stages of a reef tank are one of the most important. When I first started my current tank, I created my own RO water and used my own salt mix. The reason, I wanted to make sure there were 0 TDS trying to keep the water in top shape as possible. When purchasing water from others, they may not have the OCD I have about keeping filters changed and checked every time I make RO water. If you cannot make your own water, I would at least check the RO water to make sure it is within the acceptable limits. On the next question regarding the 480gph flow, use it, and see what happens.

Hope this helps.

 

[jdarland02]

So I went into my LFS yesterday to pick up my rock and some bottled bacteria. The lady working was awesome and showed me everything I needed. I got some Fritz 9 that I threw in per the directions on the back as well as about 10lbs of dry rock. I asked her how much she charged for water as I looked at her personal setups in the store and I trusted that she took care of them. RO/DI water was $1.95 for 5 gallons and premixed Fritz Saltwater was $5 for 5 gallons. I purchased the premixed water to start off and everything is doing good so far. I’m going to let it run over the course of 10 days or so before I think about adding any livestock. When should I do my first ammonia test?