You lucky dog, not for the cube but now when you flood the place and the wife is not happy you can say
"YOU Bought the Tank!"
Congratz and welcome aboard
"YOU Bought the Tank!"
Congratz and welcome aboard
Lokking to start my first tank and looking for advice
- Thread starter Lucky713
- Start date
- Tagged users None
Darth.Daddy12
Active Member
Congratulations! Now start slow.. it will be painful especially how excited you are to score throw in rock etc.. you should for the sake of cost plan a Fowler tank for the first year. This will present you with enough challenges and learning experiences while helping to reduce costs..
As for costs.. best advice I can give any newbie.. buy once cry once.. especially when it comes to lighting.. wave makers ehhh I still use jaebo and likely will for a while.
In the realm of cost being patient is what allows for the buy one cry once budget.. for example.. you now have a tank.. now get some dry rock and scape the tank.. Marcos etc any cheap rock.. this will occupy you for 2-3 weeks if you really try to make a scape that will work long term for corals.. place scape in the tank then add tap water and a let it run for couple weeks.. during this time research and plan your sand choice.. drain the tank.. add the sand then refill and do again.. at this point you’ll need to add some form of mechanicals filtration to help remove finer particles and decloid the water. This then goes for a couple weeks.
Now drain and fill with salt water.. during this time you’ll have had time to pick your salt and rodi and get a batch mixed.. put in the tank and let it run for couple months add food or ammonia to start the cycle... doing weekly 10% changes (just do you get in the habit.) during this time start working on testing equipment and cleaning equipment. Clean the glass every 2-3 days and test every week.
Simple salinity, ph nitrates testing is all you need at this point. Once tank cycles add your first fish..
Next week all going good add your second fish..
Change mechanicke filter every couple days or weekly depending on what your using.. top of water daily or bi daily..
Now as you start getting some diatoms and algea add your cuc..
You shouldn’t be feeding more then once a day maybe two flakes of food at this point.. not a pinch an actual flake crushed into 3-5 pieces depending on fish and size..
Add another fish.. at this time maybe you want to get a phosphate test kit.. and a $10 led light or maybe you already got a cheap $10 led a when you added first fish (most likely which is why you had diatoms and algea) you don’t need ammonia or nitrite testing if you can get 3-5ppm nitrate rose a week in a tank or if you have diatoms or algea the tank is cycled and safe for fish.
At this time I also suggest adding pods and doing a one week daily dosing if phyto. (Go go heavy on photo and you’ll have a tank full of algea with low nitrates and high phosphates! A couple drops every week is all you want to help pods produce)
(People will argue this to no end no one even arguing for this is actually doing it)
At this point you’ve noticed dead spots in the tank needing more care.. replace that $10 powerhead you started with with a wavemaker..
Nitrates are up to 10ppm a week gain start thinking in fuge or turf scrubber.. also adding another quality powerhead for the new dead sooner you’ve found from last upgrade..
Now you’re 6-12 months in and tank is doing ok.. not perfect you prob still have the odd shrimp or fish dying that you can’t explain.. now is the time to invest heavy in a QT setup maybe a 15g tank.. as well as quality testing equipment for phosphates, alk slinky’s and PH. If you can maybe even an auto top off addition. You’ll want to start monitoring coral needs weekly in your testing.
Start concentrating on keeping these measurements as consistent as possible..
Now your 8+ months in. By this time you’ve likely got few more fish then you should for a tank this size.. algea issues have gone away and you get occasional diatoms in dead spots and odd ball dead fish or dead creature every once in a while you still can’t explain. However you’re starting to notice when a fish isn’t acting right and likely new something was wrong with that fish 1-2 weeks before you found it stuck to the intake or overflow.
Once you have quality lights at say 12mo th Mark you’re properly prepared for starting corals.. keep lighting to 40-60% intensity and to just 8h per day for first few months.. add only one coral per week maybe two when your splurge.. use super glue when you place them on rocks coast you’ll be moving them later on and super glue doesn’t hold well long term in a tank..
Forget all the special lighting setups and run no red spectrum and only just enough white at only the times you’re around to see the tank to make it pleasing to you.. this is normally just 8-15% whites..
You’re now 16ninths in and have a thriving almost maintaince free tank and can’t understand why others are having so many issues.. your nitrates run 5ppm and pho’s .01 like a clock only issue you’re running into is cal, alk and PH is dropping to fast for water changes to keep up.. now is when you start dosing..
This is by far not the only way.. I don’t do this at all lol.. I spend 100x more money and will have a fully setup and stocked tank in the first few weeks most times.. but you can have the same results as me at the 5y mark with half the issues and a mere fraction of the cost setting up a system like this.. add important things as money is available and don’t try and add something the system financially can’t support yet.
Too many people will buy $100 light and $300 filtration throw it on a tank start adding love rock love sand and 6 months later they have daily issues corals that cost $50 a piece dying everywhere and buying snake oil to fix the tank overnight. These people upgrade items monthly as they have money and by the time it’s a year in they are selling 10k worth of gearfrom a dead tank on ship swap for $300.
As for costs.. best advice I can give any newbie.. buy once cry once.. especially when it comes to lighting.. wave makers ehhh I still use jaebo and likely will for a while.
In the realm of cost being patient is what allows for the buy one cry once budget.. for example.. you now have a tank.. now get some dry rock and scape the tank.. Marcos etc any cheap rock.. this will occupy you for 2-3 weeks if you really try to make a scape that will work long term for corals.. place scape in the tank then add tap water and a let it run for couple weeks.. during this time research and plan your sand choice.. drain the tank.. add the sand then refill and do again.. at this point you’ll need to add some form of mechanicals filtration to help remove finer particles and decloid the water. This then goes for a couple weeks.
Now drain and fill with salt water.. during this time you’ll have had time to pick your salt and rodi and get a batch mixed.. put in the tank and let it run for couple months add food or ammonia to start the cycle... doing weekly 10% changes (just do you get in the habit.) during this time start working on testing equipment and cleaning equipment. Clean the glass every 2-3 days and test every week.
Simple salinity, ph nitrates testing is all you need at this point. Once tank cycles add your first fish..
Next week all going good add your second fish..
Change mechanicke filter every couple days or weekly depending on what your using.. top of water daily or bi daily..
Now as you start getting some diatoms and algea add your cuc..
You shouldn’t be feeding more then once a day maybe two flakes of food at this point.. not a pinch an actual flake crushed into 3-5 pieces depending on fish and size..
Add another fish.. at this time maybe you want to get a phosphate test kit.. and a $10 led light or maybe you already got a cheap $10 led a when you added first fish (most likely which is why you had diatoms and algea) you don’t need ammonia or nitrite testing if you can get 3-5ppm nitrate rose a week in a tank or if you have diatoms or algea the tank is cycled and safe for fish.
At this time I also suggest adding pods and doing a one week daily dosing if phyto. (Go go heavy on photo and you’ll have a tank full of algea with low nitrates and high phosphates! A couple drops every week is all you want to help pods produce)
(People will argue this to no end no one even arguing for this is actually doing it)
At this point you’ve noticed dead spots in the tank needing more care.. replace that $10 powerhead you started with with a wavemaker..
Nitrates are up to 10ppm a week gain start thinking in fuge or turf scrubber.. also adding another quality powerhead for the new dead sooner you’ve found from last upgrade..
Now you’re 6-12 months in and tank is doing ok.. not perfect you prob still have the odd shrimp or fish dying that you can’t explain.. now is the time to invest heavy in a QT setup maybe a 15g tank.. as well as quality testing equipment for phosphates, alk slinky’s and PH. If you can maybe even an auto top off addition. You’ll want to start monitoring coral needs weekly in your testing.
Start concentrating on keeping these measurements as consistent as possible..
Now your 8+ months in. By this time you’ve likely got few more fish then you should for a tank this size.. algea issues have gone away and you get occasional diatoms in dead spots and odd ball dead fish or dead creature every once in a while you still can’t explain. However you’re starting to notice when a fish isn’t acting right and likely new something was wrong with that fish 1-2 weeks before you found it stuck to the intake or overflow.
Once you have quality lights at say 12mo th Mark you’re properly prepared for starting corals.. keep lighting to 40-60% intensity and to just 8h per day for first few months.. add only one coral per week maybe two when your splurge.. use super glue when you place them on rocks coast you’ll be moving them later on and super glue doesn’t hold well long term in a tank..
Forget all the special lighting setups and run no red spectrum and only just enough white at only the times you’re around to see the tank to make it pleasing to you.. this is normally just 8-15% whites..
You’re now 16ninths in and have a thriving almost maintaince free tank and can’t understand why others are having so many issues.. your nitrates run 5ppm and pho’s .01 like a clock only issue you’re running into is cal, alk and PH is dropping to fast for water changes to keep up.. now is when you start dosing..
This is by far not the only way.. I don’t do this at all lol.. I spend 100x more money and will have a fully setup and stocked tank in the first few weeks most times.. but you can have the same results as me at the 5y mark with half the issues and a mere fraction of the cost setting up a system like this.. add important things as money is available and don’t try and add something the system financially can’t support yet.
Too many people will buy $100 light and $300 filtration throw it on a tank start adding love rock love sand and 6 months later they have daily issues corals that cost $50 a piece dying everywhere and buying snake oil to fix the tank overnight. These people upgrade items monthly as they have money and by the time it’s a year in they are selling 10k worth of gearfrom a dead tank on ship swap for $300.
Similar threads
