Florida Dan
Community Member
Slow start due to stay-at-home orders..
I bought the tank, water, sand , rock, etc. at a local fish store in Sarasota FL. My goal is currently fish, soft corals and LPS corals. Mostly I want to get the process down for maintaining chemistry and being a good fish owner, then I'll likely get a much larger tank and use this for something else. It is currently stock but I want to get the InTank media tower and refugium, and a refugium light for the back. I'm using the stock filter cartridge and some ceramic rings in the bottom of the stock filter rack.
The fish store recommended using bagged sand and prepared water (Nature's ocean sand, and Nutri-seawater water). I added (2) 20 lb bags of sand, and filled with water almost to the top leaving room for the rocks. I didn't rinse the sand because that seemed to defeat the purpose of using sand with bacteria in it, so my water was initially CLOUDY. After 2 days it cleared up enough to see the rocks strewn on the bottom.
The epoxy came so I made a basic structure. Now I'm testing water and waiting to be able to visit a fish store for some fish and a few coral. Probably start with 2 clownfish, some Zoa and something like a hammer coral.
In order the pictures:
1. Stuff waiting to put together. I didn't get any epoxy initially so I waited to get that to begin.
2. Tank filled, rocks just jumbled on the bottom. I couldn't wait for the epoxy to start...
3 and 4. Tank cleared up and rocks epoxied together. The white epoxy stuck out a lot so I used a little magenta Sharpie to tone it down. I'd seen sharpie writing on frag buttons at the store so I felt that it was OK.
Hopefully in a few weeks I can travel to look at more local fish stores. I haven't had that "OMG, I love that store" moment yet. Sadly there are no stores within 30 minutes other than box stores. I'd like to find a good one and stick with them through the process, so I hope I find one.
Dan
I bought the tank, water, sand , rock, etc. at a local fish store in Sarasota FL. My goal is currently fish, soft corals and LPS corals. Mostly I want to get the process down for maintaining chemistry and being a good fish owner, then I'll likely get a much larger tank and use this for something else. It is currently stock but I want to get the InTank media tower and refugium, and a refugium light for the back. I'm using the stock filter cartridge and some ceramic rings in the bottom of the stock filter rack.
The fish store recommended using bagged sand and prepared water (Nature's ocean sand, and Nutri-seawater water). I added (2) 20 lb bags of sand, and filled with water almost to the top leaving room for the rocks. I didn't rinse the sand because that seemed to defeat the purpose of using sand with bacteria in it, so my water was initially CLOUDY. After 2 days it cleared up enough to see the rocks strewn on the bottom.
The epoxy came so I made a basic structure. Now I'm testing water and waiting to be able to visit a fish store for some fish and a few coral. Probably start with 2 clownfish, some Zoa and something like a hammer coral.
In order the pictures:
1. Stuff waiting to put together. I didn't get any epoxy initially so I waited to get that to begin.
2. Tank filled, rocks just jumbled on the bottom. I couldn't wait for the epoxy to start...
3 and 4. Tank cleared up and rocks epoxied together. The white epoxy stuck out a lot so I used a little magenta Sharpie to tone it down. I'd seen sharpie writing on frag buttons at the store so I felt that it was OK.
Hopefully in a few weeks I can travel to look at more local fish stores. I haven't had that "OMG, I love that store" moment yet. Sadly there are no stores within 30 minutes other than box stores. I'd like to find a good one and stick with them through the process, so I hope I find one.
Dan
