We are going to be moving and once we arrive in our new home we are looking to build another reef tank. We got rid of pretty much everything from our last tank so we will be starting from scratch. Here are some things I learned along the way:
1 - 24 gallons was too small. The water fluctuations were too extreme. I am looking at a 90g this time around.
2 - An all-in-one tank is not what I really should have bought. I like to tinker. The small sump in the back of the tank was too small for my hands, and made it too difficult to upgrade the tank efficiently. For the new tank I am looking for a tank built with a separate sump.
3 - I didn't use any sort of copepods on startup, I just dumped in some bacti and then let it sit there to grow lots of algae and bacteria for months. After watching the latest BRS seminar Ryan gave I think I needed to pay more attention to starting with live rock (tampa bay saltwater), live copepods (algae barn), etc. to get it self-sustaining right away.
4 - Placing the tank in a carpeted room far from the garage was a mistake. I need to have the tank on a solid waterproof surface near a utility sink and/or garage.
5 - I skimped on my lighting by going with a cheap LED light. I will stick with lights that are known, and that have profiles I can use right away with my controller.
6 - Because my tank was so small I was unable to stock the tank with enough beneficial animals. No filefish, no tangs, limited numbers of CUC, etc.. This time around I will put more effort into stocking the tank with better ratios.
7 - BE Cardinals should be purchased as a large school. I made the mistake of buying only 2 cardinals and one killed the other within a day. Safety in numbers.
8 - I really enjoyed having live coral in the tank. I will be utilizing the extra growing area, upgraded lighting, and extra equipment space for a nice coral display.
9 - Don't skimp on flow. I initially started off with a $10 flow pump which was entirely inadequate for my tank. Once I got my EcoTech pumps it helped a lot.
10 - Bare bottom ended up good for me. I like the ability to kick up the detritus each night in a cleaning cycle w/o worrying about sand moving around and/or having to vacuum all the time.
11 - I started my quarantine system too late in the game. By the time I initiated a proper quarantine system I had lost a number of animals and introduced bad things in my tank.
12 - Have a salt-water mixing tank setup right away. It took me a while to figure out that I needed lots of available salt water to speed up the water changes.
1 - 24 gallons was too small. The water fluctuations were too extreme. I am looking at a 90g this time around.
2 - An all-in-one tank is not what I really should have bought. I like to tinker. The small sump in the back of the tank was too small for my hands, and made it too difficult to upgrade the tank efficiently. For the new tank I am looking for a tank built with a separate sump.
3 - I didn't use any sort of copepods on startup, I just dumped in some bacti and then let it sit there to grow lots of algae and bacteria for months. After watching the latest BRS seminar Ryan gave I think I needed to pay more attention to starting with live rock (tampa bay saltwater), live copepods (algae barn), etc. to get it self-sustaining right away.
4 - Placing the tank in a carpeted room far from the garage was a mistake. I need to have the tank on a solid waterproof surface near a utility sink and/or garage.
5 - I skimped on my lighting by going with a cheap LED light. I will stick with lights that are known, and that have profiles I can use right away with my controller.
6 - Because my tank was so small I was unable to stock the tank with enough beneficial animals. No filefish, no tangs, limited numbers of CUC, etc.. This time around I will put more effort into stocking the tank with better ratios.
7 - BE Cardinals should be purchased as a large school. I made the mistake of buying only 2 cardinals and one killed the other within a day. Safety in numbers.
8 - I really enjoyed having live coral in the tank. I will be utilizing the extra growing area, upgraded lighting, and extra equipment space for a nice coral display.
9 - Don't skimp on flow. I initially started off with a $10 flow pump which was entirely inadequate for my tank. Once I got my EcoTech pumps it helped a lot.
10 - Bare bottom ended up good for me. I like the ability to kick up the detritus each night in a cleaning cycle w/o worrying about sand moving around and/or having to vacuum all the time.
11 - I started my quarantine system too late in the game. By the time I initiated a proper quarantine system I had lost a number of animals and introduced bad things in my tank.
12 - Have a salt-water mixing tank setup right away. It took me a while to figure out that I needed lots of available salt water to speed up the water changes.
