With my tank look more visually appealing

joshuashih1 · Sep 3, 2021

With my tank look more visually appealingWith my tank look more visually appealing if I remove those to talk rocks one on the left and the one on the right. Is there another way to make my tank look more visually appealing before adding any coral etc. My tank is clean but just doesn’t have that wow factor. Also would be moving the shelves in the bottom front of the sink make it look better?

Idech · Sep 3, 2021

You could sculpt your rocks. There are lots of videos on Youtube about rock scaping.

Sparkymarc · Sep 3, 2021

It looks good. I don’t know how many pieces of rock that is but if there’s a way to create some type of arch by stacking one rock across two. My fish love swimming through and under the rocks.

EricR · Sep 3, 2021

First -- I know nothing -- 4-5 month old FOWLR with just 3 live rocks stacked into a cave/tunnel structure, and one little ornamental round cave thingy (from daughter's old betta tank,,, leaving because little clownfish likes to rest in there at night).

I like the fact that you have that much rock area, spanning different depths, especially for when you start adding corals.

For me (knowing nothing except that I'd start with EASY soft corals that reefers consider weeds and say you need to "put on an island"), I might consider re-arranging so you at least have one secluded rock space to manage the "weed" corals, if you're even going to start with any of those (like GSP or whatever).

Susan Edwards · Sep 4, 2021

maybe do an arch by turning the left rock over. You need some swim thrus. Maybe have that left side stretch out toward the front a tad. Stacked rock also doesn't give you as many places for corals. A terraced look with caves and arches will be more visually appealing than a stack, esp. in a smaller tank. Do a little rock adjustment. Your fish will love you!

Also, if a lot of those snail shells are from dead snails, remove. If you have hermits, keep a few shells. Off to the side or back. That will declutter your sand bed which is really not looking good. . Then add some coral--get some color in there. and a few more fish. The blue/green chromis or blue/yellow damsels are inexpensive and add color and movement.

Isopod80 · Sep 4, 2021

The arch idea others have mentioned is good. You want to avoid overlapping the rock more than you have to so as to avoid pockets where detritus will build up later. Especially in a smaller tank where water quality can go south quickly as it is. Also, keeping rock at least a scrapers distance from back and sides will save you alot of headache with cleaning later once the tank starts the worst of the ugly phase. I've seen alot of tanks where people didn't think the scraper part through only to tear down and rescape after corals, etc. were added.

joshuashih1 · Sep 21, 2021

EricR said:
First -- I know nothing -- 4-5 month old FOWLR with just 3 live rocks stacked into a cave/tunnel structure, and one little ornamental round cave thingy (from daughter's old betta tank,,, leaving because little clownfish likes to rest in there at night).

I like the fact that you have that much rock area, spanning different depths, especially for when you start adding corals.

For me (knowing nothing except that I'd start with EASY soft corals that reefers consider weeds and say you need to "put on an island"), I might consider re-arranging so you at least have one secluded rock space to manage the "weed" corals, if you're even going to start with any of those (like GSP or whatever).

Thank you for the suggestion, this thing is almost 4 years old. I will be adding coral soon