eltonhodges
New member
Hi all,
I currently have a two year old lightly stocked 55 gallon high tank with a 35 gallon sump. It has one firefish 1.5 inch, a bi-color blennie 2 inch, a green chromis 1 inch and a Banggai Cardinal at 2 inches as well as two cleaner shrimp and a clean up crew of snails and hermits.
Corals include one 2 inch round chalice, a 3 inch round group of zoas, 2 inch round frogspawn, 2 inch toadstool and 1.5 inch round trumpet with 4 heads.
I'd like to add a few more corals (LPS and soft) and one or two larger tangs or foxface.
My question for the more experienced reefkeepers is this: Should I bother going to an 85 gallon interim tank, or just wait a bit and move up to a 110-120 gallon when time allows? If I went to an 85, then I'd move the 55 gallon underneath and use it as a sump. So effective water volume would be around 105 with the 85/55 combo. Would that be enough volume for what I need. Just wondering what many of you who have been doing this a long time would recommend.
I monitor salinity, magnesium, calcium, KH, PH, nitrate and nitrite and phosphates weekly. I dose two part calcium/KH and magnesium as needed. Everything is run through an APEX system.
Lighting is Ok with two Kessil 160's controlled through the APEX. But I would upgrade those to 360's with the larger tank as well as keeping the 160's as support light.
I still have a bit of a hair algae and cyano issue, but it's not out of control and I believe I just need to do more regimented water changes and control feeding a bit more. I use 3 powerheads to keep the tank circulating and suspend detritus off the bottom. The overall tank cycle is 750 gph, so about 13 x the volume of the display tank, which is better than the 10 usually proscribed.
Anyhow, that's my setup, any input from the experienced reefkeepers would be appreciated.
Cheers all,
Elton
I currently have a two year old lightly stocked 55 gallon high tank with a 35 gallon sump. It has one firefish 1.5 inch, a bi-color blennie 2 inch, a green chromis 1 inch and a Banggai Cardinal at 2 inches as well as two cleaner shrimp and a clean up crew of snails and hermits.
Corals include one 2 inch round chalice, a 3 inch round group of zoas, 2 inch round frogspawn, 2 inch toadstool and 1.5 inch round trumpet with 4 heads.
I'd like to add a few more corals (LPS and soft) and one or two larger tangs or foxface.
My question for the more experienced reefkeepers is this: Should I bother going to an 85 gallon interim tank, or just wait a bit and move up to a 110-120 gallon when time allows? If I went to an 85, then I'd move the 55 gallon underneath and use it as a sump. So effective water volume would be around 105 with the 85/55 combo. Would that be enough volume for what I need. Just wondering what many of you who have been doing this a long time would recommend.
I monitor salinity, magnesium, calcium, KH, PH, nitrate and nitrite and phosphates weekly. I dose two part calcium/KH and magnesium as needed. Everything is run through an APEX system.
Lighting is Ok with two Kessil 160's controlled through the APEX. But I would upgrade those to 360's with the larger tank as well as keeping the 160's as support light.
I still have a bit of a hair algae and cyano issue, but it's not out of control and I believe I just need to do more regimented water changes and control feeding a bit more. I use 3 powerheads to keep the tank circulating and suspend detritus off the bottom. The overall tank cycle is 750 gph, so about 13 x the volume of the display tank, which is better than the 10 usually proscribed.
Anyhow, that's my setup, any input from the experienced reefkeepers would be appreciated.
Cheers all,
Elton
