Do you need fish at all?
Short answer, no, not really.
Many people assume corals are the hard stuff. Some are. Many are so easy you have to be careful or they'll be like crabgrass.
One of the problems people have as NTTH folk (new) is assuming fish are tough. Most marine fish aren't that tough. Not all corals are. But some corals are kill-them-with-flamethrowers tough.
Corals do emit waste, but moderately so. They'll live on light (literally: their colors are from photosynthetic bacteria that takes light, carbon, water etc, and turns it into food the coral lives on)---corals with obvious mouths also take in food from the water. But they do NOT load a tank the way fish do. There's no such thing as overstocked with coral, so long as they can all get light and such. Buy as many kinds as you want if they're compatible, and they sort of solve their own problems. Stony with stony, softie with softie is the best policy. Break 'em up and trade 'em. Trade them to your lfs for store credit. Give them to friends. They're virtually immortal if well-treated, and regrow in a hurry. Your nitrates in a coral tank will stay around the bottom of the chart.
Soft coral just requires you keep your alkalinity up and even (8.3 dkh is a good reading) and your salinity around 1.024 or .002 higher, somewhere in that range.
Temp around 79-80, and otherwise---they don't jump, catch ich, brook, or much of anything else.
The good news is, you just dip them in an approved coral dip (observe them for a few days if softie, particularly zoas, because nudibranch eggs can survive dip, and will hatch soon) and plop them right in.
No fish? No ich.
There are a few caveats; you do have to feed the tank---and keep a complement of worms, crabs, etc, to keep the food so it can be sucked up in tiny mouths. And mixing stony with softie is not a good idea, because they fight.
A reef is excellent for a tiny tank if you can manage the lighting: they don't care how much water is around them as long as it's good water and it doesn't have a neighbor's spit in it. It's a great solution to a big tank---if you have the funds and the patience.
You do have to feed calcium to any stony coral, constantly. Their appetite while building skeleton is not to be believed. Once the calcium demand gets to exceed a teaspoon a week, you should consider a light (and increasing) solution of kalkwasser. qv.
They grow pretty fast if happy. They don't jump, get into your overflow, catch fish diseases, suffer from fish parasites.
And it'll drive your neighbors crazy: just tell them your fish are hiding.
If you really, really have to, and if you have a tiny tank, qt (properly) a very small fish or two, and call it quits. If you have a tank over 100 gallons, get a couple of bright blue damsels like the Fiji blue devil or the azure, qt them properly, and expect them to be front and center and on the move all the time, plus extremely hardy and trouble-free.
With some people, it's all about the fish. If that's not you, you DO have several other ways to go.
Short answer, no, not really.
Many people assume corals are the hard stuff. Some are. Many are so easy you have to be careful or they'll be like crabgrass.
One of the problems people have as NTTH folk (new) is assuming fish are tough. Most marine fish aren't that tough. Not all corals are. But some corals are kill-them-with-flamethrowers tough.
Corals do emit waste, but moderately so. They'll live on light (literally: their colors are from photosynthetic bacteria that takes light, carbon, water etc, and turns it into food the coral lives on)---corals with obvious mouths also take in food from the water. But they do NOT load a tank the way fish do. There's no such thing as overstocked with coral, so long as they can all get light and such. Buy as many kinds as you want if they're compatible, and they sort of solve their own problems. Stony with stony, softie with softie is the best policy. Break 'em up and trade 'em. Trade them to your lfs for store credit. Give them to friends. They're virtually immortal if well-treated, and regrow in a hurry. Your nitrates in a coral tank will stay around the bottom of the chart.
Soft coral just requires you keep your alkalinity up and even (8.3 dkh is a good reading) and your salinity around 1.024 or .002 higher, somewhere in that range.
Temp around 79-80, and otherwise---they don't jump, catch ich, brook, or much of anything else.
The good news is, you just dip them in an approved coral dip (observe them for a few days if softie, particularly zoas, because nudibranch eggs can survive dip, and will hatch soon) and plop them right in.
No fish? No ich.
There are a few caveats; you do have to feed the tank---and keep a complement of worms, crabs, etc, to keep the food so it can be sucked up in tiny mouths. And mixing stony with softie is not a good idea, because they fight.
A reef is excellent for a tiny tank if you can manage the lighting: they don't care how much water is around them as long as it's good water and it doesn't have a neighbor's spit in it. It's a great solution to a big tank---if you have the funds and the patience.
You do have to feed calcium to any stony coral, constantly. Their appetite while building skeleton is not to be believed. Once the calcium demand gets to exceed a teaspoon a week, you should consider a light (and increasing) solution of kalkwasser. qv.
They grow pretty fast if happy. They don't jump, get into your overflow, catch fish diseases, suffer from fish parasites.
And it'll drive your neighbors crazy: just tell them your fish are hiding.
If you really, really have to, and if you have a tiny tank, qt (properly) a very small fish or two, and call it quits. If you have a tank over 100 gallons, get a couple of bright blue damsels like the Fiji blue devil or the azure, qt them properly, and expect them to be front and center and on the move all the time, plus extremely hardy and trouble-free.
With some people, it's all about the fish. If that's not you, you DO have several other ways to go.
