Fluval Spec V Build - (Pic Intensive)

[icedearth15324]

Due to space constraints in my room, I have always put having a nice saltwater tank in my bedroom on the backburner, waiting until I could make more room. Until I began looking at some of the nano-sized tanks. I happened to stumble upon the Fluval Spec V on sale at petsmart on black friday, and I decided to bite the bullet on it. I was initially going to make a nano freshwater tank, but after finding a user's Fluval Spec V nano-reef on RC, I went that route.

I bought the tank that day, and took it home to begin cleaning it. With this being my first foray into saltwater, I've been taking my time with it.

I started with 10lbs of live sand, and 5 gallons of pre-mixed saltwater from my local LFS. I threw a thermometer in there, and began letting it settle.

Went to my local LFS, and bought a few pieces of Live Rock, and put that in the tank. I also bought a heater which I was able to fit in the overflow box. It's been keeping my temperature at a solid 76-78F.

About two days later, I went to my other LFS, and bought some more live rock, and bought an upgraded lighting system. My LFS had LED strips that work perfectly. I bought the 50/50 blue and white. The first image looks more blue than it actually is.

After getting the additional live rock, I ended up rearranging the rock formation. I also added a Koralia 240gph powerhead to increase waterflow.

I was at around a week in after setting up the tank, when algae was starting to form already and I began seeing copepods. A couple days later, and I picked up a basic cleanup crew consisting of 2 astrea snails, 2 dwarf blue-legged hermit crabs, and one electric-blue hermit crab.

Dwarf Blue-Legged Hermit Crab

Electric Blue Hermit Crab

I also began noticing some little tentacles waving in the water off my live rock. I kept checking every night and I ended up finding a Mini-Brittle Starfish that hitchhiked in my live rock.

Mini-Brittle Starfish

Around a week later the algae was starting to really grow, so I picked up an emerald crab to help out.

Emerald Crab

He went straight to eating within seconds of being in my tank.

A few days later I was at my LFS getting some RO water, and I spotted the coolest looking clownfish. It was a semi-picasso percula clownfish, and he was a fairly decent price and nice and small. I figured since the amount of fish I could have was going to be small, why not spend a little more on a slightly more exotic looking fish. So I picked him up.

Semi-Picasso Percula Clownfish

Around a week later I picked up a Red Scooter Blenny to get some more color.

Red Scooter Blenny

 

[icedearth15324]

I didn't realize he would bury himself when he slept, definitely an interesting character.

And my latest arrival, a small maxi-mini anemone. I initially placed it near the bottom of the tank, but then moved it to the top in front of my powerhead.

Maxi-Mini Anemone (original spot)

It has not fully opened up yet, but it is responding to stimuli and opening its mouth when I feed my fish. It is eating the mysis shrimp that land on it, it also moves a little. Hopefully it opens up fully soon.

And that's my tank so far. I'm at a little over a month into my tank being setup, and everything is thriving and eating.

I'm very happy I went this route, even though tank maintenance has been much more than what I have been used to with a freshwater tank.

I will continue keeping this thread updated.

And feel free to ask any questions.

 

[aydemir]

Great looking tank! Did you just stick the koralia in the back section?

 

[Cloudburst2000]

Nice looking tank. However, a red scooter dragonet is a really bad addition to a 5g tank. They might often be called blennys but are actually dragonets like a mandarin dragonet. And like a mandarin they require a well-established tank of probably minimum of 40g. They need to eat pods. They can be trained to eat some frozen food but they must eat continuosly throughout the day. So unless you are ready to feed them all day (assuming they will even eat frozen), this fish will starve to death in your tank. A 5g aquarium can't possibly have enough pods to keep this dragonet fed. It will wipe out the pod population very quickly, and then it will starve. Take this fish back to your LFS. You are already at max capacity with one clown in a 5g aquarium. Don't add another fish.

 

[fishystream]

Looks nice so far. Just make sure you keep up with cleaning the glass. Once that stuff builds up its harder to clean off. :thumbsup: