Help me convert my 92g corner reef to SH

[edshern]

After a ton of thought and 'discussion' with my wife, I have finally
made a decision. Rather than start a new SH tank from scratch, I am going to convert my 4 year old 92 gallon corner reef. Unfortunately, I am not near as handy as many of you.
So....I'm going to need some help.
First, here are some pictures of what we will be working with:

Will add more pics as I progress

The Plan, and some questions:
1-Find good homes for all the fish. Can I keep any of these guys:
Flame hawk, blue pacific tang, dragon Blenny, maroon clown?
2-Inverts- keep all? fire red shrimp, cleaner shrimp
Snails- Nasarrius, cerith, turbos,
crabs- scarlets, red legs, sally light foot,
starfish- large black brittle star, green banded star
3-Corals,
Keep? - Large finger (?) leather, feather dusters, coco worm,
candy coral, brains, mushrooms,
Remove- BT Anenomies, frog spawns, Rock Anenomie, bubble
coral.
4-Sump : Skimmer is a classic Berlin (Keep?)
25w uv light (you can see it behind the sump)
Current Pump- The Quiet One (rated about 900 gph
Note there is an orange shutoff valve above the pump. Can I just 'dial' back the flow??
What other flow will I need?
5-Lights- Now there is one Lunar aqualight 36" with 2x96 watts PC
bulbs (1 is actinic & 1 is 10k daylight)
Behind that is another aqualight 24" 130 watt
So there is a total of 322 watts light.
What needs to change here??
6-Temperature is a problem. tank now runs at 78ish. needs to come
down. Maybe if I raise the lights higher and remove the
glass cover?
PHASE 2
7- Re-Aquascape- more pics when coral is gone. add colorful artificial coral
8-pick horses (how many, types) , pipes, vendors etc.

OK- what have i forgotten?? what do you all think of the plan.
Please help me.
this is gonna be great!
Thank you, thank you.
Ed

 

[alien9168]

Well. This is going to be a pretty nice size tank for sea horses.

Hight is not an issue in this tank and all of your filtration, skimming, lighting ect. is not a problem. Keep all of it.

Go to Seahorse.org to find out what fish and corals you can keep and what you may want to add. This will prove to be an awsome tank--i think

By the way---did you use foam to absoarb the sump sound?

thats a great idea!

-alien

 

[Fredfish]

First, what is your overall plan for the look of the tank? Are you considering seagrasses, macro algae? The horses we keep come from a seagrass biotope.

Some people have kept clowns with seahorses, but you would have to watch them and be prepared to remove the clown if there are problems. In general aggressive feeders or aggressive fish are not a good idea with seahorses.

I personally do not keep shrimp with my horses because they are aggressive feeders. Hopefully someone who has done this will respond here.

As mentioned above, seahorse.org or syngnathid.org are good places to go for a list of compatible fish and corals. I think the leather is ok, Discosoma sp. mushrooms, feather dusters and coco worms are ok. Don't know for sure about the rest.

For the pump, I would not restrict the flow by backpreasure. Try distributing the flow into the tank with multiple outlets. If you can create some low flow and some moderate flow areas in your tank you should be fine. If you want to keep the pump and reduce flow, tee a pipe off your main plumbing back into the sump and control its flow with a ball valve until you get the flow you want in the tank.

What you do with the skimmer depends on the type of tank you want to have. Personally I am skimmerless and am running a 'high nutrient' tank. I dont mind a little hair algae, and am using macro algae as the main nutrient export instead of a skimmer.

If you are not growing any light intensive corals or seagrass, you can reduce the amount of light on the tank, but you don't have to.

Tank temp depends on the type of seahorses you plan to keep. If 78 is your top tank temp and you are choosing a tropical species like H. kuda, I think you will be ok. Running 76 to 78 is probably good for tropical species. I am not strong on what temps are best for each species though so someone else can feel free to chime in here.

Removing the glass cover will certainly help with temperature in the summer.

Aquascaping is a very personal thing. I like seagrasses and algaes for horses, but others keep them in more 'reef' looking tanks as well.

As to what horses you choose, with your tank size you can even go with potbellies, the big boys (I think the like cooler water though).

Whaterver you choose, it will be a very nice tank.

Fred.

 

[edshern]

Hi,
The foam is to help deaden the sound, and while it's not perfect, it does help.
Great question, what is the plan for the tank? Ok, after some thought here is what I've come up with:
I would like to create a SH show tank.
I would like to show off as many different species as is reasonable, so setting the tank parameters in such a way as to include as many different species as reasonable is important.
I Don't really want to work with fry, so a one sex tank would be ideal (which sex?)
I also would like to include other compatible life as well, different Pipes, different fish, inverts, coral.
I am trying to plan it out now so any and all thoughts are welcome.
Ed

 

[Fredfish]

Even if you do not plan to raise fry, I would still go with pairs. You will get more interesting behavior. The fry will be good live food for the other inhabitants of the tank.

Probably the easiest to get species are reidi, kuda and erectus. I think erectus like a little cooler temperatures, but its been a while.

The only issue with mixing species and adding in pipe fish is that you run the risk of loosing horses to disease. Sea horses that come from different populations seem to have resistance to different strains of disease and when you mix, they can infect each other. When horses get sick, they get hit hard and fast.

Fred

 

[edshern]

Fred,
Don't you feel bad about all those little Seahorses being eaten?
I think I will pose this question to the general population.

 

[LisaD]

1-Find good homes for all the fish. Can I keep any of these guys:
Flame hawk, blue pacific tang, dragon Blenny, maroon clown?

maybe to the dragon blenny and flame hawk. I would definitely not keep the maroon clown or the tang with the seahorses.

2-Inverts- keep all? fire red shrimp, cleaner shrimp
Snails- Nasarrius, cerith, turbos,
crabs- scarlets, red legs, sally light foot,
starfish- large black brittle star, green banded star

fire shrimp - probably ok, they are on the shy side
cleaner - how many do you have? they can harass seahorses with cleaning behavior, but one or two in a tank that size would probably be ok
scarlets - perfect, keep every one
red legs - I don't keep them, so I'm not sure
sally lightfoot - too much of a risk with seahorses, IMO
starfish - large black brittle star is probably ok, is the green banded also a brittle? if so, and it's one of the really aggressive feeders, then don't keep it with seahorses

3-Corals,
Keep? - Large finger (?) leather, feather dusters, coco worm,
candy coral, brains, mushrooms,

Yes BUT candy might have some risk. Are the brains the really fleshy kind? if so, only keep with caution.

Remove- BT Anenomies, frog spawns, Rock Anenomie, bubble
coral.

agreed

4-Sump : Skimmer is a classic Berlin (Keep?)
25w uv light (you can see it behind the sump)
Current Pump- The Quiet One (rated about 900 gph
Note there is an orange shutoff valve above the pump. Can I just 'dial' back the flow??
What other flow will I need?

you will need to reduce flow a bit, everything else is okay. not sure if you can dial back or not. try to get flow down to about 500 gph if you can. if you need more flow in certain areas, use small powerheads with intakes covered with foam, or get more surface agitation with a HOT power filter (running with or without filtration media, as needed)

5-Lights- Now there is one Lunar aqualight 36" with 2x96 watts PC
bulbs (1 is actinic & 1 is 10k daylight)
Behind that is another aqualight 24" 130 watt
So there is a total of 322 watts light.
What needs to change here??

make sure there are plenty of shaded areas and overhangs the seahorses can choose.

6-Temperature is a problem. tank now runs at 78ish. needs to come
down. Maybe if I raise the lights higher and remove the
glass cover?

you could do this, or maybe remove the 130-watt Aqualight. if you can keep temperature from ever exceeding 78, I actually think you would be ok.

PHASE 2
7- Re-Aquascape- more pics when coral is gone. add colorful artificial coral
8-pick horses (how many, types) , pipes, vendors etc.

I don't understand why you would take down such a gorgeous reef tank. Why not try setting up a 29 or 55 with seahorses? one problem you might find is that it is not always advisable to mix species. also, some of the more dramatically different species are only available WC or may need cold (chilled to temperate conditions) water. if you do mix species, I would buy only CB from reputable breeders such as Draco Marine or www.seahorsesource.com. even CB seahorses, if they come from a wholesaler, can be exposed to disease that can wipe them, or other species, out. you are less likely running into this problem if you buy from a breeder.

 

[LisaD]

Just noticed this from fredfish:

For the pump, I would not restrict the flow by backpreasure. Try distributing the flow into the tank with multiple outlets. If you can create some low flow and some moderate flow areas in your tank you should be fine. If you want to keep the pump and reduce flow, tee a pipe off your main plumbing back into the sump and control its flow with a ball valve until you get the flow you want in the tank.

good advice, I agree.

 

[Fredfish]

Almost forgot, add DanU here on RC as a good source of CB horses.

Lisa, what do you mean by aggressive feeder? I think of most shrimp as aggressive feeders, but my experience is limited to L. wurdmanii. I had to beat these guys off with a stick whenever I fed my sun coral. They would steal food from it whenever I didn't chase them away. They also seemed to have the ability to eat as much as I fed. Sort of like clowns IMO. Are other shrimp different?

Fred

 

[edshern]

I will buy all the horses from only one source.
The tank needs to come apart because I 'm sure the sand bed has become septic. Some of the coral in the picture is already gone.
To work with flow I found this product online.

"Pentair Aquatics Customflo Water System a new complete system that enables the creation of any desired flow patterns in a ny size aquarium tank and with any make or filter size. By assembling a variety of unique parts in multple ways, the Customflo is only limted by the imagination. It can be used on large or small aquariums or to upgrade any existing system. No holes are required since the over-the-wall assembly can be swiveled to allow close tank wall positioning.
http://www.marinedepot.com/aquarium_plumbing_parts_fittings_pentair_aquatics_customflo.asp?ast=&key=

 

[LisaD]

Almost forgot, add DanU here on RC as a good source of CB horses.

www.seahorsesource.com is DanU's web site. He has several species.

Lisa, what do you mean by aggressive feeder? I think of most shrimp as aggressive feeders, but my experience is limited to L. wurdmanii. I had to beat these guys off with a stick whenever I fed my sun coral. They would steal food from it whenever I didn't chase them away. They also seemed to have the ability to eat as much as I fed. Sort of like clowns IMO. Are other shrimp different?

I think where I was referring to aggressive feeder was regarding the serpent stars. Most serpent stars are ok with seahorses, but there is that olive/green kind that gets big that is a danger. When I say "aggressive feeder", if your serpent star is out on the sand, climbing the walls to get to food, it is an aggressive feeder. This kind of star is known to occasionally kill fish, and is definitely a danger to seahorses. Most serpent stars are cryptic don't move out on the substrate too quickly to grab food.

IMO a shrimp is too aggressive if it puts its claws on a seahorse or grabs food from its mouth. Peppermint shrimp, while enthusiastic eaters, don't generally outcompete seahorses for food.