How much more expensive is marine over freshwater?

[sixftsam]

Two questions in one here.

How much more expensive are the running costs of a 4ft x 2ft tank with marine compared to fresh water?

Also, which are the most important bits of equipment? Could someone place them in order for a FOWLR set up? Any I could do without?

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[sphilli40]

I would sit down and research and research and research .... then plan out your build .... then price out every thing ..... it's a hell of a lot more expensive than fresh water but it's a lot more interesting than fresh water too !


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[j.falk]

I would sit down and research and research and research .... then plan out your build .... then price out every thing ..... it's a hell of a lot more expensive than fresh water but it's a lot more interesting than fresh water too !


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Agreed!

 

[tzylak]

Once you have it all set up, it's not that bad. . . . Relatively speaking.
What's important?? You'd think that you can do without any of the doodads, yet sooner or later you realize that all of it is important and when you skip one, it can get expensive or troubling later on.
After 3 years of it I am still trying to digest the $30-50 monthly increase in the electricity bill. . . .
Have fun!!

 

[alcimedes]

I would say, based on years and years of freshwater tanks, you can expect to spend anywhere from 5x as much per gallon, up to 10x as much per gallon over freshwater tanks.

Saltwater is def. one where it's a great idea to buy someone else's tank and equipment if they're clean and in decent shape.

I also would say that saltwater has a longer/steeper learning curve than freshwater, and a longer break-in time.

Maybe it's just my familiarity with freshwater, but I can have a freshwater tank up, running and stable inside of a month, with fish.

I think my saltwater tank has been up about 6 months now, and I've only felt it was actually getting stable as of the last month or two. Easily 4 months of break-in time for my tank, and I hardly have anything in it other than corals.

That being said, there are some amazing fish and corals you can keep with a saltwater tank, and although it's a higher cost, I do think you also have a cooler looking tank if it's done right.

Also, out of everything I bought for my saltwater tank, I don't think anything was as important as the RODI unit. If you plan on keeping a saltwater tank of any size, you really want to have your own supply of RODI water on demand.

 

[Stolireef]

Easily 5X the price of freshwater. The livestock alone is way way more expensive. By way of example, my daughter keeps a freshwater tank and the average cost of a fish in her tank is about $5. Even damsels (hellions in a saltwater tank) will run you $10 to $15 each and they are about the cheapest fish in the hobby. They are basically two entirely different hobbies.

 

[mcgyvr]

It can be MUCH more expensive.. both in time and equipment..
But it really doesn't "need" to be much more and the amount of "time" can be reduced with more money into "equipment"

The bare minimum for a FOWLR is
1-Tank
2-Saltwater
3-Rock
4-Powerheads to create circulation/oxygenation
5-Fish

Thats really it..
Now that assumes you are purchasing premixed saltwater and that you have temperature controlled home maintained in the recommended temperature range at all times..

 

[ReeferNoob4ever]

I would say that in my experience (13 years freshwater) that the extra cost for saltwater for me has been lighting and live rock. I have bought some expensive fresh water fish (red devil - not to be confused with midas, Discus, etc...) that have cost in the 100+ per fish range. Plus feeding cichlids is similar to saltwater except I always fed my freshwater tanks live food not frozen. The real additional costs come with a sump and controllers which I have been able to avoid using thus far.

IMO the biggest difference in investment is time by far!

 

[Exceptionrule]

I would say that in my experience (13 years freshwater) that the extra cost for saltwater for me has been lighting and live rock. I have bought some expensive fresh water fish (red devil - not to be confused with midas, Discus, etc...) that have cost in the 100+ per fish range. Plus feeding cichlids is similar to saltwater except I always fed my freshwater tanks live food not frozen. The real additional costs come with a sump and controllers which I have been able to avoid using thus far.

IMO the biggest difference in investment is time by far!

+1 on the time, and as someone stated prior, it doesn't need to be x more expensive. Not sure about England, but in US cities where reefing is popular many people, including myself, give fish and corals away when they grow. Not sure if freshwater has the same dynamics.

 

[sde1500]

How much more expensive is marine over freshwater?

Yea I think the biggest expense of saltwater is coral related. Corals and lighting and dosing to keep them alive. FOWLR is much less demanding. Though all depends on the fish you want of course.

 

[static916]

One can keep the saltwater hobby rather cheap if you go light on stock, and use a decent All-In-One tank. The thing is in saltwater you can also go very high end. It depends on the goals of the tanks.

 

[Exceptionrule]

One can keep the saltwater hobby rather cheap if you go light on stock, and use a decent All-In-One tank. The thing is in saltwater you can also go very high end. It depends on the goals of the tanks.

Absolutely, and not entirely necessary, I'd like to add. I've seen some amazing coral growth and color from tanks with cheap sub-hundred dollar eBay led's.

 

[sixftsam]

Thank you for all of the amazing replies everyone!

I was thinking of going for a clownfish breeding set up, but in a display tank to make it actually look half decent, but the ongoing running costs were weighing on my mind - and you've all confirmed my fears!

It seems with marine I'd get a smaller tank, that was more expensive to set up, and has much higher running costs...

But I do agree that it's so much cooler, hence being torn!

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[Stolireef]

If you're going to breed clowns, you really want three or four 10 gallon tanks. I know a few people who are expert breeders and that's how they do it.

 

[alcimedes]

Also, if this is your first saltwater tank, you probably want to go with something a bit bigger, vs. smaller. Larger volumes of water are more forgiving of mistakes.

 

[Stolireef]

Also, if this is your first saltwater tank, you probably want to go with something a bit bigger, vs. smaller. Larger volumes of water are more forgiving of mistakes.

Yep. Based on cost per gallon, smaller tanks are also way more expensive. If I were helping a newbie set up a SW tank, I'd advise no smaller than a 40 gallon breeder with at least a ten gallon sump. That would be kind of a sweet spot for costs and stability.

 

[abrooks12376]

Having run fw for years, a high tech fw set up with high end live stock is still far less than sw. I went all with build my led, co2 injection, $100 in Volcanic substrate on my 40b and setting up a 29 has been slightly more, keeping in mind I went mars aqua and built my own sump for about $40. If you want a sexy reef tank than you're 5-7x over a sexy planted tank. But...... big ButT!! Sw is actually less time consuming and a bit easier than a high tech planted.

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[davehead86]

Ill address the equipment that I found very useful on my first saltwater tank (FOWLR) ...

With a fowlr you dont need an expensive light a timer on the light saves a headache and lets the light turn off when not needed so that you dont have tons of algae

Decent powerheads. Dont get the cheap walmart brand. If you want cheap a couple Hydor Korilia old generations from amazon are great.

Auto-Top Off container and Tunze ATO Controller. Its worth the money, your tank will need to have water topped off, its an annoying task to do by hand, the TUNZE is the best you can buy.

Two heaters, redundancy.

Digital Aquatics Lite Controller. Its like $200, way less than an APEX and will help with the most BASIC of tasks. Making sure it turns of a heater if it gets too hot in the tank, or turning on the second heater if its too cold. Turning off the lights, allowing you to expand into other uses (for corals if you get there). This thing is the best investment and keeps you from having to buy a million little things to help monitor the tank or heaters or lights, its all built in.

Digital Refractometer for measuring your salinity.
Red Sea / Salifert Test kits (dont get API, its just not worth it).

With all of that listed your looking at like $600 for the tank startup and things that make your life easy with the tank so you dont burn out immediately.

 

[Sk8r]

TO a large extent it depends on your skill (not losing tanks) and your attention to water quality (which keeps you from tank crashes and specimen losses) and light and flow. If all those are excellent, and backed by sump and skimmer and proper lights and pump, your outlays will be more initially, but not hugely more. If you keep good water and don't overcrowd, you should stock once and it should tootle along for 5-10-20 years, depending on your city power system and your being in one place.

 

[SycoCell]

Pro-Cost saving tip: DO NOT BUY AN APEX. It's addicting and adds $1000+ to your build. (worth every penny to me).