I always wanted to start a salt-water tank. When acquaintance of mine wanted to give up his marine tank, I decided to get his setup on a whim: 2 clownfish, one anemone and some CUC. There was a catch though, he wanted to repurpose the aquarium, so I needed to set up mine in less than 2 days. So instead of patiently wait to cycle the tank and gradually add fish I had to set up quickly. Luckily had prior experience in keeping fresh water fish and as I was planning anyway to switch to salt water, had a good technical setup.
The deal:
As the previous owner wanted to repurpose the aquarium, I convinced him to give me some of the live rock, macro algae & water as well on top of the living creatures. However, I started with a new filter, new sand and some of my own rocks (dry).
The process:
I knew his tank was about 6 month old therefore I assumed a start colony of good bacteria was present on the live rock and algae. I chose to dose daily Seachem stability as a top-up just to keep values in check. Tested water at the beginning every day, now about once a week. 10% water change every week. Only used RODI water with Sea salt. Every week drop some copepods in, more so in the beginning so we have less ammonia from food decay.
My setup:
Fairly nano tank - 30L Biorb modified to accommodate canister filter (I will upgrade a bit later to 60L as clowns grow). No other plans for fish, most likely will get one shrimp.
Oase ThermoFilt100 + in-line Fluval UV clarifier
Kessil A80 light with controller
TCM Mini Wavemaker
Successes:
Water parameters seem fairly stable: 0 ammonia, 0 nitrites, minimal nitrates, 8.4 hardness. The clownfish pair seems to do great, they eat well and fully enjoy the new tank. No deaths of CUC. Have 6 corals, neon green GSP, another octo, pulsing Xenia all doing great so far. No issues with 3 headed Duncan either.
Issues solved so far (crash course):
The only casualty - The anemone died in the first week. I felt like sh*t as I really liked it and made me regret setting up so quickly. However, after removal from the tank I realized the basal disk was damaged on removal & transport. Previous owner decided to decouple it from the rock (oh why). No plans for anemones until aquarium is at least 1 year old. Some incipient algae blooms were solved with Phosguard in canister filter and supplement of CUC. Realized (duh) had to glue coral plugs as my CUC was messing around with them. Probably i will have to move one of the corals as it gets too much light (ev. After being glued onto the rock
) Got one Aiptasia – luckily I recognized the beast and neutralized it with Aiptasia X in a separate tank (Guess my late night readings on the forums started to pay off). Latest thing had to manage the lights, as I introduced the Montipora I increased the light output but is was too much for the softies so I had to dial it back, will need to find the right balance soon. Also had to spread out the corals a bit, baing afraid the Duncan might get aggressive with the soft corals.
Plans for the future:
Will probably stop with coral acquisition for now and religiously monitor the water, now probably to include calcium and magnesium and wait for proper coralline algae grow. No other critters. About 1 year (maybe sooner, depending on clowns growth) in I plan to increase the size to 60L (20g) and will stop there.
Final thoughts on the Biorb:
This was a bit of a design choice as the aquarium is seen from multiple directions and did not wanted to have a line/corner in sight. Pain to move stuff inside due to the narrow opening but ok as I’m not messing too much with it. Advantage seems to be that the narrow top really minimizes the evaporation/top up needs. Was drilled and fitted with valves to allow for canister filter in the back but they cannot be seen. Like any acrylic tank is scratching very easily which is a bit of a pain.
The deal:
As the previous owner wanted to repurpose the aquarium, I convinced him to give me some of the live rock, macro algae & water as well on top of the living creatures. However, I started with a new filter, new sand and some of my own rocks (dry).
The process:
I knew his tank was about 6 month old therefore I assumed a start colony of good bacteria was present on the live rock and algae. I chose to dose daily Seachem stability as a top-up just to keep values in check. Tested water at the beginning every day, now about once a week. 10% water change every week. Only used RODI water with Sea salt. Every week drop some copepods in, more so in the beginning so we have less ammonia from food decay.
My setup:
Fairly nano tank - 30L Biorb modified to accommodate canister filter (I will upgrade a bit later to 60L as clowns grow). No other plans for fish, most likely will get one shrimp.
Oase ThermoFilt100 + in-line Fluval UV clarifier
Kessil A80 light with controller
TCM Mini Wavemaker
Successes:
Water parameters seem fairly stable: 0 ammonia, 0 nitrites, minimal nitrates, 8.4 hardness. The clownfish pair seems to do great, they eat well and fully enjoy the new tank. No deaths of CUC. Have 6 corals, neon green GSP, another octo, pulsing Xenia all doing great so far. No issues with 3 headed Duncan either.
Issues solved so far (crash course):
The only casualty - The anemone died in the first week. I felt like sh*t as I really liked it and made me regret setting up so quickly. However, after removal from the tank I realized the basal disk was damaged on removal & transport. Previous owner decided to decouple it from the rock (oh why). No plans for anemones until aquarium is at least 1 year old. Some incipient algae blooms were solved with Phosguard in canister filter and supplement of CUC. Realized (duh) had to glue coral plugs as my CUC was messing around with them. Probably i will have to move one of the corals as it gets too much light (ev. After being glued onto the rock
) Got one Aiptasia – luckily I recognized the beast and neutralized it with Aiptasia X in a separate tank (Guess my late night readings on the forums started to pay off). Latest thing had to manage the lights, as I introduced the Montipora I increased the light output but is was too much for the softies so I had to dial it back, will need to find the right balance soon. Also had to spread out the corals a bit, baing afraid the Duncan might get aggressive with the soft corals.Plans for the future:
Will probably stop with coral acquisition for now and religiously monitor the water, now probably to include calcium and magnesium and wait for proper coralline algae grow. No other critters. About 1 year (maybe sooner, depending on clowns growth) in I plan to increase the size to 60L (20g) and will stop there.
Final thoughts on the Biorb:
This was a bit of a design choice as the aquarium is seen from multiple directions and did not wanted to have a line/corner in sight. Pain to move stuff inside due to the narrow opening but ok as I’m not messing too much with it. Advantage seems to be that the narrow top really minimizes the evaporation/top up needs. Was drilled and fitted with valves to allow for canister filter in the back but they cannot be seen. Like any acrylic tank is scratching very easily which is a bit of a pain.
