Planning for a 180g FOWLR tank

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BigBiz

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I'll be upgrading to at least a 180 from my 40 gallon FOWLR tank in serveral months. This is a rough stocking list and I need suggestions.

1. My current 40g fish: pgymy angel, occelaris clown, lawnmower blenny, purple pseudochromis
2. Yellow Tang or Pacific blue tang (proven to be problematic recently)
3. Emperor and Annularis Angels (I know this could be a problem but I was thinking of adding different sizes at the same timthem both as juvenilles at the same time)
4. Lunare wrasse or Five-stripe / Pinkface wrasse
5. Snowflake eel
6. Auriga butterfly
 
I would dump the:

Lunare wrasse or Five-stripe / Pinkface wrasse - Too aggresive
Snowflake eel - could eat the blenny and pgmy angel at night
 
I think your list has a dichotomy of smaller peaceful fish and larger more aggressive fish, and I'm not sure how they would do together.

I agree with ronhjr, dump those wrasses. There are more peaceful wrasses you could keep. A great one would be a harlequin tuskfish.

I'm not sure about the two large angels. Even one might be pushing it.

I don't have a lot of butterfly experience, but I'd consider leaving it off as not aggressive enough. The ocellaris clown and firefish may also have problems.

I realize I haven't left you with much. :)

What are your two or three favorite fish? Maybe we can make some recommendations around those.
 
Well, I guess I'd mostly like the emperor angel, one of the wrasses, the eel, and the tang. Could I keep my original list if I got rid of the smaller fish I have now...I don't know what I would do with them though...I dont want to keep more than one tank but I really dont want to get rid of them...hmmm
 
Could I creat a sort of small little rock structure that the small fish could live in but the larger fish couldn't fit in. Like an area of open sand band surrounded on all sides by rocks that go about 1/3 of the way up the tank? Would this work at all? (Of course probably not with the eel...)
 
Lots of rock caves and hiding spots of different sizes will go a long way toward helping ensure survival of the original fish. I would also add them first, before adding any of the new ones. AND BE SURE TO QT!!! (read on for the reason why :()

I don't know how fish-safe a SFE is, but my zebra moray NEVER EVER has bothered a fish, including small clowns and a royal gramma, in the five years I have had it. I don't know if a SFE would be as well behaved or not... Would you consider a zebra moray instead?

I'll give you the stock list for my 120, which was up for 3.5 years, but I recently lost everything but the zebra moray to amyloodinium through stupidly adding a non-QT's fish. I was in the process of upgrading to a 210 (still am, just more or less from scratch now).

zebra moray
harlequin tusk
mimic tang (a wonderful fish, I like it a lot better than others)
emperor angel
four clowns and a royal gramma (because I didn't have any place else to put them) :)

Those fish plus a few others (blue throat trigger, another angel) were going into the 210...

The sad and ironic part of the story is that this very stable tank had long established fish (3-8 years in my care). I took down my mom'sn 210 AGA reef and drove it from NJ to NC. I spread the rock and a few small fish among my many tanks. The fish in the 120 came down with amyloodinium, which I never experienced before. I treated too late and lost nearly everything. Sorry for the long post.
 
The only reason I am a little hesitant to put in a zebra eel instead is because I have heard they are clumsy and are therefore bad on your rockwork, and the price of course. But if you guys think my smaller fish would be significantly safer with a zebra than with a snowflake, I will definitely consider it. This makes sense, because I've heard that zebra eels are practically blind and the snowflake is one of the quicker eels in the trade.

I plan on using my current 40 as my QT tank, which reminds me...what exactly should I have in a QT tank. Couple of artificial corals maybe? Power filter, flourescent lighting, heater, my old skimmer even?
 
I know thats fundamental stuff I should know, but I was asking more out of experience of yourself than the simple reading that you always see about QT tanks.
 
In a QT I'd have a bare bottom and plenty of cover. If the fish to be QT's appear healthy, I'd have cultured live rock, a few big pieces, your skimmer, power filter, light, etc. as you suggested.

IMO the purpose of the QT is to observe eating and behavior or new fish, and isolate them in case they are sick. The QT should have excellent water quality and not stress new fish. The QT should keep the fish in decent shape for at least several weeks to several months. Stress from bad water quality or no cover will just make them more likely to sicken or die. I like to keep a few hermit crabs and snails to keep the tank cleaned up and to help feed the biofilter when there are no fish in the tank.

A HOSPITAL tank is a treatment tank, and often needs to have any biofilter, inverts and carbon removed. (Many meds will kill the biofilter, live rock and any inverts.) If you have a simple QT, you can just remove the cultured live rock, bio-filter media, carbon and any inverts, then treat with meds. Or you can use yet another tank to treat, though this is often not practical.

Does this help answer your question?
 
In my case, I failed to QT properly because:

1) ALL my tanks were full of rock, corals, fish and inverts from my mom's 210 - I was spreading them around

2) I was in a rush. I drove 8 hours by myself to NJ over Labor Day weekend Saturday, took a completely set-up tank down and packed it into a pick-up truck, then drove 8 hours back to NC on Tuesday morning, unpacked, and had to be back at work Wednesday.

If I had taken my time, I would have been less careless. I would have taken the time to set up rubbermaid tubs for the animals and rock, and I would have avoided killing the best tank I ever had.
 
Thanks. If I went to the trouble of taking out all the live rock, the biofilter media, the carbon, and the inverts to use medication, I would not be able to put them back in for that particular fish until it is in the main tank, right? (Unless I did a massive water change). So I should have constantly cycling QT tank regardless of whether I plan on using it anytime soon? And I change the water completely between fish in the QT tank?
 
There isn't a reason to have a QT constantly cycled and ready to use. All you need to do is setup a new tank or rubbermaid container with new salt water and either a pump/power head or small filter for water movement and water breakage. The fish will be fine in this type of setup for quite awhile and you can actually do small water changes to extend the tank without any problems. Just don't feed a lot of everything will be fine.
 
If youre doing a 180 or bigger why not go with bigger fish? Triggers, puffers, groupers? I would definitely drop the snowflake eel though........I have 3, ok but not that great. There are other eels that are more attractive, and SF's just so common. It seems like every LFS around has at least 10. Anyways one of my SF eels recently developed a taste for fish as well! In a tank that big I would love to put a larger moray. A golden would be my 1st choice.

As for your smaller fish, if you dont get any eels or fish eaters ( groupers, lions, anglers) I think you could keep them together with larger fish in a tank that size if you have lots of rock and caves.

If you dont want aggressives then your list looks good to me. I have an annularis and personally like it better than an Emperor. He is starting to get a streamer and has great deep blues. As for your tangs either one, make sure u QT though. I have a banana wrasse that is very similar to a lunare and he is kind of mean you could say. They can be belligerent at feeding time. Aurigas are very nice and I found the one I had stood up well against my clown trigger and puffers.

These are just my experiences, u may be different
 
180 gal how much live rock?

180 gal how much live rock?

I am doing a 180 gal fowl and am not sure how much live rock to order.Anybody have pictures of 180 gal so I can judge how much rock to buy.I am leaning towards the haitai rock because of the cool shapes and light weight.
 
Thanks for all the responses. So how would this look to you guys:

1. My current 40g fish: pgymy angel, occelaris clown, lawnmower blenny, purple pseudochromis which I will build either many hiding places for or even their own sand band surrounded by rocks so that the larger aggressive fish cant intrude.
2. Yellow Tang or Pacific blue tang
3. Emperor and Annularis Angels which I will add into the tank at the same time as juvenilles to prevent aggression later (but could I QT them at the same time???)
4. Pinkface wrasse or Halequin Tusk
5. Zebra eel
6. Auriga butterfly

I want to have a good sized clean up crew. Which wrasse do you think would be safest with hermits and snails? And no cleaner shrimp right?
 
I think you might be able to have cleaner shrimp if u get a few and get them established for a while. I have no experience with a pink face wrasse but know a h. tusk will try to go after you hermits, snails should be ok if theyre big enough. The zebra is a much better pick in my opinion!
I have a friend who has cleaner shrimp in his tank with a stars in stripes puffer and a zebra moray. They were there long before the puffer though.
 
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