your 5 biggest mistakes

[Annie world]

well in the begining here are a few, LOL

1. trusting the LFS advice, use a few damsels to cycle your tank and get this hydrometer to check water quality, (what a dweeb)

2. not using test kits, used the strips, now use Salifert.

3. LFS guy said "Sure you can have this fish" a black and white spotted GROUPER, he wont out grow you tank, (yea right lol)

4. buying fish that were not compatible in a reef tank.

5. not topping off with R/O water :eek1: what was i using? tap.yea...slap myself silly stil tday for that


now i can laugh....what a newb!!! :lol:

 

[Annie world]

and boy oh boy i had many more, you were being kind my friend

 

[mikeandjenn99]

1. Not QTing my fish. Ich is a b***h and never wants to go away

2. Buying cheap equipment because I ended up buying the right stuff later on, and now I've spent double the money.

 

[Frick-n-Frags]

1) Not sticking very closely to a proper maintenance schedule longterm
2) Not sticking very closely to a proper maintenance schedule longterm
3) Not keeping the cleaning crew [read Astrea snails] up to par over time, this is a subset of #1 and #2
4) Not sticking very closely to a proper maintenance schedule longterm

and last but not least:

5) Not sticking very closely to a proper maintenance schedule longterm


this is the only thing across all time and space that has repeatedly kicked my can.


little mistakes? I would crash the internet with that list.....

 

[Osmotic Shock]

1) not QTing my fish when i first started
2)adding too many fish to soon
3)when I had an ick outbreak(Duh) I rushed to set up a quarintine/hospital tank and accidently overdosed the copper killing a $100 fish.
4)not planning exactly what livestock I wanted from the start. Once you put in certain animals it limits what you can put in down the road.
5)haven't gotten to number 5 yet

 

[Chrsnwk]

1.) thinking "this time i'm doing everything right so i'll never want to change it"
2.) Buying stuff that was adequate for what i was doing, only to need to upgrade a few months/years later (see #1)
3.) not knowing about RC earlier.
4.) thinking "if i decide later i don't want that capnella, i'll just get rid of it." yeah right... if you have a capnella molecule in your tank anewhere, a week later you have a giant colony. (also applies to xenia, mushrooms, zoas,...)
5.) not properly screening pump/powerhead intakes thinking "what fish/inhabitant would be dumb enough to get that close to the suction way over there in the corner...."

I could go on ad nauseam, but the thread only asked for 5

 

[rustybucket145]

A #1. Letting a friend store his 55gal tank (full of livestock) in my townhouse for the summer while I was out of town. This is how I 'inherited' my first tank. So I can't say 'not doing research' like others have. I didn't have a chance to and honestly didn't want a SW tank.

1. Listening solely to the LFS (didn't know RC existed)
2. Using tap water for the first 5 years and just accepting that my rock was supposed to be covered in algae....
3. Having my first skimmer hooked up for years before I learned that it was supposed to have bubbles in the chamber. duh?
4. not having hermit crabs all along, in my opinion they are the single most important inhabitant to any reef tank, second would be snails, third would be bristle worms.
5. Getting my mom into the hobby when I gave her my old 55gal (now her tank almost looks better than mine!!!)

Overall it has been rewarding experience. Nothing takes the stress off the day like staring at a beautiful reef for a few hours every night before bed.

 

[kurtg]

How about failing to install a GFI, drip loop, and starting an electrical fire?

I almost did that. I came in my house just now and immediately smelled electrical burning. I tracked it down to the hose coming off the lift pump and spraying water on my electrical strips. I don't think I lost most then 2 cups of water, but it was enough.

 

[RoTTen2TheCore]

Haha yeeeah ive done that recently, my tank itself started to leak on my powerbar! Thank god i was in the room at the time and heard the sizzling and dove to unplug it... needless to say i spent the next 6 hours of my night bolting to the petstore to buy a new (and slightly bigger) tank then transfering all my stock into it instead of going out with friends to a bar... yeh that was NOT fun but lucky for me nothing died

 

[techigirl78]

1. Listening to LFS that shouldn't have been giving advice
2. Buying unnecessary equipment intially (partially due to #1)
3. Buying cheap equipment and later replacing
4. Not using redunency in my system (heater went out in the middle of winter in unheated basement)
5. Thinking that closing up my system would work for us while we did some home improvements to the house.

I think that covers the "BIG" mistakes. But there have been many other small mistakes.

Oh, I forgot when we forgot that we were adding RO/DI water to the tank. BTW we realized that one the salinity had dropped from 1.025 to 1.021. No fatalities, but that was a mess! I guess that means six big mistakes.

 

[kfowler]

Before I say this, realize I'm going back to the late 80's early 90's.

1.) Buying a Mexican Dragon Eel
2.) Buying a pregnant octopus (thought Iwould make some money of the eggs)
3.) Watching eel and octopus go at it in an epic battle. (Eel won)
4.) Running a hose from outside to refill the tank.
5.) Bringing home a Carpet Anemone the quickly dissolved.

 

[dhnguyen]

Here's mine:


1. Not getting a bigger tank to start with instead of a standard 55g (the worse tank ever for a reef). This is one mistake I have to fix later this year---And yes it is my first tank and I still have it.
2. Buying a stand that is way too short and doesn't have enough room for a sump.
3. Listening to the LFS.
4. Not investing in a RO/DI unit from the first day. Wasted a lot of money buying RO from the LFS--again because I listened to them.
5. Purchasing a Sea Apple--I could still hear my wife "Look honey it looks like your new Sea Apple is laying eggs". Again do not listen to your LFS.

 

[davester1]

1. Thinking that what I bought on ebay was going to be of use to me in the long run.
2. Shopping with my wife/kid and buying livestock that I had not fully researched.
3. keeping the original livestock that came with the used tank.
4. buying cheap all in one test kit instead of salfert
5. not using r/o for the 1st 3 months.

All in all, its been a great experience so far. here is what I consider to have done right

1. read about 6 books prior to buying anything
2. joining r/c and the fmas (fort lauderdale) before buying anything
3. buying larger than needed rather than smaller than necessary
4. finding people i trust outside LFS's to get advice.
5. taking my time, no hobby should be rushed.

 

[Michelle L]

Adding a Hawkfish to my 220 gallon reef because I had pity on it and didn't want it to die at the LFS, so I took it home without researching it first.

Two cleaner shrimp and 5 cleaner gobies later, I have figured out that he was a big mistake.

 

[tigga]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=9420553#post9420553 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by kurtg
Mixing a Maroon and percula clowns. There was murder in the tank with the Maroon coming out on top.

This meant that the maroon died right

 

[E&Js]

1. Not buying a tank I would be happy with for a while. 46 gallons seems to shrink rapidly in a matter of months
2. Keeping a damsel in the tank too long. Terrorizes other fish. Hard to catch with all the LR.
3. Changing the water with non salted water....this should really be #1, maybe even before it, but it was a long story.
4. Not supplementing my tank since the beginning.
5. Not joining RC earlier.

 

[trigger111]

-thinking a standard 55 gallon tank would be adequate

-buying sub-par equipment only to replace it months later.

-not thinking long term when stocking the tank

-starting with a tank which wasn't reef ready

-going two years without a RO/DI unit

Lesson: do things right the first time this hobby is expensive enough as is without having to redo things all the time.

 

[Aaarrrggg]

Tagging along... excellent thread!

 

[Zestay]

against have to add .. only buying a 36 inch tank... if your going to get into this hobby. buy a 6foot tank.. and 6 foot lights.. so you dont buy a 3 foto tank and a 3 foot light fixture.. only to wish everyday you had a 6 foot tank...

 

[reefworm]

Don't worry about us embarrassing ourselves - sharing mistakes may be the only way we can feel good about them

#1 using crushed coral for the substrate - too many detritus pockets and sharp edges that discouraged benthic life. System overwhelmed after awhile and crashed bigtime

#2 trapping bristleworms before learning that they are my tank's friends [in regret and remorse changed my BB name to what it is now]

#3 not researching enough before getting underway - thinking the LFS had all the info I needed

#4 stumbling across RC way too late [actually recommended by one of the LFS staff!]

#5 not "bothering" to QT

Great thread idea, BTW, but thanks for limiting us to five