conflicting informtation on start up

L

lockkeeper69

Reefing newb
I have a 120 Gal tank on order and thought I had a good plan after talking with my local fish store. I want to have a natural fish tank with fish and invertebrates. No corals for now. May change in future. I have been doing much reading and was talked out of my initial plan by the advice of the "salt water specialist". I traveled a little farther and talked to another individual at that fish store and he confirmed my initial plan. Both are successful and have been in the business for a long time.

I wanted to start with live rock and live sand. The first specialist said that he does not recommend this as why introduce things to your aquarium that you don’t want. With live rock and sand you can not control what you get and you will have problems. He said that the rock and sand I put in will turn into live rock and sand while knowing I have not introduced any unwanted guests or disease.

The second store said that if I put just sand and dry rock in it could not turn into live rock and sand. I think that the rock and sand could become a bacteria filter but not beneficial in any other way. I think you need to introduce coralline to get the correct algae cultures started.

After talking to store two I decided I need to add live rock with the base rock and supplement my sand with live sand. One question is some of the rock recommended was lava rock. I have read that this may not be a good base rock. I was instructed by store one that with all the surface area and light weight it would be an excellent choice. Could I add live rock with lava and other rock to eventually become all live rock and not promote hair algae?

Store one said to use plain sand as the substrate. He said I did not need aragonite sand. I have 150 # of sand on order with the tank. Can I add live aragonite to the sand to seed it and make live sand? With fish and invertebrates (no coral or sponges) need the aragonite to help buffer water?

Any advice would be greatly appreciated. My head is spinning.
 
If you use dry rock and dry sand, you can introduce live rock and live sand into your tank, and it will turn the rest of your rock live eventually. Live rock and live sand not only provide habitat for your animals, but it will serve as your primary source of biological filtration. Thus, I think live rock and live sand are one of THE most important components of a tank. I think what you did, using base rock and dry sand, and supplementing with live, was a good decision.

Lava rock is NOT a good rock to use!! You should only use rock that comes from the ocean, calcium based rock. Lava rock's parent materials are volcanic in origin, and are filled with heavy metals and other materials that will leach out into your tank and can be fatal to your animals. I would not recommend using any lava rock whatsoever.

Live sand will seed any sand that you already have. By plain sand, are you talking about "play sand" like the kind you can get at any home improvement store? If so, there are ideas and theories about how play sand can lead to major algae problems, since it is silica based (and a certain type of nuisance algae feeds of of silica). Aragonite sand is different in composition (again, calcium based like real ocean sand) and is healthier for reef tanks.

In any case, I give you props for getting different opinions on how to set up a tank! I would recommend not listening to Store #1 at all anymore! Have you ever seen a beautiful reef tank that doesn't have any live rock or live sand? No! The nicest looking tanks look natural. And whoever said to use lava rock sounds more like a freshwater oriented store (lava rock is used a lot more often in freshwater).
 
I am not sure if it is play sand or not. I have not picked it up from the store. I think I will leave it at the store and find Aragonite Sand. What is the rule of thumb for the amount to use? I was told 1# per gallon. I don’t know if this will give me a sufficient substrate depth. I would like to have sand sifting animals work the substrate.
 
Since I am not sure of any info I have been given I would like to have your thoughts on the filter. I was told that if i was not going to have coral that a canister filter would be the best option. I have purchased a Fluval FX5. This looks impressive and is rated for an aquarium up to 400 gallons pumping over 900 gallons per hour. This will give me plenty of water movement and turnover. I am thinking this will be sufficient untill I want to add corals.
 
Canister filters do not actually remove anything, they just trap it. Just make sure that you keep it clean or you will be passing the nitrates right through the canister and back into your tank.

Skimmers seem to be the better choice as far as mechanical filtration. Protein skimmers actually remove the waste product into a cup or tube that you can then remove from the equation.

Another forms of keeping the water free of unwanted elements are refugiums and chemical filtration. I really wouldn't worry about chemical filtration for right now. A refugiums is a nice addition to salt water aquariums. This gives you a place to run a deep sand bed and microalgae which will help absorb nutrients in the water.
 
I don't care how reputable a store is...they're still out to make money. I LOVE my LFS and its employees. I've purchased 95% of my equipment and livestock from there. But I've found a couple instances where, after research, I could have made decisions to buy less expensive items, but due to their guidance, purchased the more expensive item. Not to say they were wrong to sell me the more expensive item, but I should have done research, which would have told me that it's quite ok to buy the cheaper version. Other than that, though, they've been great. So if they give you advice, be sure to do your research as well. It's good that you got a 2nd opinion from another lfs. This forum is awesome for getting advice, too

That said, everyone's given great feedback so far :) I don't have much to add. I think Biff covered it!
 
Thanks to all who replied.

I would still like to know how much sand I will need for the substrate?

Also if I decide to change filtration as I progress is this possible if the tank is cycled up and running? I originally thought of running a sump and protein skimmer but was told that was much more than I needed if I did not plan on coral.

a refugium was mentioned in the replies. I will need to do research on this method. This is different than the sump with skimmer? Again, would this be able to be added after things are up and running?

What a great resource!!!!
 
A lot of times, people have a refugium in there sump system. You can section of a part of the sump for a deep sand bed and put macro algae on it.
 
The amount of sand you have in your tank is personal preference. Some have 5 in of sand (which is more beneficial), I have maybe 1", and some have none. But I think a lot of people here go w/ 5in.

I have a 45g, with a 20 g sump w/ fuge. I'm now finally seeing the benefits of the fuge -- my nitrates have actually gone down. Plus all the pods are thriving. I have a ton of big pods crawling around down there. I have my skimmer in my sump, too. I've seen some people use big rubbermaid tubs for their sump. I used a 20g tank, and added acrylic baffles (dividers). I have my intake and skimmer in the leftside, the a tripple baffle to block out bubbles, the middle is my return area, the right side is my fuge. There are lots of designs though to accomodate whatever space you have. But the sump and fuge definitely makes things easier for me.
 
every one has you coverd. i went with over 1lb of sand and live rock to 1 gal of water you can do more, alot of people like to go with 2lbs of rock and sand to 1 gal of water in there tank the more you have the more stable your tank will be
 
I'd recommend a sump/refugium over the canister.Like was already stated,the canister dont actually remove the waste from the water.
With a sump,the skimmer and heater can be taken out of the main tank.That'll make it look a lot better and more natural.
Maybe this will help with how much sand you need.http://reefcentral.com/calc/SandBed.php
Go with either 1-1/2" or less for just a shallow bed for looks.6"+ for a deep sand bed.
 
If you haven't already opened the canister filter, I'd take it back to the store and ask to exchange it for a good protein skimmer. A protein skimmer is the best type of filtration you can have for any tank -- fish only or reef. A canister filter will work okay for a fish only tank to some extent, but if you want to eventually have a reef, why buy equipment twice over? Save your money and just get a protein skimmer from the beginning. Canister filters tend to lead to water quality problems (high nitrates) down the road. Fish can tolerate high nitrates, but inverts cannot. So even if you want a fish only tank, your cleaner crew (snails, crabs, starfish, shrimp etc) will be much happier with a skimmer! I recommend the Octopus brand of skimmers. They are excellent and not very expensive.

You don't need a sump/fuge to run a skimmer. You can run a skimmer off the back of your tank if you don't want to set up a sump right now.

Also, I think 1 to 2 inches of sand is fine. I used 1.5 lbs/gallon for my tank, but you can't really say that's the rule because it will be different for tall or long tanks. Anything about 2" will just trap crap and junk and detritus and lead to poor water quality. A deep sand bed is good, but you need at least 6 inches for that, and 6 inches of sand takes up way too much space in your tank. Space that you could otherwise fill with water and animals. So I think 1 to 2 inches is best.
 
Okay. today I picked up my 120 gallon tank. Adding water it was filling up quicker than I thought it should. I purchased a Aqueon Glass Aquarium Size 120. I assumed it was 120 Gallons and their website lists it as 120 gallons. I calculated the volume using the inside dimensions of the aquarium and it will hold only about 108 gallons. This is with no substrate and/or rock only volume.

The dimensions on the sticker that was on the tank with warranty is 48.5"Lx24.5"Wx25.5H. These dimensions are to the extream outside dimensions outside of the plastic trim on the aquarium.

Is this typical? Or is this like a wood 2x4. A 2x4 does not actually measure 2"x4" as you would think. I feel like I am getting hosed. If I am I will drain the water and retrun tomorrow. I have not added salt yet.
 
I have the new tank set up, sand added, water added and salt. I have been runing filter for about few hours. Water cloudy. I assume it is fine particulants from the sand.

I am in search of base rock. I can only find live rock in my area. I had some lava rock that I took back from Biff's post.

My question is what type of rock can I use. I can not afford to use all live rock so I want to use base, or dry rock, and suppliment with the live rock. I would like to try to find something local that I can pick and get quickly to move things along. from what I see on the net if I mail order rock it turns out to be very pricy with the shipping charges.

Any suggestion would be greatly appreciated.
 
Any LFS should carry dry base rock.At least any store thats worth its salt.
A good base rock will usually be limestone.
 
In my area here "Greater Cleveland,OH" we do not have the LFS we used to have. i have three that I can go to within a 1/2 hour drive. The third is about an hour.

I guess none are worth their salts as all three of them do not have any rock for salt water other than Live Rock. Two of the stores only sell salt water fish too.

Is there any decent sites to look at that would not break my bank to purchase on-line?
 

Similar threads

F
New to marine.
Replies
2
Views
2K
kbuser92
kbuser92
Mike
We're Back!
Replies
0
Views
759
Mike
Mike
Mike
  • Sticky
New Member (Owner 😲)
Replies
0
Views
760
Mike
Mike
I
Is this a live rock?
Replies
1
Views
5K
kbuser92
kbuser92
Sashimi
75 gallon LPS 2.0 suggestions
Replies
0
Views
2K
Sashimi
Sashimi
Back
Top