ME AGAIN , this should be better, I took some of yalls a

[kirtis]

hey ,,, my out of town local kind of , lol petstore, had two 55 gallon fish tanks my friend bought one and so did i ,,, we paid $113 for the tank and the lid and lights,

now the enviremont for my clownfish, snowflake eel , and my green brittle star should be better right,,,, he told me at the store that you can have saltwater fish in a 20 gallon , but it takes alot of attention, he said that 55 is getting on the better side of having a salwater aquarium,



any thoughts or suggestions are welcome

SORRY IF I HAVE OFFENDED ANYONE< i am just curious,

 

[MarkO1]

Less chance of a catrostrophic failure the bigger the tank. For example, a 55 gal tank will probably take 2 times as long to cool off as a 20 gal would if you were to lose power.

 

[mark h]

yes the 55 is definitely better. just take your time and let your tank develop the bacteria to support the ammount of fish that you have.

for the time being just read everything you can about your new hobby. you can learn more on the internet than you ever could at a local fish store

[ October 30, 2001: Message edited by: fsureefer ]</p>

 

[kirtis]

ok so i am planning on starting it before christmas, so how many weeks do i need to let the tank sit and filter and everything before i actually put something in it

 

[Spikehs]

Hey,

If you are starting out, by far the best thing to do would be to buy a good quality book, they'll explain everything (how long to wait for the tank to cycle, fish descptions, diseaes etc.) get a book BEFORE you get any fish, this way you will save yourself some money and the fish will have a better chance of survival...a great book is the consious marine aquarist by bob fenner...hope this helps

 

[BRichards]

Kirtis, just wondering, is your new 55g tank full of water yet? If not, and you are considering a sump, (a good idea to have a sump/refugium for a reef tank imo) you may want to have the tank drilled and an internal overflow installed. I have a 55g that started as fish only and quickly turned into a reef tank with a sump/refugium, and I have a Lifereef overflow (a good overflow ime), but if I had the chance to do it over, I would go for the drilled tank for sure! HTH, Bruce

ps, if the tank empty or not, read, read and read some more, books, internet, the more you learn the less money it will cost you, and the less critters you will lose

[ October 31, 2001: Message edited by: Silverfish ]</p>

 

[Mouse]

Nice one Kurtis, good to see you are looking out for the little fellaz. Still no tangs though, he he. I would go for some type of Biological kick start, they should have the cycling time on the back of the bottle. You should monitor the development of the nitrigen cycle using test kits, and once your Nitrates are less than 5 or so you can add fish. I would sereously consider a sump for your inhabitants, especially the eel. Its a nice way of enableing maintenance to skimmers etc without getting your fingers chewed off. Not to mention that you would be increasing the total water volume, therefore increasing stability. Dont feel you have to rush setting up this new tank as your current inhabitants are happily housed at the moment, and im sure there in no rush to go anywhere right away. If i had an eel i would get a huge piece of lava rock and carve a hole large enough to hold a drain pipe, you can then use that as the opening to a cave and build up Live Rock arround it. If you were really handy then you could even carve the rock to make a face with the eel living in its mouth, now thats a fish tank garunteed to snap knicker elastic at twenty paces.