I'm pretty much a newbie to the marine fish world. While I'd love to have a large aquarium, I'm not able to because I'm a highschool student with parents (enough said ). For the next three years, I may be able to convince them to let me have a small tank (being under 45 gallons). I was curious as to how small I may be able to get away with safely having just 2-6 (haven't decided fully on numbers, need to research more) false percula clowns? Thanks !
Deciding on aquarium size...
- Thread starter cee219
- Start date
2 in a 10 or 15 should be okay, not much chance of a healthy anemone in a tank that size, but with good circulation/ aeration and filtration (my preference is biological only cuz its prettier and the only maintenance is h2o changes and algae removal, you'll probably get hair algae w/o a skimmer or mech filt but if the fish are your main deal that's not gonna hurt 'em--by bio I mean live rock) they'll do fine and shouldn't harass each other. I wouldn't do more than two percs in a small tank cuz as they grow they won't get along, but if you want to put more than 2 fish in there (which you probably will after the shiny newness of the percs wears off, give it about 2 mos.) I'd get as big as your parents will let you, put as much LR as you can afford, let it cycle for a month and watch the creepy crawlies populate, add the percs, give it another month or two to let them acclimate and establish territory, then add some other critters/fish. If you're crazy for an anemone then you'll need lots of light to get the kind the percs may (or may not) take to, bubble tip. If not you can toss in some other kinds of inverts that don't give a rip about light intensity, like an urchin or a choco chip star (not reef safe but if you're not going that route you'll need SOMEthing interesting to look at). Set whatever lights you have on a timer so the fish know when to wake up and to grow whatever kind of algae the lights will support for nutrient export (a part of bio filt). Okay I think I've rambled on enough now and answered enough questions you didn't even ask. Hope this is more helpful than gibberish! :wink:
If I was doing a tank that size I would do the 30 cube. Not to tall, not to narrow. Can light it with a single 175 or 150 metal halide. Just my preference. I would shy away from tall narrow tanks. For any tank I would go "reef ready". Which is drilled for a sump.
Doing tank size is the largest you can afford to accomodate what you want to keep.. This is where you use your Jedi powers to see in the future...You have to decide what you want to keep in the long run and that is how you should decide on the size of aquarium. 2 in a ten..nuh uh...2 in a 20 yes perhaps. This of course is my personal feelings. that would be the smallest you want to keep and you could keep an anemone too. (that depends on the lighting and water quality) I have a twenty with two clark clowns and a carribean flower anemone. All is kosher too. Good luck with your project and keep asking questions 
cee219":24zx50hf said:
Cee - I would get out to the LFS and look at tanks. I think that your best bet is a 50 gallon tank. It will support all you have indicated and will also allow you to play around a bit. My friend just bought an Oceanic 50 gallon tank/stand/canopy/light for about 300.00. He uses a fluval 304 for filtration and a coralife aqualight for lighting. Since you are more interested in fish and have a limited budget, you can 86 the aqualight until a later date. He bought his tank at Petco. I would shop around to get the best deal if I were you. I bought my setup from some guy on ebay for less than half of what it would cost me new. I also see aquariums in the pennysaver all the time.
Just remember that you have to save some money for substrate and live rock if you plan on having a stable reef environment. In my experience you should have about 1.5 lbs per gallon of live rock, and about 2-4 inches of substrate. Crushed coral will set your initial PH to 8.3ppm but you will want to use a buffer to maintain it over time.
Hope this helps. Good luck.
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