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Well since seeing mark document his journey through the salt water set up i figure i may as well give it a whirl. Im pretty new at keeping my own tank but have been around salt water tanks all growing up.
I started with a fluval Spec V 5.6G tank with one little peice of rock and a few little corals and that same week i was already looking to upgrade.
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I found a pretty decent looking tank and stand on craigslist that came with some stuff that i hoped would be everything i needed to get started, but of course once i got everything set up it was not nearly as good as it "could" be.
The tank is a oceanic 75G 45°angle bow front. Which looks really nice! The equipment it came with was a rapids pro ps4 filter system which was new, but missing the return pump... and also a single bulb halogen light... very out dated system...
Its funny how no matter what you get your always going to be looking to upgrade or improve it... haha
I got in touch with a local fish store owner and offered him some stuff for trade for store credit and we ended up making a deal and i had 700 in store credit to burn. I got myself a brand new eshopps psk 100, a koralia 1250 gph wave maker and some necessary equipment to get me started.
I set up the tank and used dry sand. The next morning my friend dad bring me 80 pounds of live rock, who has had hundreds of pounds of it in a giant tank for over 4 years!!
The rock pretty well instantly cycled my tank. There was sufficient bacteria and i only had a few minor spikes on water levels.
After 1 more week of sitting the ammonia and nitrite were 0 and i was ready to put some chromis in! This is when i transfered the corals over from the 5g tank and shut that down.
I went back to the same fish store to get some chromis but they only had a few left. Being excited and well just plain stupid i said ill take them without even observing the fish. Once i got everything home i opened the top of the bag and started a slow drip. After a while i poured the bag out into a net and then added them to the tank.... thats when i sat down in the chair....
And right away i see one of the chromis had a huge sore on its side.... my heart sank... and of course with 80+ pounds of rock good luck catching the little bugger.
I was torn i didnt know what to do. I contacted the store and he appologized and said he would cover the medication but of course the medication isnt reef safe.... i already put away the 5g and pretty much hooped myself. I had enough for the day as i was extremely stressed out and went to bed.
The next morning the sick chromis was dead, i collected him from tank and just crossed my fingers it wasnt anything that would spread. I added a coral banded shrimp and a few cleaner uppers.
Well long story short out of all of this my tank has velvet and OR ich.... it wiped the other fish in no time. Was super depressed i out all the work in just to have to wait another 10 weeks now for the parasites to completely die off...
Lesson learned! I now have two quarentine tanks i just got set up in my storage. Im doing this correctly this time!
Well as for the main tank ive added some coral frags and plan to decorate it while i wait to re add fish. I upgraded to a 0.5w x 156 full spectrum led light but again, not good enough. I purchased a aqueon model two sump and set up a refugium with chaeto and mangrove shoots! I managed to use the over flow from the rapids pro system with a aqua lifter, so basicly if power goes out suction stops and there is no back flow to the sump besides the water already in the return tube! Cool system.
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I also just got a rodi unit and im getting away from the well water even though it has been good so far.
The next upgrades that are on the way in the mail right now is a
Dsuny automated led light system with sunrise / sunset!
And a hydor wave controller to create the back and forth flow in the tank.
Will keep up dated when new gadgets arrive,
This was quite the ramble, little bit all over the place but you get the idea!
Heres some more pics of the tank
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Sent from my SM-G930W8 using Tapatalk
I started with a fluval Spec V 5.6G tank with one little peice of rock and a few little corals and that same week i was already looking to upgrade.
I found a pretty decent looking tank and stand on craigslist that came with some stuff that i hoped would be everything i needed to get started, but of course once i got everything set up it was not nearly as good as it "could" be.
The tank is a oceanic 75G 45°angle bow front. Which looks really nice! The equipment it came with was a rapids pro ps4 filter system which was new, but missing the return pump... and also a single bulb halogen light... very out dated system...
Its funny how no matter what you get your always going to be looking to upgrade or improve it... haha
I got in touch with a local fish store owner and offered him some stuff for trade for store credit and we ended up making a deal and i had 700 in store credit to burn. I got myself a brand new eshopps psk 100, a koralia 1250 gph wave maker and some necessary equipment to get me started.
I set up the tank and used dry sand. The next morning my friend dad bring me 80 pounds of live rock, who has had hundreds of pounds of it in a giant tank for over 4 years!!
The rock pretty well instantly cycled my tank. There was sufficient bacteria and i only had a few minor spikes on water levels.
After 1 more week of sitting the ammonia and nitrite were 0 and i was ready to put some chromis in! This is when i transfered the corals over from the 5g tank and shut that down.
I went back to the same fish store to get some chromis but they only had a few left. Being excited and well just plain stupid i said ill take them without even observing the fish. Once i got everything home i opened the top of the bag and started a slow drip. After a while i poured the bag out into a net and then added them to the tank.... thats when i sat down in the chair....
And right away i see one of the chromis had a huge sore on its side.... my heart sank... and of course with 80+ pounds of rock good luck catching the little bugger.
I was torn i didnt know what to do. I contacted the store and he appologized and said he would cover the medication but of course the medication isnt reef safe.... i already put away the 5g and pretty much hooped myself. I had enough for the day as i was extremely stressed out and went to bed.
The next morning the sick chromis was dead, i collected him from tank and just crossed my fingers it wasnt anything that would spread. I added a coral banded shrimp and a few cleaner uppers.
Well long story short out of all of this my tank has velvet and OR ich.... it wiped the other fish in no time. Was super depressed i out all the work in just to have to wait another 10 weeks now for the parasites to completely die off...
Lesson learned! I now have two quarentine tanks i just got set up in my storage. Im doing this correctly this time!
Well as for the main tank ive added some coral frags and plan to decorate it while i wait to re add fish. I upgraded to a 0.5w x 156 full spectrum led light but again, not good enough. I purchased a aqueon model two sump and set up a refugium with chaeto and mangrove shoots! I managed to use the over flow from the rapids pro system with a aqua lifter, so basicly if power goes out suction stops and there is no back flow to the sump besides the water already in the return tube! Cool system.
I also just got a rodi unit and im getting away from the well water even though it has been good so far.
The next upgrades that are on the way in the mail right now is a
Dsuny automated led light system with sunrise / sunset!
And a hydor wave controller to create the back and forth flow in the tank.
Will keep up dated when new gadgets arrive,
This was quite the ramble, little bit all over the place but you get the idea!
Heres some more pics of the tank
Sent from my SM-G930W8 using Tapatalk
