What do i need??? How Much does it cost???

[badfish]

I have been meaning to get a saltwater tanks for years now, and have done some reading on the subject. I know it takes time, labor and CASH. I dont want a huge reef tank, mainly what i want are a couple of clownfish and other small fish, maybe a dwarf lionfish. My two favorite fish are the Lionfish and Clownfish, is it possible to keep these two species together. Anyway, i wanted to set up a 40-75 gallon tank and wasn't sure what i need. I have read you need a protein skimmer, then others say you dont. I know you just dont buy a tank put water salt and then fish, i know it needs to cycle and water needs to be perfect. All i need to know is what i can expect to pay, all necessary supplies and a rough estimate of cost (brands if you have any suggestions). i would start with damsels, but are clownfish east to care for. This will be a mainly fish tank with liverock and some coral eventually after i get the hang of the aquarium. What are your suggestions. Thanks in Advance. - Jeff

[Fishfirst]

ehhh I wouldn't get a lionfish (dwarf or not) with a clownfish... when they are full grown the dwarf reaches about 8 inches and can eat the clownfish because it can fit it in its mouth (unless maybe you might get a tomato clown). You want a protien skimmer, it cuts down on a lot of water changes due to nitrates accumilating in the tank without one. I would do a fishless cycle instead of starting with damsels. Clownfish are fairly hardy (read my post on which fish beginners should buy). Liverock is a big must too, plus its pretty IMO. Get a 70 gallon tank since its easier to take care of and you have more options. I would opt not for the dwarf lion since that means not much of a cleanup crew, and no smaller fish.

[Fishfirst]

Also read my post "Fish NOT for beginners"

[badfish]

thanks for your quick reply. So if i were to go for a 70 gallon tank what do you think it would cost to get it up and running. Any suggested brands? the reason why i didnt want to jump into a 70 gallon tank is cause i live in apartment and will most likely buy a house within two years. This brings me to my next question, is it hard to move, will most petstores buy your fish and coral if you had to move? Thanks in advance.

[Fishfirst]

I see I see... well if it makes you feel any better I will be moving all my tanks in the summer to a new place, (over 250 gallons of water total between 6 tanks) You don't necessarily have to sell them back to the pet store... I know I'm way to attached to mine to part with them. Perfecto, All glass are the two best brands (although I hear glass cages are a lot cheaper) A brand new 70 gallon completely set up with fish salt food etc could cost around 750 - 1000 dollars depending what you get. Cyclon skimmers are cheaper but imo pretty decent. Corals could push you to the 1500 mark because of the halide or compact florecent lighting.

[badfish]

once again thank you for your quick response. I really aprreciate your thoughts and can't wait to get started. It will probably be a couple of months. Keep your opinons coming. thanks.

[Fishfirst]

no problem, I'm sure I'll post more on several topics when i get bored hahah things such as "fishless cycling" "Acclimatization" "disease id" etc.

[Osiris]

i would say have about 1k ready to get it going good off the bat. My total so far for the 40g getting going so far is:

Bakpak2 $55(which i plan on selling for better one)
192w PC Light $125
Tank and stand $45
HOB Fuge and Light $100
Southdown Sand $10
Livesand $free
50lbs of LR $150
Heater: $24
Powerheads $50 2xAC802's

That is about it so far that i have....

[badfish]

Thanks a lot, that is a good reply. Let me ask you though, i was looking at tanks in the store and didnt find any for $45 bucks. I brought a book today on setting up a saltwater tank and it helps a lot. I was at Petco today (which i am not a fan of, but its right around the corner, and just went to look at there tanks) and they had a corner tank which had two straight sides and a bow for the third side, it was 36 gallons and had a hood with light and stand for $299, are these tanks recomended for saltwater, is a plastic hood ok? and this is such a newbie question, but what is livesand, and where do you get it. Thanks again. Anybody else have any ideas.

[Fishfirst]

plastic hood is alright as long as you plan on not doing corals... cyclone skimmers are one of the best quality skimmers yet one of the cheapest (usually under $100)... Live sand is basically sand that has beneficial bacteria in it that you can get at local fish stores... otherwise you can seed live sand by buying live rock from liverocks.com or getting it from the pet stores. After a few weeks the bacteria that is on the live rock will seed the sand.

[badfish]

Fishfirs & MalawianProt, maybe you can clear up some of my questions seeing what i read online in multiple forums and in books contradict each other. First thing is protein skimmer Vs. not protein skimmer, what i want is a tank (prob. 40 gallon) with maybe two clown fish, and a couple of others, maybe 6-7 fish total, hermits, snails, and some inverts, but not coral until i get the hang of it. I am also confused with sand, i read a 4 inch base is good, then i also read that under an inch, if not using an UGF. Ive read underground filters are bad. I also read that you can pick up sand at your local home depot for a fraction of the price of coral. i would probably do around 10-20 lbs of live rock. Can you be a little more specific on the ideal conditions for a 40 gallon tank, like amount of sandbase, type of filter, type of skimmer if at all, lighting, amount of rocks etc. I ask you guys because you seem to know what you are doing. I'll tell you this though, i have always wanted a saltwater tank, im not just jumping into this, i have thought about it for a while, and decided after school which i graduated 2 years ago and after i have a steady job i would decide to do it. I am also getting married in 6 months and will be away for 2-3 weeks, is this something i should consider, or can i leave tank unattended for this long? feel free to add anything you think i have missed, once again thank you.

[Osiris]

I got a used tank...in near perfect condition. and stand..

As for the skimmer, it's up to you, and on how many water changes u want to do. Technically speaking you can go w/o water changes for month's, a protein skimmer will cut down on that see, so good to have one, with 40g a excalibur for $100 will do you good.

As for the sand, if u can keep a 4" sand bed it will begin to act as a filteration and break down and denitrify things. And they are right about the home depot sand, it is called southdown it has a boy in blue overalls on it. It will say ' do not use in aquarium" reason for that is that the owners of that sand also make aquarium sand which costs 4x as much, but is EXACT same thing, just type in southdown sand on www.reefcentral.com search bar, tons of tests and have gone on this stuff. I use it in 10g and plan on it on 40g with seeding it with live sand from buddies tank.

Around 60lbs of Liverock will do u good and u dont need a HOB filter, it doesnt do u any good, have powerheads multiple in tank and couple aimed at liverock, as the sand, live rock, and protein skimmer is ur filter.

As for leaving tank alone, strongly dont suggest it, as couple buddies have and asked family member to watch...seen some bad crashes in systems this way, just cant do it, few days no problem with light timeers and stuff but man o man, can stuff go wrong if someone doesn't know there stuff about SW....

HTH

[badfish]

Hey MalawianPro,

i saw your 10 gallon tank in another post, and i gotta say that is exactly what i want, except bigger. So all i need will be a 40 gallon tank, 4 inches sand base with live rock, a protein skimmer, and power heads. Also, i was reading about the water, i know that tap water can be bad depending on where you live, so should i used distilled water? petshop water? To begin the cycling phase i just add sand liverock with powerheads and protein skimmer? Thanks again, Nice tank BTW

[Osiris]

Thanx i really need to update that thing, u can see more updated photo's from start to now on the 10g here:
http://www.fishforums.net/index.php?showtopic=70991

U dont need skimmer right away, not for at least past first month. You can get RO water in any grocery store, and if u have petsmart u can save money on salt, powerheads...just use their website print out page of what u need and take it in ask if manager can approve to match price. O any u also need a hydrometer to measure SG levels in tank.

[Fishfirst]

lot of good advise here!!! WOW!!! Anyway, if you plan on leaving your tank in the future, I would take on an apprentice such as a good friend of yours... have them help you set it up, pick out the fish, do water changes, etc... My girlfriend knows how to do everything if I end up going anywhere, she knows what your basic diseases look like and can diagnose pretty well... I also keep multiple saltwater books near the tank for referance. If Angela and I go somewhere together, I have a good friend take care of it... he worked at the pet store with me and I found him fairly compitent... (he took care of them for six weeks when I had to go to summer camp for Natural Resource Majors) One of my fish had to go into quarentine for a while because of a slight case of ich, but before I got home it was all cleared up! Another thing, tell whoever is taking care of it about this forum board if they have any questions usually a prompt answer is in order... good luck with your new endevor, and I'd like to see your stocking list soon!!!

[TheOldSalt]

Well, I've been reading this thread and now it's time to add my two cent's worth.

SKIMMER or NOT?
Yes.
Skimmers remove the pollutants from the water completely, leaving the water much cleaner and reducing the workload on the other filters. The advent of the skimmer is the main thing which made the modern saltwater hobby even possible. The improvements in lighting made it possible to keep corals.
Ordinary filters trap the pollutants, but those pollutants are still in the tank's water, rotting. Skimmers prevent this.
Skimmers aren't absolutely essential if you plan on spending a lot of time and money making large and regular water changes, but if you want to save yourself a lot of hassle, get one. You'll be absolutely amazed and disgusted by the stuff the skimmer removes, and you'll wonder how you ever got along without one.
The Sea-Clone is a piece of junk. It's cheap, yes, but you get what you pay for. Get a Remora instead, or a big round hang-on-back model.

LIVE SAND:

If you don't plant to have a reef tank, don't worry about this. It's main function is denitrification, which isn't as important in a fish-only tank, and it wouldn't keep up with a messy eater like a lionfish anyway.

RO WATER:

Don't use tapwater in your tank. When you mix it with your salt, chemicals in the tapwater will often bind to the trace elements in the salt mix, thereby ruining them.
( also, never mix two brands of salt mix in the same tank. They are formulated differently, and sometimes you get an undesirable reaction when they are mixed )

Now, you can use use R/O water, or you can use distilled water. I prefer distilled water from WalMart. The good stuff has the purple bottlecap, and costs about 58 cents per gallon. Stay away from the other waters they have!!! You can often find R/O water at the grocery store for less, but you really don't know what you're getting sometimes. Those RO membranes are pretty high-maintenance, and sometimes they aren't kept up with as well as they should be.

The Tank:

you can buy a new one, or you can buy a used one. Either works fine, usually, but I've found that the used ones tend to cost as much as new, so unless you can find a real deal, you'd probably do well to get a new one. Get the biggest tank you can afford and have room for. Trust me on this one; if it's under 40 gallons you are just wasting your time and money.

LIGHTING:

This is the other main expense.
If you just want a fish tank, you can use simple cheap shop lights or the lights which may come with the tank.
However, if you want Live Rock or corals or anemones, you WILL NEED the correct lighting, and it's expensive. Live rock needs the same lighting as the corals, and without it it will wither and die. This is one of the main corners that beginners try to cut, and that's the primary reason most beginners fail miserably.

Anemones:

If you want clownfish, make sure that you get farm-raised ones. The wild ones are a lot trickier, and they often carry a disease called Brooklynella which usually kills them in the small confines of a tank.
Since you want clownfish, you quite possibly also want an anemone to go with them.
Big mistake.
Anemones are a big no-no in a new tank, and without lighting suitable for corals, they will die. In the wild, anemones live for over a century. In an aquarium, most of them don't last a month. They are NOT for beginners or for new tanks.
Luckily, clownfish do not need anemones, and will happily breed without one.

QUARANTINE:

Pretty much every fish you can buy is infected/infested with something, no matter how good it looks. If you do not cleanse your fish before putting them into the main tank, you WILL have disease problems. You can keep things a bit more stable if you use an ultraviolet sterilizer, though. I would highly recommend a UV unit for any tank. Do not use UV in conjunction with any drug.

CYCLING:

Look around for a product from Marineland called BIO-SPIRA. If you use this product once your tank is set up and running, your tank will be safe for fish the very next day. A second choice would be STABILITY by Seachem, but it's a second choice at best. NONE OF THE OTHER BACTERIA-IN-A-BOTTLE PRODUCTS ARE WORTH A DIME. Do not try to use them.
There are two live sand products you can use for quick cycling as well. They come in a big plastic bag, and the tank is ready for use the very next day after installing them. Your local petshop probably has at least one of them in stock.

DO NOT use ordinary beach sand in your tank! Pollutants aside, it's made of silicate, which will serve as a constant nutrient source for the brown diatom algae which will never go away if you feed it silicate.

[Fishfirst]

lots of good info... but I don't agree with the Bio-spira, its best to add the bio-spira and add an ammonia source (such as a ****************tail shrimp) and wait and watch. See if you ammonia and nitrite spikes first... if it doesn't after a week and a half, I'd say you're set... if it does, you should wait out the cycle...

[badfish]

Wow, thanks guys, i gotta say all of this is an Information overload, i have learned more in this thread from you three guy's then i have read in books and through forums. I went looking for a tank today and found a 44G Bow tank with stand and light for just under 300, which is not too bad (made by TopFin). About the speacial light, i didnt know you needed speacial light for liverock, will a standard lightbar do, the lightbar it comes with only has room for 1 bulb, when you say speacial lighting, do you mean speacial bulb, what kind of bulb do i need? what do they usually cost. I went to my LFS and he recommended that i do get a filter even though i will have prob. 40 lbs of liverock and sand, or is he just trying to get more money out of me. He said that RO water isn't necessary but a luxury, he sad that tap water would be fine, but i should have it tested first, do you agree? .58 cents a gallon isnt bad, if i plan on having 40lb of liverock, in a 44gallon tank, how many gallons of water do you think ill need? He also suggested setting up a quarantine tank, how is this done, maybe a 10gallon tank with a small biowheel filter and some sand? TheOldSalt, can you explain a little bit about the quarantine process, not only for me, but i think this threat will be helpful for others in the future, and want to thank you all again. and finally, what exactly is a ultraviolet sterilizer? Thanks again,

- Jeff

[Fishfirst]

a quarentine tank is basically for sick and new fish... Its smaller than the main tank so you don't have to use as many meds, and you can seperate healthy fish from sick fish. a 10 gallon hex would be a little small... In my experience a 20 gallon is sufficent (just because some fish maybe cramped in that 10 gallon) New fish should be quarentined for about 3-4 weeks before putting them in the main tank (to make sure the fish doesn't have any parasites or anything that could infect all the rest of the fish in the main tank) A quarentine tank can be set up with just a filter, a powerhead, some sand (optional in my opinion), lights, and a decoration for them to hide in... it kills algae parasites and bacteria under an intense UV bulb, it pumps water in, sterillizes it, then pumps it back out...

[badfish]

so does the ultraviolet sterilizer go in the quarantine tank, would you recomend just a small biowheel filter for the quarantine tank and maybe 1 powerhead. Can this quarantine tank be stored in a tank stand underneath the big tank. any need for speacial lights for a quarantine tank? thanks again guys. I think its gonna be a couple of weeks before i get started, i new it was a lot of work, but didnt know it was this much work.