Who has a Nano? Join this topic!

[Ethos]

Alright yall, I've never posted in this section before, so here I go.
Last time I was at this forum, I was considering taking on a Nano.
Well, with oodles of help from another forum, plus a forum focusing on nanos, I started a 10G SW Nano.
8 pounds fiji LR,
1 free hitch hiking clam (he came on the LR)
No Invertabraes, no fish, no corals.
Price to date : $97.68
so far I've bought a bit of sand, 10 gallons premixed water, 8 pound LR, and a hydrometer.
The SG is at about 1.024.
Temp is at a steady 80.
I'm still waiting for my Dioatam Bloom, so I can get the "Clean up crew" and then eventually some fish and corals!
I have very basic coral lighting on it.
This is the coral pack I'm thinking about getting
http://www.liveaquaria.com/product/p...fm?pCatId=2033
There you go!

[Osiris]

i wouldnt, it didnt pull up but i would buy frags from other hobbyiests, be cheaper for ya but i couldnt pull that link up.

[flamingo]

My first tank was a 10 gallon.

Right now it has:
1. false percula clownfish
1 dwarf fuzzy lionfish ( waiting for my cousin to get his tank so i can give it to him)
1 coral banded shrimp
and 2 red legged hermits
used to have a scooter blenny but it got eaten by the shrimp.

I have had it for over i think 2 years or more. I had to start the tank over at 8 months because a massive infestation of bristleworms and other things. Right now it's perfectly fine instead of it diatom bloom thing that started again about 2 weeks ago.
Ammonia and all that are low and ph is stable.

[Fishfirst]

We discourage nanos here at fish forums for a few reasons.
1 - most newbies to sw think in terms of freshwater rules, which totally don't apply
2 - most newbies don't understand basic water quality aspects, thus making a nano extremely difficult and unforgiving
3 - nanos can be unethical to most saltwater fish due to being too small, I frequently see tangs in 10 gallons on nanoreefs.com and take pitty on the poor things, they don't deserve anything like that ever.
4 - nanos are often used as a who's better contest, in otherwords even the most experianced reefers get sucked into what they CAN put in a nano rather than what they should put in a nano.

In short, we only discouraged you because of the ethical dilema behind the nano tank. If you stock appropriately, watch dilegently for problems, and know that things can and will go wrong in a hurry and are prepared to shell out the money, then a nano can be a solution to your money problems... however, I've spent more money on my 20 gallon nano than my 55 gallon fowlr.

Flaminghoton: are you sure it was the shrimp and not the fuzzy dwarf? MP you should throw the pic up of your fuzzy dwarf eating your jawfish! Oh by the way flaminghoton, where do you get your fish, nekoosa isn't exactly known as a big sw city

[Osiris]

All very good points Fish!, that is one of the reasons i am upgrading to 29g, 10g is just too much upkeep and i am not home enough. I have seen the tangs as well, now that is truly disgusting, dwarf fuzzy shouldnt be kept in a 10g unless ur breeding them and raising fry or something. As for the photo, my jawfish was quite large when i got him, figured he'd be alright, boy was i wrong, $25 meal he ate in style that night! the lionfish.
i deleted it in my last storage maintenance sorry guys.

[Ethos]

Well, you ashouldn't really discourage it.
You should post something somewhere.
It is very expansive, and you do need to know what you can have in it.
I've probably spent 10+ hours atleast of research alone, and from what I've done so far, all it is is alittle manual labor. Its not that hard to get things right.
For the absoltue begginer, you can buy premixed SW with a set SG, and that makes it reeeeaaaallllly easy.
Anyways, I'm looking for more SW forums, all the ones like Nano-reefer.com is bogus because no one ever answers your questions!

[Osiris]

i used to get mine premixed but i always checked SG levels before adding 90% of the time it was too LOW! and that just wasn't working for me, i would never just go in, get water, assume it's perfectly alright to put right in your tank, in the end just easier to have ur own RO/DI water and mix it

[flamingo]

Im pretty certain the shrimp ate it, because well...i saw him eating it lol. The shrimp was also a couple times bigger than it.

My dwarf is only in the 10 because it was an impulse buy a while back. Im more likely going to sell it to my sort of lfs since my cousin is thinking of getting a 75 gallon fw tank and is probably a year away from sw lol.

And I order some fish from my lfs in nekoosa, in smith lumber. I have her order some and I have to pick them uo right away, sadly she doesnt have any sw tanks. She even asked if I could set one up for her lol. But mainly I go up to marshfield to get my sw stuff, sometimes petco in wausau but rarely.

And nanos shouldn't totally be discouraged. But nanos are a pain in the butt compared to most tanks. You have to know your basic info and a lot of in depth things, you have to check the water a lot, only certain fish can be kept in that small of a tank, and a whole lot of other things. I say as long as you know what your doing and you know what your getting yourself into them try it.

[AshleytheGreat]

Oh my MP!! I need to see this pic!!! Jawfish are so adorable...poor little fella!

[Fishfirst]

Also once more, I discourage nanos more to new people to saltwater as they are the ones most likely to not understand the concepts and to make big mistakes... I certainly would not do it myself without the hook up to the main system in anything less than a 20 gallon.