# will begin cycle end of this month - this is what i got



## bobo (Sep 20, 2007)

1x 42 gallon tank
50 pounds of live rock
bag of live sand (no idea quantity)
1x turboflotor blue 1000 (protein skimmer)
1x JAD Efu-40 exterior filter canister
2x 13watt white lights (have some other lighting too)

Now i`m going for a Fowlr. Maybe very few corals in the future. Heaters wont be needed for another year so i can get that later. chillers are not needed.

now i have the chance to get already salted R/o water. This is my only alternative currently to tap water. The water will come from a tank which is already set up and i`m not sure whether this is a bad or good thing. advice? I`m getting the live rock at the end of January ands tarting my cycle then.

Anyone to tell me what i`m lacking? or how to best maximise the products i have currently - thanks in advance

-alex


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## bettababy (Oct 12, 2006)

bobo said:


> 1x 42 gallon tank
> 50 pounds of live rock
> bag of live sand (no idea quantity)
> 1x turboflotor blue 1000 (protein skimmer)
> ...


You say the water will come from a tank that is already set up... does that mean a tank with fish/animals in it? If that is the case, then you would be better off with tap water. If the RO water is simply RO filtered, not being used in an aquarium where there are animals, rock, sand, etc... then it would be safe. If you take "used" water to "clean" your tank... you are simply adding the waste of your animals to the waste of the previous animals, and this would become toxic very quick. 

As for other equip you may need or have missed... the heater is going to be important to get right up front. Even provided your room temperature is warm enough to keep the tank within the right temp range, the problem is fluctuation. Unless your room is at a constant temp that never changes, the jumps in temp will affect your fish and can be deadly.

I'm still wondering about the water, and if you are planning to work with a source of premixed saltwater... what about freshwater when you need it? A saltwater tank is not going to use strictly saltwater, only during actual water changes. Between changes there will be evaporation, and while the water evaporates, the salt does not. Your new water will need to balance in spg/salinity according to what your tank needs at any given time. Even if doing water changes everytime there is evaporation, the spg/salinity of the new water will still not be able to match that of what's in the tank, or you will end up with too much salt. Always remember the need for both salt and freshwater for your tank and at any given time. 
With that said, I didn't see a hydrometer or refractometer listed on your supply list. You can't keep a marine tank without one of the two. This is the only way to measure the amount of salt you are adding, and there is a specific range (1.023 - 1.025) that you will need to stay within. Your hydrometer is something that should be used before ever adding any water to the tank.
If money isn't an issue, a refractometer is much more accurate than the hydrometer, and they last forever if you take care of it. If you work with a hydrometer, find someone with a refractometer to calibrate it for you so you know its accurate. Because of they way they are made, most of them end up "off" and sometimes by a huge range. I have seen customers who's tanks crashed and they didn't discover until after they lost animals that their hyrdometer was off by enough to have over or under salted the water. One of them turned out to have brackish conditions in his tank of expensive and delicate fish/corals all because his hydrometer was inaccuate. SeaTest makes an awesome hydrometer, and is one of the most accurate I've ever been able to find anywhere.


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## bobo (Sep 20, 2007)

thanks for the reply 

The water is simply freshwater r/o with the salt added since its going to be my first setting up, but i think i confused myself as well as others. 

I have a hydrometer just forgot to note that one down.
what about a powerhead? any good ones i should look out for?

also in the summer and winter the weather outside gets extremely hot - but my house is always heated or air conditioned and i`ve never needed a heater with my freshwater tank unless it was really cold nights at winter - which will be almost done by the time i start cycling. but better safe then sorry so i`ll get my hands on one of those too.


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## bettababy (Oct 12, 2006)

bobo said:


> thanks for the reply
> 
> The water is simply freshwater r/o with the salt added since its going to be my first setting up, but i think i confused myself as well as others.
> 
> ...


As tempting as it will be, it is also very dangerous to compare a freshwater environment with a saltwater one. The way things work is so different, the fish and their reactions, what they can tolerate or need is also very different. Its for that reason when someone asks me about the difficulty I tell them it doesnt have to be harder, but it is different.

Then, as I said about the water.. just be sure you have access to RO water without the salt when you need it and you should be fine.

As for powerheads, there are a few that are good, but to tell you how many you'll need I cant do until I know what animals will be in there. Flow rates will differ some according to your selected inhabitants.

I have always had too luck with the Rios, my husband likes a few of the others. I can get some names from him tonight.


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## bobo (Sep 20, 2007)

my choices are :

2x clownfish 
a few shrimp (fire and cleaner)
a couple gobys and a few blennies
and a firefish.

maybe - just maybe - a valentini

this is it so far - think the stock isrelatively good.

with the equipment i`m a bit more careful so i`ll probably order the powerhead if needed.


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## bettababy (Oct 12, 2006)

bobo said:


> my choices are :
> 
> 2x clownfish
> a few shrimp (fire and cleaner)
> ...


The clowns and shrimp should be fine, but you'll want to limit yourself to 1 goby or 1 blennie, not a couple of each. As for the firefish, they are a schooling fish, and if you're considering a valentini I would nix the firefish. Depending on your filtration and maintenance, you may or may not be able to add the valentini to that size of a tank. The stock list isn't bad, just a bit much for that size of a tank. If you figure 3 fish total, you're prob pretty accurate, allowing room for the inverts.


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## bobo (Sep 20, 2007)

i always liked puffer fish, and in the pest i succesfully kept dwarf puffer fish (fresh water) for about 3 years. And i was only 14  so i`m really wanting a new puffer fish. He will be the last fish i add to the tank, and if he eats my shrimp, well heck thats what had to be done. 

i chose a blue neon goby - as a cleaner
and still considering the blennie.

still trying to decide between a maroon clown and an ocellaris

btw betta, find any good powerheads?


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## bobo (Sep 20, 2007)

alright - i have a new query 

i can get fresh drinking water at $2 per 5 gallons
and i can get R/o water at 10$ per 5 gallons

does drinking water have any problems?
ideas anyone?


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## bettababy (Oct 12, 2006)

bobo said:


> alright - i have a new query
> 
> i can get fresh drinking water at $2 per 5 gallons
> and i can get R/o water at 10$ per 5 gallons
> ...


Most drinking water on the store shelves is nothing more than filtered tap water. I would question the mineral content, phosphate levels, etc. A good way to answer your own question is to get 1 bottle of the drinking water and 1 bottle of the RO water, then run tests on each for: ammonia, nitrate, pH, gh, kh, Ca and phosphate. 
I'm not sure what each company uses to purify their water, but it isn't the same as RO, or it would be labeled RO water. 
I will ask Rob tonight if he knows of anything else that I may have forgotten here.


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## bobo (Sep 20, 2007)

well by asking questions at the LFS about their r/o water, its an actual reverse osmosis tank he has which uses in his tanks to keep coral alive. So far the person at my LFS (a new one i found) is really helpful and is actually trying to help me get this thing up and runnning properly. I told him, too about the drinking water and he said i would probably have to treat it with things like aquaton and nitrivec etc. 

Will that however really help me in the long run if i want coral.? or should i just play it safe and go with the R/O ?


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## bettababy (Oct 12, 2006)

Because there is no way to know what is in the drinking water, how they purified it, etc... there are some things that RO units will pull out that standard carbon purification can't pull out.... your best bet is to stick with RO water to avoid countless problems later. (and a lot of money)


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## bobo (Sep 20, 2007)

i`m starting my cycle in exactly 2 weeks from today, and i`m already brainstorming with ideas! is it possible to somehow join two aquariums, maybe with a pipe, each with its own filter system etc. ?  as in to make your tank gallons bigger, kinda like a sump? but not a sump ?


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## bettababy (Oct 12, 2006)

The only practical way is to do a sump system, or to maintain 2 tanks with one above the other (doesn't work well for large tanks and can make maintenance very difficult) I have a series of nano tanks I am planning to do that with, and then run a sump inline with them. There are still some kinks to work out of it, but to do this with anything over 20 gallons, I just couldn't see it. The work, the maintenance, the time to do it, wouldn't be worth the effort in end result. Also, remember, if you're wanting it for filtration purposes, each tank inline with animals in it will have a waste level of its own to contribute... The proper way to balance it would be to add the sump to the whole thing... so you're still talking about needing a sump of some kind. 
What I am creating will be a shelf long row of 5 - 7 gallon invert tanks, each hooked up to each other in a row, with a 55 - 75 gallon sump system below. In the sump will be live rock, macro algae, live sand, sand sifting starfish, and light to grow the macro algae. The hardest part of setting this up is in drilling the tanks. They have to be glass, and not tempered glass. I have found a 7 gallon glass mini bow front I like a lot, and would withstand the plumbing. I will use pvc pipe, not sure yet what size, large enough to allow good flow, short enough to not slow the flow. Each opening in the tanks will be covered with some type of screening. I'm considering working with a fine grade of plastic canvas and some silicone to seal it in tight. I have not decided yet if I will connect from side to side, or take it to the back and run it from tank to tank from there. The sump will also have uv sterilizer and protein skimmer installed. My plans are to keep some of the small inverts that don't know how to play nice with others. These are research tanks, meant for study. and the animals inside will rotate according to the topic at a given time. To allow me a quarantine in any individual tank, I may also install some type of shut off unit, so if I find a problem in one I can shut them all down, or if I bring something new home I can isolate one tank... Each tank will have to have 1 powerhead, properly placed to force flow through to the next tank. 

While I wouldn't advise doing this with a large tank, I also wouldn't advise doing this without a lot of backup resources. (quarantine tanks for sure, in case there was a problem, and I am already familiar with the supplies and proper way to seal tanks, but for the average person, I say take it to someone who can show you hands on, because if you screw it up, it can be expensive to fix and make one heck of an expensive mess to clean up)


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## bobo (Sep 20, 2007)

i have no idea what glass my tank is made out of, but this sounds like work overload  i have another question, in september i`m going abroad - again i`m looking far forward. i`m gonna be away from september to december then from december to easter and easter to summer. this means my parents will be looking after the tank ( feeding and cleaning). Whats the minimum amount of cleaning that can be done, assuming my tank is stocked decently? 

42 gallons 
2 occelaris
1 neon goby
1 blenny (no idea what yet  )
3 cleaner shrimp
2 fire shrimp
1 firefish(maybe)

If that counts as decent


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## bettababy (Oct 12, 2006)

bobo said:


> i have no idea what glass my tank is made out of, but this sounds like work overload  i have another question, in september i`m going abroad - again i`m looking far forward. i`m gonna be away from september to december then from december to easter and easter to summer. this means my parents will be looking after the tank ( feeding and cleaning). Whats the minimum amount of cleaning that can be done, assuming my tank is stocked decently?
> 
> 42 gallons
> 2 occelaris
> ...


Minimum amount to expect if the tank is lightly stocked is a water change once/wk about 25 - 30%, filter maintenance (cleaning salt creep and clearing any blockages) average once - twice/month, lights can be put on timers to keep them on a regular cycle, and a skimmer would need the cup cleaned whenever it fills.... no way to know how fast it will fill, but the fewer animals the longer it would take to fill... and of course feeding the tank daily. 
If you plan to limit yoursef to appropriate in that size of a tank, I would skip either the blenny or goby, and limit the number of shrimp (not a good idea to mix those species of shrimp together, they tend to kill each other quickly). I would also skip the fire fish. If you work with the stock you listed here, you are going to have problems, even if you are there to clean it daily. That's a lot of fish in a very small tank. Ocellaris, if there are 2, you can expect a pair, females reach about 5 inches, males about 3. The neon gobys do much better in a small school of 3 - 5, which you don't have room for, and the blenny can reach 5 - 6 inches, depending on which type you choose. The shrimp would not have enough territory to live peacefully mixing the species, but 2 shrimp of the same species would be practical.

Always remember, the fewer animals the less work. The more animals, the more work, and always prepare for adult sizes, because this will happen quickly in most species.
Hope this helps!


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## bobo (Sep 20, 2007)

yeah it does, thanks alot  i`ll rethink the stock list but my GF insists on the ocellaris  she finds them so damn cute  i`d rather just a maroon tbh ! :<


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## bettababy (Oct 12, 2006)

Remember that maroon clowns are super aggressive and very territorial, and would not fit well with the rest of your options. I agree with the GF, if a clown fish is a must, stick to the ocellaris. Another reason for this is that the ocellaris stay smaller than the maroons. Average size for ocellaris would be 4 - 5 inches for a female, 3 inches for a male. With a maroon, you're looking at 6 - 7 inches, 3 - 4 for a male. In your size of tank, a pair of maroon clowns would be a full tank. 1 maroon clown isn't going to mix with much in that size of a tank... so you eliminate most of your options that way.

I was reading back, wanted to comment on something I missed a few posts ago.... your mention of the puffer fish. For as wonderful as they are, the only real option you have in that tank is the valentinim which also would decrease your population of other fishes. I'm not sure I would suggest mixing a valentini puffer in that size of a tank with ocellaris clowns (and surely *not* a maroon clown). Your waste levels would become an issue pretty fast, which would require you to do regular checks on the tank, and to test water at least every few wks. The puffers are messy eaters, which increases waste very quickly... the valentini is no exception to that. Just didn't want to see you get hopes up and to try something that in your situation has little chance of working. I would wait for a larger tank before investing in a puffer.


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## bobo (Sep 20, 2007)

i was actually debating the valentini for a long long time, and i still dont know what on earth will happen there  the problem is however nice a valentini may be he is very likely to destroy my shrimp! So i decided to wait a while and go for a 30 gallon (or maybe abit bigger) just for him or maybe just one or 2 bottom dwellers for him too. 

Scrap the fish list i set before so far its 

2x occelaris clowns  we`ll work from there


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## bettababy (Oct 12, 2006)

Sounds great. A good idea for searching out a bottom dweller for your valentini might be to begin looking at bottom dwelling fishes, like the diamond goby. With enough rock work to form caves and tunnels, that would be a much more likely mix while still serving the same functions.

As for the other tank, with the clowns... did you have ideas on anything that appeals to you thus far?


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## bobo (Sep 20, 2007)

well- clowns,
orange spotted goby looks good.
also i thought of scrapping the gobies and going for colours - lemonpeel angelfish

my choices are limited atm and i gotta run by the LFS see what they got

assuming it was your tank, what would you put in it?


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## bettababy (Oct 12, 2006)

bobo said:


> well- clowns,
> orange spotted goby looks good.
> also i thought of scrapping the gobies and going for colours - lemonpeel angelfish
> 
> ...



HHHhhmmm, that's a loaded question. I have a lot more available to me than most people do because I can order wholesale...
But, if it were mine, I guess I'd do something reef or reef safe animals to allow me to do reef later. Lemon peel angel for as pretty as they are, not a reef safe fish, and also not an easy fish to keep. Lemon peels tend to stress really bad, are difficult to get to eat, and prone to illnesses (usally from stress). 
Diamond goby, bangai cardinals, or a small school of 3 firefish... With ocellaris clowns you want to keep it peaceful... with that size of a tank you want to keep it small..., and total fish population would be done with a diamond goby and 3 firefish, and even with those and the 2 clowns, it would still be heavily stocked so would need frequent water changes.
I'm also partial to the starfishes, so would have to have one of those. The linkia stars are algae eaters, so if waste is kept to a minimum, and no aggression issues, that could thrive in there... the blues are pretty awesome.... or the brittle stars... a bit more aggressive, more active, but really cool to watch... same applies with the serpent stars... but only 1 starfish in that size of a tank, and make sure it isn't a carnivorous species like the chocolate chip.
You may also want to look into an orchid dottyback as an option... they're peaceful, beautiful color, and stay small. 

You're asking my opinions for choices, but I should let you know... I have a 20 gallon tank devoted to 1 shrimp that has to live alone (saron shrimp) and is just as much work as the fish. I prefer animals that will interact with me, and I also prefer smaller fish for the most part. The hard part is in fitting numerous fish into a tank the size of yours. There aren't a whole lot of compatible options for that size tank. Even with damsels you'd be limited to 1 - 2 fish for a long term environment. Full grown, most of the common damsels will get 5 - 6 inches. Let me see if my husband has anything he would add to your list of choices, and if so, I'll post again for you later.


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## bobo (Sep 20, 2007)

betta - thanks for your opinions, but now i`m just curious what anyone would do if they had my size tank - gonna post it up again in fish species and compatibility so add there


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