snow;4209104; said:
Wow, thanks for the info. Some say if you add powerheads this would help b/c salt fish need more current the FW fish do true?
BTW do you think I could do all this from start to until I start adding fish in for less then $500?
Currents are a part of ocean life no matter where fish live...unlike freshwater where lake life ect might be pretty stagnant.
If all you have now are the t5 lights there is probably a slim chance of you being able to do this for less than $500.
My run down of the situation is this: You want large (huge, in the case of the shark) fish in a medium-large tank.
This is going to necessitate several things:
1. The tank should have hardy inhabitants. This is a pretty ambitious first step into saltwater.
2. The tank should be setup in a manner that is "fool-proof" and relatively easy to care for.
The problems I see arising is that you want to do all this on a budget. Aquarium supplies are pretty much you get what you pay for, and if you dont pay for much, you might get equipment that is going to be a hassle to maintain and may not even be able to keep your animals healthy with your level of expertise. If I was going to set up my own saltwater pred tank, this is how I would do it.
I would get the largest tank I could afford.
If possible I would have this tank drilled for overflows because this not only makes maintenance much easier, but it also allows for pretty heft-duty filtration.
-Because you are not going to do this I would get one (or several) high quality, oversized canister filters.
-In my opinion I would say that a protein skimmer was a necessity. The number one kind of saltwater tank I would say that should never be without a skimmer would be a pred tank. You have high waste levels, and you are often attempting to stretch the bioload capacity of the tank. Do yourself a favor and invest in a good skimmer. (I recommend aquaC, and I also recommend "over-skimmming" just as you should "over-filter")
I would get a high quality oversized heater.
-Depending on where you live and how your tank runs, you may need a chiller, although with fish only probably not.
A few other points that I would make is that you can SAVE some money by buying a hydrometer instead of a refractometer. I run my reef with a hydrometer, and have not had a single problem in 8 years. If I can keep acropora with one, you can keep hardy marine preds with one.
I would also say that the only reason for you to buy live sand (which is often unnecessarily dirty, and of mixed grade) is that it comes with so much DEAD crap and bacteria in it that it will cycle your tank for you to a bioload that might be similar to your tank fully stocked. "Live" sand is a marketing gimmick...you are just paying more money for lower quality substrate. I would recommend caribsea "reef-grade" aragonite. This is a high quality substrate (although it requires a lot of washing before adding to your tank, -all substrates do, but this one to a greater extent) and you can siphon it to remove the wastes you will be getting with your large fish.
Finally I would recommend instant ocean salt. Ive come to the consensus along with many other aquarists reef and otherwise that this salt is the purest in terms of water quality once it has been made. It is also one of the cheaper "high-end" salts.
Good luck with your tank. Be sure to post pictures when you start setting stuff up.