Thinking about a salt tank- talk me out of it, please.

[FLESHY]

I guess...whats thirty seconds of stirring though?

 

[Cookie*]

I just got a used 90 gallon that had been used for SW. I got to tell you it's not horrible, but is a pain in the arse to clean out all the SW stuff (red algae and I guess calcium?) to convert it to FW.

I know everyone here is trying to talk you into SW....I'm being devil's advocate because no one is actually trying to talk you out of it like your thread heading stated. I hope you do actually do it, I've not done it myself, but wish you luck if you go that route. If it means anything, the guy I got the SW tank from was telling me it's not as hard as everyone make it out to be. Just be prepared to spend a bit more on fish.

Best wishes.

 

[FLESHY]

+1...its really not that bad.

+1...it really is a pain to clean out coraline algae. Every time I have done a complete move I have scrapped the walls of my tank(s)...better than having it turn white and flake off into your tank. It can be bad, especially when its built up over the course of years.

 

[BigO6687]

Always use a skimmer on Salt is my opinion too.

Container + water + prime + salt + mixing pump is what I used too but on a very large salt tank (1000 gallon system) this made the water change task very much a pain in the rear. Multiple 55 gallon trash cans were needed just to hole the new water. But, Now with my 1500 gallon fresh its just prime + water straight into the tank. Soon to be auto fill or continous drip.

And that's a Coral cat shark.

Ahh got it, i didn't think about that.

 

[monsterberry]

its realy no more harder than freshwater coraline is a pain to clean but you get the hang of it after a while i run quite a few saltwater aquariums ive got from a 125g to a 1g and i find the 1g no harder to maintaine than the 125 as long as you keep a check of the salinity (i do a check every day) you should be fine i defenatly say go for it its not that more money than freshwater i personaly dont youse protine skimmers whitch do cost quite a lot all youll need to turn a freshwater aquarium to marine is a few power heads and normaly a filter upgrade depending on your bioload if your going to be getting into the corals youll allso need a lighting upgrade my first saltwater aquarium was a 15g elite aquarium it was a cheap elite aquarium with an elite sting ray filter all i bourght was coral sand, rock, ro salt water, and 1 power head the cost was to convert it to marine was £30 & ive left it for a week with out a auto top off system all i had was a auto feeder i didnt turn the lights on what so ever to limit evaporasion and the fish were fine if youve got corals you would need to time the lights i didnt eaven no of a auto top of system wen i started but i would recomend a auto top of system its much less risk

 

[Heathd]

Lol that one difference is the exact reason why it is in fact more of a pain.. I'm sorry but adding prime and water straight into the tank is no where near the same as fill a temp container with water, add prime, add salt, mix, then put into tank.

I mix my salt on the morning I am going to do the w/c and let powerheads stir it while I am away, check when I get home, and make minor adjustments to get to the salinity I want it to be at.

I always felt like my cichlids were more work just because they were so messy.

 

[TheCanuck]

Freshwater was more work than any of my salt tanks are.

Thats why i don't own one anymore.

 

[yogurt_21]

Always use a skimmer on Salt is my opinion too.

Container + water + prime + salt + mixing pump is what I used too but on a very large salt tank (1000 gallon system) this made the water change task very much a pain in the rear. Multiple 55 gallon trash cans were needed just to hole the new water. But, Now with my 1500 gallon fresh its just prime + water straight into the tank. Soon to be auto fill or continous drip.

And that's a Coral cat shark.

yeah at that gallonage you'd want a 300-500g water tank that you kept premixed salt in, that would make it much easier especially if you were plannign on leaving for a while, then you could just setup a few sprinkler timers to run the w/c at an automated rate (would need to calculate the right amount of time for the amount of flow to make sure you didn't run the fill tank dry while you were gone) then you would simply need a sump that has an overflow (or a few overflows) that go out into the yard or something.

all in all equipment cost would be the factor for salt if you didn't have someone to look after the setup when you were gone.

persoanlly at 50$ a visit there are local services that will do this for you if you don't have someone though some are more expensive than others. then you would just need to arrange the service times so that whomever is watchign your house will be there when the tank servicers arrive