Alright. I think Im ready to finnally give saltwater a try. Ive been gathering everything I need the last few months. I have a 90 gal bowfront with a corner overflow, a ocianic 150 wet/dry with a built in protien skimmer, and a quite one 1400 gph pump. I also have 4 powerheads and a wavemaker machine. Right now I only have 4-54 watt floresants with luner lights for the lighting. To be honest a dont know if I should try to do live rock and coral for a first tank or just fish. What do you think?????? I have absalutly no experiance with them. Ive had everything to set up a saltwater tank- yet for some reason Imn just afraid to mix the salt and get it cycled. Any sagestions??? Also do you think I have everything I need??? I have the reef crystal salt also. I guess Im just a little bit leary of droping $800-1000 on liverock and fish and having them all die. Ive had great luck with all my freshwater tanks with hardly any problems- But its just hard making the switch. Is that enough lighting or would you go to like a t-5 for liverock??? Thanks and sorry about all the questions.
My first attemt at saltwater
- Thread starter daveolejnik
- Start date
Ok, Ill share with you my experience of saltwater which amounts to around 8 days now 
Firstly, to me it looks like you've got all the right gear, so fill that baby up and get it cycling! My tank is a 2ft 20G that is going to have 2 clowns in it once its fully cycled, at the moment I don't have a protein skimmer but will probably get one in the coming weeks. I think there is ALOT of stigma behind saltwater, with all the seemingly complicated measurements like salinity and stuff, but once you get started you realise how dead set easy it is.
One thing that had me worried is that I bought around 7kg of uncured, fresh from the reef LR, which of coarse had a large die off. I left my house for 2 days the other day to go back home to see the family and I came back to my house mates complaining about something dead in my room. I walked in and my tank was pretty much completely opaque and there was the rankest, rotting rock pool smell coming from the tank.
I freaked out a bit, but when I realised the problem is easily remedied I got to work. First picked up a bag of purigen and put some carbon in a little HOB Ive got as a spare, then siphoned out the dead stuff off the sand bed and replaced that water with new SW. This fixed the smell and my cycle is well and truly on its way now LOL.
Basically, I think you should read up as much as you can, be prepared for unplanned events and not freak out. Once you put your live rock in your tank you will be like me and sit there and watch it for ages haha, I never knew rock could be so entertaining. Don't be scared to take the 'leap' of FW to SW, because from what Im seeing a FOWLR is no harder than a normal FW setup, its only if you move onto corals it might get a little harder.
Goodluck.
Firstly, to me it looks like you've got all the right gear, so fill that baby up and get it cycling! My tank is a 2ft 20G that is going to have 2 clowns in it once its fully cycled, at the moment I don't have a protein skimmer but will probably get one in the coming weeks. I think there is ALOT of stigma behind saltwater, with all the seemingly complicated measurements like salinity and stuff, but once you get started you realise how dead set easy it is.
One thing that had me worried is that I bought around 7kg of uncured, fresh from the reef LR, which of coarse had a large die off. I left my house for 2 days the other day to go back home to see the family and I came back to my house mates complaining about something dead in my room. I walked in and my tank was pretty much completely opaque and there was the rankest, rotting rock pool smell coming from the tank.
I freaked out a bit, but when I realised the problem is easily remedied I got to work. First picked up a bag of purigen and put some carbon in a little HOB Ive got as a spare, then siphoned out the dead stuff off the sand bed and replaced that water with new SW. This fixed the smell and my cycle is well and truly on its way now LOL.
Basically, I think you should read up as much as you can, be prepared for unplanned events and not freak out. Once you put your live rock in your tank you will be like me and sit there and watch it for ages haha, I never knew rock could be so entertaining. Don't be scared to take the 'leap' of FW to SW, because from what Im seeing a FOWLR is no harder than a normal FW setup, its only if you move onto corals it might get a little harder.
Goodluck.
Before you get the lighting decide on what you want to grow in the tank. No use getting a 600+ watt fixture if you don't have corals that need that much light.
First step is to get salty, stack the rocks, and start cycling.
First step is to get salty, stack the rocks, and start cycling.
thanks for the advice. Is there anything I need to do to the tank before mixxing the salt??? I just had freshwater fish in it. I cleaneed everything out of it. Its just sitting there empty. The wet/dry has also been used in a freswater tank. I just switched the ocianic 150 with a tidelpool 2 in the freshwater. I figuired I might as well take advantage of the protien skimmer on the ocianic 150. I dont know how well those work built into the wet/dry. But Im going to get everything running this week. Would I be better off getting live rock that has not been cured to get the tank cycled????? Thanks again for the advise.