New to Aquariums, buying either a 125 gallon or 250 gallon. Need some help

  • We are currently upgrading MFK. thanks! -neo
Since you're starting in the hobby... I'd go with the 125 and a big canister filter (Like the Eheim Pro III with built in in-line heater [2180])... and keep it at that for a while. You'll have great filtration and a really simple, and easy to maintain set-up. There is no need for chillers or protein skimmers with a fresh-water setup.

Pick up about 100 pounds of pool filter stand from a pool supply store, a 100 pounds of river rock from a landscaping company... and you'd be good-to-go!

Good luck!

- Jonathan
 
http://www.cichlid-forum.com/articles/diy_list.php this will help you make you save some of your money :) a good pump for your size tank would be http://www.drsfostersmith.com/product/prod_display.cfm?c=3578+4585+9849&pcatid=9849 the 9000 model i would go with about 30 gallons of pot srubbies :) you can get it from a web site called ...well i'm not sure i'll ask to find out in 1 sec :) you want a sump of about 80gallons or so :) you could alwasy go eith this :) http://www.aquariumguys.com/eheimcanister1.html then one of these for mech http://www.aquariumguys.com/fluval-fx5-canister-filter.html you can get it 200$ shiped from john or go with a rena xp3 http://www.aquariumguys.com/filstarxp3.html i hope this helps you also the best heater imo would be this -> http://www.aquariumguys.com/visitherm14.html good luck and keep us updated :)
 
I wouldnt do the reef. They are cool and everything but they are soo much work and in the end I disliked mine as the work it took to maintain way outweighed its enjoyment. Id stick with fresh or even marine..but not reef. youll spend your whole budget on live rock anyway
 
welcome to the site ,this is a great site full of info.it's a hard choice but i would go whith the smaller one with a few starter fish,until you get used to tank cleaning,water changes,ect .then you can always upgrade.you have to learn to crawl before you can walk.soon you'll be running(to your lfs)lol
 
Sounds to me like he's got his heart set on a reef tank. That's going to run at LEAST 5k. Chillers and skimmers gave that away.;)

IMO, I wouldn't do salt water until I had at least 5 years experience with fresh. I've been doing this stuff for about 15 or 20 years, if I had started with salt water, I wouldn't be doing fish at all right now. It can be very frustrating, and disheartening when you loose a fish, coral, invert etc. Patience is so needed, that a lot of people can't stand to wait, and never end up cycling the tank correctly. It takes a few months before you can really start to stock anything sensitive in your system, and most of the good stuff is sensitive, not to mention expensive.:screwy:

Fresh water is so much more forgiving as far as water parameters and patience goes. Most importantly, take your time, and plan before you buy and stock. Look things up on the internet. Before you buy a fish, look it up, find out how big it gets, and the requirements it needs to live happy.
 
Well I did have my heart set on a reef tank, but I've taken some of the posters advice and am going with a fresh water. I think I'm going to do a south american based tank with a mixture of different colored tetras, some bottom feeder catfish, some live plants and a couple bigger non aggressive fish. Does anyone recommend a bigger fish that might work with those i've mentioned?

Also I think I'm still going to get the sump/filter as I know I will eventually get a reef tank down the road. I just had a few questions regarding it. How big of a water pump would I need in a tank that size? I've found some practical wet/dry filters that I could use and aren't that expensive. If I have the abouve mentioned fish in my tank would I also need a canister filter to supplement it? Or what other types of filtration would suffice? I just wanted to thank everyone for their responses as I can tell this is the beginning of an addiction.

I also thought about a Chichlid tank, but I don't know if I want aggressive fish or not.
 
Get the 250gal (bigger is always better)if you can and put some new world chiclids in there.
Get the sand they put in swimming pool pumps fish love digging though this stuff, just make sure you clean it very good.
You will need a powerfull filter system for a 250gal tank, propably something like fluval FX5 Cnister filter.
It is worth spending some money and getting a good filter that can move a lot of water per hour (preferably atleast 2 x the amount of water your tank holds per hour) that will save you a lot of work in the long run and keep your water nice and clean for those monster chiclids.
 
did you decide on which tank? what are the dimensions of the 250?
 
just my $0.2 but i think you will regret not getting the 250 especially with such a narrow footprint on the 125. if you ask most people on this site, they will probably tell you that they need a bigger tank, or they now have a lot of tanks. sure was this way for me. i would do the 250 with probably an fx5 or eheim 2180 with an HOB its a good start and easy to maintain
 
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