I own a small scrapyard and we mostly scrap old mobile homes, so I have plenty of window units and even a central air/heat unit I could use for the large pool house. For the month-to-month expenses tho, I can only set aside maybe 600-700. Bills here are lower than most places I've seen, but also is the income.
Newbie interested in shark(s) for private enjoyment.
- Thread starter Mr Mikey
- Start date
You do know that in order to fill this pool you will need saltwater right?
the salt mix alone would be $3,000
it would cost you 450$ a month just to replace water, thats not including electricity, food, medication, animals and many other factors.
I would say this project would cost 15,000 just to get started and at least a thousand each month to run.
Good luck my friend, i had 6,000 dollars and bought a 360 gallon tank. If anyone could make 4,000 dollars turn into a shark pond i am sure it would have been done.
the salt mix alone would be $3,000
it would cost you 450$ a month just to replace water, thats not including electricity, food, medication, animals and many other factors.
I would say this project would cost 15,000 just to get started and at least a thousand each month to run.
Good luck my friend, i had 6,000 dollars and bought a 360 gallon tank. If anyone could make 4,000 dollars turn into a shark pond i am sure it would have been done.
I wasn't including the bills as part of my monthly available funds, I already calculated in electrical and water monthly expenses, and I can easily afford them. Water is gonna run me $150 to fill the pool, I can get marine salt by the buckets for $60, food is going to be leftovers from the local port and whatever my cousin tells me to buy from stores, medication will be handled by my cousin since she's going to help with this, I'll get the animals a little at a time so not to stress my budget....when it comes to electricity, if I remember correctly, the 15k grown tank should only pull about $600 worth of wattage. I'll do my calculations again, but I believe I can handle it. If something dire does come up, then that's what an AMEX card is for, so I have that as backup for an emergency large purchase.
Were you talking about buying pre-mixed saltwater? I was thinking that it could be manually added and mixed using the filtration system, then adding a lil here and there until the levels were correct....if not then yeah, I'ma do what krj suggested and put this off for now until I get a clearer understanding of how different things are done. My cousin has a basement tank that she has always manually mixed the salt/water for, but it's only a 4.5k. I'd still rather not go straight to benthics tho, atleast a semi-small swimming non-orv to start....if I wanted to see benthics, I'd just sit and watch her (3) electrophorus electricus.
hm, so your cousin is already into large ponds/lagoons? That helps you a lot, but the cost is still going to be a lot more than you think. Like you said if you start slow and buy pieces as you build it will be easier on the wallet for long term. Though it heightens the % of quiting the project and losing money. Thats the last thing everyone wants to see, you lose money on a great plan that your pumped about. If you really think you can do it, start building that thing then we can talk about filtration, skimmers, and how your going to make your salt. You seem determined enough, any chances you could snap some pics of your cousins set ups?
Yeah, I can take some pics next time I'm up at her place, that's no biggie. But it's nothing fancy, when I helped build it, it was just built for the purpose of personal enjoyment and for her to house her rescued marine life, not something with alot of trim and stuff. I can't think of her official title, she's a vet, but for aquatic life. A fish doctor lol. She's been staying with me since the BP incident, and is probably gonna be here so long as there's oil-dilution suds showing up on the coastal/bay waters.
Thanx, I saw my share of oil suds while at the beach....they cut trenches about 15ft from water so at night when tide rose some, just the top of water(where oil/dispersant floats) would pour over into the trenches. Then they'd drive these tractors pulling skimmiers over the top of trenches sucking the sudsy water out. Pretty neat idea. Much easier than trying to catch the suds in the moving tide. While I fished, she'd drive around searching the sudsy "lagoons"(trenches) for sea life. In reality, she caught more sharks than me, there was one spot with 3 lil 1-2ft long black tips in it. I know I have pics of them and of the building of her aquarium, but they were taken on my fone and I lost it by not removing it from my pocket before releasing that almost 5ft blacktip. Seriously, the sim card's copper contacts were black. I needa find a waterproof fone, cuz I can be pretty absent minded when I got something else on my mind, like not getting eaten.
Just an additional couple thoughts to help you out.
When dealing with a big system like this, I'd suggest getting a large volume mixing tank you can fill with freshwater, then add your salt mix (I really like Instant Ocean the best for quality and cost when buying in bulk). Just run a 1/2 hp pump to recirculate it, and have a line with a valve to send it to the pool as needed.
Another thing, I saw you mentioned animals were only time, not part of the budget. Something you will need to consider is application fees for collection permits to catch and keep animals in a set up like this.
When dealing with a big system like this, I'd suggest getting a large volume mixing tank you can fill with freshwater, then add your salt mix (I really like Instant Ocean the best for quality and cost when buying in bulk). Just run a 1/2 hp pump to recirculate it, and have a line with a valve to send it to the pool as needed.
Another thing, I saw you mentioned animals were only time, not part of the budget. Something you will need to consider is application fees for collection permits to catch and keep animals in a set up like this.
