Starting a saltwater aquarium – For beginners
FIRST STEP, THE SAME AQUARIUM
Most of my tanks to customers purchasing that are too small and finish updating in the near future anyway. The minimum size for a saltwater aquarium should be at least 55 gallons. Not only will be able to keep most of the fish and corals in this tank, the parameters (salinity, pH, etc) do not tend to fluctuate both in a larger tank.
Buy your aquarium and a suitable stand. I recommend getting an aquarium at your local store that is designed for the aquarium. Do not forget, a 55-gallon tank weighs more than 550 pounds without any kind of rock or sand in it so do not put on an old table sure. Now that you have your tank and place it upright on a flat surface in your home away from windows where direct sunlight can affect the temperature. The tank is sitting on the stand level. This is especially critical with larger tanks as do not want the pressure points that can split its seams tanks.
STEP TWO, rock, sand AND LIGHTING
Buy a reef sand quality, as Carib Sea Ocean Direct Live Sand and ensure there is at least 2-3 inches of substrate at the bottom of your tank. This will help remove nitrates in the near future. We'll later nitrate but for now just be sure to buy enough sand. As for the lighting there are a variety of options there. T5 high output are a good option to keep your electric bill reasonable. You should do a little research to find out what you will meet their needs. You will need about £ 20 bags of 2.3 per 50 gallons to achieve this. Now for the rock, you can use what is called live rock or you can use dry reef which is available online. What many fans do not know is that there is no need to use live rock to start. You can buy dry reef for about $ 2.75 – $ 5 pound against the payment of about $ 7.15 per pound of live rock. They both give the same end result and the profits of the dry rock about 10-30% more weight once it is wet what is a better price. Buy about a pound per gallon of water that have so for a 55 Gallon aquarium purchase 50-55 pounds of rock. Place the rocks so secure as you want and proceed to the next step, the water.
STEP, WATER HEATERS AND MOTOR UNITS
Now you need to buy salt (Instant Ocean recommend for consistency) Powerheads (or Koralia Aquarium Systems Maxi Jets is a good choice). The flow required is a simple formula at least 10 times the size of the aquarium is so for example a 55 gallon tank needs at least 550 GPH (gallons per minute) of flow. Now you have to buy a heater Visi Therm Jager and both are a decent choice. Recommend what size is needed (in watts) in their packaging and websites. Buy a large enough consistency Warmer because the temperature is important for their cattle. Last but not least buy a refractometer online around 50 U.S. dollars. Measuring salinity with a plastic hydrometer is simply not accurate and causes pain.
Ok, now that you have purchased your powerheads, heater and salt is the time to fill the tank with water. One of the most commonly overlooked is the water itself. Take it from my experience, the use of reverse osmosis water with a TDS (solid total dissolved) closer to zero as possible. To start you can buy in any store this water in 5 gallon jugs or you can buy a reverse osmosis system for less $ 200. If you are serious about keeping saltwater aquariums you need this to help reduce eliminate algae and bacteria from different according to which they can flourish in the tank and kill all your corals. This is the reason that most of the fans to throw in the towel. I could go into more detail about this, but only Google limo or red hair algae and do some reading. Install powerheads and heater and start filling your tank. Once it is full add your salt. In general, about ¼ cup per gallon, but check the manufacturer's recommendations. Get your salt, about 1.024 or 1.025.
Step Four, the game of waiting
At this point your tank is cycling. Waiting for the bacteria is little you can not see magically appear from nowhere and begin to consume ammonia. This may take 3-6 weeks and its light is not necessary. One trick I've learned is to add a piece of 10 pounds Live Rock 5-speed cycle. This will introduce some bacteria and life to your tank. In short what happens is that the bacteria eats the ammonia and produce nitrite (another type of ammonia), however, other bacteria convert nitrites nitrate, which are more or less remain in the tank to accumulate. choosing and water changes will remain under the control of nitrate. You can start skimming any time. It is critical at this point but it is a good time to start your skimmer. I've always used Coralife Super Skimmers. They are easy to install and maintain and do a great job organic waste collection. They also give you a setting in a sink (another article, again) or hang on the back of the tank. Them are not enough, but the rock work to hide the most of it. All you have to do now is to add top off water to compensate the water has evaporated. Do not add salt water to compensate for the lack of water and its salinity increases. The salt does not evaporate into the air. It is why we round off with fresh water. When your ammonia test programs will have zero to make a change of 20 percent water and check again in a day or two. If evidence of zero can start by adding a fish. Take it very slow at this time or your tank will kill the entire cycle. Add about a fish or coral once a week and take it easy. We did not try to nitrites or nitrates because I really do not matter at this time.
STEP 5 AND MAINTENANCE OF THE TANK
So your tank is setup and has a pair of coral and fish or two. At this point you should do least one change of water by 5 percent every week to keep nitrates down and undesirable algae at bay. Also replace the calcium, magnesium and trace elements that your corals need to survive. Get a good magnet cleaner to scrub the front of the glass. If you end up getting some run some algae GFO (ferric oxide granular) in a bag of media in a filter to remove phosphates in the water. This will prevent the spread and in combination with manual extraction can keep under control.
About the Author
Written By Dan Annable, Saltwater and Freshwater Hobbyist (16 + years).
Owner of Shallow Seas Aquariums and the aquarium-products.ca website in Guelph Ontario.
http://www.aquarium-products.ca
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