New aquarium...

[Someone]

Hi, I was wondering if anybody could tell me exactly what I would need to start a new 50 gal. saltwater aquarium, with some fish and maybe a little coral. Thanks in advance

[mathias]

a 50 gal tank....
saltwater....
well salt bucket + water

depends really Im kind of being a smart *** but sit down and think about how much you are willing to spend..... then double it if your comfortable with that then lets go.....

[Reef69]

Hey, that clownfish story looks like something i wrote once in here..lol..oh, by the way..water and salt....and a good 6 weeks

[adaminaustin]

The first thing I would invest in is a good book or two. And also spend some time on the internet. You should know up front that only bad things happen fast in this hobby. So please take your time and investigate everything before you put it in your tank. It is a PITA to take something out after you introduce it into your system.
After that you will learn that live rock makes the best filter. You need to decide what type of lights you will need. I would recommend going with PC lights since this is a first tank. They are cheaper than metal halide lighting, and should do a fine job with soft corals and some LPS, SPS species. The other thing about PCs is they are not as hot as MHs so it wont be as hard to cool.

Everybodys tank is different. I can not really tell you what you want. The cool thing about this club is you can see other peoples tanks and get ideas. If you ever want to come by and look at how I set up my tank I live in S. Austin.

I left a bunch out (pumps, sand type, all the equipment for testing water quality, the list could go on and on) but the most important thing is to read allot before you get started.

[adaminaustin]

Oh yeah, If you do ignore my post and just want to jump in and get your feet wet. Please at least read about how a tank cycles. This process takes time, some people think it goes faster if you cycle with a fish. I prefer not to do this it really stresses the fish and can even kill it. I just take the extra day or so to let it cycle. I will even offer some live sand to help you speed up the process.

[dow]

Hmmm... Step 1: Read, Read, Read, Read. Here are some good sources:
"The Conscientious Marine Aquarist" by Robert Fenner. Very good information;
"Natural Reef Aquariums" by John Tullock;
MAAST (of course) Everybody here is more than happy to offer advice and help, whether moving a tank, or helping diagnosing problems with tanks or fish or corals;
http://www.reefcentral.com;
http://www.wetwebmedia.com;
Other sites on the internet. You'll find many out there if you look;
Talk to people. We were all once where you are now.
Talk to people at LFS, but remember that they are in the fish business to make a living. If something sounds fishy (pun intended) then double check with a couple of other sources before making up your mind.

Adaminaustin is absolutely, positively 100% correct, "Only bad things happen fast in this hobby."

Thoughts on setting up a system. Get the largest tank you can afford and have room for. This isn't so that you can immediately have a great show system, because you won't. The reason for this advice is that more water equals a more stable environment. That said, I've seen beautiful systems in very small tanks, but they take a special touch and a lot of care.

This is just the tip of the iceberg, so to speak. There is more to learn about this hobby than anyone can ever hope to absorb, and more is being discovered everyday.

Other than that, have fun and Welcome!

[adaminaustin]

I almost forgot.... now that I am off my soapbox.

WELCOME to MAAST!!! :D

[rocketeer]

If you're near San Antonio, you're welcome to come by my house and talk fish and see my setup. PM me if you are interested.

Jack

[Oldman]

Welcome. I'm relatively new to saltwater addiction - about 7 months - and highly agree the first and perhaps most important thing is research/reading before you buy anything (except some books) "the New Marine Aquarium" by Michael Paletta is one of the best to help you get started -- another one is "Complete Encyclopedia of the Saltwater Aquarium" by Nick Dakin. I also live in San Antonio and would be happy to show you my set-up and share my "learning curve" with you. Perhaps rocketeer can help us both learn.

[Instar]

Welcome to MAAST! And now for your first bit of controversy on the subject; I partly disagree with Adam on the lights. I do have pc's but, it cost me way more for those than it would have for halides and VHO's. And the bulbs are very expensive when you figure coverage area per linear inch to halides and VHO's. I am realizing my pain as its been a year and time to replace the bulbs. They are also on backorder still and the halides and VHO's are easy to get. You do have to know how to handle the heat of the halides as well as wiring and the physics of it all, so that kind of lighting takes more research than pc's. The part I agree with Adam about is that pc's are a great starter light for a first tank and they work for many things. Look, visit, read, study. Read everything on www.garf.org as thats free with lots of info too. One thing is for sure, you can waste as much as you spend. Good books are indispensable. People will tell you go big, but, thats not true. A well done nano reef is better than a crappy 50 gallon that is beyond a person's budget. You can spend many hundereds of dollars on a 20 just trying to fill it up and make it pretty. Its supposed to be cool, colorful, odd, interesting -- all that and much more. If you start with a 50 and its ugly, the 10 or 20 would have been better if you ask me. The books and web sites listed will help you figure the costs, equipment and so on. Some literature has errors in it as do some of the web sites. You have to pay attention to figure out what those are or your tank will not turn out so well. Check out the nano-reef web sites. Not sure what the links are but you can get them to come up in a google search.

[Tim Marvin]

Someone, welcome to MAAST. If your in Cedar Park, or Austin I can hook you up.... I am in the process of breaking down a system and giving out smoking deals! Some have picked up whole frogspawns, hammers, and other corals for only $5. I am down to frags now, but I called them all frags. I have rock, substrate, and water if you need it. How big a tank are you setting up?

[Someone]

Thanks alot, right now i only have one book, "the new marine aquarium". i've been thinking about setting up a 50 gal. or so. and I live in San Antonio.

[brewercm]

Welcome to maast and looks like a lot of good info has already been given to you. Ask any question you feel like here also.

[Ram_Puppy]

Someone, what are you interested in keeping?

A couple book reccomendations:

"The Concientious (sp?) Marine Aquarist" is a MUST READ... I would wager it's practically a modern bible for saltwater tanks. (I am sure some will disagree with that, but I have read it about 4 times. Awesome stuff.)

"The Natural Reef" the book is by the same publisher as above, I think it's a great book, while some of the info is a tad bit (not much) out of date, it defines how to keep multiple types of systems ranging from reefs to FOWLR (Fish only With Live Rock) and emphasizes geo-centric reef keeping (i.e. not mixing pacific and atlantic species. Not many people follow this methedology, I try to, my only reef so far is about 99% indo pacific... I have a mithrax for algae control, and a turbo snail that hitched a ride in on something.

My most recent book is Anthony Calfo and Bob Fenner's "Reef Invertebrates" This is an incredible book but deals heavily with Invertebrate life, and very little on fish. However, your going to run across things in your studies like Refugiums, Mud Filters, and the like, (these are very important components in a modern reef system, though not everyone has one) This book has entire chapters devoted to this, it is an excellent resource I reccomend to all.

Also, when you decide what you want to do (I reccomend having an idea of what you want to keep, in what size tank you want to do it in before you ever start (posting your ideas here for constructive criticism is never a bad idea either!) then research each life form that you want to keep heavily. A great way to do this is to go to http://www.wetwebmedia.com where you will get an introduction to the animal/plant and then people like you have written in asking questions, the answers are posted on the web for everyones benefit, more than once I have found questions and answers I never thought to ask. Cool stuff.

And of course, use us, we all love talking about our addiction, so it's a great free resource.

[Someone]

Do any of ya'll have any ideas of what kind of fish I should put in there? lik do you know of any good starter fish?