New tank.. what filtration is recomended?

[Anonymous]

This is going to be my first marine tank. It's a 75gallon. It came with a Magnum 350 canister filter/pump with the carbon inserts to do chemical filtration, and I plan on using live sand to do my biological. I don't have a protein skimmer yet, but will add one before the cycling stage is done. Will this be all I need? I noticed the Magnum has optional mechanical filtration that can be inserted in place of the carbon for occasional use as well. It also has the option of adding a bio-wheel for additional biological. But I'm thinking with the live sand, this won't be necessary.
Do I need to worry about "killing" my sand? Anything special need to be done to keep the biological entities alive during the beginning cycling stages?

 

[Anonymous]

A good skimmer is a great piece of equipment. Some people run tanks without them, but it requires much closer monitoring of tank perameters and is not something I would recommend right now.

I don't think the bio wheel is necessary, it could even be counter-productive, the live sand will do a much better job. Hold onto the mechanical filter insert, but just keep it on hand in case you need it, (like you if you get a sand storm from a digging tomatoe clown or something.) I wouldn't use the mechanical filter for every day filtering, just run carbon in the magnum.

How much live sand are you planning on having? Are you thinking of going with a deep sand bed? Are you planning on having any rock in the tank too?

 

[Anonymous]

I'm thinking 3-4 inche bed, plus live rock. Amount uncertain yet. Not a lot though, I'm not going for the standard reef tank... something a little different.

 

[Anonymous]

Cool, if you want to have only a little bit of live rock, I would go ahead and try and get a good 4 inches of sandbed.