Hi everyone I have a 56 Gallon High Column Reef tank.I have a lot of live Rock and 20 to 25 Various Damsels and Clown Fish and a yellow Tang in there.Everyone gets along fairly well,I have toyed with the Idea of putting in a few corals.But I dont want any sales pitches and bull from the various pet stores I go to.Could someone tell me the cheapest and best advice for me please.Most pet stores want to sell you over priced garbage to make a sale.I have fallen for some of the lies in the past.Need some straight talk not a sales pitch.I want to put in 3 maybe 4 corals.I currently have a 75 gallon wet dry on my Tank if that is relevent to the subject at hand.Need advice and a cost guess to see if it would be worth the effort Thanx. 8)
Cheapest way to add a few corals
- Thread starter snapper1
- Start date
Hi everyone I have a 56 Gallon High Column Reef tank.I have a lot of live Rock and 20 to 25 Various Damsels and Clown Fish and a yellow Tang in there.Everyone gets along fairly well,I have toyed with the Idea of putting in a few corals.But I dont want any sales pitches and bull from the various pet stores I go to.Could someone tell me the cheapest and best advice for me please.Most pet stores want to sell you over priced garbage to make a sale.I have fallen for some of the lies in the past.Need some straight talk not a sales pitch.I want to put in 3 maybe 4 corals.I currently have a 75 gallon wet dry on my Tank if that is relevent to the subject at hand.Need advice and a cost guess to see if it would be worth the effort Thanx. 8)25 Damsels?! AAAAAHH!!! 8O You've got a Civil War reinactment goin on in there?! :lol:
Joking aside, I agree, start with shrooms. You can get some colorful ones, even. If after a few months you see they're doing good and multiplying, then check out some more softies. With Normal Output bulbs (NO bulbs), that's probably all you'll be able to keep. With that many fish, carefully monitor your feeding amounts, keep religious(even aggressive) with your water changes, and hopefully you have a decent skimmer in use. Good luck!
Joking aside, I agree, start with shrooms. You can get some colorful ones, even. If after a few months you see they're doing good and multiplying, then check out some more softies. With Normal Output bulbs (NO bulbs), that's probably all you'll be able to keep. With that many fish, carefully monitor your feeding amounts, keep religious(even aggressive) with your water changes, and hopefully you have a decent skimmer in use. Good luck!
I would agree with Seven. If you are considering adding corals to a fish only tank I would start with softies. Two reasons, as Seven mentioned they are typically less costly than SPS or LPS stony type corals. They are also easier to care for and a little more forgiving in water quality than the other types. Not only that, if you for whatever reason have a tank crash or die off you will minimze your losses as far as cost goes.
You will want to check your water parameters before adding any corals. You may also if you dont already have some, consider going with adding some fully cured live rock. This does a couple of things it looks nice but more importantly it is a great bilogical filter and will compliment your wet dry. The rule of thumb is 1- 1 1/4 lbs of rock per gallon of water.
My question is this.... are you planning on just doing a few softies and stop there? The reason I ask is if you are planning on doing more than this you are going to have to start doing some reasearch and homework on reef keeping. The mere fact that you are here asking questions is a good sign. I personally would recomend even for softies that you upgrade to VHO, T5 or similar lighting. Especially if you are only using regular output flourescent lights. I am sure most people here will agree.
Do not let your LFS tell you you have to add costly metal halide lighting for softies this is just not true. If at such time you want to go with LPS and SPS type corals you will need to have more intense lighting but again you dont have to go MH if you dont have the cash. I have seen many wonderful stony coral tanks with no metal halides at all. Just good husbandry and a lot of VHO lighting can keep stiny corals. Although you will find that the opinions on this are as varied as the stars.
Again the single best thing you can do is get a good book on marine/reef tanks and do some reading.
The filtration you are using is probably going to pose some issues concerning nitrates, there is much debate over the use of bio balls in a coral tank. I would not use a wet dry system with bio balls for a coral tank. But if you are going to stay fish dominate and add just a few softies then maybe you can have some success.
I am hoping others will pipe in as I am not a reef guru by any stretch, but I have this time around, done a lot of reading and listening to what others have done to keep corals.
A word of caution... if you are like the rest of us you will become quickly addicted to having and keeping corals and the urge to add more will probably come. Go slow, read a lot, ask lots of questions and remember that you and you alone are responsible for doing the right things to assure that your critters have a healthy good life in your tank. I am a little concerned with the bio load you already have with that many fish. I believe there is a formula (not written in stone) about how many fish per gallon of water you can use as a guideline for your tank.
In closing the first thing that caught my eye in your post was asking about a cheap way to go about things. I can personally attest that there is nothing cheap about the hobby of keeping corals. Unless you are an avid DIY er and can fab a lot of your own stuff.
Well hope this helps some. And pardon me for the lecture about "you being responsible speech about your critters health". I am just an avid supporter of saving the reefs as we know them, each one of us can do our part by becoming as knowledgable in keeping marine tanks because if we are successful in keeping livestock then hopefully we can limit the demand for the constant harvesting of live/wild caught specimens. I will now get off my soapbox.
You will want to check your water parameters before adding any corals. You may also if you dont already have some, consider going with adding some fully cured live rock. This does a couple of things it looks nice but more importantly it is a great bilogical filter and will compliment your wet dry. The rule of thumb is 1- 1 1/4 lbs of rock per gallon of water.
My question is this.... are you planning on just doing a few softies and stop there? The reason I ask is if you are planning on doing more than this you are going to have to start doing some reasearch and homework on reef keeping. The mere fact that you are here asking questions is a good sign. I personally would recomend even for softies that you upgrade to VHO, T5 or similar lighting. Especially if you are only using regular output flourescent lights. I am sure most people here will agree.
Do not let your LFS tell you you have to add costly metal halide lighting for softies this is just not true. If at such time you want to go with LPS and SPS type corals you will need to have more intense lighting but again you dont have to go MH if you dont have the cash. I have seen many wonderful stony coral tanks with no metal halides at all. Just good husbandry and a lot of VHO lighting can keep stiny corals. Although you will find that the opinions on this are as varied as the stars.
Again the single best thing you can do is get a good book on marine/reef tanks and do some reading.
The filtration you are using is probably going to pose some issues concerning nitrates, there is much debate over the use of bio balls in a coral tank. I would not use a wet dry system with bio balls for a coral tank. But if you are going to stay fish dominate and add just a few softies then maybe you can have some success.
I am hoping others will pipe in as I am not a reef guru by any stretch, but I have this time around, done a lot of reading and listening to what others have done to keep corals.
A word of caution... if you are like the rest of us you will become quickly addicted to having and keeping corals and the urge to add more will probably come. Go slow, read a lot, ask lots of questions and remember that you and you alone are responsible for doing the right things to assure that your critters have a healthy good life in your tank. I am a little concerned with the bio load you already have with that many fish. I believe there is a formula (not written in stone) about how many fish per gallon of water you can use as a guideline for your tank.
In closing the first thing that caught my eye in your post was asking about a cheap way to go about things. I can personally attest that there is nothing cheap about the hobby of keeping corals. Unless you are an avid DIY er and can fab a lot of your own stuff.
Well hope this helps some. And pardon me for the lecture about "you being responsible speech about your critters health". I am just an avid supporter of saving the reefs as we know them, each one of us can do our part by becoming as knowledgable in keeping marine tanks because if we are successful in keeping livestock then hopefully we can limit the demand for the constant harvesting of live/wild caught specimens. I will now get off my soapbox.
Thank you for the advice I have 12 Damsels 6 clown Fish.They are two False Perculas two yellow sebea clowns and two Black saddle Back clowns.One pigmy angel, One yellow Tang, one strawberry Basslet,and several cleaner shrimp.and a lot of live rock and snails and a sebea anemone which my clown fish love.I have 75 Gallon wet dry with a built in protien skimmer built in its a Jebo.Its not bio balls its black plastic strips in the wet dry.The lighting is standard 110 v single bulb.I just want to add a few soft corals thats all to enhance its beauty.I change out 10 Gallons of water every two weeks,its a 56 Gallon high column tank.I dont mind buying some Mushrooms will my light be strong enough?.Most of my fish get along, there are disputes with the clowns sometimes.Thank you for your replys I said cheap because I have been taken for a ride several times by Fishshop owners out to make a saleWell, you have a ton of fish for your tank. You are going to be limited depending on your parameters. If you can, test your nitrates and post em because that will limit you. With that many fish, I can't honestly see how they would be low but anything is possible I guess. The angel can pick at corals but might not. It is a trial thing.
For your lighting, mushrooms would be about the only thing. Honestly, metal halide is not expensive as everything puts it out to be. You could go with VHO if you wanted to try to save a bit.
But honestly I would post your full tank parameters to get a better idea. If you do want to go SPS, you are going to need to get rid of quite a bit of fish.
If you could, post the following.
Salt Gravity
Calcium
Alkilinity
Ammonia
Nitrate
This will give us a good idea of what to start with. Also, the width and length of the dimensions of your tank and I can give you a good bulb scenario to go with.
For your lighting, mushrooms would be about the only thing. Honestly, metal halide is not expensive as everything puts it out to be. You could go with VHO if you wanted to try to save a bit.
But honestly I would post your full tank parameters to get a better idea. If you do want to go SPS, you are going to need to get rid of quite a bit of fish.
If you could, post the following.
Salt Gravity
Calcium
Alkilinity
Ammonia
Nitrate
This will give us a good idea of what to start with. Also, the width and length of the dimensions of your tank and I can give you a good bulb scenario to go with.
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