By artarmon42 | No Comments
Last updated: Saturday, October 6, 2007

I was pretty heavily into reef aquariums a few years ago. For those unfamiliar with the term, that is salt water aquariums with corals. I’ve had softies, LPS and SPS… nanos with PCs, MH and T5s. In fact, my thread on how to install Metal Halide lighting in a Nano Cube over at nano-reef.com is still a hit after all these years

One of my favorite pictures is of my Onyx pair lounging in some fluorescent Green Star Polyps:

After nearly 1.5 years out of the hobby, I decided to setup another tank. To my embarrassment, I’d forgotten some of the basics such as how much live sand I needed! So to avoid future embarrassment, I figured I’d blog what I learnt (the second time around) so that I don’t ever forget again.

• Salt Water - 1.26 SG (always use a refractometer… for its price, it’s the best value for money of anything you’ll buy in this hobby).
• Water Temperature - I normally stay in the range of 79 to 80F.
• Live Sand - 1 lb per gallon. So 40 lbs of Live Sand for a 40 Gallon tank.
• Live Rock - 1.25 - 1.75 lb per gallon. This is based on density of Fiji rocks. If you get less dense rock (like Marshall Island rocks) then you might want less. If you buy from a reputable dealer, you can talk to them and they’ll factor in density differences. For this new tank, I bought rocks from Pacific East Aquaculture, and have been very happy with the quality of rocks and prices!
• Hermit Crabs - 1 hermit per 2 gallons. I prefer scarlet hermit crab, as I’ve personally found blues and reds to be too aggressive (attacking snails and other slow moving inhabitants).
• Snails - 1 snail per gallon. A variety of snails is good. I’ve traditionally gone for 10% as Ceriths, 15% Nassarius, 25% Trochus, 25% Margaritas & 25% Nerites. Astreas seem to be a staple of most aquariums, but I find them to be horribly lazy compared to these other snails.
• Other Clean Up Crew (CUC) - 1-2 Peppermint Shrimp (for Aiptasia), 1-2 Emerald Crab (for Bubble Algae), 1 Queen Conch per 10 gallons (to stir up the sand). If the tank is larger than 30 gallons, 1 sea cucumber per 30 gallons (to stir up the sand).
• Pump / Powerheads - Aim for a water turn over of 10 times per hour. So for a 40 Gallon tank, you’ll need pumps that do a total of 400 GPH. You will need more (~20 times the tank volume) for SPS.
• Lighting - “Watts per gallon” measurement is total crap. It’s all about PAR (Photosynthetically Active Radiation) which is the light that “feeds” your reef. As a general statement, normal flourescents (T12, PC, etc) is fine for fish, although you might need VHO or more lighting if you want to grow coralline (to get those colorful rocks) or LPS. You’ll need higher powered lighting (VHO, Metal Halide, T5-HO and more advanced lights) for Clams, Anemones and SPS.

I’m sure I’ll remember more as I get my tank setup… but that’s all that I’ve (re)discovered recently.

CommentSubscribe