How did you discover nano reef keeping, and how did you get started? Was it Nano-Reef.com, a friend, or a local fish store? What was hard about getting started? What would you have done differently?

I first discovered nano reefing by seeing the tank of another aquarist on a different forum. I was blown away by the colors and diversity and felt that FW was not going to 'hold me' over time. What pushed me over the edge was seeing a setup JBJ NC 12G, obviously well placed near the register of a large lfs near me. I had to stare at the tank to determine if that fluorescent green was real or plastic (was an open brain and REAL).

I got started by reading for weeks here and decided on going with the NC but a 24 gallon since I thought it would hold a larger volume and be more stable. Purchased mine over Ebay after reading here, Paletta's book, Kurtz's book and fortunately, someone here picked me up as a lost wondering soul and became my guru. Credit goes to him..Trekbear and a single early helpful post by Slaeyer.

The hardest part about getting started was NOT getting started. That is, acquiring the information necessary prior to setup and having to stare at the big, colorful box containing an acquarium sitting on my living room floor with a reef picture on the side. After that, I think that learning to make 'interventions/decisions/ on your own with a tank science that seemed alien was very difficult. A bout with cyanobacteria was the greatest challenge. Most frustrating was seeing the photos of tanks by Tighaboy, Mikeguerrero, etc while I had a 'pile of rocks' in mine.

I"m sad to say that the main thing I would have done differently now is.....that...I would not have purchased a JBJ Nano Cube. My tank has a latent hairline crack which has me in limbo. The idea and design were brilliant, but, I think the engineering was lacking. In retrospect, I would have chosen an Oceanic 30G which probably stretches the true definition of a nano tank. It would have provided more room for livestock and more flexibility with design. However, the main 'flaw' that I was unaware of with the NC, that is, that it came with stock lighting, provided me with the best challenge.....to setup a tank under those conditions and also to provide help to others in setting up theirs. Am I really a reef tank owner now??? SH

My uncle got me into the hobby.After seing his 3 Reefs at his house ans his Pico at work I just knew I wanted one.
We started talking and that was really it, he got me my first setup for my birthday a 2.5 Gall,Filter,LR,LS,the works and he pretty much set me up from there and I just loved the Hobby instantl Plus I like stuff like this.

I was always told marine tanks under 30 gallons are a "no no", then NR.com stumbled into my life and the rest is history.

IMO, the hardest part of beginning this hobby was getting a grip on my water parameters, and knowing the right equipment to buy.

I was keeping a nano for years and didn't even know it. I had a 30g FOWDC (fish only w/ dead coral) and a 10g hex FOWDC. Had such problems w/ the 30g that we changed it to FW. This was back in the days of using UG filters though.

Decided to re-do the 10g several years ago and this time did it w/ sand, LR and better lights. Doing a nano & didn't even know it! Then earlier this year (March) the 10g started leaking at the bottom and we decided to replace it w/ a 24g NanoCube. The Cube is in our living room and after I got it set up I was doing a search for Nano Cube and came across Nanoreef.com. That's when I found out I had been nanoing for years!

Now we have a nice Cube and have learned a lot from all the good posts on NR. Plus we have a 2.5 MB that is looking good too.

The hard part about getting started was having patience!

just google..it was an accident. a very good one

saw a nano cube in a LFS and googled nano cube. learned all about it =)

Heard about it, but then was linked to Liquid's 2.5g which deffinately piqued my interest. Read the rest of the forum and that was it.

Been keeping cichlids for a while in a 4ft tank, didnt want to ditch em, and had a spare 50litre tank, so wanted to try my hand at marine.

Everyone (lfs) told me a 50 litre tank was too small to try marine fish, but I knew that I could do it, so I googled for a few hours, came across your site and thought "I wanna give this a go"

Your site gave me the knowledge and confidence to start out!

So I did.

One of my roommates started up a 10g nano about two years ago. I watched him get it set up and running, read these forums for a few months, then gave my semi-retarded goldfish to my nephew and converted my tank to SW. I hate goldfish now.

The only thing I would change about my tank is the size. I like my tank, but I just have very little room for livestock. I'd feel wrong dumping a fish, even a small perching goby, into my tank.

I have always loved aquatic life, and finally figured about a year ago that I was going to be in the same place long enough to look into an aquarium. I knew I wanted saltwater, and so I just started googling. I was amazed by "mini-reef" sites I found, even though those were hundreds of gallons. At some point either I or my girlfriend stumbled on nano-reef, which had so much information in terms of posts, links, and basic terminology that I was able to research enough to know what not to do. I live in New York City, so I didn't really have the option of a large tank; I bought a JBJ 12 DX in late October of 2004, and have been through all of the trials a first-year aquarists has to weather. My system is still up, my livestock is still healthy, and my corals are growing. I'm hooked.

I always wanted to start my own saltwater tank. I love the idea of creating an ocean in my room. But i couldnt really start one because its pretty expensive. Until I saw my friend's 2 foot tank. I was like wow..
I am still new here havent actually bought a tank yet.. Doing reseach and getting more information..

Still wondering what size I want.. Probably will go less than 2 feet probably a small 7 gallon tank to test the waters.

Stumble into nano-reef will googling.. I really love this forum and I find that the information here is good, tested and proven.. Will be bugging the pros here alot..

guy at lfs, through casual conversation, really demystified alot of the issues with me. after that went straight home and started googling. 5months late started first tank. still learning, of course

I've had FW tanks for a couple decades and I've always thought SW tanks were beautiful. I was telling my wife a couple years back that I'd like to get a saltwater tank and bless her heart she got me a 10G tank a couple years ago so I could set up a saltwater tank. I immediately got online and did a search on google and stumbled across this site. Been a member ever since because of the amazing stuff that I saw here.

Go '03!

1 word "steelhealr"


I find it ironic that he was the first to respond to this question as I am sure he has sparked quite a few SW people. I know I saw his famous post at a different forum and read the entire thing in April or May. I, like many others thought a small SW tank was impossible. However after alot of reading and bugging the crap out of him I started my own 6g NC which I bought when the competition started. It's kicking butt now I love it. Unfortunately it has caused FW deglect almost because everyday I see something new in the tank. I have 8-9 FW tanks ranging from 2g to 75g. I am actually starting a pico now. It has been very rewarding over the past 6 months. I have watched my tank bloom, and my wallet empty

Wow.. isn’t it amazing how Google has transformed the way we search for info? I would have made many more mistakes if it weren’t for Google and forum sites like this.

I wanted to go from fresh to salt for years. One day I was talking to someone at Petco of all places and she said that 55gal was the minimum. I, of course, didn’t believe her and began a ton of researching and setup my first tank shortly thereafter.

I think the advice I would give is know how much this is going to cost to do properly and spend the extra $$ up front to get good equipment. Good equipment will save you money in the long run and make the transition to the hobby far more enjoyable. A nice reef tank is going to inevitably be a shock to your wallet but HEY do you want an expensive new TV or a reef to look at? I choose cheap TV + new reef.

i came across a NC in my LFS..... liked the way it looked so i went home and looked it up the rest is history

I was searching for nano cube because I ordered one on line from premium aquatics after seeing it in aquarium fish magazine. I could not believe what little information was sent on set up and wanted to ask what was up with that. I saw this sight then read Steelhealrs post took days it was in July so pretty big by then. Started set up 07/18/05 going very slow still learning a lot here and lovin it. Thanks

always had FW tanks. got a job, started researching, and visited Nano-Reef.com. the rest is history...now if i could just convince people im not crazy...

How about all of the above? seriously Ive always been surronded by saltwater in some form or another.
AS for it being hard, not really you just got to research, research, think for a while,research, and then check your wallet. I wouldnt do anything differently if I could.

Got into fw after seeing my friends 90g planted. He introduced me to Petfish.net. Then i saw a post in the sw section in the petfish forums and foudn a link to mini-bow.com. After that i foudn a post about nano-reef.com. After seeing some beautiful 10g setups, i knew i had to make the cross over to the salty side. VIVA NANO-REEFING!

NanoReef.com, it showed me how a small tank can look great.

started out with a 12g eclipse as a fowlr. figured out that even with the stock lighting i could put some corals in the tank and they would thrive. was told by all lfs that i couldn't do a reef tank smaller than 55g. that irritated me and made me want to prove them wrong.

decided to search for some information and came across n-r.com and daveESPI, crakeur, tiny, seamountain, etc. they were always a handful but i learned a lot from them all. mainly, not to ask a question without searching...which, btw, seems to be a point well overlooked by current newbies.

as for the originator of nano-reefing, in general, i think i'll have to say that sloreefer started it...right, eric?

Had a friend with a 15 gallon and I wanted one of my own. wish it would not have took so long to find nr as it pushed me into the hobby and got me learning where I kept messing up.

Caught a 3" trigger in a tide pool. Put him in an uncycled 3 gallon tank. Looking for info about him and stumbled on another reef forum after a google.com search. Read a little and put him back in the ocean the next day

Learned a bit about reefs and started cooking up ways I might be able to have one. Most people suggested getting one 40+ gallons, but I'm in college and having one that big isn't allowed, my LL said hell no. About 10 gallons was supposed to be my max, I got a 20 gallon but I figure after live rock and :cough: fish volume it might go down to about 10 gallons

I'm just starting off, and I just got my tank less then a week ago, but it's coming along and I have a lot to thank NR and all the great people here for it.

Only got one blurry pic of the little guy (remember 3 gallon tank)


Ahhh the memories

was told by my lfs that anything under 50 gallons was imposible so i had to prove them wrong fond this site then went back and made a huge seen when they told my little brother theyd give him a 2 dollor credit on a fish he bought from them less than a week before. chased off a couple of people two served them right though

I was looking for a "nano protien skimmer" for my NC 12. Found this and read Undrtheradar's wetworx thread. Took a few days to join but I'm looking around almost every day now.

Thanks to my wife! In 2001, then my wife was a girlfriend, I wanted to setup a reef tank but she was very much againt it. So i needed to find a reef tank that could ft on the shelf of my closet, and biggest tank I could get for that was Eclipse 6. Then rest is history!

I discovered nano reefkeeping thru the magazine 'CORAL' Vol1 Issue 2.Superb articles & photos! Also in this months 'Practical Fishkeeping', a Uk magazine, there is another good article. I have written to the editor asking for further details from the author. (he mentions this website as a good source of info!)
I currently do not have a'nano reef' but 60 litre marine tank with a small picasso trigger, 2 clowns, and an iris wrasse. and one lone hermit! The tank has been going for some time now.
i am still exploring the possibilties of setting up a nano reef tank so would be pleased to hear from members particularly any in the UK.
We do not seem to have the availability of 'kit' that you have in the USA..still looking! Dave

I have been scuba diving for over 26 years and always loved the Ocean. I have been all over the world from the Gulf, Mediterranean, Atlantic, Pacific, Red Sea, Carribbean & Indian Ocean in Africa. I have logged well over 160 dives, but only do recreational diving and seldom go below 100ft.

In the last few years, I have not been able to do as much diving. Last year, I went last year off the Florida panhandle, but that is not very good diving.

So I decided if I cannot get to a reef as much as I want, I'll bring the reef home.

I researched extensively on the internet and found nano-reef.com. I read a lot of threads and decided to buy a 24g nanocube. Now I am addicted and officially a reefgeek....

Was looking into getting a 90+ gallon tank. Was searching online and found Reefcentral's tank of the month page. I saw a picture of a 29 gallon tank and was astonished..... At that point it was over.... I could afford my little race car and a saltwater tank....

Next week went out and picked up my wife a 12 Nano. A month or so later ordered a 32 gallon m-tank, which is still cycling. Wife is already talking about setting up another 2-3 90 to 250 gallon saltwater tanks once we move. Of course, I want to try a pico later.....

I always like saltwater tanks but always assumed they were too expensive and hard to keep. Then I got a new job where all my coworkers had tanks and they told me it wasn't as hard and expensive as I believed. I did some searching online and found this place and now I'm horribly addicted. I can't stop thinking of new tank ideas, upgrading to a bigger better setup, etc but I absolutely love it.

Me too!

right here!! and in 2001!! i'm an original.. by the way, i just looked up my old posts and want everyone who may have read them to know that i'm no longer a drunken idiot... just an idiot.. thanks

I originally bought 2 12g Nano Cubes as temporary tanks for my South American cichlids. I was planning on setting up a 75g high-tech planted dwarf cichlid setup, but since I was newly married and just getting settled, I figured the 2 Nano Cubes would tide me over until I had the time to set up the 75.

Well... as luck would have it.. I saw a beautiful Nano Cube set up at an LFS as a mini reef. I was so captivated by that little tank, and I knew that someday, I wanted to do that! I kept my FW Nano Cubes going for another year, until I had a major crash with one of them about two months ago. After some thought, I decided to convert it to a reef. But when I read about all the cracking issues, I bit the bullet and upgraded my plans to a 37g reef, which I'm in the process of starting now.

As for finding Nano-Reef.com? Just a lucky accident while searcing for Nano Cube in google.

Liquid's 2.5

started with a pico 2.5.Wish i went straight to a larger tank with MH from the get go.

I had freshwater fish tanks for years and then decided to go into saltwater fishtanks..I had a 75 , and 20 gallon fish only up and running and then sold them and decided to go into reef tanks cause they were so interesting.. In 1982 I set up a 10 gallon reef tank , even tho I was told it was impossible by the local LFS..and every other LFS for that matter..Back then the only lighting I could put over it was a double flourescent which totalled 30 watts.. but the tank did fairly well . I only had mushrooms and pollups in it tho..and one clown fish.. I did weekly water changes of 1 gallon. I had that tank for 5 yrs before going bigger and bigger and then smaller again..It was funny to return to the local LFS every once in awhile to get something and tell them about the 10 gallon tank and just watch them scratch their heads .....They all said it was impossible ...but I had proof that it wasn't.... That was before anyone even coined the phrase "Nano Tank" Anyway I have been hooked ever since ....

Current Tanks:
18 gal Via Aqua 80 watt Orbit
6 gal Eclipse 26 Watts
2.5 gal MB 20 watts
2.7gal Lighthouse Pico 26 watts
10 gal AGA 70 watt MH

This site.
My friend
My freshwater systems
My addition to anything with fish and or water

My daughter want a Nemo and my wife said no to big saltwater tank. Got a 20 gallon long and pop a clownfish in and started everything.

about 5 years ago my friend was setting up a 55 gal hex the lfs had a minibow setup as a nano reef and I had to have one a couple of years later I wandered into a lfs and came out with a small tank and big plans

Probably from my visits to my LFS, they always have some lovely displays. I started out with fresh, then I went to FO saltwater (I always viewed the corals as some sort of 'expert' animal that wasn't even close to my leauge), then I got a nano reef that the store help me set up, which was a disaster the 1st time because I was ignorant. Now I have a better knowledge about the care, but I still have algae

I honestly can't remember... But I do remember that what really made me get into this was seeing a photo of a xenia tank. It was the coolest thing ever, then I started a 15G and kept expanding.

P.S. This hobby is like crack, make my thousands of dollars come back!

I walked into LFS and was looking at their amazing tanks. And sitting on the little desk space where the fish gals do their work at was a 2.5g nano with two neon gobies, snails and a shrimp. I knew nothing of the Reefing concept, but i was just blown away by having something so small and so full of life. Everything i had read in the past had said you got to have big tanks to have saltwater. Now i am getting a 29g tank to give my danios a bit more room to swim. I am eyeballing the 10G seriously as a nano. I am also reading everything i can from you guys.

Hello. I`ve got a four foot freshwater and in a mag i get there was an article about nano`s loved them, so Im looking for info about them, I hope my tank will look as good as any of the ones i`ve seen. The measurements are in U.S gallons are they. Any tips on best equipment would be very handy

Well i have always loved salwater tanks, but what really got me hooked was i was just finding info about clownfish and i stumbled across stealhair's 24g nanocube discussion and this website. I have been hooked for about a month now. I am planning stage of a mini bow 7gallon still doing research and finidng out information(as to stealhair's suggestion) im doing this as much as possible before i start...aslo saving up money! hopefully in about a month and a half im going to start it up

Well my first tank came in the form of a glass bowl and a beta, then a 1 gal hex with an under gravel filter and light (my beta was totally tricked out) and well after eight ten gal tanks and a 55 and a tricked out beta in the summer of '01 I was on a quest to bonsai every thing (unfortunately my underwear came under that quest too. bad memories! bad memories!) So I googled "bonsai tanks" and I strangely got results for "Bonsai reef tanks" I was totally flabbergasted. and not much later my beta jumped the gun and I saw an opportunity. In that little 1 gal hex I managed to have two hermits and some mushrooms for about 2yrs. That’s about the time when I found this website. And I saw all the cool ten gal tanks and I figured " heck I can do that too" However when I up graded one of my 10gal I failed to invest in proper equipment as well as lighting and lost my mushrooms and one of my hermits. So I gave up reef keeping except for my 55 (which got converted into a FOWLER) and went to the books to try to figure out why my reef tank crashed. To make a long story short my 55 (ONI BUCCA the dragon wrasse) and got better lights (but still not good enough) and I’m now constantly pushing the envelope of traditional SW fish keeping (which I don’t recommend unless you can accept a lot of loss)
So what would I do different? Well ask for MH lights every x-mas until I got them. Other than that I’d change nothing. My mistakes got me where I am as a person and as a livid fish enthusiast. and that little1gal hex is a Pico sitting next to the TV and guess which one gets stared at more? THE PICO!!!




Oh I forgot I got this little $5 zoo who managed survived every thing and well now every week there is a new polyp, This is an old picture now it's at least doubled Click to view attachment

i went into petco...love the bettas...but then my bros gf encouraged me to get a betta six months later i have a 12g SW tank almost going to get a 24g ticked out jbj NC DX 2006

a fellow NRer posted pics of his nano set up on a cichlid forum and i decided to check this site out. i'm now planning my first reef 40br w/ 30g sump. the rest is history. i was always curious of SW set ups but thought they were too expensive(i was right). but after much reading and many questions later i decided it could be done. thanks NR. QUE VIVA NR!

I followed SW right after FW. My cousin had a african cichlid tank, and I was hooked. When I took a visit to a LFS I saw all of these SW fish. As far as I knew I didn't think any place sold SW fish. Once I went in there I was really hooked. It became sorta my crack.

After seeing a FO marine tank that belongs to a guy I work with I stopped by a lfs to look into what it would take to turn a 55 gal fresh water tank that he had into a marine fish tank, I came home with with a 12 gallon dx, salt, test kit, bag full of chemicals, premix water, and some live sand. Don't regret starting the hobby but wisht I'd found this site before I bought that Nano Cube.