38 Gallon Nursery FOWLR

[rev138]

When my wife got pregnant with our son 3 1/2 years ago, I emptied out the "snake room" and sold off my eight snakes ( ) and renovated the room to be the baby's nursery. As part of it, I set up this 38 gal as a FOWLR tank with a custom built stand.

 

 

It's still going strong, and my son loves more and more as he gets older.

 

Current stocking list is:

• A pair of false percs (6+ years old)
• 1 banded coral shrimp
• 1 pencil urchin
• 1 reddish chocolate chip star
• 1 mexican turbo grazer snail
• 1 trochus snail (3 years old)
• 3 nassarius snails
• 1 mystery snail that was supposed to be a nassarius but isn't
• 1 electric blue hermit crab

Hardware:

• 38 gallon glass tank w/ blue painted back
• 1 20000K 18w fluorescent bulb in stock hood
• 1 small blue LED moon light
• 1 Rena XP1 canister filter w/ floss pad and LR rubble
• 1 Eheim 200W inline heater

I have to say, I think the inline heater is awesome. Since this tank is sumpless, I had no place to hide a heater in the display, and it keeps the water temperature VERY constant (to within .5F).

 

Because the tank was built for a child's room, I wanted to make very, very sure it couldn't be tipped over, so I sunk a pair of huge eye bolts into the back of the stand, another two into the wall behind it, and used some heavy duty zip ties to secure them together.

 

Here are some setup pics also:

 

 

[Blubbernaut]

That's a nice urchin you got there!

[PodRod]

Lets see a pic of that stand! I'm always looking for ideas. Great idea for the nursery btw ?

[rev138]

That's a nice urchin you got there!

 

Yeah. He's been there for about a year now. Doubled in size. He's my favorite inhabitant.

[PodRod]

Oh wait. You've got Perc's that are over 6 years old? Impressive

[rev138]

Lets see a pic of that stand! I'm always looking for ideas. Great idea for the nursery btw

 

Kid's asleep right now. I'll see what I can do tomorrow.

 

Oh wait. You've got Perc's that are over 6 years old? Impressive

 

Yep. I got them some time in 2006. First they lived in my BC14, then in a 20H I set up, and for the past 3 years, here. What's the typical lifespan?

[PodRod]

No idea. The carpet always gets mine eventually

[rev138]

Lets see a pic of that stand! I'm always looking for ideas. Great idea for the nursery btw

 

It's nothing to write home about, but here you go. I was renovating the room, so I had a bunch of beadboard and moulding left over, which is what I used to make the exterior. The colors were chosen to match the rest of the room. You can see the true color in the second pic, the first one came out weird because of the lighting. The tank has a stock FW flourescent canopy and hood, which I painted the same blue color.

 

 

[PodRod]

That is so perfect for a kids room. Love it!

[1.0reef]

Some live to 20-25yrs old!

[rev138]

New tank-mate. Hopefully he won't shorten those clowns' lives

 

[rev138]

Well, the lion killed the shrimp within a few days, and last night the star ate the turbo, so I crossed a few things off the stocking list

[Fish_Bagger]

Our True Percula just died at the shop, it was 15 years old. I know there are some still around that are 25-26 years old.

[chironerd21]

keep up with the water changes... if you are lucky and get the lion eating it will be a messy tank. the canister filter wont be enough. maybe time to invest in a nano skimmer.

[rev138]

The lion eats just fine. I feed him silversides or mysis daily, plus pellets for the clowns. It's been a month, and everything is holding up fine. I do weekly 3 gallon water changes. The canister is plenty, evidently.

[rev138]

Sad news: I did a water change on Sunday, and somehow I must have jostled the heater because the dial was turned all the way up to ~90F. The lion and the urchin are both dead, everything else made it through. I'm pretty upset about it, especially because I have to explain to my two year old where his fish went.