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First video of my tank...


Gromet

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To give you an idea for stocking, my 29G Biocube, which is only slightly larger than your tank, holds the following inhabitants:

 

  • Pair of Ocellaris Clownfish
  • Blue Spotted Jawfish
  • Banggai Cardinal Fish

 

That's four fish, and I may add a fifth, but that would be the absolute limit. Keep in mind, that I monitor my nitrates, and I never see any nitrates in my tests. I also run Chemi-Pure Elite, Purigen, and grow Chaeto in the back of the tank, which helps keep the nitrates down.

 

And last but not least, I added my fish over a period of several months, if you don't do this, you will shock your system with a spike of nutrients and potentially kill all of your fish and inhabitants.

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One thing I have learned (the hard way I might add) is that what you as a noob (In the kindest sense of the word) can succesfully keep and what someone like Glennr for instance can keep are two different things. You learn over time what works for you and how dedicated you actually are to doing the maintenance that is required to keep a heavily stocked tank. With what you have no doubt spent on those fish you could buy extra equipment that will allow you to build up to having a thriving heavily stocked tank. I.e small skimmer, ato, fuge or even a small sump. IMO

 

P.s. you are going to be in the same boat with the wifes tank. Pp puffers get huge and a sea goblin needs a vast sand bed to cruise. Research research research!

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Please take the seahorse and everything else but the clowns and goby out! What are you currently feeding it?

 

 

the tank is pretty much brand new, it would probably be a good idea to take all of the fish back.

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TriggerHappyDude

I will admit, I made mistakes back in the mid-90's, had a 55 gallon aquarium with all kinds of wrong stock in there, and killed many nice fish...of course back then if we'd had the internet like we do today, I would not have done a lot of what I did, but this guy's stock tank reminds me of what I did back then. I saw a cool fish I wanted, I bought it. And some of my decisions were way worse than what you have here! So I'm guilty too, and proud to say I've learned my lessons.

 

People on here have been great, the advice is solid, and opinions are opinionated, but its good advice still.

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Sorry for being a little rough, Gromet.. I am a mean drunk.

 

Anyways, you should absolutely remove the batfish. It has no business in your tank the size it is now. Also, your blue tang should not be in there either, but it is quite small at the moment and won't cause any serious issues. If you remove the batfish and the blue tang, I don't see any extreme overstocking problems with your tank.. Except for the bioload issues. The best thing for you to do right now is find another tank or a friend that will take these fish if your tank starts to crash, which it likely will. It seems like you added alot of fish in a relatively short period of time. They will be fine for maybe a week.. But your water will cloud up and your fish will start to die. Make sure you take care of the situation before this happens..

 

Secondly, your puffer MUST be removed from your wifes tank. Pufferfish like that require a minimum of 75 galons, and that is even small. It will be fine for a while, but in a few weeks it will likely get stressed and release toxins in the tank.. It will be dead before you know what happened, I can guarnatee it.

 

Also, your wifes tank has not cycled yet. It doesn't matter what magical product you purchased, you absolutely can NOT skip a cycle. Your puffer will not live past the first stage of your cycle. If you trust your product, take your livestock out and cycle the tank before adding livestock. It is very narrow minded to think that you can create a functioning ocean ecosystem in a day.

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supreme_spork
lgreen's Ultimate Guide to Nano Fish helped me out a lot. It's not a set in stone list but it's a great place to start to get an idea of what you want to do. Hopefully nobody posted it already.

 

^^

 

This is an excellent guide -- it's not perfect, but it's far better than most of what's out there.

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NanoReefNovice

I couldn't even read this!!! I got to his response post and got so angry that i had to post this and leave. :angry: :angry: :angry:

 

Im so sad for his tank inhabitants :tears:.

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lakshwadeep

My thoughts on fish stocking:

 

1) Know the maximum adult size of a fish, and assume that you will keep it in the first tank you are putting it in. If you feel it cannot fit inside the tank as an adult, wait until you have a larger tank, or put it in the larger tank. The justification of "when it gets bigger, I'll have a larger tank" is a perfect opportunity to make an excuse for a fish that you're not prepared to keep.

 

2) With the maximum size of the fish in hand, research about how active the fish is (i.e. open water swimmers need a lot of space). Also, research territory issues (clowns live only in their anemones, shrimp gobies rarely stray from burrows, and angels/tangs have large territories).

 

3) For any tank, there is a range of the total number of fish that is generally acceptable. The high end of the range assumes you have small fish (meaning smaller than an ocellaris clown). The low end assumes you have a mix of medium and small fish. Large fish for nanos includes most fish available in LFSs.

 

4) If anything, think about the proportions of the tank. A 6" tang doesn't look so out of the ordinary in a 55 gallon tank, but it looks monstrous in a nano reef. Also, there are hidden proportions in the bioload of a tank. Adding one more small fish to a nano is a much larger percentage than adding the same small fish to a 55 gallon tank.

 

5) Fit the tank to the fish/livestock you want, not the other way around.

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So our daughter was doing her nightly reading for school when I called her over after she was done and showed her the video. She started to laugh at what a bad set up you have. I didn't say a word to her and just asked her what she thought. This is word for for word of what she said " The bat fish is going to die. The Tang is going to die. The seahorse is going to die. The puffer is to big and going to die." Take the advice of a 9 year old and take the fish back. We are not trying to mean but it is not good plan to buy fish in the hopes of putting them in a bigger tank later. You really should think your choices out. Go back to your fish store ask them if you have a 24 gallon could you put all of these fish in. Just call a random fish store and ask them if it would be OK to have all of this. I have $20 on they say NO WAY!

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Gromet,

 

Learning the balance of a tank takes time. That is why you add slowly. The batfish isn't the only problem fish, the tang is a POOP FACTORY!.

 

I suggest taking back the bat, the tang, and the seahorse and using that to do some upgrades that will allow you to run a tank that will only need to consider swimming room and not bioload when adding fish. To do this make sure you have enough live rock that has cultured bacteria. Use some purigen and chemi-pure. And have a working protein skimmer.

 

Spanks

 

Actually... I did some upgrades in the very beginning. I am running a Sapphire Aquatics Protein Skimmer, I use Purigen in the right chamber and Chemi-Pure Elite in the left chamber. I have a hydor flo deflector instead of the locline and a Koralia Nano powerhead...

 

Gromet

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Did you take some of the fish back yet?

 

No, I think I'm going to stick with the advice of my buddy who has been fish/reefing for over 30 years. Someone whos results I can see and I know, knows what he is doing...

 

Gromet

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No, I think I'm going to stick with the advice of my buddy who has been fish/reefing for over 30 years. Someone whos results I can see and I know, knows what he is doing...

 

Gromet

 

Successfully? If he's got a tank anything like yours, I can't imagine how.

 

Also, IBT :lockdown: This thread is full of fail.

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supreme_spork
No, I think I'm going to stick with the advice of my buddy who has been fish/reefing for over 30 years. Someone whos results I can see and I know, knows what he is doing...

 

Gromet

 

Why are you here, exactly?

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Dude, seriously. Be a man and admit you made a mistake. We won't come down hard on you (well I won't anyways) and it you will save the lives of your fish in the long run.

 

If you want to fix things, we are all happy to give you advice without being dicks about it. If you are too stubborn to admit your mistake and let us help you out, things won't go well for you in this hobby. I screwed up multiple times (just check my threads) but I admited my mistakes and took the advice given to me. You aren't owning up to your mistake yet because you don't see any problems yet.. which you wouldn't. Give it a few weeks and you will start seeing huge problems. It is not fun watching your fish suffer and slowly choke to death because of high ammonia and nitrites.

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Hmm... These threads excite me...

 

Gromet, I've been the op of a thread like this (unrelated to reefing, but committing a huge noob mistake anyways) and this thread is actually looking pretty tame...

 

So I don't really feel like telling you what to do... As an adult I say you should do what you feel is best. I also commend your attempts at doing research, and I can tell you with assurance that not everyone here on nano-reef.com knows what they are talking about. I can also, however, tell you that there are quite a few people here who DO know what they are talking about and they have proven it over years of successful reefkeeping. I'm sure that both types have posted here today.

 

Well, at the very least I would suggest that you carefully consider what decisions you make with regards to your tank. One thing stands true, and that is that hasty decisions often give bad results. In fact, netting these fish and taking them on yet another trip in the car in such a short period of time could make them worse off. At the very least I would let them alone for a few days. I would also keep a very very close eye on all of the inhabitants and look for any signs of stress or weakness. At the first sign I would suggest being prepared to deal with the pufferfish. To help your cycle out though, do you think your buddy would allow you to have a few pieces of established LR, a handful of sand, and some tank water from a water change? This could reduce the effects of the cycle by giving you a bacterial "boost", just make sure there is plenty of flow to let the bacteria do it's job...

 

In any case, I'm sure you're aware that the vast majority of saltwater fish are wild caught rather than captive-bred as with many FW fish. I just say this because sometimes we tend to think of them in terms of $$. So if we have a lot of $$ we can get a lot of fish, and if one dies I can get another without much effort. The problem with that is while ornamental reef fish are a "renewable" resource, there are instances where the collection of fish has harmed the reefs and thus the "renewable" aspect of the resource becomes compromised.

 

Good luck. (Also, take some pics of your buddy's tank! Not for any other reason than to just see it... I like pictures...) And keep us updated, okay?

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