spanner28 Posted January 16, 2004 Share Posted January 16, 2004 hi, can someone please answer some questions for me. i am thinking of setting up a nano reef and would like to know the following. how many watts of lighting would i need for a 12 inch deep 2ft 12 gallon tank? should i use live sand aswell as live rock or one or the other? whats the minimum amount of live rock i could get away with and could you get away with about 6 pounds of it ? would a red scooter blennie be suitable for this setup ? if i was to do this i would be running an external filter and would like to know if i would need a skimmer aswell or can that be sacrificed if regular water changes were to take place ? thanks Link to comment
caja Posted January 16, 2004 Share Posted January 16, 2004 Lots of people run 2x32 watt pc's over a 12, you go go with a 96 watt powerquad or even a 70 watt MH set up. Really depends on what kinds of corals you want to keep. LR for sure but you could go with bagged live sand or even a playsand like Southdown and let the LR seed the sand. Better still would be to add some cups of LS from others tanks to add biodiversity to your sandbed. 12 gallon tank, go with 15-20 pounds LR. No no no to the scooter blenny. They are voracious pod eaters and a newly set up nano does not have the established pod population that the scooter belnny needs. Skimmers are a personal choice really. I can't comment on that since I don't run one on either of my tanks. Link to comment
spanner28 Posted January 16, 2004 Author Share Posted January 16, 2004 so do you think it would be possible if using live sand to only use about 6 or 7 pounds of live rock. and also how long do you have to wait before you can put coral into a newly established tank. and thanks for the info on the blennie im new to this so info like that is really good cheers Link to comment
Tempest Posted January 16, 2004 Share Posted January 16, 2004 IMO sand is a nice addition to the rock, not a substitute. I've seen plenty of bare-bottom tanks with rock and no sand, but never sand with no rock. In a 12g tank you want at least 12 lbs of rock. As for when you can add corals... patience grasshopper. First let the tank cycle. This can take up to 6 weeks. Then slowly add corals so as not to overload your new system. Try and figure out what type of corals you would like and make sure that they are compatable and that you have places for them in the tank, the right lighting etc. Link to comment
spanner28 Posted January 16, 2004 Author Share Posted January 16, 2004 thanks for that. i was trying to do a setup like this on a budget but it works out to be quite expensive because of the live rock altho i dont doubt its capabilities. thanks for the info on corals i wasnt intending to do it straight away and was just looking for a kind of guide as to how long. looks like i will have to work out the cost of the other things i require and come up with a total cost as to how much the setup will come to. if i cant afford to do it at the moment then i will definately have to in the near future coz they look really good Link to comment
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