New to reefing not new to freshwater.

[DSFIRSTSLTWATER]

3 minutes ago, paulsz said:

to be honest, you may be jumping things too quickly. One thing i'll tell you is take things slow. If you have a plan of a setup and  list of fish/inverts in mind, make a list on paper. And slowly you can add things. To start,  have your live rock and some floss. You can add carbon once a month if you want, but there's no need to have it running constantly. The scrubber can come later. No need to dose nitrates and phosphates if your tank is going to produce them naturally. You're going to want to test for them...

 

Remember, this is not like freshwater at all. The only thing that is similar between the two is the nitrogen cycle. After that, it's a completely different ball game. 

 

By posting messages one after the other, we are going to have trouble following along and helping you. Try making your replies one message altogether. And it also seems like you've already made up your mind on fish. Even though me and Murphych said it was too much fish, you seem to thing it is fine. So there's not much we can do to help you there...

 

Good luck! 🙂 and if i can recommend, read some of the articles on nano reef before starting anything: https://www.nano-reef.com/articles/beginners/

 

And again, take things slow! Too fast is only asking for trouble, trust me. And i'm sure others can testify to that!

 

 

I wish i could like this 100000 times.. 

Couldn't have said it better myself. 

@Noahlikesfish please go slow. Nothing happens fast in this hobby. 

Also, you need to do much more research before you start. 

[Tamberav]

He already has two threads on R2R where people told him not to do it and he basically came here to try and get different answers I guess?

 

You are going to find the same advise anywhere you go. The care for the animals does not change. 

[DSFIRSTSLTWATER]

2 minutes ago, Tamberav said:

He already has two threads on R2R where people told him not to do it and he basically came here to try and get different answers I guess?

 

You are going to find the same advise anywhere you go. The care for the animals does not change. 

Well hope he listens. Things in saltwater are getting harder to get and more expensive. Hopefully people treat this with respect before we can't get anything anymore 😕

[Noahlikesfish]

Ok but I will need phosphate b/c tanks don’t make phosphate right? I am thinking of doing mud b/c I don’t want a ULNS tank I wanna just have mainly macros and softies which need higher nutrients and I also wanna have a algae scrubber or a very coarse sponge to grow pods

[Noahlikesfish]

Some idiots in California are going to kill all the reefs b/c they are dumping kelp into the ocean to ‘remove co2’ and it is gonna make like 99999x more co2 from the decomposing kelp

[Tamberav]

44 minutes ago, Noahlikesfish said:

Ok but I will need phosphate b/c tanks don’t make phosphate right? I am thinking of doing mud b/c I don’t want a ULNS tank I wanna just have mainly macros and softies which need higher nutrients and I also wanna have a algae scrubber or a very coarse sponge to grow pods

Tanks make phosphate. The food you feed fish is full of it and stuff dies which decomposes. 
 

Since you want to fill the tank with lots of rock and pots and all sorts of stuff.. it can impede flow and likely have debris build up which will likely create nutrients. Keep in mind pest algae can put compete nice macros and grow on them and smother them and the tank can turn into a real 💩 show if not done properly. 

 

If you take a look at macro tanks they still have good flow and proper maintenance and shocking levels of fish. Yes most dose po4 and no3 which means testing. 
 

This is the list of what they dose:

• ESV Alkalinity/Calcium/Magnesium (Daily)
• Microbacter7 (Daily)
• ChaetoGro (Daily)
• Phosphate - Green Leaf Aquarium KH2PO4 dry fertilizer (Daily)
• Nitrate - Green Leaf Aquarium KNO3 dry fertilizer (Weekly or as needed)
• Ferrion (Weekly)
   

 

I love macro tanks but don’t run one currently as I find them to be demanding if you keep a truly diverse and amazing display. More so then corals. 

 

 

[Noahlikesfish]

Can I just do this exactly and then if it’s too much or too little adjust it. The tests I’m looking at are super expensive, I can use a fw master test that I own or I could get strips 

[Noahlikesfish]

Could I do a pair of clowns a mandarin the blenny then a hawk?

[Noahlikesfish]

I like this tank 

 I am going to try combining both tanks and make a layout similar with mostly macro on one side coral on the other with a opening where things like bottles and other ‘trash’ collects for hiding places for fish. Then I will have like lps softies and gorgs. I might even do a couple EASY acros for realism after I advance 

Are there any kinds of warm water dwarf sculpins?

[Clown79]

In a 20g you are looking at 4 small fish max.

 

So if you want 2 clowns(percula or ocellaris only in this size) you can add 1 maybe 2 very small fish.

 

The more fish you have, the more waste,the more waste, the more nutrients- all equal the need for waterchanges.

 

The more rock you have, the less flow that can get to areas of the tank, which leads to detritus abd decaying matter.

 

Freshwater and saltwater are nothing alike beside there is water and fish. Thats where similarities end. 

 

I highly advise doing a ton of research because what you want and what needs to be done is completely different. 

 

I liked doing waterchanges every week, my tanks didn't like it or need it but they required a waterchange every 2 weeks.

 

I hated dosing but my tank needed daily dosing.

 

What we plan to do in this hobby is rarely what happens.

 

You can use carbon regularly but in sw its better to use smaller quantities and changed every 2 weeks.

 

 

[Clown79]

8 minutes ago, Noahlikesfish said:

I like this tank 

 I am going to try combining both tanks and make a layout similar with mostly macro on one side coral on the other with a opening where things like bottles and other ‘trash’ collects for hiding places for fish. Then I will have like lps softies and gorgs. I might even do a couple EASY acros for realism after I advance 

Are there any kinds of warm water dwarf sculpins?

If you want lps and sps, you need a better light than 6500k flood lights, you will eventually need to dose and test your parameters regularly

[Tamberav]

2 hours ago, Noahlikesfish said:

I like this tank 

 I am going to try combining both tanks and make a layout similar with mostly macro on one side coral on the other with a opening where things like bottles and other ‘trash’ collects for hiding places for fish. Then I will have like lps softies and gorgs. I might even do a couple EASY acros for realism after I advance 

Are there any kinds of warm water dwarf sculpins?

Don’t believe any sculpins are commercially available. 
 

Be sure to have a lid.

 

Mandarins are advanced and a captive bred one which will arguably increase success of keeping one will set you back around $100. Buying pods is expensive and out of your budget. Culturing them probably requires more money to spend and permission from you parents for more things to hold water. 

 

Test strips are not good enough. 
 

The main ones I would suggest see a GOOD kit like salifert or Red Sea for Alk, No3 and PO4. Don’t bother with pH and Mg and Ca right now. They are less important if you do regular water changes. You dose 2 part off alk anyways. 

 

 

[Noahlikesfish]

I talked to a guy with a 50 year tank, he said to not dose if I’m using good real live rock and I am using crushed coral 

[Noahlikesfish]

My stocking I think Rn is 2 bicintus clown a tiger watchman because they look awesome then a mid swimmer or blenny and then a mandarin or small hawk (falco or dwarf anthias hawk fish thing) or wasp fish. 1st the mid swimmer mabye the clowns. Bicintus are in clarkii complex but seem a lot less aggressive. 

[Noahlikesfish]

Ik I’d have to trade some of the fish as they grow

[Noahlikesfish]

Also I have thought of a extremely smart way to wean fish off of pods and stuff and it works in fw too. What u do is slowly increase salt in daphnia, like mabye 5 ppm. Weaken it each time u feed make it weaker and weaker until the fish actually eats dead daphnia. Then try feeding it frozen and if it eats that try giving pellets or flake If u want

[Noahlikesfish]

You need daphnia culture but it could work b/c you need enough daphnia to weaken it very gradually and once the daphnia are now dead from the salinity level, the fish  just associate the round red ball (dead daphnia) as food (a round red ball be golden Pearl or pellet) 

Doing this alongside the controversial starve method could easily wean micropredators and things off live 

[Tamberav]

1 hour ago, Noahlikesfish said:

My stocking I think Rn is 2 bicintus clown a tiger watchman because they look awesome then a mid swimmer or blenny and then a mandarin or small hawk (falco or dwarf anthias hawk fish thing) or wasp fish. 1st the mid swimmer mabye the clowns. Bicintus are in clarkii complex but seem a lot less aggressive. 

Tiger watchmen gobies are sand sifters and don't belong in nanos no matter how awesome they look.

 

You can just buy live brine shrimp... mandarins will take these but it is not good to be the only source of food. They should get multiple feedings if you are not using pods and you said you vacation a lot. So how will that work?

 

Your tank is not 100 gallons or 50 years old. He also uses water direct from the ocean to do water changes. I doubt this is something you can do. 

 

 

 

 

[Noahlikesfish]

I’m probably not gonna do a mandarin yet. I am still trying to work stuff out. I’m gonna talk to my friend for a while, he says that I could do more tiny fish and I realized how big a tiny fish was and tiny dosent seem super tiny 

I like tomato clown gudgeon dart fish and Pygmy geometric hawk fish (anthias) and also green spot watchman goby. I will add a couple tiny tiny fish too then lots of inverts 

[blasterman]

On 5/4/2021 at 11:44 AM, Tamberav said:

He already has two threads on R2R where people told him not to do it and he basically came here to try and get different answers I guess?

 

You are going to find the same advise anywhere you go. The care for the animals does not change. 

If I recall the thread on R2R he was told to use biowheels and other nonsense. Also the usual acropora goose stepping because how dare he set up a tank without acropora as a goal.  Filtering through the noise over there is maddening. 

 

Dose iodine  ...keep nutrients...slightly elevated and stable and done.

 

Also, 6500k floods will work fine provided you have enough of them. Just look yellow.

 

 

[Tamberav]

1 hour ago, blasterman said:

If I recall the thread on R2R he was told to use biowheels and other nonsense. Also the usual acropora goose stepping because how dare he set up a tank without acropora as a goal.  Filtering through the noise over there is maddening. 

 

Dose iodine  ...keep nutrients...slightly elevated and stable and done.

 

Also, 6500k floods will work fine provided you have enough of them. Just look yellow.

 

 

Yes they do say some crazy stuff. Likely because they have too many members.