Reef Tanks

Steve Williams

Site Founder, Site Owner, Administrator
When I was still in practice one of the Ob's in my office had a Reef Tank which I would sit and gaze at for hours on end. I have a desire in the back of my head to get involved once again as an aquarist and start a reef tank. I understand that this is no easy task, can be very expensive and can be disastrous if the water is not properly cared for.

Who of our members either have a reef tank or knowledge about setting one up and what are the pitfalls.

My only downside to a reef tank is that the ones that I have seen, although mesmerizing, had only a few fish in the tank. Is this the norm for a reef tank?
 

amirm

Banned
Apr 2, 2010
15,813
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Seattle, WA
Not me. I think there is some law keeping me away from such experiments, giving the many fish I have killed in my days attempting to keep them in our household this way! :D

The little I learned was that you want lots of volume and few fish as you say. The desire to keep bringing new specimens home and jamming them in too small of space seems to be one of the main reasons for failure.
 

JackD201

WBF Founding Member
Apr 20, 2010
12,308
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Manila, Philippines
Cleanest way ;)


 

mep

Member Sponsor & WBF Founding Member
Apr 20, 2010
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Steve,
My wife has a very well established 55 gallon salt water tank that she would like to give away to a good home. Too bad you are in CA and I am in IN. Her tank is beautiful and she just bought new lights and pumps for it. She has $7K invested in the tank if she has a penny. If anyone cares to come to my house in IN and you have a way to transport the tank out of my house and into yours-you can have it for free.

Mark
 
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DonH50

Member Sponsor & WBF Technical Expert
Jun 22, 2010
3,947
306
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Monument, CO
Ah Steve, back at the salt, are you? :) Reef tanks are great but not all fish/critters like them, and they are a bear to keep running well. When they are well-maintained, they are gorgeous, especially with the new light systems available now. (Though, I'd never though about light systems costing significantly more than my first tank system!) Salt-water tanks in general support fewer fish than fresh-water; I do not recall reef tanks being any worse (originally were to be better but it may not have worked out that way in practice). Like so many things in my past, my knowledge is out of date with advances in technology so I can't really offer more.

I think I have said before that, after working on a 55-gallon tank, and with all respect and admiration to Mark's wife, I will never again set up a salt tank less than 100 gallons. The critters are just too picky and as Amir said more volume makes it easier. I have not owned but worked with salt tanks from 50'ish to about 1000 gallons, and 100 to 250 or so seems to be the sweet spot for a good in-home tank that will look great and not require daily care.

FWIWFM - Don
 

elescher

Member Sponsor
Sep 12, 2010
201
1
0
New York
I have had reef tanks for the past 15 years or longer. They are very expensive to maintain and require a lot of daily routines to keep healthy. When a reef tank is thriving, I think there are few things as beautiful. There are so many different species of fish and corals available today (lots of which are tank raised, which help save the natural reefs we have growing around the world) that most tanks are designed to house a particular type of coral(s) and fish. The three most important things to have for a successful reef tank are adequate lighting, proper water movement, and a good reverse osmosis water filter. Of course there are other important factors that can't be overlooked but without these you may as well not bother. I would be happy to answer any questions or make recommendations on products available to anyone interested.

Steve
 

cjfrbw

Well-Known Member
Apr 20, 2010
3,323
1,314
1,730
Pleasanton, CA
Not a reef tank, but easier and less expensive to implement, smaller fresh water tanks with schools of neon and cardinal tetra are pretty nice light shows in their own right. The tetra are neon and red, are interesting to watch, and are always moving around and flashing their neon stripes.
 

CJO

New Member
Feb 25, 2011
6
0
0
I've found my reef tank to be somewhat easy. I purchased a mature 65 gal tank last Christmas and now it looks great, with minimal maintenance. I think the thing that gets most people is either messing with their tank too much (changing too many things) or not enough (doing regular water changes, etc.). My maintenance is basically just cleaning the tank a couple times a week, cleaning the skimmer once a week, doing a weekly water change and refilling the topoff water container. I have a controller to do most of the rest- check the temp, pH and ORP; control the lights; turn the automatic topoff on and off; change the water flow; feed the fish; etc.

CJ
 

amirm

Banned
Apr 2, 2010
15,813
37
0
Seattle, WA
Welcome to the forum CJO and giving us some hope that this project is not beyond our means! :)

How do you go about changing the water? Hook up a hose? If so, no danger of it leaking, etc? And wouldn't that shock the tank or is there a gradual and specific process?
 

CJO

New Member
Feb 25, 2011
6
0
0
Thanks for the welcome! Bruce wrote on RemoteCentral about your forum and I thought I would check it out.

IMO, doing routine waterchanges is one of the most critical steps you can take for maintaining a successful reef tank. A proper waterchange will both lower the amount of harmful nutrients, such as nitrates and phosphates, and replenish helpful trace nutrients that are used up by your corals and other livestock. I wish that it were as easy as hooking up a hose and turning on your faucet, but it ends up that it isn't too much harder. You basically have two choices when it comes to your mix water, you can buy it at your local fish store already made, which is convenient but can become expensive, or you can make your own. I prefer to make my own.

A successful water change starts with clean water. Although some people are fortunate enough to have that right out of the tap, most tapwater comes with significant amounts of sediment, phosphates, possibly heavy metals and chlorine (if using treated water). To get these out, you should run your tapwater though a set of filters including one or two sizes of sediment filters, an activated carbon filter, a reverse osmosis filter and finally a deinization filter. If you water provider uses chloramine instead of or in conjunction with chlorine, you will also need another filter for that. It is also helpful to have a pressure gauge and one or two TDS meters connected inline with the filters so that you know when they need to be changed out. Since this is such a common setup for aquariasts, there are several vendors who offer a kit with all of these filters, which runs between $100 and $200. If you run your water through the deionization filter, it is a good idea to aerate the water before going on to the next step.

Now that you have your clean water, it is time to add your salt (yes, you do need salt water for a saltwater aquarium and no, you shouldn't use table salt). Although many aquariasts and vendors will espouse the benefits of one salt brand over another, I think that most major brands of salt work just fine (there may be a parallel here with audio gear, but I'll leave that alone). But, how much salt do you need to add? Because we are trying to replicate most of the conditions of the ocean, the salinity of seawater is commonly used as the basis for your mix water. However, salinity is fairly hard to measure, but luckily, specific gravity can be used as a fair approximation. The specific gravity of sea water is 1.0264. There are several instrument commonly used to measure specific gravity including the swing arm hydrometer (cheap but commonly innaccurate), the floating glass hydrometer (more expensive, fragile and doesn't compensate for water temperature) and refractometers ($30-$50 and most compensate for temperature). I recommend using an ATC (automatic temperature compensating) refractometer.

Now it's time to do the water change, right? Not quite. Once the salt has been mixed, it is good to let the mix water "age" for at least a few hours, but better, for at least a day. When you add the salt mixture, it doesn't just dissolve in the water, it also undergoes some chemical reactions. Aging the mix water allows these to go to completion before it's added to your tank. After the mix water has been aged, it is also a good idea to bring the water up to your tank's temperature and to aerate it before doing a waterchange so that the shock to the inhabitants is minimized. Some people also measure and compensate for pH differences, but I've found that the pH difference is minimal if I've aerated the mix water.

How often do you do a water change? There are many theories and practices going around. Some people use an automated system to change their water on a continuous basis, the theory being that there is no shock to the inhabitants and that the trace elements are replaced as they are used. Others go for months without a water change or don't do any at all, saying that their tanks are running fine without them. I personally think that the people who can successfully keep an aquarium without waterchanges is very low and that those who go without would see a beneficial change to their aquarium if they started doing water changes. I do a weekly, roughly 10% waterchange. This is frequent enough that the trace elements are not fully depleted. It is large enough so that the waste products are removed (one 10% waterchange removes significantly more waste than ten 1% changes). Most importantly, it is infrequent enough that it doesn't become a burden.

Reading through this, it may sound like a time-consuming process to do water changes, but it really isn't. It takes me roughly 30 minutes, once a week, to clean my aquarium, clean my skimmer and do a water change. I make up mix water about once a month and it takes me about 15 minutes of actual work. Most of the rest of my aquarium is automated. Here is a picture of the area I have setup to mix my water and includes the filters, TDS meters, bulk water storage container (trash can), salt and 5-gallon containers for the mix water:



Here are some pictures of my aquarium:









Thanks!
CJ
 

amirm

Banned
Apr 2, 2010
15,813
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0
Seattle, WA
Thanks for the detailed write-up! And the last paragraph + pictures. Without then, I would have surely resorted to the Blu-ray version :). I had only seen tanks with color saltwater fish and not all the sea life you have in there. Do they sell all of that at the store or do you go diving for them as my brother-in-law used to do?

When I first read it I thought you were saying to replace all the water once a week. Just clarifying, you only change 10%?
 

CJO

New Member
Feb 25, 2011
6
0
0
Thanks. That was actually the second time writing and trying to post that (and this). For some reason my first writeup didn't post and I had to rewrite it.

Tanks used to be mostly fish only with some bleached corals since the knowledge and technology weren't advanced enough to keep live corals, anemones, clams, etc. I prefer the look of the corals with a few fish. I remember going with my father to the Keys to catch fish for his aquarium when I was a young kid (about 30 years ago). I still like snorkeling, but have never brought anything back for my tank. Partially because I don't know the current laws and partially because I don't like to disturb the natural reefs. When practical, I prefer to buy things that have been captively bread and raised. Most of what is in my tank has never been in the ocean. I have bought all of my corals and livestock from stores (local and online) or other hobbyists.

Yes, I only do 10% waterchanges (+/-) once a week. Sometimes I go two weeks without a water change, but haven't gone beyond that. I doubt my fish and corals would like a 100% water change!

CJ
 

amirm

Banned
Apr 2, 2010
15,813
37
0
Seattle, WA
So how suitable the real thing is? Our vacation house is on the water. Can I bring sea water from the bay and put it in the tank? Or is there an issue with using the natural version?
 

CJO

New Member
Feb 25, 2011
6
0
0
So how suitable the real thing is? Our vacation house is on the water. Can I bring sea water from the bay and put it in the tank? Or is there an issue with using the natural version?

There are positives and negatives to natural sea water. The positives are that it is cheap, it contains all of the major and minor elements in their proper ratio (this is actually almost impossible to do with synthetic) and possibly elements that are not available through synthetic. It also contains nutrients such as different types of phytoplankton and zooplankton that don't come with the synthetic version. The negatives are that you may also introduce contaminents from industrial runoff, various diseases, bacteria, viruses, etc.

Many people have used natural sea water without issue. I'm not sure whether they run it through a UV sterilizer first or not. The problem with running it through one is that it can't differentiate between the good and the bad organisms in the water.

One other thing to keep in mind- most fish in nature have various disease organisms on them. It is only when they get weak that it becomes an issue.

Beautiful setup, CJ!

Lee

Thank you!

CJ
 

Bruce B

WBF Founding Member, Pro Audio Production Member
Apr 25, 2010
7,006
512
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Snohomish, WA
www.pugetsoundstudios.com
I guess Steve you'll have to do what you did when you had a practice... Have someone come in twice a week and do all the dirty work for you!
 

CJO

New Member
Feb 25, 2011
6
0
0
No problem. Having someone else care for your tank is definitely the easiest way of doing it!

CJ
 

Steve Williams

Site Founder, Site Owner, Administrator
CJ
welcome to the forum and thanks for such a wonderful description and photos.

Having returned yesterday from the South Caribbean for the past 10 days and snorkelling off the shores of 6 islands I am more than ever determined to get back into the hobby and start a reef tank.

Yours looks simply awesome.
 

CJO

New Member
Feb 25, 2011
6
0
0
CJ
welcome to the forum and thanks for such a wonderful description and photos.

Having returned yesterday from the South Caribbean for the past 10 days and snorkelling off the shores of 6 islands I am more than ever determined to get back into the hobby and start a reef tank.

Yours looks simply awesome.

Thanks, I appreciate it. Where did you snorkel?

The biggest thing you have to remember when setting up a reef tank is to take it slow!

I learned a lot smaller, a few number of fish you want and what you say. Desire to continue to bring new specimens and interfere with their family had a small space seems to be a major cause of failure.

Yes, you definitely don't want to put in too many fish. I'm pretty much done with purchasing fish with 6 small fish (2 ocellaris clowns, a neon dottyback, a 3-striped damsel, a yellow-tailed blue damsel and a green mandarin dragonet) in my 65 gallon aquarium.

CJ
 

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