Research, Research, Research!!!!

Brian K. Griffin

Introduction

Let me start by saying that I am not a biologist, chemist, or other scientist. What I am is a hobbyist that has been setting up saltwater tanks since the mid 70’s. In fact, I setup my first saltwater tank about 30 years ago as a freshman in college. I have made many mistakes over the years and learned from them. While the equipment has changed greatly and knowledge base has increased 10 fold since my first saltwater setup, the basics have never changed. The purpose of these series is to help you develop a checklist for things that you need to learn and explore before you setup your saltwater reef tank. If you do your research BEFORE you setup your reef tank, I can almost guarantee that you will set it up the right way the first time without costly mistakes. I will try to do this in a way that you can understand and grasp. It is in no way a complete reference for setting up a reef tank.. I have included some reading suggestions for reference and research.

Before buying

The largest portion of this article will deal with what you need to know and what you need to do before you even buy your tank. One of the huge problems today is that, most reef tanks are purchased on impulse or close to impulse without any thought going into what is required, the inhabitants that are going to be keep, time required for maintenance, placement of aquarium, and most importantly the money required to correctly set it up. Starting a saltwater tank is no different from making an addition to your home, buying a new computer, remodeling the kitchen or buying an outdoor grill. If you were to do any of these, you would research and plan before you even think of spending any money. From time to time, I will be recommending buying a book or two. This is all a part of the research required to successfully setup your reef aquarium. Plan on spending $200-$300 if you choose to follow my reading suggestions. If you cannot afford to spend this on research, then frankly, you should not be setting up a reef aquarium. I am also a firm believer in using the Internet for research. While it does not replace the excellent books in print, it provides a vast amount of information (good and bad). Bad information can cause you to fail. Ask questions to validate what you find on the Internet. Here are some sites that will get you off to a good start:

www.reefs.org

www.nano-reef.com

www.mahattanreefs.com

Budget

Inhabitants

Okay, so we know that you want to get a reef aquarium. What made you want a reef aquarium? Is it the corals, the fish? This question requires some thought. What aquariums have you seen that you like? These are important questions as they determine your ultimate setup. If you find that you are really more interested in the fish than the corals, then you may want to set up a fish only(FO) tank, or a fish only with live rock (FOWLR) tank. The difference between a FO tank and a FOWLR or reef tank is the use of a Wet/Dry filter instead of live rock for filtration.

Fish

Saltwater fish are no doubt the most colorful and most entertaining fish there are to have in an aquarium. A reef tank can support a number of elaborately colored reef safe fish. There are also fish that cannot go into a reef. You will need to research the fish to find out which ones are reef safe and which ones are not. Go out and look at as many other aquariums as you can to see what others are doing and to find the fish that you want.

Corals

Reef aquariums are some of the most beautiful in the world. There are hard stony corals (SPS – small polyp stony) which include acropora and montipora. There are large fleshy corals with flowing tentacles (LPS – large polyp stony), and then soft corals such as leathers with their long fingers. You need to be familiar with the requirements of each type as this determines how your tank needs to be setup. The major difference in requirements for these types of corals is lighting and water flow. All can be kept together providing their individual requirements are met.

To be continued………

In the next article we’ll discuss aquarium size and filtration. If you have questions you would like answered, you can email them to me at brian@oceangalleryii.com and I’ll answer them in the next article.