Advice & What I Need For A Marine/saltwater Tank

[Pearsondesign]

im sorry, but im gonna have to be blunt here.

your tank will fail.

it makes no difference if its setup for 2 months or 12 months, with no water changes, over feeding and lack of sufficient supplements for corals, its not going to work.

how can you explain or justify this?

ive "sucessfully" kept tanks running for over a year with little to no water changes, but with loads of filtration etc, and eventually the water always goes bad. its going to, theres no doubt about it.

how can you honestly think that not changing the water is a good thing? adding supplements is fine, for a while. but it isnt the same as giving them completely fresh, clean and healthy water.

also, i have to agree about the dragonet, i had one in a large reef tank for over 6 months. looked like he was eating happily, but around the 6 month mark he started to look skinny and then died. water was fine, and all other fish and corals were healthy.
just because a fish takes food in its mouth, does not mean it is eating!
my dragon wrasse has gone missing in the last few days, from what i can only think is the same problem.

if you can reply with ALL your test results for nitrate, nitrite, calcium, ammonia, phosphates etc then we will have a better idea of what your claiming, but as it is now i dont believe things are going to stay the same for you

also, why take water to test for salinity? surely you can afford a few £ for a hydrometer at least!?

you say your not a newbie to the hobby, just to this forum and saltwater tanks. well if your new to saltwater tanks how can you be so sure and positive that your tank is fine?
dont forget a lot of LFS are runb by money hungry people, not just in it for the passion. ive had so much conflicting advice from LFS and im lucky to have a very good and reliable one near me.

please, dont take this as a slamming, its purely my opinions. but in my eyes your actually being cruel to these fish and corals.


EDIT - also i noticed you say you change the filter media, what do you mean? you swap it out for new each time? cos this is also a sure fire way of killing everything. the filter media holds bacteria which breaks down bad stuff. if you are putting new media in every time then the bacteria wont be there, causing problems with water quality....

 

[Doph89]

I top up using either CaribSea purified sea water or RO depending on what the salinity is like, so if its been hot and a lot has evaporated my salinity might get a bit high so I'll add plain RO (no salt) until it drops back to a good level then use sea water again.

I know my dragonet is a greedy little #28### - he's always straight into the food and eats until he feels too full to chase any more around! My LFS is extremely good and has never given me bad advice yet, and I've been using them for over 3yrs, and he suggested the dragonet for my small tank because he said like a lot of slower-moving, peaceful fish they often prefer a smaller space as they feel more secure and don't have to venture too far to get their dinner. Mine certainly seems to be thriving

 

[Pearsondesign]

I think it's an interesting method, Doph89. Hope it all works out for you (seems to be so far).
Just like say to the others (although I'm sure you do know this) that Mandarins can live in small tanks successfully if they are used to taking frozen/live food. All the Mandarins we used to get at the LFS from TMC quite happily took food added to the tank. Fat little buggers they were too. TMC would keep them until the Mandarins had learnt to do this.

id like to add my bit here. TMC are by no means a reliable or good source of fish in the UK. yes, they are one of the biggest, but imo they arent the best by a long way.
i used to go and get fish from them when i worked at my LFS and if im honest, i wouldnt again.
if you order from them, unless you have the time to go and pick up the order yourself you will get whichever fish they decide to catch. you cannot choose particular fish, they literally just scoop some up, not looking at each individual.
ive had countless fish from TMC that have been ill, damaged or generally not very well.

also, on a side note, TMC say "captive bred" well this is a lie. not a complte lie, as some of their fish are captive bred properly.

but captive bred to them means bred in a cage in the sea in vietnam.
this isnt captive bred! they will still have parasites, illnesses and wounds etc from the sea as being in a cage is not the same as being bred in a tank or at a fish farm.

sorry, just my opinion, i felt i should add it about TMC. of course i have had some amazing fish from them, im not saying they are the worst by any means.

I top up using either CaribSea purified sea water or RO depending on what the salinity is like, so if its been hot and a lot has evaporated my salinity might get a bit high so I'll add plain RO (no salt) until it drops back to a good level then use sea water again.

so you are doing water changes?
if your adding sea water then you are changing water.
why not just do it properly?

do a 10% change weekly. in a nano tank this will cost next to nothing and at least youll be treating the animals right

 

[Doph89]

im sorry, but im gonna have to be blunt here.

your tank will fail.

it makes no difference if its setup for 2 months or 12 months, with no water changes, over feeding and lack of sufficient supplements for corals, its not going to work.

how can you explain or justify this?

ive "sucessfully" kept tanks running for over a year with little to no water changes, but with loads of filtration etc, and eventually the water always goes bad. its going to, theres no doubt about it.

how can you honestly think that not changing the water is a good thing? adding supplements is fine, for a while. but it isnt the same as giving them completely fresh, clean and healthy water.

also, i have to agree about the dragonet, i had one in a large reef tank for over 6 months. looked like he was eating happily, but around the 6 month mark he started to look skinny and then died. water was fine, and all other fish and corals were healthy.
just because a fish takes food in its mouth, does not mean it is eating!
my dragon wrasse has gone missing in the last few days, from what i can only think is the same problem.

if you can reply with ALL your test results for nitrate, nitrite, calcium, ammonia, phosphates etc then we will have a better idea of what your claiming, but as it is now i dont believe things are going to stay the same for you

also, why take water to test for salinity? surely you can afford a few £ for a hydrometer at least!?

you say your not a newbie to the hobby, just to this forum and saltwater tanks. well if your new to saltwater tanks how can you be so sure and positive that your tank is fine?
dont forget a lot of LFS are runb by money hungry people, not just in it for the passion. ive had so much conflicting advice from LFS and im lucky to have a very good and reliable one near me.

please, dont take this as a slamming, its purely my opinions. but in my eyes your actually being cruel to these fish and corals.


EDIT - also i noticed you say you change the filter media, what do you mean? you swap it out for new each time? cos this is also a sure fire way of killing everything. the filter media holds bacteria which breaks down bad stuff. if you are putting new media in every time then the bacteria wont be there, causing problems with water quality....

Don't worry - I'm not offended or upset by anything, I'm really grateful for the advice as I'm relying only on the advice of my LFS (who I do trust, but I also recognise is not an absolute authority and complete genius).

Filter media wise I change the chemical media (seagel and purigen) as per box, change the large floss whenever it clogs up but never remove the good stuff with all the bacteria on it - I have a good layer of matrix full of lovely bacteria keeping my water nice.

Please rest assured that I always try to do the best for my fish, as with any other pet, and at the first sign of anything going even slightly wrong (ei change of feeding behaviour or declining water quality) I would immediately remove all the livestock and rehome them, either until I had remedied the problem or for good, I have no desire to keep sick fish just as a decoration - I like them healthy and happy so I can enjoy watching their behaviour.

I cannot be sure and positive that my tank is fine, as no one can be 100%, but given the fact that all the corals I have in there are growing and budding off tremendously well and all the other livestock seem active, happy and eat very well I don't have any concerns. My peppermint shrimp even keep laying eggs, although the fish and corals eat them before they hatch.

I think the reasoning my LFS uses for not changing the water in a small reef tank is that if yo have good, mature water with all the correct levels of supplements etc for your fish then why mess with it and put new, immature water in?

I would not allow my tank to become dangerous to the health of my livestock, as previously stated, if this method stop working I will switch to religious water changes and anything else you suggest, but until then, I will be sticking with the system I have now as it works.

I am interested that you said you had maintained tanks for a good while without wc but then they crashed, and I will definately be purchasing test kits/equipment so I can test all my levels at home weekly from now on, also be keeping a closer eye on my dragonet, but as of yet i have never seen him spit any food out (is that what you meant by not eating just because they take food into their mouth?)

Thanks again for the advice

 

[Doph89]

so you are doing water changes?
if your adding sea water then you are changing water.
why not just do it properly?

do a 10% change weekly. in a nano tank this will cost next to nothing and at least youll be treating the animals right



I suppose you could call it a water change, but I never actually take water out, I just replace what evaporates. As I said before, I think my LFS thinks removing healthy water that has developed a full complement of microscopic life that actually helps a tank and replacing it with healthy water that doesnt is a bit pointless.

I would obviously change water if I had water quality issues, but I don't (so far at least - fingers crossed )



so you are doing water changes?
if your adding sea water then you are changing water.
why not just do it properly?

do a 10% change weekly. in a nano tank this will cost next to nothing and at least youll be treating the animals right



I suppose you could call it a water change, but I never actually take water out, I just replace what evaporates. As I said before, I think my LFS thinks removing healthy water that has developed a full complement of microscopic life that actually helps a tank and replacing it with healthy water that doesn't have it is a bit pointless.

I would obviously change water if I had water quality issues, but I don't (so far at least - fingers crossed )

 

[seffieuk]

I'm so glad you said you are feeding copepods because although dragonets can and do eat frozen, brine shrimp etc they will not get the nutrition they need to keep them healthy. To stay healthy they need large amounts of copepods, rotifers etc, which is why a tank containing at least 75lbs of live rock is required or a copepod culture I take it you buy in your copepods or do you have a culture? We would love to see some photos

I love the term 'mature' water - do they mean water that is full of the waste from the live stock there is no benefit from 'mature' water to a reef tank that I can think of, mature water is just another name for water that has been in a tank a long time, mature is not always good Although obviously someone of my mature years is

One great thing about this hobby of ours is there are different opinions and things change over time - and we all learn new things along the way

Well done everybody for keeping things calm and polite

Seffie x

ps you asked if I have any experience of a nano - you can find my nano journel in the journel section

 

[-Nemo-]

Just want to be a smart*** here first
Peppermints don't lay eggs, they carry them underneath them, near their belly, on their pleopods. So impossible that they're getting eaten as eggs.


Also, I am a very open minded person when it comes to this hobby, as I myself tend to do things out of the the "standard". I very rarely do water changes (my system has gone months without), and I also have been using my tap water for almost 4 years in the tank. I believe, however, that no matter how big the system, new water needs to go in to keep the tank healthy.

That being said, you do seem to be adding new saltwater to the tank, although I wish you would explain that more because it doesn't make much sense to me. Salt never evaporates, so if you are not taking any water out, you should only ever have to put RO water back into the tank. How is the density dropping and making you add saltwater?

 

[Doph89]

Yeah, I buy all live food (the BS the dragonet loves are live as well) - no frozen or dried at all - but also have a small copepod culture incase of emergencies and for extra top ups.

By mature water I mean water that has a lot of microscopic life in it, I am fortunate enough to have access to a laboratory and have examined both new and (what I call)mature water under high power microscopes. The difference is astounding - mature water is full of any number of microorganisms that are beneficial (admittedly some may be not so beneficial) to your tank and its inhabitants, whereas new water - even the purified sea water - is relatively bare. It is these little critters that I am loathe to discard without need to as I feel they provide a bit of help and are what would be found naturally.

Apologies about the poor explanation - I realise reading back through that I didn't explain myself very well! Water is not only lost through evaporation in your tank, it comes out in little bits in any number of ways such as during cleaning, adding livestock, changing filter medium etc etc, all which add up in a small system to mean water level decreases visiably much faster than in a larger tank. So I replace evaporated water with RO, and water lost through spills and in sponges etc through sea water - hope this clarifies. Also, toward the beginning of setting up with the dragonet I was just chucking the whole bags of live food in along with all the yucky water in there! HUGE no-no I am aware, and I got a serious smacked wrist for it off LFS as it sent my salinity rather high and caused a bit of a rise in my nitrites. You will be pleased to hear I purchased a proper sieve straight away and have not done this since

Cheers for a bit of extra know-how on the shrimp I have seem the female carrying eggs around on multiple occasions and just presumed she deposited them after they had been fertilised, however the lack of babies must mean that either daddy isnt up to the job or they're all becoming lunch before I see them.

Will look at your journal asap Seffie - always nice to hear from other nano people as I don't know many at all!