Bio Cube 29 Stocking Questions

[tsport]

I am NEW to the hobby... NEW to this forum (this is my first post) and would like some suggestions.... I would like to create the most natural salt water environment as possible.
 
INFO:
Bio Cube 29 - (Pretty sure its only 22 - 25 gallons)
5 weeks old and the parameters below have been the same for over 1 week
Salinity - 1.025
PH - 8.2
Ammonia - 0
Nitrite - 0
Nirate - 0
Temp - 76 - 78
Live Rock - 20 lbs
Live Sand - 40 lbs (2 inch)
 
CURRENT LIVE STOCK:
Oscellaris Clown - 2
Turbo Snails - 2
Blue Legs Hermet Crabs - 2
Red Leg Hermet Crabs - 4
Sand Sifting Star - 1 (1.5 inch)
250 pods in the tank only
 
INFO REFUGIUM:
Chaeto
Gracilaria
 
What I want to do:
I want to get a small yellow tang, green mandarin goby, 2 blood red fire shrimp, and lots of different corals. I will purchase 2,500 additional pods and put 1,500 in the tank and 1,000 in the refugium.
 
My Plans:
This is my first saltwater aquarium. I plan to keep it and learn from it for 1 year then up grade to at least 120 gallon tank at that time. I will make the Bio Cube a dedicated Sea Horse tank moving all fish to the larger tank. I all ready know what most of you will say about the yellow tang... that I should wait until I get the larger tank and that the cube is too small. My questions are as follows:
 
1. Will my tank be over stocked with the listed stock above?
2. Can I have too many pods in the tank?
3. What eats the "fish, snail, crap" at the bottom?
4. Will my clown fish breed?
5. should I glue coral to the live rock or just place it?
 
Any other ideas or suggestions would be appreciated and I would like to thank you in advance for your advice and recommendations.
 

 

[Chad]

Two clowns and a goby are really the best stocking for that tank. It's a very small tank and the square shape means what swimming space exists is limited. So you want fish that are going to relatively stay put. If you pick a small enough fish you could do 4 fish but I really recommend two clowns and a shrimp goby. The clowns can breed though it often takes a while for them to. The larvae won't survive in your tank though. They will just be food for others. It requires special conditions and food to raise clownfish out of the larval stage.
 
All the tangs are not going to work. The kole tang is the smallest tang and requires a minimum of 55 gallons (or 4 feet).
 
Mandarin are hit or miss. I generally don't recommend them for any tank less than a year old. Pod populations tend to stabilize according to their food source over time which will give you a much better idea of what the tank can sustain. Purchasing pods can get very expensive. A single mandarin is capable of eating thousands of pods a day. It spends its entire day hunting for them. It expends a great deal of energy hunting for them and even more producing it's slime coat every nice to sleep in. That means it's difficult to keep a fat and happy mandarin. I have one red mandarin in my 210 gallon tank which has a 40 gallon sump/refugium. I generally add to my pod population every other week.  Fortunately I get them local from a breeder so cost is low. If you can train the mandarin to eat daphnia or Mysis shrimp then none of that matters as it will change its habits accordingly and be fine. My recommendation is to purchase one already eating frozen foods as training them is difficult. Be sure to see it eat, don't just take their word for it.
 
You can't have too many pods in the tank as they are generally self limiting based on food supply. If you buy too many they will simply die.
 
There are many species of sand sifting sea star and they generally look the same to the naked eye. If you are lucky to have gotten the "right" species it will eat leftover food and can be kept quite successfully in a biocube. If not, it will starve to death in less than a year. Most species of sand sifting star only eat the worms and other creatures that live in the sand. In a tank as small as yours there isn't much sand. That means once the sea star has destroyed the population (less than a week) it will not have anymore food. The general rule of thumb is if the sea star comes out on the rocks or glass it's likely to eat leftovers or even allow you to place food near its central disk for eating.
 
The fire shrimp and hermits will be just fine. Though I recommend skunk cleaner shrimp as they are more active and likely to come clean your hand for you. Fire shrimp are deeper water shrimp that like the dark so they don't come out all that often during the day. As a side note don't keep fire and skunk cleaner together in a tank that small. They don't like each other and will fight. Even in a large tank they will but in that case there's room to run.
 
For now I recommend you just get fish and let the tank mature for about six months. After that you could start out with some easy corals. Here's an article on some good beginner corals and one on how to pick a good clean up crew.