Aquascaping a small tank

zchauvin

zchauvin

Active Member
24 x 12 x 14.

I have only 20lbs of rock right now and I've got a considerable pile in the tank. I want to have a nice looking sps tank eventually. Point is, I don't want to have so much rock that I can't fit sps colonies. I deff want to have montipora also and that takes up some room. I want a lot of sand bed showing but also can't go high because of a 14 inch tall tank. Does anyone know of any good rock scapes for smaller tanks? I don't want to end up with so little rock that I don't have sufficient biological filtration.

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dmatt88

dmatt88

Has been struck by the ban stick
Buddy that's like telling us u have a jigsaw puzzle n need help putting it together. Id start one rock at a time n go from there. Ledges n caves r perfect.

.............I'm feeling salty.
 
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DaveK

Well-Known Member
Here is the thing. Your tank only holds about 17 1/2 gal.

That's not a large amount of water, especially for an SPS system. To get the most out of it, you want to keep the sandbed minimal. Just enough to cover the bottom, maybe 1/2 inch or so. For live rock, your going to need about 15 pounds or so. I would not add more than that. Usually I prefer a mix of sizes, so you can aquascape it decently. Don't go overboard on ledges and caves. Some are OK, but you need the above the rock space for the corals. Usually I start with the larger rocks and work down in size as I aquascape. Do your best not to put all the rocks in the center of the tank making a pile. Put the rocks higher to one side to keep it interesting.
 
PIMPALA

PIMPALA

Well-Known Member
Do you have a sump? If so, keep most of your rock in there.

If not, keep the rocks small. It makes the tank look bigger. Try the two island, or one large island on one side. But aqua scaping is a VERY personal thing. Everyone likes something different.
 
zchauvin

zchauvin

Active Member
I'm in florida on vacation right now so no, I can't give you guys any pics. I have about 1/2" of sand in the tank and 1" in sump in refugium area. I have about 3 large rocks and most of them baseball size and smaller. Right now I just have it setup in a figure 8 cut in half. Its hard to explain but its like a m up against the back glass. I came from the front of tank to the back of tank and covered the top. Made it have two caves inside the rock pile and I have a lot of areas for the water to flow through. It isn't the worse but its not nice. Its just a pile. I want to have more area for sps. Matt, I was told your puzzle skill is the greatest. If its necessary I could always put a small amount inside the sump. The total water volume is about 21 gallons.
 
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DaveK

Well-Known Member
Generally a sump is a poor place to put live rock. In that location, the rock tends to become a dirt trap, and you get a lot of build up of "glop". Unlike a tank, it's much more work to clean the live rock in a sump. In a tank you can use use a powerhead to blow it out. In a sump you usually need to take a bucket of water from the system and swish out each piece of LR in the bucket.

Keep the live rock in the tank.
 
Jetbkk

Jetbkk

Member
The thing about aquascaping is that you can't just consider how the rocks themselves are laid out, you must anticipate what corals you will be buying and try to leave appropriate room for them. My advice is try to leave as much open sand space as you can as well. I'm going through an issue now on my 230 where the rockscape looked awesome, but i'm finding I didn't leave enough sand space in the front and it is challenging placing some of my corals and clams now. It will be much harder to move rocks later when you have fish and some coral in there, so try to get a foundation that you can really build on.

In my experience I think it is pretty hard to really visualize exactly how your tank will end up. It is a bit like building a puzzle one piece at a time and part of the fun is that it takes you in directions you never considered before!
 
zchauvin

zchauvin

Active Member
Well that's just it. I know no one can scape my tank or what not I was just looking for different options. I know of the "pile" look and I've seen a few videos of these bonsai scapes. I want something that will provide lots of areas to attach sps but also want enough area to put brains and what not. I also want a montipora in my tank so I have to consider that ahead when building the rock scape. I just bought a ADA 60p to replace my GLA 60L so I may use the 60L for my sump, or even buy a 20 tall or something so that would give me a tonnnn of help. I'm only working with a 3g sump right now and since everyone seems to be worried about my water parameters I think more water capacity would settle some nerves.

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Doogle

Doogle

Well-Known Member
Maybe a cave on the left side? Just a thought. You might as well tinker with the rock...it can take a long time to get it the way you like it.
 
zchauvin

zchauvin

Active Member
Yep, this will all be transferred to my Ada 60p will glass overflow in a few weeks so its just temporary

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zchauvin

zchauvin

Active Member
Thanks, still the older tank but its finally cleaning itself If you want to put it that way. Almost all the diatoms gone, I'm building my new stand so once that's done I'm going to transfer it all to the new rimless I have.
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