new 90 gallon

[tommyp]

hey all,

I bought a 90 gallon tank that I am going to be setting up. was thinking about running basically a FOWLR with possibly some shrooms. Going to run a few tubes of t5 for light.

I wanted to do a snowflake eel and a possibly a small valentini puffer and maybe one other fish.

Do I just set up like a regular tank? was going to use my basement sump and large beckett skimmer. go bare bottom with starboard or a little sand.

What do ya think?

T

 

[HORNFISH]

Sound like a great setup, I think the snowflake would like a little sand thrown his way. Great eels with tons of personality.Good luck can't wait to see pics.

 

[mps9506]

If it is a fowlr I would use a shallow sand bed, espcially one with large enough psrticles that you can gravel vac. And puiffer will decimate the cleaning crew, so you will be doing the cleaning yourself. However since you main objective is not growing corals, water quality doesn't need to be pristine. I would use NO lights, the more intense lights you have, the more liekly you will be fighting algae. The larger sump and larger skimmer help keep water quality good, and increase water volume.I personally think UV or ozone is a nice addition to any FO or fowlr system.

Mike

 

[dwall174]

Originally posted by tommyp
I wanted to do a snowflake eel

The snowflake eel is really cool! I had one a couple of years ago but he jumped out of the tank. So just to warn you make sure you have a good top on the tank & also if you have an overflow you will want to have some type of screen over the drain. My snowflake did good with my softies but they will go after most inverts, So it's hard to keep any type of clean-up crew.

 

[Maxx]

Tommy P,
I second the motion on a CC bed for the tank. This allows you to gravel wash with one of those gravel vacuums for sale at pretty much any LFS for fresh water set ups. Also, if this is a FO I persoanly wouldnt bother with lighting any more expensive than NO bulbs.....the fish don't need it, and there's no need to waste money on something you don't need. One neat suggestion for Eel tanks......find/beg/borrow etc, (I'm not telling you to steal...that would be wrong!) some clear PVC tubing about 1 1/2 inches in diameter and build a tunnel system in the tank, under the substrate. This will give the eel something to hide in and a place to feel safe, but (if planned properly) will also allow you to see it when its hiding. Anthony Calfo came up with the idea and published it in his book of coral propagation....
I thought it sounded cool. Another suggestion for a FO tank with an eel would be a Fuscus Trigger. This is a crappy picture, but these are gorgeous fish IMO and relatively laid back as far as triggers go....
Nick

 

[tommyp]

Thanks all,

CC is the way to go definately. I was thinking to place some softies in the tank since I will have an sps only tank and want to keep some of my soft corals and I have the tubes of t5. I am having crummy luck with my corals since I swapped out my dsb and moved my tank.

So I am thinking of restarting a smaller more manageable sps tank. I started cycling it in last week. I really thought my tank would do much better sans dsb but it really took a little bit of a nosedive. I think it was the moving that hurt it. clear pvc sounds cool i would have to check it out.

Nick those triggers get 22" yikes. beautiful fish though!

T

 

[dwall174]

Originally posted by tommyp
Nick those triggers get 22" yikes. beautiful fish though!
T

The Blue Throat is another trigger that’s not too aggressive! A LFS by me has one in their display tank along with snails & even a cleaner shrimp! I don’t know how he gets away with it but the shrimp has been in there for a while now. I imagine the snails & shrimp would disappear if he forgot to feed the trigger for several days.

 

[mps9506]

Bluethroat, crosshatch and sargassum triggers are all openwater feeders that feed on zooplankton in the water column. They are typically reefsafe, and won't harm most reef inverts. You can notice the small upturned mouth on them and much smaller teeth they have. I have seen several large reef tanks with male/female pairs of bluethroats.
Very awesome fish to have I think.
Mike