New to the game

Dani Dannison

New Member
Hey everyone! I’m new here and totally clueless in the saltwater game, I have a cleaned, ready to 40g breeder tank and I’d like to set it up really nice! I love the idea of clownfish but I know they tend to be aggressive! I had thought a good combination would be: 2 clarkii’s, 3 Blue velvet Damsels, and a flame angel as what I’d pick but now I feel like I want to see more fish in there and these guys are all mean and bigger so I’m not sure anymore!! Any suggestions and Tips on set up and livestock choices are welcomed! Also I don’t want a TON of love rock, if I can get away with it.
 

DaveK

Well-Known Member
Welcome. You really want to rethink this. Blue velvet damsels get big and very territorial and nasty. Clarki clowns are not as bad, but are still going to stake out a lot of your tank.

Now with a 40 gal tank by the time you add live rock, live sand and so on, that 40 gal tank will contain only about 35 gallons of water. You don't want to crowd SW fish. Typically you want about 1 inch of fish per 5 gal of water. In other words, about 7 inches of fish or about 3 to 4 two inch fish, total in your tank. You also need to allow for growth. With your current fish list, considering that those fish can easily grow to 3 1/2 inches, this would work out to about 21 inches of fish, about 3 times what you should be keeping in the tank.

As you can see, you have a fairly small tank, as such you need to make every selection count. Choose each fish, invert and coral so that it really adds something to your tank, making the total tank a real gem.

While people do keep tanks using minimal live rock, you need to consider that the live rock is the biological filtration system. Your going to need about 1 to 2 lbs per gallon of water, so you'll need about 40 to 80 lbs. It's tough to put an exact number on this because live rock varies a lot in density. Start with about 40 lbs. However this need not all be live rock. A large portion of this can be dry base reef rock, which is a lot less costly, and in time will be come populated with bacteria and other good stuff, turning it into live rock.

I have posted this next part many times before, but it's the best general advice I can give someone new to the hobby.

DaveK's Standard Lecture #1 – Advice for people new to the hobby

The very first thing you want to do, before you spend any money on equipment or livestock, is get yourself a few good books on state of the art reef systems. Then read and study them, so you have some idea about what your are doing.

Here are two to start with -

The Conscientious Marine Aquarist by Robert Fenner
The New Marine Aquarium by Michael Paleta <---This book has an especially good section on fish suited to someone starting off in the hobby.

A note on the books. You can often find used copies at much lower prices at places like Amazon. In most cases these are going to be as good as new copies, especially when your first learning.

This is information that you can not easily obtain from the net. While it's out there, it's all over the place, and there is a massive volume of information. There is also a lot of bad information out there.

Once you get that done, plan or rethink your system. What do you want to keep? Do you have the necessary equipment? Do you have the knowledge to keep the livestock you want? Do you have the time to dedicate to keeping a system and it's livestock?

Many salt water fish, corals and inverts often have very specific requirements. Some are extremely difficult to keep alive, even if you do everything right. Before you get anything, research it, and be sure it will work out in your system.

Lastly, you will find that most LFS people are clueless when it comes to SW systems. Verify their advice, until they prove otherwise.
 
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