The Marine with No Name!! Nano Reef-ish

[Cheltgirl]

The mandarins are lovely and I have always wanted one but they are notoriously hard to care for and are known to starve in aquariums which put me off!

When I get to the water change stages there will be plenty of calculations for you to double check me on All the salt mixes say different amount per litre for certain salinity/specific gravity. Does make it confusing. But fun too.

[Gingerlove05]

Yeah that’s what i’ve read about them, getting them to eat is half the battle.

I’ll have to read up on calculating salinity etc The things i do for fun 

[grommit]

Morning all,
OMG Brian's in the house! lol.
Must have another tank to play with.
Soooooo next weekend getting a 25l tank of my pal up Aberdeen.
Hes the culprit getting me started off again!
Had shrimps etc but always wanted a coral tank and evertualy critters.
Don't know if i'll be tempted as itll be the 3rd tank within a month.
Sensible thing I should do (me and sensible together makes you LOL) is consintarte with fresh fist and re-learn what I forgot. ;-)
But i'll be logging in for your progress.
Bri

[stuaz]

Looks interesting

Always wanted a reef tank with corals and a pair of clown fish but don't really have capacity for another tank so would have to shut down an existing tank but only one I would willing shut down would be one of my 30litres and that sadly limits what I can do

One day maybe!

[Cheltgirl]

We have live rock woohoo!

Marine6.jpg

There are 4 individual pieces adding up to 1.8kg. Tried a few different combinations but this one seems to be the most sensible.

Marine7.jpg

As its only been a few hours I've not seen any critters yet (it'll be at least a few days before they appear) but there are some whiteish polyp/fan-y type things in the centre of the pic. Hopefully they'll turn out to be something pretty

Marine8.jpg

Will do a full batch of tests tomorrow with fingers crossed there hasn't been too much die-off in the rock to cause an ammonia/nitrite spike.

The rock was £15.90/kg which I believe is similar to most lfs. It's important when getting rock that you can trust the source or it may not be alive at all. Make sure you can see where it is being held and that place has clear water with good flow and lighting. If it's got slime or tons of algae on it or smells bad don't get it. Same as when buying second hand from an individual. Make sure it's being kept properly or you'll just have a pile of expensive dead rock.

To save money you can get a small amount of live rock and put it in with a larger amount of 'dead' rock as the bacteria and critters will spread but that will take time. So it depends on how patient you are

[Pleco Fan]

Wow it already looks like the ocean floor. 

[Annie]

Yes, agree with @"Pleco Fan" looks great already, looking forward to seeing pics of some action on the rock

[fr499y]

[quote="Cheltgirl" pid='26631' dateline='1558808355']
The rock was £15.90/kg which I believe is similar to most lfs. It's important when getting rock that you can trust the source or it may not be alive at all.
[/quote]

Ouch! i think i paid £8-£10/kg when i got my last lot! gone up a bit in the last few years!

For a nano it always pays to get a small amount of live rock, as most corals will come on some rock. My older nano started with 1kg of live rock and by the time it was full with softies, must of had about 5-6kg in it

[Cheltgirl]

That’s very good advice. Real reefs usually has the corals on rock. Other places have them on frags.

[fr499y]

I'd also get a SW-2 wavemaker in there and do away with the filter pump Oh and how do you find the little Astra 20 light?