Newbie Saying Hi to All Forumers

[dreamzenn]

Hello fellow forumers, I am new to Marine setup. Recently I was just poisoned by a friend who is setting up his marine reef tank.

For me, I have always been a freshwater fish hobbyist so I am stepping into foreign land. Due to space constraint, I would be setting up a nano fowlr only. In fact I just purchased a Dymax IQ5 tank yesterday. I guess the next step is to get live rocks, natural sea water and substrate to start the cycling process. I dun think I would be keeping many live stocks, just a few clown fish maybe.

Hope to learn from all the experience members here. All advice and comments or suggestions are welcome.

Thank you.

[bugattilambo]

Hello fellow forumers, I am new to Marine setup. Recently I was just poisoned by a friend who is setting up his marine reef tank.

For me, I have always been a freshwater fish hobbyist so I am stepping into foreign land. Due to space constraint, I would be setting up a nano fowlr only. In fact I just purchased a Dymax IQ5 tank yesterday. I guess the next step is to get live rocks, natural sea water and substrate to start the cycling process. I dun think I would be keeping many live stocks, just a few clown fish maybe.

Hope to learn from all the experience members here. All advice and comments or suggestions are welcome.

Thank you.

why not get a 2 ft cube to start with? The bigger the tank the less problems you'll face such as evaporation and etc that will affect water quality. for a small tank get nsw will be good enough small pieces of live rock since your IQ5 should most prolly be pretty small. sg temperatures are like crazy so installing a fan or ice prob would help u maintain it more efficiently. I have a few pieces of small LR is you would need it just pm me!

Oh yes most importantly is to read up while cycling your tank

[dreamzenn]

Thanks for the reply.

Since I have already bought the Dymax IQ5 nano tank, I will just use it first. As mentioned currently I am having a space constraint so getting a bigger tank might be an issue for now.

As for the evaporation issue I would need to top up with maybe distilled water before performing water change with nsw. I might put a cooling fan blowing at the tank instead of at the water itself. Will monitor the temperature first.

Thanks for the offer for live rock. I am not sure what landscaping I like to do due to the space limitation so I am think about the design first. Or maybe I will drop by Irwana to buy the rock and sand plus water.

What kind of sand would you suggest?

[poomoon]

welcome bro.

like the other bros mentioned, the smaller the tanks, the more care you have to take, so as long as you're really into it, then should be ok. what do you plan to keep ? that would affect kind of media and how much changes you have to make. for sand, it also depends, you may use smaller grade sepcially if you plan to keep the likes of gobies, if not you can also go for bigger grades of black ones. lastly, be patient with proper cycling and LS adding. you can get a lot of help from reefers here, just advise what you need. cheers

[dreamzenn]

i have not decided what fish to keep but most likely it would be a pair of clown fish or so.

i understand that marine and freshwater bio-filtration is pretty different.

in freshwater, i use various medias to convert ammonia to nitrite and then to nitrate. as a result i need to do frequent water change if i want to get rid of nitrate.

in marine, i understand that most bio-filtration is done via live rock and live sand, right? if so do i still require to have additional bio-media in my filtration?

[peacemaker]

Hi dreamer, and welcome to SRC!

Keeping a nano reef tank can have its own challenges. It is less forgivable in terms of swings in water perimeters, so your aim should be to create as stable a condition as possible.

The best type of marine bio filtration would definitely be live rock. The more porous the better. However, in a nano tank, space is a constraint, and to fit in as much bio media as possible, you might want to consider using more compact forms. I would personally recommend Bio Homme. It has to be coupled with mechanical filtration though, as you do not want waste to get trapped in them.

Keeping a low bio load (minimum number of livestock) would be the best option.

You might want to visit Nano-reef.com to read up more about nano reefkeeping. Check out the monthly reef profiles for some inspiration, but more importantly, how they achieve it.

Happy reefing!

[dreamzenn]

thanks for the replies.

i understand the limitation of space so i would be very careful not to overstock.

i will put bio-home from my existing freshwater tank into the dymax iq5 tank.

i just came back from irwana. bought some live rocks and nsw. the lady boss is kind enough to give me some spare sand instead of me buying one big bag.

i am thinking of using deep sea bed method to help to remove nitrate. but given the size of my tank i am not sure if it will work.

[bugattilambo]

thanks for the replies.

i understand the limitation of space so i would be very careful not to overstock.

i will put bio-home from my existing freshwater tank into the dymax iq5 tank.

i just came back from irwana. bought some live rocks and nsw. the lady boss is kind enough to give me some spare sand instead of me buying one big bag.

i am thinking of using deep sea bed method to help to remove nitrate. but given the size of my tank i am not sure if it will work.

Dsb is a good idea if u have a large space in ur sump however if I aint wrong the Iq5 sump is ios so no place for any dsb.

however u might be interested to try having cheato in ur sump with a small light source. bro's who have cheato would be definitely happy to pass it to you once their's out grows.

[FuEl]

Get a storage bin/container to store saltwater. As long as the water parameters are within normal range, it is rather easy to maintain water parameters via frequent water changes. You will not need to worry about nitrate accumulation. I do a 10% waterchange daily, more than enough to keep nitrates down. Alternatively you might opt for 30-50% a week depending on your bioload. Water change for small volume is not hard to do.

[dreamzenn]

I have started cycling by putting a market prawn into the tank. After a day it smells so I removed it.

Does nsw has expiry date after purchasing from lfs?

[dreamzenn]

I found few worms in my tank not sure how they got in. Is it necessary to cover the tank?

[mrball]

I've managed to run a 3ft fowlr tank for 4 yrs+ already, no chiller, no sump, only hang on skimmer

[limz_777]

welcome

[Snoopyhamburger]

Welcome!