Welcome to the forums and SW keeping
Definitely don’t worry about asking any questions you have. The guys here are great and were a massive help when I started up my marine tank. Everyone starts off in the same position so don’t worry about it
The other thing I would mention is that even if everything doesn’t make sense right now it will probably all click into place once you actually get going.
I read up on marine tanks for months before getting one and it was only after I got it running that I started thinking to myself "Ahhh THATS what it means!!" on many things that hadn't really made sense before.
Assuming you have kept fish before (sounds like you have) reef keeping in its most basic form is actually pretty easy if you plan ahead and keep the hardier soft corals and livestock.
Kit:
The tank is a good one to start with. The lights will be fine for a lot of soft corals and mushrooms.
Heater: Taken care off.
Water flow: As mentioned a powerhead (yep just a submersible pump
) will help. Ideally you want somewhere between 20-30 times the volume of your tank to be turned over per hour. IE on a 24g tank you want the flow to be around 480 to 720 Gallons per hour. This doesn’t all have to be from one powerhead and it is actually better to have a couple of powerheads to give a more "random" current in the tank and stop and deadspots forming (where there is no water movement).
Quick note on the powerheads. It is better to get high flow powerheads that dont have a narrow "stream". Maxijets are a good cheap option, Korillia's or tunze powerheads are proably the best ones but slightly more expensive.
Liverock: You will want about 8-12kg of liverock (LR). This in combination with good water flow acts as your biological filter. You will also most likely get a bunch of hitch hiking critters. Be warned that you will end up spending many hours staring at lumps of rock in salt water watching as things emerge
There are different "grades" and "types". To make it as simple as possible pretty much all you need to worry about is if it is "cured", "uncured" or "base rock". Liverock is basically rock that is pulled right out the ocean so contains all the beneficial bacteria and lots of other critters. The rock is often out of water for long periods of time as it is transported from the ocean to the fish shop and as such there is a certain amount of "die off" within the rock.
As such when it gets to the fish shop it is often then counted as "uncured". This means that there may still be stuff within it decomposing and producing ammonia and there is not enough bacteria on it to cycle the ammonia away. If you buy this for your tank expect to pay less than for cured rock but for the cycle period to last longer. Also never put uncured rock into an established tank.
When the uncured rock gets to the fish shop they will often hold it for a period of time to "cure" it. This basically means they keep it until the bacteria has re-established itself and it is no longer causing ammonia/nitrite spikes. You can then pretty much take it home, put it in your tank and not really have any ammonia spikes (still recommend not stocking for a couple of weeks). Cured rock costs more but in general is less hassle (and means no smelly tank while it cycles).
Base rock is basically just dead rock (so technically not liverock but still worth mentioning). Over time you will get bacteria growing on it and it will be "seeded" by adding it in a tank with liverock. It’s a lot cheaper then liverock so many people will go for a mix of liverock and base rock to help keep the cost down (50/50 mix is probably fine as long as you stock slowly to start with).
Sand: To be honest sand is sand. Go for anything that is aragonite based and you will be fine. The rest is pretty much down to personal preference unless you want a deep sand bed (not needed) or you have specific livestock requirements (ie something that likes to dig).
Salt/water: Instant ocean is a good brand but there are many other good ones out there as well. It works out a lot cheaper to get bigger amounts but means paying out more in one shot. I would go with RO water as it helps keep the water quality in the tank much higher. You can buy it from your local fish store (LFS) but over the course of a year it works out a lot cheaper to just buy your own RO unit. An RO unit basically fits on your cold water line somewhere (easiest to get a Y connector and fit to the same line as your washing machine) and then filters pretty much everything out of the water to make it very pure (you also need to find somewhere for your waste water to go).
test kits: Ammonia, Nitrite and nitrate are a good start and I would count these as a must have. Also I would recommend a refractometer of a hydrometer. The reason being that they are much easier to use. You can get one for around $40-50 and is well worth it in my opinion. If you get your own RO unit then a TDS meter is a must have as well to make sure it is working ok.
If you are just keeping soft corals you can leave the test kits at this. Later on if you want to start getting more difficult corals then you will want to watch the other water parameters but until then you are pretty safe to ignore the rest (assuming you do regular partial water changes).
Critters: The clean up crew (CUC) is probably the first thing you will add. This is something for more discussion later on but generally most people go for a mix of various snails and hermit crabs. Red legged hermits are probably a better option then blue legged ones if you plan on having snails as well. Given my experience with crabs and snails I would say they don’t mix very well. My tank however is smaller which probably didn’t help. That being said I will not add any more snails to my tank which has hermits in and when I get my big tank set up I will probably avoid crabs all together as I think they can be just way to destructive for a reef tank.
Fish and the other livestock again is a different discussion
Other kit
Bucket or similar container to mix saltwater in.
Powerhead to mix new saltwater in the bucket.
Small heater (again for mixing new saltwater).
Fish food (Some fish are very picky so you may have to get frozen food as the staple food instead of flake).
There is TONS more kit you "could" get but is not really needed. A skimmer and an RO unit would be my first two optional purchases.
Setting up:
Basically:
Set up tank so it is level, etc.
Set up heater/powerheads in place (don’t plug in yet obviously).
Set up the lights on a timer (10-12 hours a day)
Fill up with RO water.
Turn on heater and power heads.
Add salt gradually until the SG reads around 1.025 (it will take a fair amount of salt to start with).
Leave it to sit for a day and check the SG is still the same. If it is not it most likely has risen, if so remove some of the salt water and add fresh water. If it is the same then:
Take some of the water out and add your Liverock (put the bottom rocks right onto the bare glass)
Add sand around the liverock (unless you decided to go without sand which is also a viable option). Top back up with the water you removed.
Make a mark somewhere in the tank to indicate where the water level is (this is useful later on).
Now just leave it for a few days. After a day or two check ammonia and nitrite it may or may not be detectable. If it is then keep checking it until both have cleared. Once they are both at zero wait another week to make sure and then you can start looking at stocking the tank. Stock slowly and make sure you research the fish and livestock before you get them (best bet is to have a look around and see what you like the look of then come back and ask around on here for more info).
maintenance
Daily:
Check the temps.
Feed fish.
Check livestock looking ok.
Check powerheads all working.
Check water level – This is where the mark you made initially comes in. Water will evaporate fairly quickly and as it does the salt stays behind making the SG rise (not a good thing). So you need to top off the tank with fresh (ro) water to the same level is it was (which will bring the SG back to its original level).
Give the glass a wipe down with a magfloat (in my tank with no snails I have to wipe it down daily).
Once a week (or once every two weeks):
You will want to do a 10 or 20% water change. To do this you want to mix up a batch of salt water in a bucket or container and get the SG and temp to match that of your display tank. You will want to heat the water first and then add salt (as SG changes with temp* and the salt will dissolve better in warmer water). (*note: I’m not actually sure if SG changes with temp or if different temps just effect how you measure it, either way you want to heat the water first).
What I do is when I get home from work on Friday I fill a bucket with RO water, check in the powerhead and heater and leave for an hour. Then I add 2 and a half glasses of salt (this is just right to get 1.025 sg in this volume of water, you will need to gradually add salt the first time to get a close idea on how much salt to use). I leave it to mix overnight and check it in the morning to make sure the SG is correct. If it is I unplug the heater and leave it for 30 minutes (never take a hot heater out of the water, it is likely to go bang). I then use a jug to take water out of my tank and then use the same jug to add the new water in.
It’s a good idea to sometimes use some 16-22mm tubing to siphon out debris that build up over the rock and sand surface (I actually haven’t bothered as after the first month most of it went away by itself and now it’s pretty much clear).
If you have biomedia in a filter you will want to give this a rinse in tank water once a week. If you have liverock though you can probably dump it all together. If you have any mechanical filtration you will want to rinse/clean/replace it once a week to stop debris build up (which can cause increased nitrate).
And that is pretty much it. Once you up and running its pretty much a case of just doing water changes, cleaning filter media and feeding the fish. Hope that helped a bit, it really isn’t as hard or complicated as it seems (especially with some of the guys from this forum to help out
).
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Which version of the Aquapod 24 do you gave? PC lighting or HQI? I have the Aquapod 24 PC lighting. Everyone on here is super-knowlegable so ask away. Anything I can help you on in particular with the Aquapod feel free to let me know. Good luck!
