Requesting A Sanity Check

[kevinbenko]

Greetings:

I just started setting up my first (saltwater) aquarium. I intend for it to be a FOWLR setup.

I understand that patience is important in maintaining a saltwater system. I've taken my time with each step along the way,

I currently have a 75-gallon tank of salt water,
Ph is OK,
saline level is OK,
temperature is OK as of this morning
the water has been properly conditioned, gravel, crushed coral, and live sand substrate.
Filter, protein skimmer, and pair of heaters up and running (well, the heaters have stopped heating as the temperature has stabilized at 77 +/- 1)

Right now, I'm waiting for the water to clear up from having just added the live sand (filteration is off until the the mud clears up a bit)

Once the water clears, I'm going to get me a 10-pound hunk of cured live rock.

I figure that I'll let the live rock hang out for a while before a get a few mollies to get the nitrogen cycle started, once everything stabilizes, I'll either get another 10-pound hunk of live rock or get some (species as of yet undetermined) saltwater fish.

Does any of this sound wrong to anyone?

Any advice?
I don't plan to get any actual saltwater fish in there until July-ish, is this July-ish estimation rushing it?

 

[n3ont3tra]

Well, it sounds pretty good so far.

A few pointers, though.

1. Next time, ask the marine section. Down near the bottom.
2. What actually IS the specific gravity (sg) and PH? Just want to make sure you get it right.
3. What kind of 'filter' do you have, and what's in it? For saltwater tanks, most people just use a phosphate remover, no sponges or anything like that.
4. About the live rock (LR). Generally, people get all of their live rock at the same time, and usually you should end up with about 1-1/4 pounds per gallon, no less than one pound per gallon. So for a 75g tank, you'd need about 85 pounds of live rock. Also, there's two ways you can buy it. Cured or uncured. Cured is more expensive, but you DO NOT have to cycle your tank. It's already been cycled for you, and you can add your clean up crew and some fish pretty soon. Uncured rock is cheaper, but you need to cycle it. The way most people cycle their marine tanks is just with live rock. As all the organisms die off, they produce all the ammonia you'll need to cycle it. It takes about a month, and there's no need to cause harm to the fish.

As for the July estimation, it depends on how long it takes you rock to cycle if it's uncured. If it cured, then there's probably no problem.

Oh, and welcome to the forum!!!

 

[andywg]

3. What kind of 'filter' do you have, and what's in it? For saltwater tanks, most people just use a phosphate remover, no sponges or anything like that.

Most people here don't use normal filters (as the Berlin method is heavily followed), but I am not sure if the same can be said for the wider world. I know of many people who utilise sponges and filter floss in their salt water filtration, especially if keeping FOWLR rather than a reef set up.

4. About the live rock (LR). Generally, people get all of their live rock at the same time, and usually you should end up with about 1-1/4 pounds per gallon, no less than one pound per gallon. So for a 75g tank, you'd need about 85 pounds of live rock.

While the above is correct for the Berlin style of fishkeeping, the 1lb per gallon guide does not really apply to FOWLR. One must first regard the demands of the fish being kept. Some fish prefer open water, or open sandy bottoms, so less LR and more "conventional" filtration will be used (or a sump).

There is absolutely nothing wrong with starting out with a smaller amount of live rock and adding, many people do this based on cost. I would advise to get 20lb first and then 10 lb each time afterwards. This means you are never adding more than half of what already exists in the tank and prevents too much of a spike in any levels as the life on the LR dies off.

 

[n3ont3tra]

Yeah, umm, I missed the FOWLR part.