| 31 August 2009
I am a relatively new customer to Seven Seas Aquarium, and like popping into the Store every week or so to have a look whats new, and tease advise out of Jim and Chad on current challenges. But now, with a couple of years experience with my marine tank and inhabitants under my belt I got to thinking if I was starting out in this hobby, what are the 5 biggest things to avoid when starting out. Here's my top 5 list!....
- When you first start out, try not to buy too small a tank. The issue is not "bigger is harder" but actually the other way around! When you own a marine (or freshwater) fishtank, the community is isolated in a tiny world, that is represented wholly by the total volume of water. As an owner, your job is to try and replicate the biological, chemical and natural processes that take place in water to deal with toxins, waste-products, elements, acidity etc The smaller you make the world, by volume, the quicker issues or problems can escalate. Therefore, my advise is to buy as big as you can afford, both financially and of course from a real-estate perspective. Save that "Nano-Aquarium" for your office desk only until you have really mastered the art of managing water! You see, at the end of the day, the tank inhabitants are there for our viewing pleasure. We don't look after them though, we look after the world that they live in. To keep our inhabitants alive, we have to feed them, and this creates waste. A lot of it! The bigger the volume of water in your tank, the easier your tank will be to care for, and the longer it will take for problems to arise. They will arise, that is guaranteed, but they will do so slowly, and with less 'shock' on the community!
- Don't overstock your tank. This relates directly to advise number 1! It is 'Soooooooooooo" easy to see a beautfiul fish, invert, or huge anenome and think "I just gotta have it!"....but, remember, you are managing water. There is NO rule of thumb out there for the number of fish inches per gallon, and if you read or see anything like that then please ignore it. The number of inhabitants that your tank can accommodate is a function of your setup. Things like water origin, filtration, bed, skimming, lighting, air-exchange, temperature, Ph and so on all mix together to derive your maximum biological load. My third piece of advise is directly related too....
- Be careful what you put in your tank. Decide early on a roadmap of what you want your tank to be when it grows up! It is easy to inadvertantly buy fish or invertebrates which are not 'reef' friendly at the outset, only to find that as your experience with your tank grows that you want to take your "Fish with Live Rock" to being a reef tank, and find your inhabitants happily grazing on your new coral additions. More importantly, you should read up or ask knowledgeable people about the 'social behaviour' of the fish you are planning on stocking your tank with. Some are very friendly with each other, but extremely unsocial and aggressive to similar looking or totally different species. Believe me, you will get attached to your critters, and seeing one them being hounded, stressed or even killed by another tank inhabitant is heart-breaking. So plan your roadmap and intentions early, and always seek good advise before making a purchase. Best of all, thoroughly research any planned inhabitants well in advance
- Don't chase water management issues! Your tank will cycle (biologically) as it works its way from taking ammonia, turning it into nitrites, then into nitrates, and finally releasing the nitrates in the form of gas (nitrogen). It takes at least 6 weeks for the average tank to settle after setup, and then will partially cycle through to equilibrium every time you add more load to the system. Even changing the water flow in the tank, adding rock or even changing lighting can have a marked effect on the biological cycle in your water. Get a decent monitoring kit and make sure that things are under control. The best and easiest way of dealing with a 'spike' is good water change practices, as this instantly dilutes any bad toxins, and also adds trace minerals back to the water column that are being absorbed or assimilated by inhabitants, including the live rock! If you get a spike in Ammonia then you can be sure that there'll be a downstream speak in Nitrites, then Nitrates too! The best way of buffering these spikes is to change out a good percentage of the water volume. No more than 20% at a time, as, yes, you guessed it, changing more than 20% can actually create a spike itself as it changes too much the biological handling footprint of your setup, and yes, it has to cycle all over again to catch up! So, don't get lazy and not bother with your water changes. There are some 'experts' out there that claim that they haven't done a water change in years, and their tanks are fine and thriving. I for one, don't hold to this theory. Living things are complex by nature, and sea-water is a complex mix of compounds, elements, metals and trace ingredients. I believe your tank soaks up these elements over time in ways that we cannot test for; so change some of your water volume regularly to keep these unmeasureable items in the balances needed. I use SEA-LAB FORMULA 28 blocks in my tank to help buffer PH, Alkalinity and trace elements. They slowly erode to replace trace elements and minerals keeping everything in beautiful balance for a good long while with each block. Don't put these blocks in high flow area's. I have mine behind the return pump in the final stage of my wet-sump, so they have a very steady but slight stream of water over them.
- Take time to sit back and really enjoy your creation. The inhabitants all have different characters. They have their little favorite places, their own bed, their favorite food, their little routines. Get to know each of the characters in your tank, as they are really good indicators of problems, and you will only know if your animals are stressed by knowing their behaviour patterns in 'good times' For me, a really good barometer of fish stress is my Blue 'Hippo" Tang, which is affectionately called Dorothy by my kids. Dorothy is very sensitive to changes in the tank, and quickly retreates to her bed if she's stressed. Too much stress and she may even break out in a bout of 'ich' which is pretty hard to eradicate in Tangs without putting them in isolation for at least 7 weeks and treating the full lifecycle of ich. I have learned to live with it. She is perfectly fit and healthy if she remains unstressed, but is quick to tell me if she's unhappy. My two clowns (Nemo and Nema) are very upset if I change furniture in my tank room (the main family lounge!)
The normal dancing (mating) routines are interrupted and they sulk. It's amazing, but they know all of us in the family, and if strangers enter the house, they know, and react accordingly! So, I know my fish watch me as I go about my daily business in the house, so take some time, and just sit back, relax and watch them enjoying their world. My analogy, is your tank is like a City. You are the Mayor. Your job is to keep the City ticking along, dealing with any issue's that happen. The difference between the Human City and the Tank City is the Humans can tell the Mayor what they want and expect. Your Tank City cannot! So, you have to be one step ahead of the current politics all the time!
I get many hours each week of total enjoyment by just sitting back and watching my tank and its inhabitants thrive. I am lucky that I work from home, so I often conduct my business whilst sitting in my favorite Laz-y-boy right next to the tank. The fish all come and tease me by the glass, trying to catch my attention in the hope that that magic hand will appear with offerings of food! The Yellow Tang, Bubbles, will do a race dance, holding her fins back and darting back and forth. I know she can't really do this, but I'm sure she's pulling a face at me! The Copperband Butterfly, Buttie, hovers with her nose on the glass, and scans me with her big eyes. Oh, I found an excellent trick to make sure the Copperband gets her share of the food. I have trained her to eat from my hands. A few of my other inhabitants have learned that this is a cool thing to do, so they join in. My CopperBand is a timid eater, and in the wild spends all day long hunting for worms and critters in rock. In the tank, of course, she quickly cleans up on the critters available for snacks. So, I hand feed her. It took a while for her to get the idea, but now I hand feed her until she starts spitting out the food taken, then scatter the rest of the food for the other crew waiting patiently downstream. She is thriving as a result, and I can rest easy knowing she has a full belly and will not suffer like most Copperbands do; namely; dying in the tank after 2 to 5 months.
