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Setting up a reef tank is not a simple matter. Don’t let anyone try and tell you otherwise. It takes time, planning, money and a lot of patience. But, if done correctly, can be fun and rewarding.
There are lots of resources on the web that go into great detail on this topic. Such detail that it can go on for pages and pages. This guide will be more of an overview and, hopefully will provide you with a good start on setting up your tank.
Before stating this adventure into aquarium building, one must start with a plan. Developing a plan will help you stay on budget and keep you focused on the end game. Your goal, which is a happy, healthy reef tank, may take months to develop. And focusing on the end will help you get through the middle part of you plan.
The first thing you have to decide is what kind of tank you want. There are several types of tanks including a freshwater, saltwater fish only, and reef tank. Since you are reading this article, I will assume you have decided on a reef tank. Of the three choices, this can be the most challenging, yet most rewarding of the aquarium habitats to keep.
Below is a list of equipment you will need to start and maintain a reef tank. Not every topic will be covered in this article. I will handle things like light sources and filter media in other articles. For now, I will only touch on the basics of each part below.
Equipment Needed:
- Aquarium (Tank)
- Lights
- Light Timer
- Salt Mix
- Sand (Live or static)
- Live Rock
- Protein Skimmer (Optional for Now)
- Power Filter (optional)
- Algae Scraper
- Sump and/or Refugium (optional pieces of aquarium equipment)
- Quarantine Tank (Optional)
- Power heads (multiple)
- Food (depends on what you plan on keeping in your reef aquarium)
- Thermometer
- Heater
- Test Kits (chlorine, pH, ammonia, nitrite, nitrate, phosphate, calcium, alkalinity, iodine)
- Reverse Osmosis filter or even better an RO/DI (deionization) filter. (Optional)
- Hydrometer or refractometer
- 2 Five Gallon Buckets (clean and for fish tank only use)
- Fish, Corals and other Invertebrates
This equipment listed above can be purchased at most any aquarium store. As with any merchandise, there many different brands to chose from in all different price ranges. Setting upa reef is not cheap. But cutting corners to save money is not always the best decision. The old saying about “you get what you pay for” holds very true in this instance as well. This Is were research comes into play. How cheap was the lighting to start with? By doing some research, you can determine the type of equipment is needed for the exact type of aquarium inhabitance you will have regardless of the price. Remember, you are investing in the future well being of your fish.
Putting things together
Once you decide on what kind of tank you want to start and you have done all the research on size, shape, contents and needed equipment, it’s time to put it all together. The location of the tank in your home is very important. It should not be near any source of sun light. This is important for 2 reasons. The first is that sun light is perfect lighting and will promote algae growth. The second reason is temperature control. You don’t want to put your tank in an area that has large swings in temperature. Ideally, you should place your tank in a dark area of your home, away from air conditioning vents and heat sources. Its better for your tank to be a little cooler and be able to control the temperature with a heater than to be too hot and need to purchase a very expensive chiller to cool it down. The location should be fairly close to a water source as well unless you want to drape a water hose across your expensive imported area rug.
When setting the tank and stand up, make sure the stand is level and on a firm surface before placing the aquarium on it. If the hand is not level or on a firm surface, the weight of the water may cause the stand to buckle or tip over and that is something you never want to see. A hundred gallons of living saltwater all over you carpet is not a pretty site.
What ever type of substrate you decide to use will determine if you need to rinse it before adding to the tank. Plain sand or gravel should be rinsed. Live sand and live rocks should not be rinsed as it will wash away the living organisms that are needed for your tank.
Once the sand is in place, and all your live rock is in just the right position, it is time to add the water. Here again, how you add the water will be determined by where you live and how hard your water is. I am not going into water conditioning in this article. Suffice it to say, you need to test the water first to make sure it doesn’t need to be treated first.
When adding water, it is always best to place a bowl or other type of container in the aquarium to pour the water into. This will help prevent the water from becoming cloudy from all the fine particles in the gravel or sand. Remember to poor slowly so that the spillage will be gentle and slow.
There are two thoughts on how to add the salt to the aquarium. One is to fill the aquarium one third to one half with regular fresh water and then add the pre-measured amount of salt to that water.
The second way, and the way I prefer is to add the salt each step along the way; If you are filling the tank a bucket at a time, then I add the salt to that bucket, fill it with about ½ hot water and dissolve the salt. Once dissolved, I fill it the rest of the way with cold water. That way, the salt is already dissolved in the tank and the salt measurements you take will be more accurate.
Fill the tank about 90% full and stop. Let it filter for about 24 hours. This allows the salt to completely dissolve. You can then add water with more or less salt until full and have a better level of salinity.
The tank will look like crap at first. This is normal and is caused by all the fine particles that are stirred up from the sand or gravel. Over the next 24-48 hours, it will filter out and/or settle out nicely.
This is the basics of setting up the tank. There is much more to do but it will depend on what equipment you have decided to use. Setting up your lighting system, filter/sump and power heads are all very important and will be covered in other articles. What ever type equipment you choose, the key at this point is to let the aquarium run. This is where patience comes in. Your aquarium will look very empty without fish and fauna. You will be tempted to start adding live stock, but you need to resist. Ideally, you should let the tank run for 7-10 days, all the while monitoring the chemical levels in the water. This is the beginning of the water cycling stage. This topic is handled in another article and depending on the method you choose, will determine when you can start adding live stock.
This article covered a quick and dirty method for setting up a reef tank. It is by mo means a comprehensive setup guide, but rather a overview of what is needed to get started. As simple as it seemed, the devil is in the details. Please read our other articles on filter selection, lighting and aquarium maintenance to get a more detailed explaination of what is needed to get a reef tank going.