2.5 gal tank - newbie here and need help

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milomlo

New Member
Hello all!

I actually fell into this by accident. I didn't even know there was such a thing as a Nanotank. I was in Galveston last weekend and found two hermit crabs in the surf. We brought them home and have purchased a 2.5 gal tank, a hydrometer, salt, pump (3 gal pump w/filter) sand (more like little shells) and shrimp pellets for the crabs.

I got the tank all set up with salt and the range is between 1.022 and 1.023. The crabs aren't moving around much and I don't think they are eating. I was told on another site that they will probably die. Since you guys know so much about little tanks I thought you could help more.

I also have gotten so interested in this that I thought about putting a few small items in the tank as well. Like the picture above. So nice. But others say not to bother with a small tank. Any suggestions. I have absolutely no clue on this so all help is so appreciated.
 
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incysor

New Member
Unfortunately the hermits from the Galveston area aren't reef-safe. They'll eat anything. Corals, fish, snails, other crabs, etc...

If you want to keep a nano, this site is great for info, but those crabs will need to go.

Welcome to the site BTW.

Another local board with tons of general marine and reefkeeping info is:

www.marshreef.com.

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milomlo

New Member
I used Oceanic sea salt and they said tap was ok if I let the salt circulate for 24 hours. He said after the fact that he forgot to give me conditioner and that on my water change (whenever that should be) I will need to use conditioner to take out the chlorine and such.

So I can put nothing else in here with these crabs huh? Also anyone know of a good size tank to start a first tank...you know a complete set up? Is a 12 gal good?
 
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incysor

New Member
Tap water is NEVER ok to use. Period.

Even with dechlorinators.

Marine and reef tanks need RO, (reverse osmosis), or RO/DI, (reverse osmosis/de-ionized), water. Both for your makeup saltwater, and your topoff freshwater. Many people get away with using tap water for a little while, but then suddenly have huge algae outbreaks, fish/coral deaths, etc... and wonder why.

Were you at a petco, or petsmart when they told you this? These stores are notorious for not knowing what they're talking about when it comes to fish in general, and it gets worse when you start talking about marine tanks. Saltwater is simply more complicated/diverse than freshwater, and these stores simply don't pay enough to keep someone with the experience and knowledge to run/maintain/train the kids that work the stores. Any time someone gets that type of experience they end up moving to one of the LFS, (local fish store), that have decent saltwater departments and that pay better.

One of the major problems for newbies, is that you can't trust your LFS when it comes to marine tanks. Until you've done enough reading/research online, and through CURRENT books, you simply don't have the knowledge to know when the kid at the store is giving you bad advice based on freshwater experience, or when someone is trying to sell you expensive equipment that you don't need, or fish that aren't suitable for your tank, etc...

Here's a recent thread where we discussed this a bit.
http://nanotank.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=1997

Oceanic salt is fine.

There's lots of things that you can collect on the coast that will do fine in aquariums, many of which won't be suitable for a nano though. Here's a great thread about it.

http://marshreef.com/modules.php?name=F ... pic&t=8347

You're lucky in that there is a fairly large active number of reefers in your surrounding area, and a couple decent clubs with good web sites.

http://www.marshreef.com - Mostly Houston and surrounding area folks.
and
http://www.maast.org - Mostly San Antonio and Austin area folks.

You also have a lot of stores available in the Houston area. There really isn't much available in the Galveston area. Jungle Jims is the closest to you, and from reports it's a very hit-or-miss type store. If you come a bit further north to fuqua/alameda-genoa, there are two stores near there, that have saltwater depts. One just moved, and I haven't checked it out since the move, but I've never been impressed with their knowledge, stock, or prices, the other one used to be pretty bad as well, but they've got a series of guys in there trying to turn it around, and it's doing much better. Decent stock, a couple experienced people, and fair-to-good prices. PM me if you want to full list of the Houston stores.

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smoke eater

New Member
Miloman, you are the right track by hitting the forums and asking questions. Read, read and read somemore. It is a constant learning process. I had freshwater tanks since I was eight, before that a goldfish in a peanut butter jar. There was not alot out there about keeping freshwater tanks, especially if you wanted to keep discus or african cichlids. In reef keeping everyone is readily giving their insights and sharing expierences which has made the hobby so much more enjoyable for me. Learn from mistakes, don't be afraid to try something, and enjoy it.

This hobby is very addictive :lol:
 
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milomlo

New Member
Well i am already addicted. The problem is I just want to get stuff....I don't want to read. :lol: I have ALWAYS wanted a saltwater tank, but thought they were to hard to keep. So I am wanting to bad to just START ONE :oops: I do appreciate all your help and I also appreciate the fact that everyone is nice and not slamming me.
 
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incysor

New Member
Unfortunately without patience and research, everything you've heard about keeping saltwater tanks being hard, is a serious understatement.

It will be expensive, frustrating, time-consuming, and did I mention expensive? :lol:

On the other hand if you do the research, you'll learn the proper pace for things to happen, and while it's still not a cheap hobby, at least you won't be throwing money down the toilet each time you flush a dead fish, or kill a coral, or throw away crappy equipment.

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Abarnswell

New Member
Hi, milomlo! Welcome fo the forum. You've certainly come to the right place to find out about marine reef tanks.

I'm a newbie myself... just a couple of months ago... and I have a 15 gallon reef tank up and running with a few soft corals, some hermit crabs, snails, and 3 fish. It's very addicting! And, as incysor mentioned, it's rather an expensive hobby. :) But, the good news is that if you take your time, do a lot of reading on this forum and on good web sites, you'll be able to put a tank together gradually (which is the best way to go), after your tank completes its initial cycle period.

The men and women who frequent this forum are incredibly knowledgable and experienced, and they are very generous with their time and knowledge. And they have great senses of humor -- it's a lot of fun here. Stick around!
 
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Abarnswell

New Member
Do you a have a picture of your tank so I can see it? I would love to see it.
Click to expand...
Well, I'm not very good (yet) as arranging my rocks and corals -- my tank looks like a garage sale!! Some of the folks here have really gorgeous tanks! See the Tank Photography section of this forum for a bazillion photos.

Here are a few photos from my tank. They are the first pics I took, and they came out surprisingly well, I thought. Beginner's luck... :)

http://www.nanotank.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=2042
 
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milomlo

New Member
Well guys I did it. I started today. I went and bought some LR, distilled water as I could not find RO, I already have coral sand and salt. So I mixed it all up, filled the tank, and put the rock in.

The LFS (has a very extensive SW section and seemed to know what they were talking about...I hope). They told me since the tank is so small that I should only have to cycle it 2 weeks. Does this sound right? Anyway, after the cycle what should I get next? I have not purchased lighting yet as they said no light while it is cycling. I put in cured LR so do I need to add a shrimp pellet or something? BTW in case I never mentioned earlier in the thread I am creating a REEF tank. I have done some research since my last post but still need input...I am still reading as well. I have ordered 4 different books also that I am waiting on. :lol3:
 
EDGRAY

EDGRAY

New Member
well im not expert i just started mine has like 1 month of running and i have alot of coral and fish and is 12 g nano cube dx and everything is well and keep going but i did my cycle in 2 weeks and they told me that was gonna be like a month or so what i did was i put alot of live rock and sand(aragonite) and also got a API STRESS ZYME for the nitrate,nitrite and amonia well in other words helps you to controll the nitrate,nitrite and amonia ... not sure but i think helped for the cycle i used it everyother day and then i got 2 damsels really hardy and help my cycle and keep using the STRESS ZYME after 10 days everything was normal so i took my damsels back and got some clowns and then 5 days later some coral and then like a week later my cleaning crew and nothing has die... but they say that is better to cycle and then add the clening crew so you should try the stress zyme cause work like a charm for me and just for cycle use some damsels with the zyme of course and there you go and also follow instructions of STRESS ZYME after a month add some every week or months just for any spikes but the thing that helps alot is the live sand and rock and i forgot what works great and makes your water kristal clear is adding the CHEMI PURE instead of carbon i prube that too.... so thats my opinion use STRESS ZYME , CHEMI PURE, SOME DAMSELS AFTER SOME DAYS and then take your water samples to lfs to check of your levels of everything and if everything is in other for 2 weeks youre set well that work for me ... :cool1:

also if you ever get cleaning crew the ones that work great for me were the nassarius snails great for cleaning sand (s***... of your fish and dead organisms and food) ,cerith snails great for sand and rock brown and green algie , astrea or nerites snails for glass and rock brown algie i prefered the nerites mine work their :moonin and make my brown algie go and some blue leg hermits and scarlet hermits for green algie and dead organisms , frozen food...

well lets see what everyone else says but this work for me...

and yeah alot of people here are really nice and really wise some of the ones that i had great experience is with sadielynn,mikeguerrero,incysor,dragon79,Phischy,johnanddawn,reefman23 & djconn.

really nice people and they know what they talking about and i think for best setups of nano cubes and small thx like the one your gonna make is mikeguerrera here is the link of his 1 g nano

http://nanotank.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=978

here is my pic of my tank :
taked 1 week ago when my flower pot was in his last but is better now it survived thank good .... and also looks dark cause was in the morning during fishies breakfast thats why looks dirty... lol :lol: :lol: :lol:

i hope this helps you...
 
EDGRAY

EDGRAY

New Member
i dont know why but i cant put my pictures something about no space contact your administrator :cry:
 
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dragon79

New Member
EDGRAY said:
i dont know why but i cant put my pictures something about no space contact your administrator :cry:
Click to expand...
resize them.....there is a size limit here.

try using "tinypic.com"

it'll automatically resize your pics and give you the
"IMG" codes so you can just copy and paste and get the pictures up and going.
 
EDGRAY

EDGRAY

New Member
i know i always resize my pics and i know the limit :sad: but is not letting me post my pics ill try later today....
 

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reefman23

New Member
milomlo said:
The LFS (has a very extensive SW section and seemed to know what they were talking about...I hope).
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Sounds like a nice place. Did you ask if they sell ro water? Places like that almost always sell premixed saltwater and ro or ro/di water? Thats the way to go. As far as cycling, you just have to play it by ear. Keep testing your water daily, measuring nitrIte, nitrAte, and ammonia until these read as low to 0 as possible. If you dont have test kits, get some. These are a little expensive at first, but they are necessary. Salifert is a great brand because of its accuracy, but they are some of the most costly. The time period for cycling depends on how much dead matter was on the LR. Generally, expect 2 to 4 weeks. Nearing the end of the cycle, i would recommend that you add a couple cleanup crew members, a couple dwarf hermits, a few small nassarius snails. These should be about 1 per gallon each. these will help to clean up the detritus that will settle to the bottom as well as any decaying matter that is on the LR. Are you using the 2.5g still? If so it probably isnt wise to ad any fish. However, you could begin adding like one coral at a time after the cycle is well done. In a tank that size, one coral a week is about as often as you would want to add corals. This is due to the biological load that the corals put on the system. This allows time for the tank to stabilize.

If you use chemicals such as prime or cycle, chemicals that rid the tank of nitrates, nitrites, and ammonia, keep in mind that these impurities may still show up on tests. All those chemicals do is bind to them and make them safer for the system. Only filtration and the nitrogen cycle can remove these impurities.

I agree with Edgray about chemipure. In pico systems, this stuff work very much like a protien skimmer which is obviously to big to put on a 2.5! This stuff, chemipure, are little pellets that you put in a filterbag and put in you filter, good stuff.

Oh yeh, some standard questions:

1. What kind of filtration do you have?
2. What kind of lighting do you have?
3. What do you plan on keeping?


Sorry if you have already answered these questions somewhere else!

Feel free to ask any questions that you might have...thats why this site is here!
 
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