Starting a Pico this weekend!

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redknightspecial

New Member
Hello all, I have been browsing these forums for awhile, gathering info. You guys are better than any book. I have a few specific questions, though; so I had to make me a Handle and post.

I have decided to start with a Mini-Bow 2.5. Seems like I can get it up and running with a 50/50 bulb, which is great, seeing as I don't have a lot of technical knowledge just yet. I will start it out with some LR and a dead sand bed. I plan to get the LR rubble in spmall peices frome each of the 5-6 LFS's in my area. I will also see if I can get them each to give me a little bit of LS to start me out. I don't think there will be much of a die-off, but I won't add any stock for a good 3-4 weeks anyway, except for maybe a hermit crab and snail. This plan sound OK? Any suggestions?

On to my second question. Seeing as I am going to use well-cured LR, and it will be very small LR to begin with, I am worried I won't have any of those cool small critters I like reading about, such as worms, amphi/copepods, and other interesting stuff. That "stuff" is actually what is drawing me to the hoby. Truth to tell, I could care less about fish, and I could even do without coral (my wife disagrees). I like the inverts. So..what can I do to ensure I get lots of critters? Is there a place to buy them? Buying uncured LR is extremely unhandy for me.

Last question. When I do decide to add some corals and larger stuff in there, do you have any suggestions for pico-beginner-hardy critters? I am thinking maybe some polyps and a Bumblebee Shrimp,
 
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Kris

New Member
Welcome to the board :) Glad to have you here!

1 - Sounds like an excellent plan. Perfect. On a side note, to get maximum beneficial bacteria and critters, try to get scoops of live sand from different fish stores, local people or people on here. That will help alot.

2 - Most of the things you want will come on the rock. If you get rock that is too small, you might not get anything. A good thing to do is get larger pieces of rock, fist size and they should house enough critters to seed any other smaller rocks you get. These things also come with sand.

3 - There are alot of choices. This is based on lighting. You can keep softies like shrooms, ricordia, zoos, xenia etc etc. You have to decide based on how much space you have.

4 - If you don't have a digicam, get one. Pics are a great thing to have when having a reef!

Again, welcome to the site! :mrgreen:
 
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incysor

New Member
Your plan sounds fine. Of course adding critters is based on water chemistry, not time, so as long as your tests are good at the 3-4 week mark you should be fine with adding some inverts.

How much life is on the rocks really depends on where it comes from, how long the shipping takes, and how it's cured. This is the same for whether it's us ordering 50lbs, or a store ordering 5000lbs. Since you're planning on getting several pieces from different LFS, you'll get a variety of life. Some of it may not be apparent at first, but the longer your tank is up the more will show up.

A bumble bee shrimp is a bad choice for a pico. They're just like harlequin shrimp, they only eat the tube feet of starfish, and I think this'll make keeping your water parameters in check difficult in that small of a tank.

Like Kris mentioned most mushrooms, zoos, and xenia will do fine. Yellow polyps, green star polyps, palythoas, leathers, sun polyps, clove polyps, feather dusters, candy canes will all do fine under PC lights.

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incysor

New Member
Everything I've read, or heard suggests that they're like harlequins and will only eat tube feet of starfish or urchins, and I don't always agree with liveaquarias info. They suggest aquariums as small as 30g for mandarins as an example of information that is generally considered to be incorrect. However they're cheap shrimp, and if they're right would be a very cool addition. I'd say give it a try. Let us know how it turns out.

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