reef lover
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My Tank Thread
Welcome to the salt life!!
Converting from freshwater to saltwater
- Thread starter Forkman
- Start date
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GoPitt88
Pitt Basketball is BACK!
- Joined
- Oct 20, 2016
- Messages
- 1,066
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- Location
- Pittsburgh, PA
- What state or country do you live in
- Pennsylvania
Welcome to R2R! I converted my 55 gallon from fresh water to saltwater as well, 3 years ago. Best thing I ever did. Love, love, LOVE this hobby. Just remember.....nothing good happens fast in this hobby. Go slow and be patient!! It will pay off in the long run. I was impatient an stocked my tank too fast......my tank crashed, and I lost over $400 in fish in a couple weeks. I started over, and now I have a beautiful mixed reef tank, full of life [emoji16]
Welcome to R2R!!!
!!! Welcome to R2R !!! I was on the same situation you are now. This is what I did. I bought a 40g breeder from Petco and I use the 30g that I had to make my sump. I sold all my African Cichilds with the 55g tank that I have including the canister filter and a few other stuff and start all fresh with the saltwater tank.
Welcome to R2R!!!
Crimson
Active Member
- Joined
- Jan 2, 2014
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- Location
- South Jersey
- What state or country do you live in
- New Jersey
- Have a credit card with a stupid limit <joking sort of>
- Read
- Ditch your canister filter.
- Buy a sump and a HOB overflow, Skimmer , Live rock or dead (Slate or Texas holey rock can be moved from your current tank to your garden), sea salt like instant ocean or red sea blue bucket (not table salt - yes, people have done this)
- Lighting Led/t5 or both (I use T5's with a moon strip). Don't cheap out on lighting!
- Be patient or your gear will end up in the dry goods section of the forum.
- Did I say money?
- Read some more. Do homework before you buy!
- Don't impulse buy!
- For fish, most LFS sell babies... they grow, don't buy a fish that will outgrow you tank. Unlike Cichlids...having more is not better.
I don't believe you can take FW bacteria and place them in SW and have them survive due to osmotic shock (the increase in salinity causes cells to explode) and also likely different bacteria from FW to SW
Here's a pic from one of my favorite articles on reefkeeping, applicable to new hobbyists and old as well:
The nitrogen cycle is only the startup of a SW tank cycle. The next 6-12 months is a maturing phase, and it's typically in this time frame where algae outbreaks occur and things can sort of roller-coaster, and if you stock the tank up too quickly, you might see corals randomly dying & fish getting sick, etc...hobbyists can very easily fall into the trap of chasing problems = making more problems => giving up and selling everything off. We don't want that to happen to anyone!
Long-term stability and balance are the keys, and you just can't shortcut the process significantly. That's always the #1 thing to keep in mind!
