Small tropical saltwater setup query

[Dane]

Hi there,

A friend of mine from the CT aquarium is possibly giving me a young clownfish pair! I'm very excited - they are awesome to watch and quite beautiful. He is keeping his in a very small low tech set up. Basically just a heater and a UGF.

I have bought a small tank - 46x22x21cm, and I wanted to know if I could accomodate a clownfish pair in here. I am not planning on growing inverts like coral or anenome - I have it on good opinion that they are quite happy without an anenome, a refuge like a pot or cave will suffice. The tank I want to put them into has a internal powerhead dolphin f200 filter - which is quite big for the tank! (max 300l/hr), a 50w heater, and I will be putting a daylight globe in. I do not plan on getting a protein skimmer for such a small tank..

Do you guys think this is ok?

Second part of the question is... If this is ok, I know marine tanks need some calcium source as part of the substrate... But would exchanging one of my filter compartments for crushed shell suffice? I like the dark substrate I have at the moment and don't really want to pepper it with shells! :-)

Thanks in advance everyone...

[Matt]

bud head over to marineaquariumsa.com TASA's sister site they will help you there!

the tank size is good for a small clownfish pair but you DONT want to go with a UGF for marine. In a tank that size just buy GOOD QUALITY POROUS live rock, and do regular water changes and you'll be good to go ;)

Also granular phosphate remover, purigen, activated charcoal to keep the tank water polished and algae at bay

DONT put shells in, they become clogged with detritus and will source algae issues.

BEST is to go for Aragonite (CaribSea is a good make). As fine a grain size as possible.

Check out marineaquariumsa.com

[Dolphin]

only a very thin layer of substrate is advisable...

IMO... the tank will be fine if you get high quality live rock - not Kenyan! - preferably fiji or similar and use a high quality filter medium such as Eheim Substrat Pro in the filter...

test regularly for nitrate buildup and keep up with regular water changes...

[Dane]

Thanks to both of you! I know that there is a sister site for marine, but I wasnt keen to register on a whole new forum just for one q - and I was sure that many of the fwater keepers have salty experience too! So just wanted to sneak this one in!
:-)
@Dolphin - It is only a thin layer of substrate, so thats all good :-) If I get live rock from that the cape town aquarium uses in its marine sumps that should be well seeded and fine? I'm not sure of the source of the actual rock..

[Matt]

Dane: Dolphin suggested you dont use kenyan because it is quite dense, thus less porous and has less filtration capacity. Specifically in a small tank you need the highest quality liverock you can get really. Check how porous the rock is ;) I used to use Figi or bali live rock in my nano tank. Kenyan is much cheaper but doesn't work as well at all...

[Dolphin]

yep, as Matt says the key with live rock is the porousity which provides surface area for bacteria to colonize which is what you're looking for! typical live rock in most lfs will be kenyan or indo base rock (incorrectly labelled as malaysian rock in SA!) - neither has great filtration capacity. so try to get the fiji rock which if fresh will already have plenty bacteria in it. if you want you can get a small piece from the aquarium as that will add diversity in the bacteria population...

[Henk Hugo]

Dane - go sign up on MASA where the marine experts can help you

[Big G]

I agree with Henk, and I'm sure once you start with Marine, you'll have a lot more questions? Cheers! Big G!

[Dane]

Argh! fine! Hahaha. I'm starting to lose track of how many bloody fish forums i've subscribed too! Why dont TASA and MASA merge into ASA and just have two forum sections for fwater and swater? Mleh. Rant out.

Thanks everyone for the marine advice that you did give ;-) I will ensure that i get the spongiest poriest rock I can find :-)
d

[Henk Hugo]

Dane - the forum software doesnt allow for it - we have tried