New to saltwater

[Tex851]

Hey guys, I am looking to give a 3g saltwater picotope a shot. I ordered the Tom Deco 3g aquarium, dKH buffer, a hydrometer, heater and thermometer. I plan on doing 3-4 lbs. of live rock, 3-4 lbs of caribsea live sand, some polyps, snails and if things get stable enough a clown goby. I plan on just buying premixed saltwater from a local shop and doing 1g weekly changes. My questions are 1) How much flow is too much for a 3 gallon (I don't plan on attempting more than mushrooms/polyps)? and 2) What is the best local shop with reliable pre mix, and quality live rock (only buying 3-4 lbs.)? Thanks in advance

[+mcallahan]

Tex-

Welcome! Is this your first SW tank? I ask b/c one of the "secrets" of saltwater is that bigger is better in terms of tank size and stability. So a small tank might look great from a budget/ease of care standpoint, but in reality, they are more work than a larger tank.

To answer your ?s:

1. Flow will be dependent on what you want to keep in it in term corals. Since it is only a 3G, you won't be able to keep SPS corals so something like a Koralia nano might do the trick. Even it might be too much.

2. That's up for opinion. RCA/Aquatek both sell pre-mixed SW and live rock. I don't think one is better than the other, I go to Aquatek b/c I live 5 minutes from it.

[+dapettit]

For live rock check wit hProf (Dave at Epic Reef) or Shane at Fishy Business. Both have quality rock and are great wealth of knowledge.

Oh and welcome.

Dave-

[doktorstick]

Gallery of Pets also sells premixed saltwater for $1.00/gallon IIRC.

[Tex851]

It is my first sw tank, but money/space constraints have me limited to a smaller set up. I also live really close to Aquatek, so I may just go there for everything that I need.

[Zarathustra2]

Hey Tex, Welcome to the hobby.

I would really really argue against a 3 gallon pico as a first tank. I understand budget but from personal experience, a smaller tank really is exponentially more difficult than a larger one and a 3 gallon tank would absolutely fall in the "expert only" category. Also a larger tank is not that much more than a smaller one. I payed about as much for my 90 G build that is about to get some fish in it as I did for my 24g build. You can find 55G setups all over the place used for very little.

That being said, on the 3 G tank 30GPH would be great flow. You also will probably find a benefit from swapping out about a half gallon of water 3-4 times a week instead of 1 gallon once a week. Make sure that you pre-buffer/add alk/CA/mg to this water to help keep the tank stable. I would also use an auto top off for your top off water or it will be very easy to induce large salinity swings in a tank this small. You also might want to ask the team at aquatec about thier 10G pico tank as they have that running very very smoothly with almost no maintenance.

[+dapettit]

Welcome to the addiction!

[mFrame]

Welcome, I'd recommend going with a bigger tank as well.

I've got live sand available whatever you end up getting (and a 29g tank/light/skimmer setup if you just want to buy an all inclusive system).

[+dapettit]

Hey Tex, Go for the PICO!

[GKarshens]

I have kept everything from a 1.5g to a 125g. The bigger they are the easier they are. I ended up tearing down the pico because it was too much work. So hard to keep stable! I used a very small hang on back filter with no filter in it for flow. Took up almost no space that way.

[Laura]

WELCOME!!!!!!

Try to make the meeting next Saturday, the 21st, to meet alot of great people in our club. It's at my house

[diabeetus]

my very first tank was the exact 3g toms pico. for the flow, you cant really add a koralia or anything like that and the light is not sufficiant enough to keep much. i bought a rated 10g tetra filter from petsmart and that gave the tank some better flow than the dinky little filter you get with the tank. also, river city sells a coralife light that is about 12" across. it doesnt fit all the way across the pico, but i just hung it over the tank with some string since it was on my computer desk that had another shelf above it to hang a light.

i hope this helps!! good luck and welcome to the club!!

-Corey

[diabeetus]

to me its not harder to keep a smaller tank, you just have to make a commitment, more so with a smaller tank, to make sure everything goes well.

you can do it

if i can, you can most definitely.

[Tex851]

Update! Went with a Tom Deco 3 gallon pico, here is a picture of it as of today (few weeks old). Not the best it has ever looked, but got behind on maint. because of finals. I was thinking about doing GSP on the big rock, any suggestions/comments? Current inhabitants are 1 turbo snail, 1 turban snail and 1 50 cent cleaner shrimp.

[+dapettit]

Looking good. Keep us posted.

[PeeperKeeper]

Current inhabitants are 1 turbo snail, 1 turban snail and 1 50 cent cleaner shrimp.

Don't I see some more inhabitants in there? I see some zoas and is that some type of SPS on the bottom? Don't forget that corals are animals even though they don't move. How is your water chemistry? Has the Ammonia and Nitrites had their spike and gone to zero? How are your nitrates? pH? Doing such a small tank, you'll need to keep an EXTREMELY close watch on those levels, especially here in the beginning and especially if you're going to do corals.

[PeeperKeeper]

Oh, and GSP might not be a bad idea. It is generally tough as far as surviving, but it can also act as kind of a canary in the mine because it will tend to close up if something isn't right. With a small tank, the challenge is that things change much faster. Concentrations of different chemicals can spike suddenly because there's not much water to dilute them. I mean think about a fish pooping in a thimble versus a the same fish pooping in a swimming pool. Also the temperature can change quickly because of the low volume, same is true of pH, calcium, etc. So if you notice one of your corals refusing to open or anything looking different, that would be a signal to check everything right away.

Back on the small vs large tank conversation, the smaller tank can be more expensive in the long run because when you lose an inhabitant, whether it's a coral or fish, snail, etc. it can crash the whole thing because one dead organism can muck up all the water. So then you find yourself replacing everything in it, whereas on a larger tank it wouldn't have been an issue. So try to hold back on adding any more living things for a while, whether it's a fish, a snail or a coral. I know it's hard, especially in the beginning when you just can't wait to have all these cool things in the tank, but you have to go really really slow with that size tank. Each time you add something new, your itty bitty bacterial bed has to grow to meet the new demand of that organism.

[Tex851]

I figured the corals were obvious by the picture and did not require listing. With that said, the stocking of the tank is complete for awhile. The tank has yet to yield a big spike, mainly because the coral bed and rock came from very established tanks. I use a bit of TLC on a regular basis and never have my water parameters been anywhere near out of norm.