going to saltwater

[dayday]

Hello people i"m new to the saltwater world been into salt water for a long time and now i'm converting my 60gl to a saltwater the tank has a wet-dry hang on filter. This friday I plan on getting the live sand and water and let it run for a couple weeks is there chemicals that i sould get also to condition the water like you do with freshwater? And do I need to put live rock in the filter? Ive seen some tank with that set up. I have freshwater eels and stingrays and would like to have saltwater rays and sharks, whats the best set-up for stingrays and sharks in saltwater thank you guys look forward to learning all I can from you all. And if you all need help with freshwater fish let me know.

 

[kadella]

Hi there, welcome! Good luck with your new saltwater endeavers. As far as water goes, don't treat for it, unless you test for it. Establish what your levels are and adjust from there if necessary. If you are doing fish only - you're looking essentially for zero ammonia, nitrates, & nitrites. A ph of 8.2-8.4, a salinity of around 1.025. Also I would not use tap water on SW tanks, use RO/DI water. Not sure what kind of wet/dry you have, but you can add LR for additional biological filtration I believe. You also will need a good protein skimmer on a SW tank. Others may chime in here, but I think you have your sights set way too high for a 1st SW tank. Those types of species require enormous swimming room. I'm not positive, but I don't think a 60 gal is even in the ballpark for keeping rays & even the smallest of tankable sharks. You might be able to have some small eels possibly. Anyone else? Pls give info on the shark/ray issue, I'm not familiar at all. Tx!

 

[joshradio]

unless you have about 125 gal tank in your pocket... I would back off the extreme predator tank you envision... A) extremely hard to keep B) size requirements... and such...
if you're going for a "cool factor" check out spiny puffers, banana, green wolf and snow flake eels, volitan lionfish, panther groupers, triggers..... and keep in mind these are solitary tank fish... keep with other predators!