Need Advise

[mexican]

I need some input on starting a reef aqaurium.
I have a 55 gal. that I have been getting ready for a year now and have been doing everything the local fish stores have been telling me from lighting to filters. Well I finally started adding live rock and corals, and nothing seems to be doing good at all. The local "aquarium specialists" have done their own test and tell me nothing is wrong, so that's when I started searching the net and found this forum.
What I have:
55 gal.
aquaclear sidemount filter
uv sterilizer
coralife lighting w/2 65watt 50/50 bulbs
3 pumps to keep water movement
about 15-20 lbs. of live rock
leather, bubble, and star polyps coral
bubble anenome
clown
tang
manderin
jawfish
and a cleaning crew
Any and all help is greatly apreciated!!

 

[firefish3]

tang is a 55 :nope: :nope: :nope: :nope:
75 gallon minimum dont worry its not your fault. What is it with lfs and being wrong? need more live rock for the manderin. tey eat pods I think. what king of fish? besides tang, like yellow tang, kole tang, etc...... what exaactly is going wrong by the way I have my guesses but could you give a little more information. hope your tank works out better in the future. make sure the lr is cured

 

[spicyballs]

got sand bed for your jawfish?

 

[mexican]

About the tang it is a yellow tang and I suspected after the first week that my tank was too small when he started getting very aggressive. And just how much Live Rock do I need per gal.? Is there a ratio to go by? All together the fish seem to be doing great. I do have a sand bed for the jawfish and seems to be enjoying himself. He already has a tunnel under the Rock. As for the corals they don't open up completely and do not have a full color to them. Thanks for the quick replies hopefully I can get this worked out asap!

 

[greatfullreefer]

What are your water parameters?...additionally you need about 200 more watts in lighting you are way to low. Was the rock cured? how long has the tank had water in it, did it cycle?
As stated the Tang is bad, i also believe your Manderin will not fair so well without a refugium to populate pods which is its diet.

 

[boomper]

There is a standard ratio for live rock
1 lb - 1.5 bl per gallon
You can add more or less than this (mostly a personally preference) but that is the recommended amount.
If you are planning to do a reef setup then I would say closer to the 1.5 lb per gallon.
As always, cure the LR before sticking it in there. Do a search for curing LR (there's tons) if you aren't sure what that means.