Reviving my tank

[cousenfl]

I have a 55G tank that has been neglected for about 5-6 months now. When it was up and running I had some fish, LR and some pollopsand coral in it. The fish have been gone and the corals are gone. There are still some of the pollops, crabs and snails alive in the tank. I want to bring the system back to life but right now I am on a limitted budget. For now I want to only add some fis back into the tank but the long term plan when my funding improves I want to have a reef set up. My plan is to clean the tank up well and do a large water change and add a couple of fish but I was wondering if anyone has some suggestions as to some hardy fish I can enter that are reef friendly will survive if the tank goes thu a cycle and I do not have to try and catch later when I start to add corals? I would appreicate any input.

 

[mrdc]

First I would test your water to see what it looks like. What sort of filtration are you using?

 

[ibanez]

Throw a raw piece of shrimp in there. You don't have to use fish to cycle anymore. It is not necessary. I hope you aren't the type to get bored with it quick and neglect it. If so you might reconsider if you want to do that again.

 

[cousenfl]

I have about 50-60 lbs of LR and and a bed of LS about 1-1 1/2" and I am running aReef Devil skimmer by E.T.S.S.

 

[cousenfl]

No I don't get bored quickly I have had this set up for about 30 years it just got neglected after we lost power foe a few days and my funds would not allow me to bring it back sooner. Thanks for the input.

 

[mrdc]

I would test the water and it might be good to force a cylce (if that is the right term) before considering a fish. Once you think the tank is ready, there are a lot of really hardy fish to choose from. I neglected my tank for about a year and just recently have started back. I was still doing some infrequent water changes and still had all the equipment going but just wasn't adidng anything new to it. I finally decided to set it back up again.
Though I would stay away from a lot of damsels and hawkfishes unless you want mean fish. They are reef safe but may restrict what other fish you may be able to add. I would look at gobies and blennies.