heres a run down of my tank, good thing i saved it on microsoft word. i modified it a bit to answer your questions.
Tank size: 10 gallon
Placement: corner of bedroom
Set up: about 1 year and 3 months
Filtration: emperor 280
Skimmer: no skimmer (and probably will never need one)
Lighting:
-2x40 watt PC + 1 moon-lite. (complete hood with fan)
-1 10,000k bulb
-1 ultra actinic blue bulb
-8 watts per gallon
Parameters:
-pH: 8.2-8.3
-ammonia: 0
-trites: 0
-trates: 0
-Phosphates: .25-.50
-Calcium: 440
-salt level: 2.5 (a little high for my liking)
-alkalinity: I don’t have an alk. Testing kit.
Live stock:
-1 PJ Cardinal (Oscar)
-1 long-fin fairy wrasse or carpenter wrasse (Musik) – committed suicide over the weekend. R.I.P Musik
Invertebrates/clean up crew:
-About 8 hermits
-2 turbo grazer snails
-2 living bumble bee snails (3 died)
-1 scarlet cleaner shrimp (Cosmo)
-3 queen conches
-1 lime green feather duster
-1 sand sifting starfish (bought it with only 1 leg, nursing back to health and doing fine)
Corals:
-Pulsating xenia
-Medium star polyp frag
-Pearl bubble coral
-2 green striped mushrooms (used to be one. It had a baby within a month and a half!)
-1 purple spotted mushroom
-2 teal mushrooms
-6-9 red mushrooms
-1 purple and orange ricordia
-zoanthids (1 frag of brown w/ white center, 1 frag of lime green w/ orange center, 1 frag of brown w/ bright fluorescent green middle, 1 frag of dark orange w/ white center, and 1 frag of moon zoanthids)
-3 small frags of bright green button polyps
-1 small toadstool leather
-1 green with pink tip frog spawn (newest specimen)
Unwanted pests:
-Bristle worms (I have one that must be at least 4 inches long!)
-Some string like things that come out of a piece of my LR
-Algae (red on sand bed, and green slime on glass. Treating and deleting)- conches eliminated it now
Water changes:
-1 gallon every 2 weeks
Chemical dosage:
-Iodine (1 does every 5-8 days)
-Strontium (1 does every 4 days)
-Calcium: (I use a liquid buffer reactor. 1 dose every day, but stopped because of saturated calcium levels. At the moment I don’t have anything that relies on calcium like a clam. Dose changed to 1 dose a week.)
-Coral food: (1-3 doses every week depending on water quality)
Water testing:
-Water is usually only tested if a problem is noticed. Best indicator is the pulsating xenia.
-Schedule for water testing is needed and soon to come.
Personally the 20” 2X40 watt PC moon-lite fixture is the perfect light for a ten-gallon tank. At 8 watts per gallon, you can put any coral you desire in there. I love this light! It comes with a built in fan and the hood is made of heat resistant material of some kind. My water temperature is almost the same as it was before, but now I have to add a lot more top off.
The emperor 280 filtration system is also great. User friendly, easy to install and clean, and is almost noiseless. Only problem is that it takes up a little less than half the wall space, but I stacked around it and it actually is beneficial to my wall. I would prefer a fuge but I don’t have the money nor the time, nor the knowledge for setting one up.
Thank you for appreciating my hard work on my tank, lemme tell ya, it was a struggle in the beginning. Lack of light made my early corals die. And lack of care, experience, and knowledge made my fish die. Personally corals are much easier to keep alive than fish with my experience.
SUGESTIONS FOR SETTING UP YOUR NANO:
-If you go with a 10 gallon, get no more than 2-3 fish.
-Don’t skimp out on the LR you will end up needing it, and it basically creates you tank all on its own.
-Sand bed should be 1-2 inches. Maybe more depending on what critters you want.
-Scan your tank frequently for signs of red algae growth and green slime. The earlier you notice them the easier it is to get rid of them. I used conches for my red algea, and turbo grazer snails for my slime. Conches got rid red algae on my sand bed in less than a week.
The turbo grazers are still working on the slime.
-Make sure to only purchase fish and corals at a fish store that you trust. Try not to get them at supermarket places that sell dog and cat stuff too.
Good luck.
Any questions, comments, or suggestion please don’t hesitate.
. thats the best way to obtain new equipment is to ask for it for your b-day or x-mas:happy: .