hi all

[duce]

wats the best fish to cycle a new sw tank .??
oh and its gonna be a reef tank

[gem]

Live rock is the best to cycle a reef tank with to be perfectly honest. If you insist on using a fish, then a damsel, but they do tend to become agressive and are hard to catch if you want them out. Live rock will do a perfect job in cycling your tank. It has everything the cycle needs.

[duce]

cheers !
at wat point after set up can live rock go in???

[gem]

Right away. Your sg should be around 1.024 and go ahead and add your live rock. It will take a while to cycle the tank. There really isn't anything special you'll need to add. You just need to test your water and keep the params straight during the cycle. Once you see I diatom bloom, (brown dust like algae on rocks sand and glass) add a clean up crew (astrea or turbo snails and hermit crabs) and keep testing. It can take quite a while...weeks to a month or two to fully cycle, but if you take it slow and be patient, it's all worth the wait. = )

[duce]

wicked stuff
am looking to set up soon
just looking for filters for my fluval 405
wat would u lot recon would be best ????????

[Halelorf]

Your live rock will actually be your filter. They are very porous and all the bacteria live inside the rock pores. You just need a powerhead(s) to keep water moving.

[NickFish]

Think of live rock as an established filter.

Just throw the live rock in there first thing, put in some live sand and wait 2 months, it should be cycled and ready to go.
Not at all like FW where you have to go through the whole ammonia drip process and stuff.

[zackish]

I don't know how big of tank you are going to go with but if you are running a fluval 405 I imagine it's pretty big.
That being said, get rid of the 405 and get some kind of skimmer. Unless you want to try modding the 405 but usually canisters are just a good house for nitrates which are no good in a SW reef tank.
Basically you don't want any phosphates or nitrates in a SW tank, as well as the obvious (ammonia and nitrites).

[Kuli_Loach]

Depending on the rock is your cycle time. My 55g reef was cycled in 6 days because I got rock that was not cured so it had a lot of life already on it and then I transfered rock from an established tank and it never left the water. If the tank is 30g and up then you need a protein skimmer but if it is less then I don't think you need one. Run several powerheads depending on size and make sure to purchase 1 lb of LR per gallon at least to provide good filtration. Add inverts and corals and such BEFORE fish.

[NickFish]

I have an HOB on mine, but I just use it as a powerhead, with no media in it.

I also have a fluval canister, but I modified it for chaeto. Which by the way, is a great idea if you want to try it! You can mod pretty much any HOB or canister filter for macro algae.

[Kuli_Loach]

Thanks right, you can! So what size is the tank?