Reef nutrition

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dksoba

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Hi all, I’m Matt.

I’m moving up to Fremont next month from San Diego. I won’t be having a tank immediately, but fortunately I found a renter for my house in San Diego to also care for my tank (friend).

Before I set up a tank, I need to figure out how big of a tank I want and where in my house rental I’m going to put it. I also need to get the renters insurance add on for aquarium liability squared away.

My plan is to start a new tank and only take a few corals and fish that are very special to me up to Fremont, probably in June.

Does anyone have recommendations on where to buy a tank (around 180 gallon, possibly much smaller if I don’t have a proper place for a salt water mixing station and auto water change)?

If I stayed in San Diego, my plan was to get a custom 300 gallon tank made, but due to career opportunities my plans need to change.

Anyways, I met a lot of nice people from SDReefs and I plan to do the same here.

Cheers,
Matt
 
Welcome to the club! Looking forward to getting to see you around and at the meets.

I'd recommend looking at Neptune or Aquatic Collection if you want something immediately, or ordering through High Tide Aquatics if you're looking for something ordered (owned by our very own @under_water_ninja , Kenny).

Given their 40% off made to order discount right now, Innovative Marine may be the best bang for your buck. A bit larger than you're looking for, but @Beanju , myself, and (soon) @popper have build threads of the Nuvo 200 for ideas.

Welcome to the club, though! You'll like it here :)
 
IOnceWasLegend said:
Welcome to the club! Looking forward to getting to see you around and at the meets.

I'd recommend looking at Neptune or Aquatic Collection if you want something immediately, or ordering through High Tide Aquatics if you're looking for something ordered (owned by our very own @under_water_ninja , Kenny).

Given their 40% off made to order discount right now, Innovative Marine may be the best bang for your buck. A bit larger than you're looking for, but @Beanju , myself, and (soon) @popper have build threads of the Nuvo 200 for ideas.

Welcome to the club, though! You'll like it here :)
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Welcome! Echo everything @IOnceWasLegend said and I think you can still get the discount and order through a LFS if you choose for the IM tanks.

Someone in the club might have a tank for sale too, maybe post in the https://www.bareefers.org/forum/forums/buy-sell-trade/ forum.
 
Welcome! High level question, given you're just moving into the area and going to be renting, I'm curious what's making you jump to such a large tank from the get go? I ask because I imagine at that size you're at the point where you should get approval from who you're renting from and that opens up a series of other complications. Unless of course you've got a long term location locked in and what not.

I don't ask that to get in your business or push you away from that idea, but there's very commonly a lot of good, resold, tanks available in this area that are pretty cheap and closer to the 50-100gal range. That range might be easier to pull the "well... the lease didn't explicitly say no aquariums" card.
 
richiev said:
Welcome! High level question, given you're just moving into the area and going to be renting, I'm curious what's making you jump to such a large tank from the get go? I ask because I imagine at that size you're at the point where you should get approval from who you're renting from and that opens up a series of other complications. Unless of course you've got a long term location locked in and what not.

I don't ask that to get in your business or push you away from that idea, but there's very commonly a lot of good, resold, tanks available in this area that are pretty cheap and closer to the 50-100gal range. That range might be easier to pull the "well... the lease didn't explicitly say no aquariums" card.
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This is a great question! I already had the landlord put into the lease agreement approval for an aquarium (as long as I get insurance protection against flooding caused by the aquarium).

As for the size, I’m open. I have a 70 gallon tank and I want a larger one, but I very well could go the other way and get much smaller. All I know is that it should be between 30 gallons and 300 gallons. I need to live in my new place and feel the stress of my new job. That will give me an idea of how much I can reasonably accommodate.

Bigger tanks allow for more area to put equipment under the tank, more stability, and more room for fish to swim.

Smaller tanks are much easier to do water changes on. If I don’t have room for a salt water mixing station, I’ll almost certainly go on the small side. I had a friend check the place out before I signed the lease agreement, so I don’t know specific details on where I might put an aquarium and a salt water mixing station. I’ll know more next month.

I’m also totally open to buying stuff used. Almost all my reef equipment was purchased used.
 
Welcome!

I think you’ll be better served by a tank in the 50-70g range like you have now.

I like tanks in the 200g range but would not recommend in a rental home. At that size, there are new significant things to think about like possibly needing to reinforce the floor, not being able to put it upstairs, not being able to drain and move it relatively easily, larger volume water changes needing more dedicated space for that plus other related stuff, possibly needing to cut pass-throughs in the wall… just lots of things that are better done with a house you own.

With the smaller tank you can forget most of those issues and just have a tank.

Maybe others in the club who have been in your situation can give more specific advice about it.
 
dksoba said:
This is a great question! I already had the landlord put into the lease agreement approval for an aquarium (as long as I get insurance protection against flooding caused by the aquarium).

As for the size, I’m open. I have a 70 gallon tank and I want a larger one, but I very well could go the other way and get much smaller. All I know is that it should be between 30 gallons and 300 gallons. I need to live in my new place and feel the stress of my new job. That will give me an idea of how much I can reasonably accommodate.

Bigger tanks allow for more area to put equipment under the tank, more stability, and more room for fish to swim.

Smaller tanks are much easier to do water changes on. If I don’t have room for a salt water mixing station, I’ll almost certainly go on the small side. I had a friend check the place out before I signed the lease agreement, so I don’t know specific details on where I might put an aquarium and a salt water mixing station. I’ll know more next month.

I’m also totally open to buying stuff used. Almost all my reef equipment was purchased used.
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Sounds like you've got it under control. Have you lived in the Norcal area before? My $0.02 is erring on the side of simpler and smaller for the first year or so might be beneficial. For example, you could almost certainly get something like a second hand Reefer 170 (or slightly larger) setup with some main peripherals for $1k + lights + livestock (eg kinetic's recently sold one). That'd simplify placement and reduce your need to have all the things fully baked (eg that size tank would have less need for a full saltwater mixing station). You could still buy most of the long-term, high-end, stuff to go with it if you desired (eg apex+trident or equivalent) and buy the high end lights just running at low intensity (eg an ap9X way throttled down).

That way you'd still have a lot of flexibility, and also be able to move without it being a ginormous ordeal. Assuming you over-buy the big things, and you buy the tank-size-specific equipment second hand (eg skimmers, ...), if you decide to upgrade later in the year it wouldn't be much of a monetary loss. Worst case you end up deciding to keep it as a frag tank (maybe look for an IM tank which usually would be shallower).

You even could get away with buying a couple larger fish as juveniles if you decide you're confident you'd want to upgrade.

Anyway, going big also works, but with all the gotchas after a big move you might get a higher risk vs reward result going a bit smaller. Good luck either way!
 
Since it's a rental, temporary and unpredictable, go for a manageable easy to move size tank.

Welcome to the club. Glad you found us.
 
Welcome!
I don’t really want to jump on the smaller reef for renters bandwagon, though supper practical to be sure,
Can we start a Multiple Reefs! for renters bandwagon?!
I’d say go with 3+ 50gl or less!
Welcome to the Bay!
 
Welcome! This is a great place to be and I truly think you'll enjoy it. I'm exiting the hobby myself atm and breaking down my 112g but I'll vouch for this group of scallywag's!
 
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