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Rainman
03/18/2003, 11:27 AM
Hi All,

I've been keeping a mini-reef in a 30 gallon corner tank for about the last 18 months now with a good mix of sps, lps and softies mixed in with a few small fish (clowns, small gobies, etc.) with a good deal of success and indeed the reef bug has bitten my quite hard.

We've now upgraded to a 120 gallon and will now be moving the inhabbitants from my 30 across to the new 120, which leaves me wondering what to do with the old corner tank.

The thing that has really stopped me from doing anything really interesting with my little tank is the shape which has been less than easy and has restricted the species that I've been able to keep. My latest brainstorm is, once it's inhabbitants have been migrated to their new envorinment, is to give this tank over to sea horses.

My questions are:-

1. Would I be right in thinking that the shape of a corner tank will have a less profound impact on sea horses than regular fish?

2. I have a nice mix of "fijian" and "tonga branch" live rock which is riddled with pods of all kinds. Should I just remove all the fish and inverts and leave the setup as is and just add sea horses?

3. Clean up crew. I was also going to leave the clean-up crew behind, which comprises or 1 linkia startfish, 8 blue leg hermits, 6 turbo snails, 1 peppermint shrimp (on aiptasia duty), 1 cleaner shrimp, 1 blood shrimp (all shrimps are pretty large).

Take equipment includes a Deltec TS1250 skimmer, a kalk-stirrer/top-off system and a sulphur bead nitrate filter. Tank parameters are :-

0 ammonia, 0 nitrite, trace nitrate, 26c, 8.35pH, 1.024 sg. Temperature can fluctuate about a degree either way in a 24 hour period but never any more than that.

I understand that stability in water parameters are paramount and my LFS has a regular supply of CB animals.

I have a hospital tank all setup and ready and I keep a good supply of live baby brine (for my cichlid fry) so keeping other live foods should be no trouble for me.

Am I missing anything?

Regards,

Phil

Hara
03/18/2003, 11:29 PM
I would not leave the hermit crabs there. The peppermint shrimp is ok, I am honestly not sure about the other two shrimp.

The size and shape of the tank would be just fine. If you get CB horses, they should be used to frozen food, and the brine is not really needed except for a live treat. Although my peppermint shrimp spawn often enough to keep mine in live treats.

WaGuy82
03/22/2003, 07:03 AM
Sounds good to me. Seahorses are more height oriented. Personally I think the seahorses are fine. I keep blue legs, scarlets, peppermint shrimps, lots of bristle worms. The only thing I might be concerned about is bubbles. Does your skimmer spew lots of air bubbles into the tank? If it does, you might need to buy/make a bubble trap for it.

Will
03/23/2003, 08:53 PM
I agree, sounds like a good setup. Keep the hermits; they'll be fine.
-Will