We have a 55 gallon tank on a pine stand with a pine hood. It used to be a fish only tank but
we converted it to a reef tank by upgrading the lighting from strip lights to power compacts.
Also at conversion, we removed our bio balls from our sump and added more live rock to the main
tank. Our tank has been a reef tank about 3 1/2 years.
We currently have about 60 pounds of live rock. We have about a 20 gallon sump. We have 220
watts of power compact lighting with 2 daylight and 2 actinic bulbs. For circulation, we use
three powerheads and a spray bar (water return bar). Our only mechanical filtration is a
hang-on skimmer attached to our sump. On the bottom of the tank we have 1-2 inches of fine
reef sand mixed with some crushed shells.
Invertebrates and corals: We have numerous mushrooms - red, blue, green frilly,
brown frilly, etc. (had about 2-3 years), 2 colt corals (one we've had for one year and one is
brand new), an awesome purple and green favites coral (about 2 years in our tank and about 2
years in a fish store display tank), a tiny toadstool leather (about 1 year), 2 long tentacle
anemones - one pink/purple and one peach and green (the pink one we've had for about 3 years
and the other one we've had for about 2 years in our tank and we bought it from another reef
keeper who had it for 2-3 years). We also have button polyps and a tiny colony of star polyps.
We also have a small crop of caulerpa, a pair of true percula clownfish, a peppermint shrimp,
a cleaner shrimp, mithrax crabs and a lawnmower blenny.
We add calcium and iodine and PH buffer when necessary. We have a reef tank page on our website with pictures, more in depth information about our tank, advice and information on how to set up a saltwater fish tank. Visit us: http://home.att.net/~jandtchavez/opening.html (Note from Editor: Site Gone 09/13/06)
