small tanks

Question
i was wondering if you could give me some incite on the difficulty of nano tanks with regards to what is work is needed to be done to reef potential also is there anything else i would need to add to a tank other then what comes it the already set up systems sold in pet stores?

Answer

Hello,

Nano tanks are hard to maintain due to water parameters.  This is a closed system so any kind of spike in Ammonia or nitrite could wipe out the whole system. You must perform weekly or daily water changes to this tank.  So water parameters must be pristine. Also you must not overcrowd a nano tank keep 1 inch of fish per 3 gallons of water volume.  This will help the tanks biofilter and limit any NH3 spike.

 For a good reef set-up you will need premium lighting VHO or Halide (5 watts per gallon) plus great filtration as well as a good protein skimmer. I am sure that these would be upgrades to the system your were talking about.

I have one 20 gallon nano with 150 watts of lighting, a CPR protein skimmer, one powerhead, an Aqua clear 70 hang on filter with 2 inches of live sand and 20 pounds of live rock.  This tanks holds 1 longnose hawk fish, and 1 pair of banded coral shrimp with some mushroom coral. I do more work with this tank than my 75 gallon show tank. Again if you can keep up on water quality then you should be alright. Make sure you get good quality test kits like Salifert kits.  They are a bit $$ but are worth it because of their accuracy.  

I have seen some (Nano's) in Doctor Fosters/Smith with an upgrade in the lighting aspect.  I believe they are 12-25 gallons in volume.

If you need any thing else let me know.
Thanks and good luck
Todd