how much shit do i have to do to take care of these planning to get 5-7
>>2071953
Depends. What's the pH, GH, and KH of your tap water, and do you want to breed them?
>>2071953
you'll need a 55g or larger tank, heater, filter, lighting, substrate.
Personally I wouldn't bother with tankmates or live plants right off the bat since both are going to cause problems.
next you probably want an RO/DI unit and a bunch of discus buffer (acid buffer). Also a decent selection of live foods and ground frozen beef heart.
this is a lot of money, in particular the RO unit is pretty pricey. But not really that much when you compare to the cost of the average discus.
This is what fucking happens when faggots decide to ruin the /aq/ by starting it out with "dirted tank edition"
>>2071974
This nigga is old as fuck if he thinks this is all needed now.
Discus aren't that hard anymore especially since less and less are wild caught and more have been tank raised and bred for years.
>>2071999
HAHAHA
I was thinking the same fucking thing, too many people are going to see the pick and right off the bat assume 'gardening' or some shit, whereas a fish just tells you right away
>>2072000
I don't think it's needed. It wasn't needed back when I kept them.
it's just what's needed if you have hard water like most people do. It's also what's best, and really if you're going to pay $200-$400 for your fish I can't imagine why you'd balk at a $120 RO unit.
But by all means, keep some expensive fish in a dirt cheap setup if you like. What could possibly go wrong? Maybe stick a thousand dollars worth of reef animals in a 20g tank with $40 lights while you're at it.
>>2072001
Hey, it's not the OP of that thread's fault people are too dumb to read a thread title
>>2072005
I have $1000 in reed animals sitting in a 30g with lights that cost me $10 and a homemade protein skimmer xD
>>2072084
Reef* fuckin gey iPhone
Fish are a meme pet, worse than birds
>>2071999
Dude there are rogue fish threads outside of /AQ/ pretty much all of the time. The thread of which you speak is probably already coming up on its bump limit anyway.
>>2072088
Explain what that even means.
>>2072084
I know.
I've seen 20 or 30 tanks like yours over the years here. It's pretty much the only type of reef tank anons own.
the owners come on here showing off a tank that's somewhere between 6 months and a year old. They post their tank repeatedly, the same picture hundreds of times. Then they disappear never to be seen again.
presumably because their tiny box of reef inevitably died and they quietly fled. It happens. All the time here since anons seem intent on doing everything dirt cheap.
>>2072118
I mean, it's not like I'm incompetent, shit. My skimmer pulls skimmate excellently, and my light is a 165w LED. Tank has been thriving for 9 months, haven't lost a single coral.
>>2072118
Also, that whole 'disappear to never be seen again' this, probably because they moved to actual reef forums, not this sad forum.
>>2072154
I know, you're doing great. Your tank looks damn good. A little over a year is about average for most people though. Right around that mark things often go catastrophically wrong. Perhaps you'll avoid that. Hard to say. Going cheap on equipment isn't a good sign though. if your tank crashes it's probably not because of incompetence, it's almost always equipment failure.
>>2072157
very possible. from what I've seen among reefers I've personally known most quit though. Perhaps they move, maybe they just can't afford it or get tired of the hassle. A lot of them have their tanks crash. Either way I pick up more free livestock and equipment from newbs than I care to talk about. It takes some pretty serious dedication and financial stability to stay in the hobby very long. I like to think most of those guys come back later when they're better equipped to do the job. If so they undoubtedly do better the second time around. They'll have learned not to go cheap on equipment anyways.
>>2072164
Are you that anon who always hates on poorfags in /aq/ for not having reef tanks?
>>2072164
If you do it right it really shouldn't be THAT expensive. I don't rely on things like controllers, because a. their expensive, and b. they fail. I have two heaters, and thats about all I really need as far as redundancies go. I spend money on salt, and even then I usually just bring in a few frags and I get my salt free. Although I did just splurge and bought 150 gallons of salt, at only 42 bucks i couldn't pass it up. I've actually already dealt with my first 'crash', my urchin had picked up one of my mushrooms and scrapped it against my liverock while I was out of town. The softy was pretty pissed, and did what softies do when their pissed, try to kill your whole tank. Luckily my tanksitter was pretty competent, and I had him add 5 lbs of carbon, and i got there asap, did 150% water change over the course of two days, and everything went back to normal pretty quick with not a single casualty. Most of my stonies bleached, and at the worst points my fish were acting super sluggish and close to the ground, but still everything pulled through fine. Another day or two without my attention though and it could've been a different story.
Needless to say, that urchin is no longer in the tank.
>>2072287
The size was really for mobility. I have to move frequently, so a nano is much more practical. I just really don't think a crash will happen any time soon. This tank has been incredibly stable the entire time it's been operational. Heater's breaking is the number one reason these things crash, because they drop in temp so fast without heaters. But I have two of them, so I should be covered there. One's set a whole 4 degrees lower then the other, so it literally never runs, unless something were to happen to the primary. Other than that, I don't know what would cause this tank to crash (although you never do till its happening)
>>2072304
power outage is a common cause.
getting busy and falling behind on water changes is another.
yep, a failed heater or skimmer or filter can kill a tank too.
