This is true

This hobby can be very expensive or very cheap.
I don't use 3/4 of that equipment you listed and my mixed 40 year old reef is doing just fine.
Also no one can quote scientific journals to me because I do my own research and have been doing it since before any of the researchers were born.
I forget how I started my reef but it was probably with a dead shrimp, but it could have been with a live blue claw crab that I later ate or a lobster.
The water I collected from the East River. The rocks I found in the Long Island Sound along with the macro. The sand was from a beach.
This thread is much too violent for me so good luck.

I promised myself I was going to stay out of this verbal fist fight. I find it very frustrating to seek help and then have two posters offer different advise and then have one start thumping his chest and calling the other names...my God grow up and relax...Reefing Madness I can see how you got your name. If you think your methods are the ONLY successful way to start a tank you don't have near the experience that you think you do.

For every new person that gets into this hobby, my advise is to listen to every "expert" self proclaimed, or recognized by others, and then weigh those opinions against your own levels of confidence, your situation and resources. Different things work for different people and locations. This can be a very expensive hobby, but it doesn't have to be and still have great success. There are many ways to start a tank. I would argue that if you're planning to keep fish and invertebrates, it's not as hard as many might lead you to believe.

Then when you are no longer the "newbie" and have some experience, please don't recklessly bash other very successful aquarium keepers that use a different method than your own to pursue their enjoyment of this great hobby. Be thankful that the different methods are shared so that you too can have your own stories of success and tales of tribulation.

klinemw

By all means, set up a 10g tank and partition it off for your macro algae. Let us know how that works for you. Until you've been there and done that, how would you know how to answer? How much room is now left in the tank for its inhabitants? With the live rock and the sand, that's about all your going to get in that tank that is now cut in half. I'm with Paul, I don't use half the crap that was listed, not even close, but Beasl's way to fix everyone's problems is to add algae, it aint gonna cut it. Set it all up, run your tank like that, and let us know how it runs for you. Don't guess, and by all means don't take sides, but know what your getting into, and know what you are talking about........first. Then jump in.


One last question for you Klinemw, I see you have a Sailfin and a Yellow Tang, very nice. May I ask what size tank that is you have them in?

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Ive read this entire thread..Sorry but Reefing Madness is correct here..I have been in saltwater a long time..if i have a problem(rare, but it does happen) i go to him..this hobby has to many varibles to take anything for granted.culurpra will go asexual in a heart beat and once it does good luck getting it out. sure you dont need a skimmer or all the fancy bells and whistles, but the main thing a experieced hobbiest thats giving advise should do is tell the person what he should do and have to have a sucessful tank,, and Reefing Madness has done just that..+1 on the playsand..it has glass in it, and silicates do not use

Rick

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