Johnny Reefer's FOWLR

[Palster]

This thread has been a great reference for me in the planning of my 135 gallon FOWLR. Great work so far on the setting up of this tank. It is looking real good. I have one question for you. How much live rock do you have in the tank? I know the live rock is highly effective for biological filtration but purchasing enough live rock for a 135 gallon tank is a very expensive endeavor especially when many of the LFS charge 10 dollars a pound for cured LR where I live. Might have to order a box from J&L or somewhere online and cure it myself.

[Johnny Reefer]

Hey, glad to hear your getting something out of this thread. That was my initial intent. Not so much as teachings, as I am learning SW too, but rather a documentation of my experience with setting up a FOWLR tank. Your feedback has made it worthwhile.

As for the LR I have in there....it is 136 lbs (1lb/gal.) of Bali LR. It's pretty good stuff and is not very dense. (Meaning lighter and more porous than some LR).

You don't have to stock all the LR at once. You could start with say 35-40 lbs and work up from there. Just make sure that your bio-load is very low to start with, too, if you do it that way. (IMHO). When I set this tank up originally as a reef, one year ago, I started with about 34lbs LR and 5 Chromis. The tank cycled right away. Or another way of looking at it is that it didn't cycle at all. The magic of LR.

Good luck and cheers,

[niloc16]

absolutely beautiful work. i really like the aquascaping. looks like you really took time to choose your rocks. nice job

[Johnny Reefer]

Introduced 2 Green Brittle Stars (Ophiarachna incrassata), last week, as part of the clean up crew. (Wanted more crabs but LFS's LR orders having been lacking in hitchhiker crabs, lately).
Nitrates are on the rise, as I suspected they would. There at 20 ppm now.
Bought a Rena XP3 canister today and I am going to run strictly Kent Nitrate Sponge in it. Settin' that up tomorrow. A temporary procedure, until I can get a sump going on this tank with a proper skimmer.

Cheers,

PS: Thanx niloc16.