Edmonton Freshie walking the plank, Any advice to ease the wallet/headaches :)

[Wayne]

Well I can start off with a few questions:

Usually 1lb of live rock per gallon is recommended, so somewhere in the neighborhood 300lbs is going to be needed. For that kind of amount you definatly want to buy that from this board from someone with a big tank thats shutting down. Many people don't recommend bioballs because they need to be rinsed weekly to keep nitrates down. As for sandbed being used to reduce the amount of rock, I would certainly go the rock route. you don't need live sand, with the live rock it will eventually make the sand "live" aswell.

Tap water can certainly be used with a declorinator as I am sure your familiar with and just synthetic salt mix will work just fine for you. For your original cycle I recommend just buying cheaper salt mix, then when you get into corals you can start mixing in better stuff if you so choose.

Chillers are only needed if you have heat problems, generally if you have a/c in your house you should be fine running metal halide. If you don't and your temps rise past 84F for too long you can try fans, if that doesn't work then you might need a chiller. UV sterilizers can be added later, they are good to combat green algea after scrape the glass and will help with water clarity, but most people don't use them.

CO2 is something that I am not as familiar with but lots of people with bigger tanks seem to have them.

Take your time let your system cycle for 4-6 weeks before you add some hardy fish, then wait a few months after that before you start adding corals. You can add some durable softies a few weeks after the fish but nothing delecate for sure. Do lots of research before you buy fish or corals as its the number 1 biggest newb mistake. You need to make sure everything is going to be compatible. I wouldn't personally put fake coral with real coral because it will be obvious which ones are fake when they are next to each other.

If I missed anything I am sure someone will jump on and answer it for you, otherwise feel free to pm me.

Oh and welcome to Canreef!