How do I maintain a coral only tank?

[Nanolifeuk]

i would like to start another tank, coral only, and maybe introduce some fish later down the line.

Do I Cycle w/ dr Tim’s fishless , water change then go straight in with coral? I know people can battle for weeks to lower nitrates.

Do I ghost feed/ feed coral food/ dose nitrates back in after they drop?

Is a protein skimmer still necessary? Inverts/CUC?

I am hoping there is a coral only reefer out there eager to help me out!

 

[KStatefan]

I have tried a coral QT tank and it is a pain. Before i start it back up I am going to get an AWC system in place and take water form the display tank to the QT tank and from there to the drain.

 

[Tired]

You'll need cleanup crew, yes. A protein skimmer is needed only in tanks where organic particulates need to be skimmed out of the water, which isn't necessary for many setups, fish or no fish.

Putting coral into a newly cycled dry rock tank is probably not a good idea. If you really want to start right away, I'd suggest getting some ocean live rock. Once that's done with a little die-off from shipping, your tank is not just cycled, but fairly mature. Tampa Bay Saltwater sells little starter packages in their Treasure Chest section, or there's always KP Aquatics if they have any rock in stock.

Any particular reason you want to go fishless? It's not necessarily any easier.

 

[Nanolifeuk]

I have tried a coral QT tank and it is a pain. Before i start it back up I am going to get an AWC system in place and take water form the display tank to the QT tank and from there to the drain.

Sounds a lot less hassle that way, I water change every week with a gravel cleaner and that water is usually yuck, full of detritus and algae.

obviously it would be silly to dump all that waste in your qt tank, and a awc wouldn’t clean the substrate and cause that problem.

say for example you have it set to water change every week (like I do mine manually), are you not missing out and accumulating all that debris?
I presume you would set it to replace a low volume very often, and do manual w/c on top of that?

on top of that if you had any parameter swings in the DT, could this not also affect the corals in your QT.

It’s even a pain just looking into it.

 

[Tired]

If you have huge amounts of gunk in your substrate, you either need more flow, more cleanup critters, or both.

 

[Nanolifeuk]

You'll need cleanup crew, yes. A protein skimmer is needed only in tanks where organic particulates need to be skimmed out of the water, which isn't necessary for many setups, fish or no fish.

Putting coral into a newly cycled dry rock tank is probably not a good idea. If you really want to start right away, I'd suggest getting some ocean live rock. Once that's done with a little die-off from shipping, your tank is not just cycled, but fairly mature. Tampa Bay Saltwater sells little starter packages in their Treasure Chest section, or there's always KP Aquatics if they have any rock in stock.

Any particular reason you want to go fishless? It's not necessarily any easier.

No sir, not really. I love coral but am quite inexperienced in keeping it. I hate losing fish and get quite attached. I’d like to use it as a frag tank where I can max out on as many different corals as possible, learn more about keeping coral than worry about the fish in the tank with them.

There’s not huge amounts of gunk in my substrate, I meant relative to the volume of dirty tank water removed. I only w/c 12L a week so at the bottom of that bucket there is quite a bit of gunk that I wouldn’t pour anywhere but the drain.

So once the tank is cycled with live rock, presuming using old tank water isn’t an option. How would you maintain the low level nitrates in the water? Just go heavy on the CUC and feed a little regular food ?

 

[Tired]

Dosing nitrates and phosphates is probably the best way to keep the levels up, in the absence of fish.

That said, it might be easier to just get a super easy fish. Could buy a couple of pre-quarantined clownfish from somewhere. They'll thrive in whatever conditions the corals like, and plenty of other conditions besides, and they should live a good decade with proper care.