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NaH2O
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As mentioned a mature tank has well established bacterial populations, as well as microfauna. When a tank is new it goes through many changes. You are currently creating many changes for your tank, and having sensitive livestock at this time is very stressful on them. Even if you weren't making any substrate changes, or fish changes, the tank itself will go though different fluxes as it tries to stablize its bacterial populations. Once you have had your tank set-up and without change for almost a year, you will know what is normal for your tank. In my mind some questions to ask yourself when considering if your tank is mature or not: What will your tank do in the hot heat of summer? What effect will that have on your livestock? How much is it going to evaporate on a normal basis? What about when winter hits, what kind of temperature fluxes will you have? Will your parameters be swinging while you attempt to keep your water chemistry in check? How are your water parameters? Have you gone through algae cycles that follow a normal nitrogen cycle process? What kind of issues do I see if I feed too much?
Your tank is not mature right now. You are changing livestock around, and your tank needs to adjust to every change you make. If you feed too much one day, your tank will have to compensate for that....changing out fish will also cause your tank to flux and it will need time to recover from that change. Stability is key when adding something like an anemone. As you can see the more mature your tank is, the more stable it's various micro populations are, and it will be able to handle change better. Please, do not get the bubble tip anemone until your tank is older, and you are more experienced to try it. Your lighting is still insufficient for the anemone. Did you read the links I provided in my earlier post? Perhaps the LFS will allow you to wait for your tank to mature 9 months or so before you collect on their offer.
As for wild caught clownfish, as posted previously, please try and stick with captive raised, when at all possible. Wild caught clownfish can have a slew of diseases you may have to deal with. If you insist on wild caught clownfish, then please research their diseases. Here is one article, and I encourage you to read more: Clownfish Disease Why not keep something captive raised and hardy? I would recommend wild stock to more advanced aquarists. There are many species of clownfish available that are captive raised.
The more research you do now, the better. You will save yourself and your livestock alot of stress (& money). Your livestock is in your care, so you owe it to them to learn as much as you can, and provide them the best environment you can.
If I remember correctly, inverts such as crabs, snails, shrimp, etc are much more sensitive to water parameter changes (salinity and temperature especially), so an extended acclimation period should be used when adding them. The slow drip method over a 1-1.5 hr period is what I usually do when acclimating inverts (which is about 2-3 times longer than I normally acclimate fish).
Your post brought back all my memories of when I set up my first tank. I was so excited about my new hobby, and patience was the one thing I couldn't afford at the time. However, I paid for that in the long run by learning many lessons the hard (and expensive) way. You're off to a way better start than I, however, since you've already found these forums! I know it's really hard to be patient at this stage, but all the advice above is really, really good advice. Take advice from your LFS with a grain of salt, since they are in business to sell you stuff, and when good advice means not buying something now, I think they hold that advice back.
HTH & good luck!
rob
Curtswearing
Mantisfreak
You are correct Rob. Inverts are more sensitive to changes in temperature and salinity because they are osmoconformers as opposed to osmoregulators. Fish have a limited ability to control osmotic changes in salinity.....the inverts have no such ability.
There's a LOT of great advice from previous posters so read this thread a second (and maybe a third) time. There are ways to do this hobby relatively cheaply. However, there are certain animals that will never be cheap and anemone's would be one of those animals. They need more expensive lighting, cleaner water, target feeding, etc. Anemone care is incompatible with the word 'cheap'.
There's a LOT of great advice from previous posters so read this thread a second (and maybe a third) time. There are ways to do this hobby relatively cheaply. However, there are certain animals that will never be cheap and anemone's would be one of those animals. They need more expensive lighting, cleaner water, target feeding, etc. Anemone care is incompatible with the word 'cheap'.
Well I went around to a bunch of pet stores and I basically saw that...Between the actinic and daylight compacts...I have 72 watts = 2.5 Watts per gallon. The only other compacts I saw was a 50 watt combination of actinic and daylight. And many of the guys I talked to said the lights in there now should be fine, and two of the places had biocubes setup since around december with corals/anemones in it.
NaH2O
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I still would not recommend keeping an anemone in such little lighting. Your anemone will be under stress, and will be less able to deal with other stressors (such as temperature fluxuations, chemistry swings, etc.). These stores may have been able to keep corals and anemones since december in similar conditions, but that isn't long term success. Shouldn't we be providing the best environments we can for our animals, so they can thrive in their little glass boxes, as opposed to just get by? I know the things we are all telling you isn't what you want to hear, but we are just trying to give you an unbiased opinion based on experience, knowledge, and through talking with alot of other experienced people. The fact that these stores are telling you you can even keep an anemone in a 3 week old tank scares me, not to mention they say your lighting is sufficient.
What are your tank dimensions?
vimal
Well-known member
guys,you got idea for acclimating a shrimp?
