The Wait

Well Everyone -- Sorry it has been so long since I have written here. I got so busy I didnt get much chance to add to my blog. My sister sent me a link to her blog (Amerith's Voice) and she mentioned to me that I needed to get back into my blog. Until that time I had almost forgotten about it. So....... Here in the near future I am going to try to be more active here. I have also decided to take a page from my sisters book..... Anyone who would like their blog to be listed here let me know and I will consider listing it. It doesnt have to be related to fish.
The Tank is doing really good. I have a good set up and a lot of fun fish. But I should go back to the beginning about the set up.......
I left off listing all the equipment we needed. Now comes the fun part.
We got the tank all set up and filled with water and our live rock. Live rock is chunks of rock that comes from the ocean. It already has organisms in it to help balance the tank. After we filled the tank we wait.... and wait..... and wait. It took 6 weeks or waiting with just water and rocks in the tank. We wait for our nitrates, nitrites and amonia to balance out before we can add any fish. This part felt like it took forever. It is hard to watch a tank for 6 weeks with nothing in it.
Here are some pictures of the setup. The first picture is of the fill and the second is just after filling. I will have to find where I put the pictures of the live rock. Until Next time!!

Getting Started - Buying Equipment

There is a lot to buy to get a salt water aquarium started. Here is a list of the equipment that was suggested to us to get us started with our salt water tank. There is the obvious tank and stand (we bought a 75 gal tank to get us started.) Other things we needed were the heater(250 W stealth heater), filter, hood, light, substrate(crushed coral), salt, hydrometer(used to measure the salt content of the water), thermometer, live rock, filling hose, prime, and stability. Many people suggest using a protein skimmer but we have not bought one yet. We are going to wait until we know how many fish we are going to keep in the tank. All in all we spent around $1300 to get everything started.
For those in the Billings area that are interested in starting a salt water aquarium a good place to start is at The Coral Connection in the heights. For more information visit their website at http://thecoralconnection.com/
They had a very helpful staff and were very flexible in working out payment plans. They are very knowledgeable and take extra steps to make sure you are getting started in the right direction.

Well that is it for tonight. I will let you know more when I get started creating my mini ocean!!

Welcome to Salt Water Experience

First off I wanted to say Thank You for visiting Salt Water Experience. I am here to tell you about my first experience setting up and maintaining a salt water aquarium. I will keep track of every step I take to set-up and maintain the aquarium.

Thanks for Visiting!!!