OK! LOL! Yeah my Reef is 9 years old so it's auto pilot.
So I am very lucky. I am friends with the countries leading pleco expert...yeah it's a thing. She used to own a LFS here. She had lots of discus for sale in those days. She used our tap. She told me to stop being stupid and set up the damn tank. So today I went ahead and paid for the tank stand. I'm having one made out of aluminum. One of those fancy strong as a house things.
Water coming into house is 90-110 TDS. PH out of the tap varies but stays relatively consistent at 7.9-8.1. We do not use chlorine or chlorimides here. On rare occasions they have to we get a warning. I would use Prime or Safe to treat water anyway. The hardness of the water is insane though. She assures me this is not an issue. I might use peat in the sump? I don't know.
She suggested no more than 1/2 inch of sand. I might cheat here and use egg crate in the scape for the illusion of depth. We don't do bare bottom around here. We just don't. It will be completely inert. I am growing out some mangroves in my reef tank just for fun. I think I might get them acclimated for fresh water instead and use those in my scape. I am going to use my dragon rock, that I never even looked at just threw in the garage. I got some of those twigs and mopani. I will scape with some Lace Java, rosin maiden crypt, and some flamingo crypt. I also have some petite anubis, like really petite. Also some dwarf hairgrass, that is in no way dwarf as it grows 3 to 5 feet tall. All of these plants are long lived in my other tanks. I won't be using CO2.
I am going to order a python long enough to get to the utility sink. That will make life EASY.
Plans for sump. First chamber, filter cups with poly fill that I will change daily. Then I will use Mattenfilter against the first wall of the sump. And then in front use several layers of Swiss Tropicals foam. Next chamber will be K2. I have never used K2 but it seems a good choice here. I will use one of a million pumps I have laying around to get a nice uniformed roll of the K2. Next sump chamber is a wall that forces water down through media. I will use more layers of Swiss Tropical foam in a finer grade. Last chamber is the return pump. Around the return pump I will use a single layer of ceramic in the long form.
reef.jpg
Lighting is SB Planted.
She suggested I get 6 juveniles from Hans (I don't know who this is). So I guess 6? I will get some shrimps. All my shrimps are all cross bred now, so I will start new with some fun warm water loving scrimps. Will probably do rummynose. Enough to get a nice school/shoul however you say it. A zebra pleco.
I use a heater controller on ALL my tanks. Anyone in this hobby without one is crazy. On this controller will be a 300 watt titanium heater. My home is generator backed up, so if we lose power this system's heater and return pump will still function, all my tanks are on their own breaker. A perk of buying a 120 year old home that needed to be updated. Allows you to add crap like that. I will make sure my generator can support another heater and pump. Should not be an issue. I'll have the electrician move that outlet to the tank breaker.
I'm sort of talking out loud here. Anything I missed? Any suggestions, (not barebottom) LOL!
I have oodles of equipment. Just tons. I even have canister filters. However the tank is drilled and rimmed, THICK TWO INCH ALUMINUM FRAME. Custom Brands aquariums build these damn things like tanks. The glass is an inch thick! I don't however have an overflow box yet. Given they don't need a ton of movement I am going to buy one that's rated less than I would reef.
I guess after the stand has shipped and I assembled it, I will start a build thread so you all can watch a fail in real time.
One more thing, a dude in our reef group has discus. He might even be in this forum. If crap goes south, I can rehome to him right quick. NO LOSSES ON MY WATCH DAMMNIT!