NEW NANO!!

[Fish_man]

i am setting up a 10 gallon nano and i plan on custom making my own sump because this tank will be for dwarf seahorses and i dont want them hanging on the heater or getting stuck on the filter. i plan on a 5 gallon for the sump with the filter and the heater in there. my problem is how top heat the water if it is constantly moving in and out of the 5 gallon? i want a 200 gph pump in the tank and in the sump to pump the water throughtout the system. and the return will split 2 ways and go to either side of the tank. does everything sound in order? i also plan on having a metal halide system 175 watts over the tank for some zoanthids and colony polyps and maybe 1 or two acro's. some gorgonians and a couple of halimeda plants. just wanted your opinion on things before i get all started and screw up...lol just kidding. my parameters right now are 0 ammonia , 0 nitrate, 0 nitrite, 8.2 ph, 1.025 SG and the tank is always kept between 76-78 farenheit. i have 10 lbs live rock and a tiny little cleanup crew until i get the real crew with the seahorses.

 

[Anonymous]

Well, I've never looked into dwarf seahorses. Do they appreciate a calmer tank like regular seahorses, or can they tolerate the high flows you'll need for acros? I don't think you'll even need to buy a heater if you use a 175 W MH. You'll probably have problems with the temp going too high. My tank has acros under PCs, and they do just fine.

 

[liquid]

To be honest I think you'd be better served doing a species tank if you're planning to keep dwarf horses. IIRC, they prefer very calm tanks and I think you're going to have problems w/ combining them w/ acros. If it were me, I'd forget about keeping high light coral in there and focus on either a dwarf horse species only tank or go w/ low light stuff like mushrooms, zoanthids, green star polyps, etc. There *may* be some incompatibility between your horses and certain corals so I'd do my research up front on problems you might face w/ horses and coral. I'd probably drop my lighting down to a set of PC's or something like that if you find out certain species of coral are OK.

For a much better discourse on keeping dwarf horses, head over and see our friends over at Seahorse.org ( http://www.seahorse.org/ ) and they'll be able to help you with your seahorse questions.

Heh, if I ever tire of my reef hobby, I'll probably pick up a couple dwarfs and head in that direction.

Shane

 

[Fish_man]

yea... i just said acros of the top of my head. im only putting in 30 watts of lights. 1 actinic, and 1 daylight. and i wasnt really going to focus this tank on reefs. i have others for that but i wanted a lot of stuff for them to be able to hold on to. hence acropora. branchy coral gets large and i could move it when i need it somewhere else. so other than having the acros do you think the others are ok? is their anything else i can add for branches to hang on?

 

[liquid]

Gorgonians and macroalgaes are two that come to my mind for things for them to hold onto. IIRC, there's a bunch of setup pics over at Seahorse.org with pics of horses hitched to gorgs, caulerpa, halimeda, etc.

Shane