New Saltwater Tank, Fish Suggetions

[AoiroKibou]

Hello-
I am new to the Saltwater thing and was wondering what fish are good for a beginners tank about a month old. It is a 75 gallon tank the lvls are good got them tested today. Has two heaters and live sand and rock. Now, I would like some fish and would love some suggestions. I have look around at what is in the stores by me and I like Royal Gramma's, Many different clowns, a few gobies, Snowflake eel, Butterfly's, Tang's, Angle's, and Dwarf Angle's. There are others but I don't remember the name lol

Any suggestions would be very helpful

Thankies in advance

AoiroKibou

[crissie]

Are you planning to have corals? If so this can affect your fish selection.

[AoiroKibou]

That is what we are trying to decide ..... I heard some fish can eat anemone

[crissie]

Some fish will eat anemone and/or corals in general. As will some crustations/invertebrates.

If you keep your tank as fish and live rock then you have much more choice in fish (you just have to make sure they are compatible with each other. If you add corals then you have less choice of fish, but the corals themselves are also beautiful and add a great deal to the tank.

If I were you I would check out which fish you really really want, then see if they are "reef safe". Or of course you can check out the range of corals and see if they are worth the compromise on fish types.

It's worth noting that it is much easier to keep an aquarium without corals but, generally speaking, most people find a full reef aquarium more satisfying.

[Wings672]

IF you decide to go with an eel make sure there is plenty of substrate in your aquarium because they love to dig. I set up a PVC pipe system in mine under the sand in my new tank and hopefully when i transfer him over he wont dig anymore( its worked for others). When they are bigger then can really make a mess out of a tank.

[madean]

If you go with corals you need to make sure you have the proper lighting that will support the corals you choose to keep. I didn't see any mention of a protein skimmer. Hopefully you have one or plan to get one in the future. I would suggest you stick with fish until you feel like you have a better grasp of how to take care of a saltwater tank. Overtime you will learn what fish are compatible with each other either through trial and error or hopefully through research. As a general rule eels will eat anything they can fit in there mouth including your precious clowns, gobies, dwarf angels. I have had good success with a zebra eel not eating small fish but that could be because I exclusively fed him krill for years before I added him to a reef tank. I also had a good experience with ribbon eels. But I do believe that's because their mouths are small. They would still hunt and fin and eat fish the size of damsels. But bigger fish then that we're safe. I had a snow flake, Japanese dragon, Brazilian yellow chain link, yellow banana and they all eventually killed. Plus they could move rock around mostly by accident and sometimes the rock would tumble down the structure. So it would be a good idea to secure the structure as much as possible. You can read as much as you can but some times you will need to experience things to learn. This is why I still suggest you stick with fish. Just getting into the saltwater world can be a daunting task. You should learn about what's going on in your tank with the nitrogen cycle and how to manage nitrates. This will take time and trial and error to. Figure the sweet spot of your tank. And what's a balanced attack with cleaning and feeding and proper stocking levels for you. A lot of people try to rush into this hobby and kill a lot of things and spend a lot of money and get discouraged and just leave the hobby. Take it slow and try to learn as much as you can. Do research about the fish you are going to buy and don't just buy stuff on a whim because it looks cool at the lfs. Experience will tell you that the lfs employee might be a knowledgable person and could a complete fake and try to sell you an octopus to go into your open top tank with your prized gobies. I have come across more people selling stuff that have no idea what they are selling then people who do. So the only way to combat this is to educate your self. Even here on rc you will find differences of opinion (that's probably the nicest way I can put it).

Good luck

[AoiroKibou]

We are doing a lot of reading on the internet, and talking to people in many different stores. Our tank is in the middle of cycling so we have a few days or a week before it will be safe for fish. We are taking it slow and learning all we can before we add fish and other stuff.

Thankies again

AoiroKibou

P.S we are doing research on skimmers before we buy one.