Over 25 pieces of gear to cover today.
So if I want to keep this anywhere under 20 minutes, let's just jump right.
Right.
Was Matthew here from my first fish tank,
collaborating with Marine Depot this week, episode six of the beginner,
how to guide the saltwater creams and rethinks.
We talk all about the optional gear. So why is my hair all matted?
And I'm wearing different clothing because I'm using this new camera.
And when I click the record button, I actually was stopping the record button.
So all the stuff I recorded, I actually didn't record.
So I have to film a few of these again, the last video,
somebody left a comment and told me, Matthew,
you forgot one piece of essential equipment and they're right. I forgot heater.
I actually filmed it. And I put it in the video,
but I must have deleted it by accident. So yes,
a heater is an essential piece of saltwater aquarium equipment.
Can I give you guys one general disclaimer for the whole video?
Because last video, I just kept saying this over and over again.
This video has over 25 pieces of equipment.
And the purpose of this video is not to explain in detail each one of those
pieces of equipment. We will deal with all of this equipment at later videos.
This is just a general overview as to what situations you
may or may not need this piece of equipment. Okay.
Let's get started
first up.
Oh my God. My goodie. My kitty is photo bombing me all day.
Oh my goodness. You need to stay off today. He hates being held. Okay.
First up we have protein.
Skimmers is this necessary? No, it's not necessary. Just look behind me.
Protein, skimmer, protein skimmer, mixed reef tank,
no protein skimmer,
a protein skimmer may become necessary over time because what our protein
skimmer does is it removes very, very small organics,
which help prevent them break down into nitrates. Right?
So if you're having a really high nutrient levels, especially your nitrates,
then a protein skimmer may be one of the ways to help lower that and
stabilize your water parameters. Number two, reactors.
This is a calk Wasser reactor, which is not common reactor,
but there are all sorts of reactors.
There are your general media reactors for DFO, for carbon,
for bio pellets, you have calcium reactors.
You have algae scrubbers or cater more for reactors. All our reactor is,
is it's a chamber for some sort of media to react.
You don't need a reactor,
but I use a reactor on two of my tanks.
And specifically the reason I use a reactor is when my phosphates get out of
hand and I can't seem to lower it down.
Using a reactor with the appropriate media is one of the ways to lower
those nutrient levels.
I'm also going to be adding a reactor on this tank right here,
because my protein skimmer isn't working enough to really get those nitrate
levels down.
So I'm going to be adding a bio pellet reactor to help lower those things.
You absolutely don't need it. This tank doesn't have them.
And instead of using a reactor with a pump, you can just use a media bag,
but reactors are definitely more efficient in using the media.
Number three is media GFL,
carbon call Glosser bio pellets. Do you need media?
No, you don't need media.
And a lot of beginners make the mistake of just adding media when you don't need
it. Sometimes media can be really helpful. If you have high phosphates,
then using some sort of GFR can be great.
If you have smells or discolorations or some sort of chemical warfare, then,
then maybe, maybe carbon is the right option.
If you want an easy way to dose your tank instead of two part, and you have,
you know, not too much calcium or alkalinity depletion every day,
then calc washer could be something good, but as beginner,
don't go hunting for solutions to problems that don't exist.
Wait until you have problems and have tried other things before you start using
media. The fourth item is an ROI filter. Again, it's not essential,
but if you don't have an RDI filter, then you have two options.
One is to go to the store and buy distilled water,
or to go to the local fish store and buy our ODI water.
RDI filters are one of those things that seem expensive upfront around $200,
but it's one item that I recommend over and over again for beginners,
because it will make your joy of this hobby so much better and your hassle
so much less. And over time, it will easily pay for itself. The fifth item,
those are socks. Obviously you don't need filter socks,
but this is a really good method of mechanical filtration.
I've gone through phases in the hobby where I've used them,
or I haven't used them.
I currently do use them on two of my tanks because I find they just capture so
much gunk.
And when I'm dealing with phosphate and nitrate issues in heavily stock tanks,
they can be really helpful.
But I know plenty of people who rely on other things, they rely on sponges.
They rely on filter cups. They rely on filter floss.
You don't need this to be successful. And in fact,
this tank doesn't even use a filter sock, but they can be helpful,
especially if you need to lower down your nitrate in your phosphate levels.
By changing these out every day. I don't. Number six is just a simple sponge.
Do you need a sponge? Now? They're just like filter socks.
It's just another way to have mechanical filtration. I use a sponges,
my primary mechanical filter over here.
I find sponges to be helpful in lower nutrients systems.
If you have a lot of nutrients, a sponge just might not cut it. But yeah,
a sponge is a good weapon to have in your arsenal for mechanical filtration.
Number seven is a, refugium a refugium can be confusing for people,
but basically it's a refuge.
And in a refugium people usually use it to grow macroalgae and to provide a
safe place for their pods or amphipods and their Copa pods.
You don't need a refugium, but a refugium can be really,
really helpful for two things. One nutrient export,
if you are dealing with high nitrates and phosphates,
putting in macroalgae into refugium can help because that macro algae
will consume nitrates and phosphate and two it's a great place
to grow and to help breed copepods.
And amphipods so if you have some sort of livestock,
like a Mandarin dragon net,
it's a really good idea to have refugium so you can keep up a high supply of
Copa pods. Number eight is an algae scrubber or algae reactor.
It has the exact same function as a refugium that grows macro algae
and algae reactor. Basically,
you just take a reactor and you put algae in there and it consumes the nitrates
and the phosphates and algae scrubber works very similarly,
but it's an external box that drips water over this kind of perforated sheet.
And then you just have to manually remove it. You don't need these things,
but if your struggling with high phosphates and high nitrates,
you could go with a refute gym and.
Or now
we have eight foam mat.
No foam mat foam mat foam mat foam
mat. You don't need a foam mat. All a foam mat does,
is it help even out the inconsistencies on the top of the stand,
because just imagine if the top of your stand had some sort of bumps on it and
that bump pressed against the glass,
it's going to stress out that one area and possibly lead to cracks.
So if you have a small tank, 10, 20 gallons or less,
that's probably not something you need,
but why not go to Amazon buy an inexpensive yoga mat and just cut out a foam
mat to place on top of your stand. Number two is a stand.
We already talked all about the dance. Do you need a stand? No,
you never need to stand. You can always just put it on the ground,
but a stand does raise it up,
makes it easier to service has a nice viewing angle and can also hide your sump
and all sorts of other equipment. So I personally do love having stands,
but if I have a really small tank, I'll just put it on a sturdy desktop.
Number three is a sump. Now of course you don't need a sump,
but if you have a larger tank and really want to experiment with the full range
of filtration options, then a sump is a great idea.
A sump is fantastic because it hides all of your filtration gear and it also
increases the overall water volume of your tank, which leads to more stability.
I don't have a sump. And this one, I do have a sump in these too.
So I have two sumps and three tanks with no sumps.
You absolutely don't need a sump,
but a sump is just a much bigger area that you can put in a big protein
skimmer, one or two reactors.
Oftentimes you can put a macro algae refugium,
it can be a place to house your auto top off, but for beginners,
I don't typically recommend larger tanks with sums just because it can
over-complicate things, a simple rear filtration chamber will do the trick.
Just fine. Number four is a fan not necessary depending on where you live.
But in the summertime here in the Palm Springs area, we keep our house at 78,
which means all of my tanks would go to around 80 to 82 degrees.
So I just put a small fan,
attach it to my Bay controller and I have it turned on,
and that does seem to help keep the temperature down by two degrees through
evaporative cooling, which is just enough for us. And the summer.
Number five is a chiller.
This is just a simple Thermo electric chiller, right?
Meant for small tanks. You might need a chiller one.
If you have a cold water Marine tank, too,
if you live in an area with really high temperatures and you keep your house
really, really warm, especially in the summertime or three,
if you're having some sort of livestock like certain seahorses or pipe fish
that like to keep the temperature somewhere closer to 72 degrees,
you may need something like this.
This Thermo electric chiller is fantastic for small tanks,
but if you have a larger tank, you may have to bite the bullet,
pay several hundred dollars to get a larger chiller.
Number six is salt mix.
I've gotten made fun of this in previous videos before for calling salt mix
optional, I'm not saying salt waters optional in a saltwater aquarium.
Obviously you need salt water to have a salt water aquarium.
I'm saying you can get away without buying salt, mix yourself,
because if you live near an ocean or you live near a local fish store,
they make salt water and you can just go there and buy it.
I've always mixed my own salt water just because I bought an RDI filter early
on.
And I really do recommend doing it yourself because you will save a lot of money
in the long run. Number seven is sand. You don't need a sand bed,
but a sand bag. It does provide several things.
A sand bed can provide a home for berries animals.
There are certain kinds of snails starfish,
gobies that rely on us sand bed to, to sleep at night,
to eat and to feel safe.
But a sand bed also is a highly poorest area that houses a
ton of beneficial bacteria, but you don't need that.
One of my tanks over here is a bare bottom tank and yes,
it has a nice aesthetic to it.
And it's just easier to clean and keep detritus from. But no,
you don't need a sand bed. You can definitely go with a bare bottom tank.
Just be aware that you may need to add in some more live rock or some more
ceramic media to really beef up your biological filtration.
If you go without a sand bed, number eight calcium and alkalinity test,
it gets if you're going to have any sort of corals then yeah,
you're right in a need at a bare minimum to test for calcium. Okay.
In alkalinity,
if you're just going with a fish only system or your we're just going to put in
a few corals and keep up on your weekly water changes,
you can probably get without this. But, but I mean, why not? You know,
it's really good to track. And then as you get into the hobby,
you'll probably start buying more and more corals and have more and more
inverts.
So it'll be a good idea to track your calcium and alkalinity because you may
have to start dosing. And number eight is a controller.
There are different types of controllers from, from something like this,
which is a simple temperature controller. This one's made by ink bird.
It's not my favorite. My favorite is actually a BI temperature controller,
but this one works just fine.
And what you can do is you can plug in a heater and a fan to these things,
and you can have a turn on a fan of it gets too hot and turn on the heater when
it gets too cold, right investments,
I recommend every single person use one of these, but there are also really,
really fancy controllers like in that tune apex that can cost you thousands of
dollars.
And while there are a lot of great benefits to a fancy controller like that,
I don't even own one of those because it's just, doesn't make sense in my setup.
And for most hobbyists, you don't need something.
If you're a super techie person and you just want to spend a thousand dollars on
a fancy controller, then by all means, go for it.
But the only controller I recommend, especially to begin.
It's just a simple peppermint.
First up, we have fish.
Cycling. There are just so many different fishless cycling products
out there.
The basics of all fishless cycling products are some sort of ammonia chloride,
and then some sort of beneficial bacteria,
all of which these are beneficial bacteria.
I definitely do recommend official a cycle because one it's way nicer to your
fish, because if you put a fish in a tank and then cycle it,
you're exposing them to ammonia levels, which are toxic to them.
So it stresses them out. It is also faster to do a fishless cycle,
oftentimes because you can just dose things and your tank can be cycled within a
couple of weeks. So no,
you don't need to do a fishless cycle with some sort of fancy products,
but it's definitely recommended. Number two is an auto top off a pump.
Do you need an auto top off system?
Of course you don't need an auto top off system.
You can do what I do on one of my tanks, which is just get a pitcher,
fill it with RDI water. And then every single day go around to those tanks.
Don't have an auto top off system and just pour a little bit in,
but all my bigger tanks out would be a lot every single day.
So you can go ahead and pick up something like this from reef breeders,
there's all sorts of different companies that make these auto top off systems.
And they're awesome. They will automate the process for you.
You add a pump and they will just either optically or physically read the water
height and then add the water for you.
So if you just fill up like a five gallon bucket with RDI water,
then you really only have to fill up that bucket once a week,
which is just so much easier in the long run and having to take this around to
all your tanks. Number three, two part dosing, super doesn't,
it's kind of a misnomer. It's calcium alkalinity, but also magnesium.
There are different ways of going about it.
Two-part dosing is not necessarily essential.
There are a couple of ways to get around two-part dosing.
If you don't have any corals, then you probably never,
ever need to two-part dose,
unless you have like a crazy amount of inverts in there.
But if you do have some corals, you might not need the two-part dose.
If you buy a salt mix,
that's high in calcium and alkalinity and you keep up on your water changes.
Well,
that's something like the red sea coral pro salt would fit that bill just fine,
but you may need to two-part dose.
If for some reason your tank is depleting calcium and
alkalinity at a faster rate than you're adding it back in.
You can either two-part dose by hand, or you can set it up with dosing pumps.
That leads us to number four dosing pumps.
There are just different kinds of dosing pumps from something that's just manual
that you have to program by hand to something a little bit fancier like this
come more wifi pump that you can control from anywhere.
You don't need a dosing pump. For example,
I don't have a dosing pump in this tank. I just manually dose as necessary,
but for my tanks that are packed with corals like this one,
and this one I found that I have to put in between five and 10 milliliters of
calcium and alkalinity every day, even with my weekly water changes.
So investing in a dosing pump to automate that for you in the long run
will just save you a lot of time. Number five is a wave maker.
A wave maker is really any sort of power head that has some sort of
pulsing motion. That's really all it is.
There's really inexpensive wave makers and really,
really expensive wave makers in a really small tank.
Let's say something like 15 gallons or under, you might not need a wave maker.
You might have enough flow in there with just your return pump,
but a wave maker comes in really handy.
One for larger tanks and two for systems that want to create more flow.
Some of your corals will need medium to high flow.
So investing in a wave maker will be a good idea at that point.
Number six is a calcium reactor. Here's a little secret.
I've actually never used the calcium reactor in my life.
A calcium reactor is basically a way of adding calcium and alkalinity back into
your tank automatically. Basically you take a reactor,
you stuff it with a Reaganite, which is calcium carbonate.
You add a little carbon dioxide,
which melts the a Reaganite and produces calcium and carbonate,
which will then feed your corals. Absolutely not essential.
The only time you would want to consider is if you have a large tank with a lot
of small polyps, Stony corals, and it's just a pleading,
your calcium and your alkalinity super fast,
then an affordable option and an option that will just save you.
A lot of headache is to purchase a calcium reactor and our seventh and final
item is battery powered air stones.
I think owning these,
which are incredibly inexpensive is just a good idea.
And you should own one of these for every single one of your tanks. These here,
I think I got them for $10 on Amazon. They'd run with two C or D batteries.
And in the event of an extended power outage,
the primary reason your fish and your corals will die is oxygen depletion,
because does oxygen get into your tank through water surface agitation?
And if you don't have any agitation,
they will use up all of that oxygen quickly. So do yourself a favor,
purchase a few of these at the start,
at least one for each of your tanks and that way in an extended power outage,
you have a greater chance of success with keeping your livestock alive.
That's it for episode number six,
be sure to tune in next week for episode seven,
where we're going to discuss the key things you need to know before buying
your gear. If you found this video helpful,
please consider sharing it with a friend,
giving it a thumbs up and subscribing to both Marine Depot and to my first fish
tank. And as always, thanks for watching everybody happy refund.
We'll see you next week.