[Inaudible].
I hear from my first fish tank working with Marine Depot.
So today we're going to do 10 common beginner,
saltwater quorum questions.
This isn't like the top 10 saltwater beginner questions.
These are just 10 questions that my blogger max and I get frequently.
So we figured to kick off our 51 weeks.
I think it's 51 weeks to kick off our 51 weeks of the ultimate
beginner series. We'll start with some of the basic questions.
I also realize that I have been working with Marine Depot now for about
a year, and I just wanted to say thanks to Marine Depot.
I've worked with some great people with Steven, with Manny.
They've been super supportive and have just, I don't know,
they've just been super great. So thank you,
Marine Depot It's been a fantastic year.
This new series max and I have been working on this.
I'm doing the video portion and max is doing the blog portion.
This is basically our attempt at the ultimate beginners here.
He's not just like a single video. That's 30 minutes long,
which I have or a single video. That's 10 minutes long, which I have,
or a series of 10 videos.
We wanted to go super in depth for the complete beginners.
We put out newsletters with every new video that goes out.
So if you just go to my first fish tank.com and click on subscribe,
you'll be signed up for our newsletters. You'll get an alert.
Whenever this new video and blog comes out,
we're going to put out one video every single Friday at Marine Depot and at my
first fish tank for the entire year for the entirety of 2021,
let it be known that this is going to be a beginner ultimate guide.
This is an intermediate or an advanced ultimate guide.
It's for those true beginners out there who don't really know anything about the
hobby. So is it going to be simplistic at times? Absolutely. Absolutely.
But that's the point. So go ahead and set an alert every single Friday 9:00 AM.
You can watch it marinedepot and you can watch it at my first fish tank and then
head to
myfirstfishtank
.com forward slash start dash year start here.
There'll also be a link on the homepage itself. And as we upload those videos,
you can have an opportunity to see the blogs that max have done,
and the blogs will have similar information,
but much more detail and links to all the various products we're going to be
talking about. With that being said, let's get started with questions.
Number one.
Were aquariums more difficult than fresh water aquariums. I mean,
if you were comparing a simple freshwater system to a simple
saltwater system, then yes, it is more difficult because you have salt.
So you have one step, but honestly,
a simple freshwater system and a simple saltwater system.
Once you get the gist of it are really both pretty much the same.
I wouldn't say that a saltwater system is much more difficult. In fact,
you can do an extremely difficult freshwater system.
When most people think of fresh water tanks,
they're thinking about a simple betta fish tank, you know, or, you know,
some sort of neon tetras in a tank in a bowl, right?
But that's probably not the best way to go about our fresh water system.
Freshwater systems need good filtration, freshwater systems need good heating.
The same is true on the saltwater side.
Saltwater system need good filtration and they need good lighting and good
heating and all that stuff. So if a beginner was to do a fresh water system,
right, it would be very, very similar to doing a saltwater system, right?
And in fact, you can have salt water systems that are just as complex,
if not even more complex than a saltwater system.
I'm talking about high end planted tanks with CO2 dosing and all
sorts of unique plants in there.
It's it's out of this world and I've never done it because I'm so intimidated by
it. So our salt water crane is more difficult than freshwater aquariums.
It's a yes. And a no
question. Number two, I don't have very much money.
Can I still set up a saltwater aquarium? Yes, absolutely.
There are plenty of YouTube videos out there that talk about budget saltwater
aquariums. And when we're talking budget saltwater, grooms,
we're talking like under $300 and if you're really thrifty,
you can often get used equipment that you can just clean it yourself and save
a ton of money. Can salt water systems be extremely expensive? Absolutely.
Absolutely. Let's just look back here. Right? Here's my fluvial reef tank.
This system here with the aquarium, the stand,
these lights, the Wavemaker, the heater,
the auto top off the dosing pumps. I'm going to say it's $1,500. Okay.
That's an expensive tank. This tank over here, the reef octopus Lux 90,
these lights are 550.
This tank in this stand cost about $2,000. So total here,
I'm probably looking at $3,500,
but you don't need to spend that much to have a successful saltwater aquarium.
You can get a small 10 or 20 gallon tank.
You can build something from Petco or PetSmart and easily have success for
under $300. I don't have much money. Can I still get a saltwater Corrine?
Absolutely. Absolutely. You can.
And you can do what I did with my first aquarium.
I ended up going with a high end aquarium for my first set-up,
but I just bought it over a period of six months.
So if you have a goal in mind and you want something bigger and slightly nicer
than just save up with each paycheck and buy a piece at a time and
in six months, you'll have a beetle.
Question. Number three.
How do I clean and sterilize old equipment or old tanks?
This is a really good question,
because if you are a beginner and you want to save money,
there's nothing wrong with buying secondhand aquarium or secondhand heaters or
second-hand pumps. But oftentimes when you buy these,
they're going to be super dunky and nasty. And who knows,
maybe there's parasites and stuff in there as well. So how do you clean it?
Well, the easiest way to clean it is number one, rinse everything out,
rinse it really well.
Then just add standard white vinegar or citric acid.
These are both readily available. So what I do every time I change out a tank,
I will rinse it out once. Then I'll fill it up and I'll just pour in a ton,
like one of those Costco size things of vinegar, and I'll just pour it in there,
let it sit for a few hours, three, four, five, the longer you let it sit,
the more it will tack the calcium and the algae.
And then you can clean it up really, really easy.
Just make sure when you're done with that process,
that you give everything a really good rent. If you want to be really,
really sure that there's no bacteria or anything in there after you rinse it,
after you give it the vinegar bath,
you can fill everything back up and just put in a small amount of bleach.
Obviously we're goggles,
we're protective equipment and let that equipment soak in that bleach for a
little while. Then obviously drain it out and then rinse it out really well.
And then before you use it,
let all of that equipment die because the bleach is no longer dangerous once
it's dry. So as long as you let all of your equipment dry,
both inside and outside, you have a completely stick
For what equipment is essential for a saltwater aquarium.
Most of the equipment we use in the hobby is not essential.
The absolute essential for a successful saltwater aquarium.
Obviously you have to have a tank. You have to have some sort of filter,
some sort of light, some sort of heater and salt. Really.
You don't need fancy things to have a successful aquarium.
Is there a lot of fancy and expensive equipment in this hobby? Absolutely.
Absolutely. But you can start out inexpensively with very,
very little and still find that
Number five. How much time does it take each week? A small,
simple salt water aquarium,
something 10 to 50 gallons is only going to take you a couple
hours a week.
There's not a lot that needs to be done once your tank is up and going,
generally your weekly tasks are going to be things like keeping the glass clean
algae, scraping checking on your livestock, doing some water testing.
And then the biggest thing you're going to do on a weekly basis,
which not everyone does. You don't have to is doing some sort of water change.
And that's probably the most time consuming part,
depending on how fast you are and how much you've done it before.
And how far you have to take the water,
but taking some of that water out and then refilling.
It can take a little while. So I would say if you're getting something small,
like either really one of these tanks right here,
you're looking at two to five hours per week. It can be a lot more than that,
right? Depending on what kind of equipment you have,
depending on if you're dealing with issues. For example, in this tank right now,
I'm dealing with green hair algae. So after I make this video,
I'm going to be going in here for probably 30 minutes to an hour and picking off
that hair algae. So you will find problems,
but most of the time you're looking at two to three hours a week.
There are occasional tasks you have to do like once a year or once
every six months. Things like removing the calcium buildup from your pumps.
Just things that will give your equipment longevity.
And those do take a little bit longer.
But as long as you just have one small tank, I'd say two to three hours a week.
What's your number six.
What are the ongoing costs for saltwater query? Once you bought everything,
all of your equipment and your livestock,
really your ongoing costs come down to electricity for running your lights and
your pumps and your heaters food for feeding your fish and your
invertebrates buying saltwater for doing water changes. And that's about it.
Electricity, food, salt, water,
electricity obviously is going to depend on where you live,
but things have gone a lot more efficient in this hobby.
The biggest pieces of equipment that use electricity somewhat heavily in your
tank is going to be any of your pumps, especially your return pumps,
your heater and your lights. But nowadays,
most people use led lights and they're pretty energy efficient as it is.
I'd say the number one largest cost is going to be from doing water
changes. If you're just buying salt water from your local fish store,
typically they charge a dollar a gallon.
You can save a lot of money in the long run by making it yourself.
But a lot of beginners just don't have the expense or the time or the knowledge
to really want to do that.
So let's say you just go to your local fish store and you buy that.
If you had a tank, that's this size right here,
this is about a 60 gallons overall. And you were to do a 10% water change.
You'd be looking at $6 a week to do that.
You could probably cut that price in half by making it yourself.
Obviously the larger the tank, you have, the more money it's going to cost.
So if you keep your tank small 15 to 30 gallons,
the expenses on a monthly basis with everything are probably going to be between
20 and $50, depending on.
Yeah.
Seven are corals and saltwater fish expensive. No,
and yes, it totally depends on what you buy.
Just like in any hobby.
There are certain things that are more rare and difficult to come by.
And there are certain things that are more collectors items.
While you could have a simple coral that you could pick up for a few bucks,
you can have one with slightly different colors. That's a few hundred dollars.
Me personally.
I always just go on the cheaper end because my eyes really aren't good enough to
be able to distinguish between a high end and a low end.
So are corals and fish expensive. They don't have to be,
I pretty much always go with cheap inexpensive fish. Yes.
You could pay $200 for a fancy clownfish or you could pay $10.
And for me, I think the $10 ones are great. Yes,
you could pay $2,000 for a fancy anemone,
or you could pick up an inexpensive anemone for $15 depending on
what your tastes are.
And if you can stomach getting something that's just not quite as fancy,
then the answer would be no saltwater, fish and corals.
We're not.
And number eight are corals and saltwater fish difficult to keep it.
Totally, totally depends.
There are species out there that are super Hardy and there are
ones that are super finicky and it depends on so many factors.
Some species ship really well. Some don't,
some species need a big aquarium and some can deal with a small aquarium.
Some have like a really thick slime coat that makes them more impervious to
disease. And some seem to just pick up diseases all the time.
Some corals are really,
really good at different lighting conditions and water parameters and some
corals, if one little tiny thing changes, we'll just bleach out and die.
So are corals and fish difficult to keep. They don't have to be.
I would recommend as a beginner choosing corals and fish that are known to
be beginner friendly, that way, you know,
they're going to ship well and you know,
they're going to be Hardy and they're going to be tolerant of the.
The stakes.
Number nine. How many fish can I put in my saltwater aquarium?
Not the easiest to answer.
We used to give a one inch of fish per five gallons. And,
and while that's probably a really good idea, that means what,
if you have a 20 gallon tank, you can get for one inch fish.
And that just oversimplifies things because we've made so many advancements in
aquarium filtration that as long as your water is filtered, right?
And as long as you're able to take care of all the nutrients you're putting into
the tank, by exporting them, then you can have a lot more fish.
But when you're thinking about how many fish you can add,
it's really going to depend on several factors. Number one,
how aggressive is the fish? There are docile fish,
semi aggressive fish and aggressive fish.
And if you put one single aggressive fish in a tank, that's 20 gallons,
that's probably the only fish you can have when you could probably go with a
whole bunch of more docile community fish and put a whole bunch of them in
there. Another question to ask is, is, is where does that fish live?
If you to buy four fish that only live at the surface, that's not great,
but if you have some fish that like to live at the surface,
some fish that like to live more in the rock works, and some fish that like to,
to sift the sand or live in the sand bed,
then you were putting your livestock at different levels.
So they'll inhabit different areas of the tank.
So how many fish can I put in an aquarium? Let me just give you an example.
Right back here is my 24 gallon tank.
It's 18 gallons up top with six gallons of filtration I have in
there, a Gobi to clownfish, to pajama, Cardinal fish,
a cleaner shrimp,
a whole bunch of corals and a whole bunch of snails and hermit crabs fish
wise. I have five fish in there,
but the livestock options are really kind of endless.
Once you get the knack of it,
is it better to start out as a beginner with fewer fish? Yes, absolutely.
And start out with docile community fish,
and then you can kind of go from there to make sure that the fish you're adding
are going to be playing nicely together.
If you have your heart set on one specific fish and do your research and build
your entire tank around that so that, you know,
what sort of livestock options are going to be available with that one specific
fish. So how many fish can I put in an aquarium? Totally depends.
Totally depends. Do your research have good filtration?
And you'll find yourself.
The 10th question that max and I get quite frequently is what is difference
between anemones, corals,
sponges and macro algae? A lot of times people think, Hey,
what kind of plants can I add to a saltwater aquarium?
And most of the time when they're thinking plants,
they're actually thinking of corals and anemones. Yes,
there are plants you can add. And we call those plants, macro algaes,
different kinds of seaweeds. There's all sorts of beautiful,
large algaes out there. And those, those are plants. They're photosynthetic.
They use the light to create their food.
They can also benefit from nitrates and phosphates in the water column.
But when we're talking about corals and anemones and sponges,
those are not plants. Those are actually animals.
The main difference between a coral and an anemone is corals are stationary.
They don't move anemones,
have feet and can move all around your tank.
Most corals and anemones are photosynthetic and get 90% of their
nutrition from the light, but can also handle supplemental feeding.
Although when you get into higher end corals,
there are corals out there that are non photosynthetic and require daily
feedings to survive. Well, that's it. Week one were done as of now,
max and I have 51 of these beginner,
blogs and videos plan. So if you don't want to miss out on any of them,
scroll down, click on my first fish tank.com,
click the subscribe button to subscribe to our newsletter.
If you found this helpful,
please consider giving it a thumbs up and subscribing to Marine Depot and my
first fish tank. And if there's someone in your life,
a friend or a family member, you know,
who might want to start a saltwater aquarium,
if you consider sharing this video them, we would greatly appreciate it. Well,
that's it for week one,
we hope to see you guys here next week for week two of the 51
week, ultimate beginner series, whatever we're going to call it,
which we haven't figured out a name yet. We'll see you next week.
Everybody be well.