Allow myself to introduce.......myself!

welcome back anthony, good luck

 

You could have a 5 gal bucket with a lid and when you get the frags acclimate them into there. You can pick up a battery powered bubbler and maybe have some hot packs to throw in. But, thats ALOT to do for 1 coral. Maybe you could trade with someone local, if there is anyone local? Where are you located?

 

the rolling stones?

 

In a healthy tank, even a pico, most corals will outgrow it quick. I would stick with corals that are easy to keep pruned back so tank keeps in balance. Kenya trees, finger leathers and even xenia can be kept trimmed up pretty easily.

Tiny fish varieties...ie. little gobies, and a crab or two would be all you need to keep tank interesting.

 

I've been told that you really can't have ANY kind of fish in a pico... not only because of the bioload, but also because of the lack of swimming space... i saw a seahorse in a pico, but personally, i'm not a fan of seahorses..

what kind of goby would you recommend? i was looking at my DF&S catalog that came in the mail about a week ago, and the best options they had was the firefish, and those blue and black gobies, that i can't remember their names.. i'll do some looking around throughout the day... i have a feeling its gonna be a slow week...

 

Nope, a Dr. Evil quote from the movie Austin Powers

 

Of course you can keep fish in a pico....just very little ones not requiring much swimming room.

A firefish goby should be OK...any of the Clown gobies also.

Keeping water params in check is going to be a challenge regardless. -- but frequent water changes should do the trick and be easy enough.

Even just a couple of shrimp would be interesting.

 

Well you have the right plan "but I plan on doing it right this time around". Doing it right includes doing it SLOW, take your time at the beginning and it will take you allot less time to take care of it once its all going.

Plan it all out, read and learn as much as you can about how to do it before doing it. Keeping in mind that what works or doesn't work for one person might be an entirely different story for you.

I realize I only have small tanks but I don't have my freshwater listed here so between salt ands fresh I have 5 tanks of various sizes for a total of over 120 gallons. I too work depending on the weather and other things an hour to hour and a half away from home, some days I am gone from 5:30 till 8:30.

I have had several conversations with the wife since I got back into salt about the amount of time I spend with my tanks, some not real good talks trust me! So as a result of these talks I have limited myself major maintenance on my tank to one day a week, Saturday's in my case.

Don't get me wrong, I check all my tanks everyday, I feed, top off, clean glass and occasionally do tests most every night but I limit myself to about 1/2 to 3/4's an hour. But I do water changes and all other major maintenance on Saturday afternoon. There are ways of doing water changes really quick, by using pumps and and 5 gallon buckets of premixed water, when I use water and I make more after using it so its ready for the next time.

So it can be done, you can keep your family life and the lives in your tank happy at the same time.

Sorry about rambling on.....

 

gazog... i tend to ramble on myself, so i can stay with ya on everything ya said.. hehe by the way, very motivational.. makes me reconsider the "home tank"

as far as the pico... we just played musical cubicles again, and i got a bad cubicle... there's a column and i have about half as much space as my old cubicle... but (hehe, brainstorm), there's a perfect gap between the column and the edge of my desk, probably 2 feet wide... looks like a biocube with a stand would fit in perfectly! perhaps a 12 gallon? hehehe

 

12 gal would be great fun. Also not too heavy to move (with some water drained) if you need to.

Get one, and get with it! ;D