Do you have to lighlty stock with a MM system?

[Sanj]

Hello again,

I have been wondering after getting my knickers in a twist over whether to skim not to part time etc blah everyone has a different and sometimes totally oppsoirt opinion on this...

well often im told that you have to stock lightly with a MM system and a few people on here seem to have seemingly few fish for their systems.

So i thought i would ask the opinion on this stocking:

system net will be about 400 litres: Main: 32"x27"x27" sump: 27"x20"x18"

fish:

5x Green Chromis
2x Black and White Common Clowns

later on 6months plus+

1x Coral Beauty
1x Watanabe Angel female (genicanthus = most friendly reef angels)

and at least 1 pref pair green Mandarins

Is this quite high stocking for a mud system without skimmer?

[Frogfone]

it's not so much lightly stocked as what you stock you need a good diversity of feeding stratagies. looking at your stock list almost all of your fish are mid water feeders and are therefor going to need food added to keep up with demand. this will put more pressure on the filtration.

2x Mandarins are your only fish with a different feeding stratagy. there's no way a tank this size can sustain 2 mandarins in the long term unless they also adapt to flake/dry which means more food added.

i would also say your tank is to small for a Large angel, i would swap this for a small tang (kole, purple or scopas ) as they are biofilm grazers.

you also don't have any pest control in the form of a small wrasse (6 lines, radiant etc)

there's also no blennies or gobies on your list i would swap the mandarin for one of these as mandarins will decimate your pod population which is a very important part of an ecosystems cleanup crew. could also be swapped for a dottyback which has a less specialised feeding stratagy.

there's also nothing on your list that sifts sand, it does not need to be a fish as many will annoy corals by dumping sand on them. we have a fighting conch for this and he's really cool to watch.

i would say in a system this size you could have between 9-15 fish depending on size/type unless you want to keep SPS in which case i would keep it to under 10 small fish. I would say you would be over stocked because of the size and type of fish you are planning.

I would also recommend buying an autofeeder as 4 small feeds are far better than two big feeds as less food will be missed and allowed to rot.

Roddy

[Sanj]

hi Roddy,

thanks for your coments, esp re: spatial feeding.

The Watanabe grows upto 6" although females a little smaller, it is the smaller of the Genicanthus angels. i had done a lot of reading including WWW (not sure if im alowed to mention other Reef info sites). In the majority seemed like 90-100 (USG) was the minimum recommended for them. Isnt this the same size or even smaller than the tangs?

i really wanted to keep a Mandarin, would not one be ok in a 400 litre system? i was not going to include a Wrasse becuase of competition with the Mandarin. Hopefully ill be able to get one weaned onto frozen food/flake. i dont know if any supplies do this, otherwise may have to do it myself.

tank will be predominatly soft and lps although i do like plating Montis.

Subtrate is not going to be deep less than 1", i didnt think i would need sand sifters other than the critters (crabs and snaisl i will be adding).

Ill have a think on the gobies/blennys.

Regarding the autofeeder, i had been thinking about this and intend to get one although not sure which is better, often go for Eheim products. can I ask which you use?

[Sanj]

Bump

[Frogfone]

sorry i should have been clearer, you could easily keep a Watanabe in that size of tank but it's using up more bioload than a tang due to the body thickness and fills the same niche as the Chromis and the coral beauty. A bristletooth tang of some kind will help this. BTW i just checked and scopas's are not bristletooths I was thinking of tomani tangs.

One mandarin would be OK if introduced once the tank is mature (6mths plus) However even if weaned onto flake will still still need a large supply of pods. however you can top up your pods with live culture now and again to keep it happy. A pink scooter blenny would be a better choice IMHO.

the sand bed will be fine with crabs and snails but it's another Niche that builds up bioload which can be exploited to feed fish.

the eheim autofeeders are excellent we have had 3 (one went for a swim) other than that they work flawlessly

Roddy

[Sanj]

Thanks for the input Roddy.

I am really keen on the mandarin, it was what first drew me to keeping marines then ofcourse the whole reef set up. i would never keep a Fish only set up as it does not interest me enough (ive come from years in the freshwater planted arena).

I may even get the Watanabe and not a Coral Beauty, not set in stone yet. I think the only 99% definates i want to keep are a small shoal (chromis) and the Mandarin.

Eheim autofeeder it will be then.

[Frogfone]

yeah logics fine and good but sometimes you just want the fish you have always dreamed about, we have all been there at one time or another.

one mandarin should be fine if added last but i would strongly advise against two.

I would also advise you to read up a bit on chromis and then have a look at some of the damselles, smaller more peaceful and stunning to boot. we are looking at a shoal of these ourself.

Roddy

[arata]

as ur mm system develops, the diversity shud increase, as long as u keep the nutrients in the water...critter life shud explode if there no wrasses or mandarins, etc...
however the angel, will get big even in a 400l
i had the lamark angel and it looked out of place once it had quadrupled.

anyways the mm system, will use a sump so, u will get a huge critter population, which can support those fish more inclined 2 livefoods, whilst skimmer will remove 2 food 4 these critters,

i use the skimmer 2 bring in fresh air from outside in-order 2 keep the water gud, then the bubbles just flow back in2 the tank

[Sanj]

Hello Arata, do you use a skimmer 24/7?

I am still wondering whether to include one or not although the Ecosystems website (mm people) says to run a skimmer at night.

I would not keep a Lamarks Angel in my system because they can grow upto 9", but the Wanatabe is quite a bit smaller at 6" and the females are a bit smaller still.