hi trish,
the best thing you could do at the moment is go down to seahorse ireland. find out what you want to keep and what you actually can keep together. i thought myself as an experienced fish keeper, but whe it came to marine i was f~~~~~. i tried to put every thing into one tank, didnt plan anything. you should read a book on marine set ups. it is vital you understand you are creating a mini reef and the days of using tap water are over. reverse osmosis water is water that has been purified to the state that there is no good or bad bacteria they say its not necesery to use ro but as you heard 1 of my nightmares alraedy, i personally wouldnt take the chance. this means you can make your own ro with a machine but it takes ages, only 1o% of tap water actually gets used and depending on the time it can takeup to 10hrs to get enough 4 one wchange, then you need to put marine salt in it to bring it to a certain salticity the alternative is to buy the water ready to use;) . true my experiences this is the best method i have used and reallistically the only one. people usually start of with the best intentions to follow this method{slightly varied}, and here it is. get your tank put a lot of live rock in ,as much as you can afford use live sand also. remove all bio balls from filter if your not planning to have a sump and fill with live rock. fill with ro water leave to cycle make sure you have loads of current going through the live rock. do a 50percent wc after 2 weeks leave a week add as many snails hermit crabs shrimp to airate the sand and clean up any algae problem i have a crab that would clean the gaff if i would let it. ill find the name of it 4 u. the next week you can add a damsel just for something to watch. not the done thing to do but it helps the tank cycle and its the hardiest fish you can get, they would live in toilet water(only jokin). then leave the tank for 2months, doing a 10percent wc weekly. the week before you get fish add a good quality carbon rhophos and nitralock. just ask 4 these items and do as it says on the tin.this might seem drastic time wise but good quality water is hard to achieve. if you have good quality water, you will be able to keep any fish as long as they dont kill each other and any corals as long as you have addaqit lighting.
well there you go luv my fool proof pro set up.you will need to do weekly water checks.
1.amonia
2.nitrite
3.nitrate
4.ph
5.salticity
always make sure you water is heated up to the tank temp when doing wc. when starting the tank it helps to use some bacteria. ask for demitrol(its the buisness) i managed a full set up for a friend in 3 weeks with this stuff without any losses to date.can only be done with a serious amount of work , water has to be changed daily adding a load of doses of various treatments NOT RECOMENDED. u should use this every wc also
there are more simple methods regarding buying all the extra stuff regarding the set up instructions but i gaurentee your tank will be perfect without any problems. just make sure you keep happy tank mates.
i have a 350l tank for sale on this site there is a pic to .prob a bit big.
i am at a stage where i do a 10 percent wc every 2 weeks [i could prob get away with every 4weeks and still keep impecable water conditions which you could probably do in 6 months.
i know its a lot to take in , but what i have given is a step by step guide to getting it perfect there are other ways but you leave yourself open to probs i have found.
dont forget take your time adding fish now no matter how impatient you get. this is why i say add a damsel for something to look at but you should prob get rid of him when you add new fish cause they are little Bs.
hope this helps, sorry about spelling and grammer,
lots of luck,
paddy
