"Walstad" Saltwater Aquarium?

[JaredL]

I have a friend who has been struggling with his saltwater aquarium. I would like to be able to give him advice, but I have no knowledge of how these systems work(my only knowledge is regarding freshwater) . I've begun trying to educate myself with information online. However, everything I've read seems to be reliant on "brute force" to maintain their systems(eg. frequent water changes, additives, fancy equipment).

What I'm really hoping to find is a resource similar to "Ecology of the Planted Aquarium" by Diana Walstad. My goal is to understand the natural ecosystems of marine life and how to replicate that in an aquarium. I hope that by doing that my friend can create a low maintenance, healthy system.

If anybody could point me in the direction of a great scientific resource about this I would be very appreciative. Thanks!

[Biotope Biologist]

My advice would be to start small and have patience. Saltwater aquariums don’t have to be high tech reef aquariums. You can also follow similar approaches as walstad for saltwater, I’m not sure if there is a resource specifically for it but I will describe it below:

 

Macro algae “estuary” tanks are slowly but surely becoming more popular. These will be your plants that soak up nutrients and fish waste. Some algae can be quite beautiful and easy to grow. Red algaes tend to be more light dependent, but otherwise tend to be the focal point of your tank. Gracilaria is a popular red algae genus and is readily available. Next for your substrate, the world is your oyster as far as sands go. You can have inert sand or sand with oolite in it to boost your alkalinity and general hardness. Aesthetic preference here is more valuable. This is because your hides for your fish should be live rock. Live rock is your live-in waste management system. This will have micro algae as well as a host of bacteria colonies to eat up any waste products in the tank. I also like to have a clean-up crew in the sand itself. Marine worms, copepods, and other invertebrates will keep the sand churning so there is no toxic build up of waste. Again readily available in most LFS and online. 
 

As for filtration, the fun thing about saltwater is you can go as high or low tech as you want, the live rock is going to be doing the heavy lifting. HOB filters are cheap, and you can find them with built-in protein skimmers which is very useful in saltwater. I prefer refugiums or a sump as to me they are aesthetically pleasing and easy to maintain. The plumbing can be daunting to some, however.

 

As for fish, saltwater shops have started moving away from the big ‘species only’ reef brutes as I like to call them and to a bit more user friendly fish that stay small. Gobies, clownfish, and blennies come to mind. But there are alot of fun small saltwater fish with loads of personality. If you go the goby and blenny route pay attention to their temperament. Some are quite territorial. If you want a fun challenge that commands attention I recommend the mandarin goby. They are fussy about food and prefer live food, but they are magnificent and full of personality. 

[Patrick_G]

On 1/16/2022 at 10:05 AM, Biotope Biologist said:

Macro algae “estuary” tanks are slowly but surely becoming more popular. These will be your plants that soak up nutrients and fish waste. Some algae can be quite beautiful and easy to grow. Red algaes tend to be more light dependent, but otherwise tend to be the focal point of your tank. Gracilaria is a popular red algae genus and is readily available.

I’ve been considering at tank like this. Is there a go to place for resources or is it more a matter of developing experience in the general aspects of marine aquarium and then jumping to an “estuary” type tank. 

Edited January 16, 2022 by Patrick_G

[JaredL]

On 1/16/2022 at 12:05 PM, Biotope Biologist said:

My advice would be to start small and have patience. Saltwater aquariums don’t have to be high tech reef aquariums. You can also follow similar approaches as walstad for saltwater, I’m not sure if there is a resource specifically for it but I will describe it below:

 

Macro algae “estuary” tanks are slowly but surely becoming more popular. These will be your plants that soak up nutrients and fish waste. Some algae can be quite beautiful and easy to grow. Red algaes tend to be more light dependent, but otherwise tend to be the focal point of your tank. Gracilaria is a popular red algae genus and is readily available. Next for your substrate, the world is your oyster as far as sands go. You can have inert sand or sand with oolite in it to boost your alkalinity and general hardness. Aesthetic preference here is more valuable. This is because your hides for your fish should be live rock. Live rock is your live-in waste management system. This will have micro algae as well as a host of bacteria colonies to eat up any waste products in the tank. I also like to have a clean-up crew in the sand itself. Marine worms, copepods, and other invertebrates will keep the sand churning so there is no toxic build up of waste. Again readily available in most LFS and online. 
 

As for filtration, the fun thing about saltwater is you can go as high or low tech as you want, the live rock is going to be doing the heavy lifting. HOB filters are cheap, and you can find them with built-in protein skimmers which is very useful in saltwater. I prefer refugiums or a sump as to me they are aesthetically pleasing and easy to maintain. The plumbing can be daunting to some, however.

 

As for fish, saltwater shops have started moving away from the big ‘species only’ reef brutes as I like to call them and to a bit more user friendly fish that stay small. Gobies, clownfish, and blennies come to mind. But there are alot of fun small saltwater fish with loads of personality. If you go the goby and blenny route pay attention to their temperament. Some are quite territorial. If you want a fun challenge that commands attention I recommend the mandarin goby. They are fussy about food and prefer live food, but they are magnificent and full of personality. 

@Biotope Biologistthank you very much for all the information! Super super helpful. I'm going to do a "deep dive"(forgive the pun) on the live rock and bacteria cause I'm curious to learn more about that stuff. Also the info on some of the creatures is very helpful since I really have no knowledge about this topic.

[Biotope Biologist]

On 1/16/2022 at 12:25 PM, Patrick_G said:

I’ve been considering at tank like this. Is there a go to place for resources or is it more a matter of developing experience in the general aspects of marine aquarium and then jumping to an “estuary” type tank. 

I’m not sure I am hoping one of the saltwater people can step in here and give some resources where I wasn’t able to. My specific resources are a bit dense and not very easily translatable to the home aquarium.

I have been doing research on macro algaes for my eventual brackish estuary biotope, I could share those resources if they would be helpful?

[Patrick_G]

On 1/16/2022 at 4:33 PM, Biotope Biologist said:

have been doing research on macro algaes for my eventual brackish estuary biotope, I could share those resources if they would be helpful?

Yeah, that would be helpful. I’m  starting a brackish tank for a Green Spotted Puffer. They apparently need to transition to full marine as they mature and I’m envisioning “scaping” that tank with interesting macros. 

[Biotope Biologist]

Although archaic and likely the only time I’ve ever used tumbler, this post has given me good places to start with their references and ideas, a good place to start down the rabbit hole:

thebrackishtank.tumblr.com

everyday aquarist on youtube has a handful of videos on macroalgae and how he maintains them

 

I have also found “livealgae.co.uk” to have good info on parameters but I tend to be weary of blogs as they don’t ever provide sources for their info. Unfortunately there isn’t much other info out there for y’all to use without purchasing marine botany books. I don’t trust any of the blogs on sites that are trying to sell the item as they tend to try and oversell the facts.

 

I agree with everday aquarists advise to treat macroalgae estuary tanks like you would a freshwater planted tank. 
 

@Patrick_G you and I will have a bit more of a challenge than full saltwater with macro algaes, but I have found a handful of species that prefer salinity in the 1.008-1.016 range. And we also have the added benefit of being able to use some hardy vascular plants such as Vallisneria.

 

 

[ScottieB]

You (and you friend) are gonna find lots of information and its a tough thing to address in one forum post.

I'm an avid "reefer" with 400+g of saltwater aquariums. Not all are are high tech and most are just running long enough to develop a stable, consistent ecosystem. Way back in the day when controllers, LEDs, wavemakers and automated testing robots were not available things were done with a very "back to nature" approach.

A good reference to start with is something similar to the ecology book you mentioned: the Marine Aquarium Handbook by Martin Moe it was published in the late 80's and its based on the original idea of maintaining an ecosystem. It can also be found fairly cheap and will not make reference to high tech equipment. 

If or when your looking for a friendly forum try ree2reef its been around a long time and will have a massive database of posts, pictures, info, etc. 

Tell your friend not to give up theres lots of resources to help!