Arriving from Tacoma

I am just getting back into fish. I had a betta that lived in a 5 gallon tank a few years ago. It died but I did not get another one. Now I'd like to start again. I bought a Marineland 30 gallon Half-Moon aquarium at Petsmart that I want to setup and stock. I have most of the equipment needed, filter, air pump, heaters, lighting and water changing hoses. I need help with stocking it with decor, plants and of course fish.

On a side note, I wanted to use an Emperor 280 filter that Marineland's website seemed to indicate would work with this tank. The filter slot in the lid turned out to be too small, sized for a Penguin 150. I had already bought the Emperor and 12 filter cartridges for a damn good price from Foster & Smith and didn't want to go through the hassle of returning them. I contacted Marineland about another cover that would accomodate the emperor. They said it is being developed but no ETA. They did send me a Penguin 150 for free for my troubles. So kudos to Marineland on that front. I am looking for someone who knows how to cut plexi-glass or similar plastics to basically recreate the factory lid with a larger slot for the Emperor filter. If anyone is interested, please let me know.


Thanks all.

Dont even get me started on the whole Marineland....

I got the new led top for a 29g/20L and it looks awesome but it would not work with the Emperor 400, only the penguin 350. The actual filter body fits the hole but the lid does not work on it . Sent off a nasty email in regard the lack of research and development put into their products!

Sorry for the rant, and again

hey there welcome to the site. as a matter of fact i plan on trying to gather up a few others to snag some choice lace rock pieces from a guy in poulsbo. lemme know if this may work for your decor. more info is located under the substrate, decor, etc tab. also feel free to give me a call if you find it to your liking to work out details. again Welcome to the site!!!


on a side note:
i may have some neo. pulcher i could toss your way if you think they might fit into your tank plans. common name is brichardi. just google for images and more information. GL in your new tank setup!!

Welcome to the site. Glad to have you here.

What are you planing to do with your tank? I almost bought one of those. There cool.

I haven't setup my tank yet. I decided that the room it is going to be in, needed some remodeling before it is setup.

I'm doing that same thing, except my tank is going to be a 150 gallon (temp), adventually I will be looking into the 300ish gallon range for that spot. Good luck!

I hate to say it but I never got around to setting up my tank. I have finally made up my mind to get this done. I plan on getting a large canister filter for it. This should allow me to overload it a bit. I am looking for suggestions on aqua-scaping? suggestions on livestock? I'd love to do salt water but I don't have the time.

Pralix.... this is great. Your original post was back in 2011 and now (it's 2014 you know) you are getting ready to set the tank up. Not laughing at you...just enjoying that sometimes we can take a while to get to where we are going. I'm happy to see you looking for ideas and ready to get your tank setup.

Maybe you can share with us what size tank you have and what your like are as far as fish. That will help with suggestions and such. As for aquascaping, look at the photos sections and tank setups in the various individual sections. There are many ideas to spur you on.

cichlid-gal wrote:Pralix.... this is great.  Your original post was back in 2011 and now (it's 2014 you know) you are getting ready to set the tank up.  Not laughing at you...just enjoying that sometimes we can take a while to get to where we are going.  I'm happy to see you looking for ideas and ready to get your tank setup.

Maybe you can share with us what size tank you have and what your like are as far as fish.  That will help with suggestions and such.  As for aquascaping, look at the photos sections and tank setups in the various individual sections.  There are many ideas to spur you on.  

It's a 30 gallon Marineland half moon tank. I like salt water fish but as I said, too much work. I put things on hold after the HOB filter thing with marineland in my orginal post. Wasn't sure what canister filter to get. I orignally was going to buy a Fluval 405 but they got replaced with a more expensive model. Now I am going to go with an Eheim Pro 3e. I think I would prefer a more natural look than trinkets and baubles at the bottom of the tank.

For natural looks good stuff to use would be sand, manzanita wood, and anubias and java ferns (just because those are good starter plants). Most of those items will work with just about any stocking.

And the Eheim Pro 3e (filters start at 396GPH to 490GPH) might be a little large for a 30G tank. You might want to look at the Eheim 2217 series. I have one of those and a Aquaclear 70 running on my 33G tank and really like the flow from the two of them. Maybe the Eheim Pro 3e would be OK...but I think you might need to do some adjusting in your flow...like putting it on an end side of the tank rather than the back side ..just something to think about. Eheims are good filters. I love mine.

And what about the stocking? That also might determine what filter would work best. Some fish like more flow than others.

The Eheim Pro 3e 2078 can go from 88-407gph. I am looking at liveaquaria.com to see some of the species that I may want. So far I like the Endler's Livebearers, I like a lot of the others but they need larger tanks. I have a feeling I will be stuck with small fish.

appears to be an old thread but for the sake of throwing it out there. tank needs to be cycled before adding fish. can do an in fish cycle but suggest against it as it requires every other day water changes of 70% at least and lots of Prime. cycling the tank a bit of a miss nomer, you are actually cycling up the filters, thats to say cultivating good bacteria that turns ammonia to nitrite and nitrite to nitrate, takes about 6 to 8 weeks. does not live in old tank water but on bio media in your filter and all surface areas in your tank that get oxygen, you can instant cycle a tank if you have a seeded filter or media to put in the filter.

Welcome back pralix! I like Donna's suggestions with just using a natural sand  substrate. Perhaps a LOG with some ferns and Anubias in the tank. This setup would give a total natural look and feel. Perhaps later with some lighting modifications stretch into some grasses in the substrate.

Again, welcome back

Some of the plants will need to grow tall as the aquarium is tall. I am also going to have 2 heaters at different depths.