How expensive are saltwater tanks (including the fish, equipment, and upkeep)?

[Blake]

Originally Posted by import36

are the costs to maintain a freshwater tank much cheaper? i'm assuming they are. sorry for the noob question, i'm still early in the research.

yes and no. aquariums aren't cheap no matter what, but a freshwater tank is significantly cheaper. there's less involved in freshwater, the substrate is cheap, upkeep is more simple and allows for more for error, and the fish are relatively hearty. that being said, all freshwater fish are by-in-large boring and colorless. i've never seen a freshwater tank that i've been like 'OOOO look at that!' unless it's a massive, multi-thousand gallon display with hundreds of fish.

i would recommend picking up a book or two on aquariums. i started the hobby with nothing more than a 'saltwater aquariums for dummies' book, and was successfully able to start and maintain a reef tank just off what i read in that book. in the book, they pretty much recommend right off the bat that rookies should try freshwater first to get a hang of the upkeep, but if you're not a dumbass and are educated, jumping right into saltwater won't be a problem. just take it slow and don't go balls out crazy right away, like any good book or aquarist will tell you to do.

i would recommend starting a fish-only saltwater tank at first, but make sure you buy a reef tank setup so you can add coral later. coral are very finicky and require a healthy, established tank before they'll prosper in that environment. you'll waste a lot of money if you just splurge on a bunch of coral in a new tank. new tanks often take a lot of close care to get balanced out with all the different elements at first. stick with fish that can handle a lot of stress until your tank balances out and becomes more stable. once you've mastered the art of keeping the elements balanced, then start buying coral and cooler, more exotic fishes.

like i said above, buy as big of a tank as you can afford. yes, the initial price will be pretty steep, but no tank is cheap to run or start. the benefit to going big is you'll be able to have more of everything as you grow you tank. but the biggest benefit of all is the more water, the less likely you're going to have a disease or poor water condition spread fast in your tank. small salt tanks can just go to absolute shit in a matter of a day in the worst case scenario. then you're out $$$ for fish and you're left having to rid the water of whatever problem caused the kill off, which can be tough to balance out.

it all may seem daunting, but it's a very rewarding hobby. you will need to allocate significant free time to maintain a tank yourself. at first, you'll want to watch things daily, but after the tank gets healthy and the ecosystem starts to maintain itself like a mini-ocean, it becomes much easier. water changes are the most time consuming aspect. a good cleaning and water change will take the better part of an hour or two, plus time to get RO water from your local store. you can mix your own, but that takes even more time and space to do such things.

[Blake]

oh and i had a 70-gallon reef setup. it cost me about $5k to get up and running with a couple clowns and a sifter goby at first. i added lots of coral down the line, but had to move eventually and got rid of my setup. i would do it again, but i would go at least 300 gallons this time around.

[KingOfJericho]

I had a 54 corner that was easy to keep once up and running. The annoying part is getting the live rocks and substrate ($600ish) and having them cycle with no fish for 6-8 weeks. Initial setup is a fucking pain in the ass but once it's up and running it's kind of on cruise control. The larger the tank the more stable your parameters will remain which will make things like water changes a less suspenseful process. It's like farting in a coffin vs a large room. I found my reef to be easier to keep presentable than a fresh water setup.

This is what was needed to keep my reef:
Reef-ready tank and stand $500
24" Halide setup $850
Sump & pumps $400
Chiller $350
Live rocks $500
Substrate $100+
Carbon reactor $75ish?
Protein skimmer $150ish?
Fish and coral - probably $2,000 in total over about a year

[Fantom555]

dont buy coral at stores, frags from forums or craiglist are 10x cheaper and its gonna grow rapidly if you treat em well. Just broke down my tank since I am moving, had a great setup...paired up a black clown with orange clown among other nice corals and fish. Just gotta clean the tank before i throw it up on craigslist and Ill be good to go.

[matthewk]

400 gal tank, setup, livestock, etc, etc, etc... $25,000 to get it going. All in about $800 a month to keep it up..

[ny176]

Here's an old photo of my Red Sea Max 36 gallon. It an AIO or All in One tank and is classified as a Nano. You should definitely look into an AIO tank it comes with mostly everything you need to start up a tank. There's many brands such as Red sea max, Solana, Biocube etc. all with different sizes ranging as low as 8 gallon with the biocube I believe. Obviously the smaller the tank, your limited on the amount and species of saltwater fish you can keep.
Just like our car hobby, upgrades/mods are pretty much inevitable in the saltwater hobby lol. I upgraded many things in my tank including a 24" T5 metal hallide outer orbit light fixture, new skimmer and an mp10 vortech pump to name a few. Never needed a chiller and my electric bill has gone up maybe $15 bucks since I upgraded my lights but I live in a 900 ft sq apt and not a house. Since my tank is pretty much topless, I just have a clip on fan on the side of my tank that turns on whenever my lights turn on.
I started my tank about 2 yrs ago without ever having any experience in fresh or saltwater. I just did lots of reading before hand on saltwater forums. I initially bought my tank from a local fish store for $700 cash. What really surprised me was the cost of live rock. You will never believe how much rock can cost. When i get the chance I'll post some updated pics since my tank has changed since this pic. Sorry for the bad pic.