well, its just an empty tank right now, we know it takes a lot of money to get one started, especially such a big one, so we have to take it one step at a time. we're on a limited budget, but really want one. i wanted to know what we should buy/do for it first, step by step, before its ready to have fish and other living things put in it. also if you could throw in an estimate on about how much to get it ready, (including everything except fish/coral/etc.)
The most important step isn't live rock but rather a good filtration system. And that include a excellent protein skimmer. If it is FO (Fish Only) tank you don't even need live rocks. I would strongly suggest buying a 40 to 55 gallon tank for sump. Then go about plumbing it. This is where you need to put a lot of effort and money.
You need to get about 1lb of live rock for every gallon of water. you can cheat a little on this but not much. you need to get the water stabilized and cure the live rock first. don't be cheap when buying live rock either, it'll just bite you in the a$$. Search live rock and curing live rock on the web, after your rock is cured and the tank is cycled you won't need too much external filtration, a few power heads with sponge filters.The live rock will filter your tank. You will also need substrait, Live sand. If you bought good healthy live rock and you set everything up right it should only take about a month until you have good bio filtration.you can then add fish and invertebrate
