juwanil

Alright so i decided to keep the tank i have and complete the conversion from brackish to fully saltwater by taking out the freshwater gravel and driftwood. I have a couple of questions because basically i have no prior knowledge about saltwater tanks at all. After i pull out all of the gravel and decorations, which i think will still be possible with my puffers in the tank, how would i go about adding sand, and live rock? Also this tank used to be a planted tank and have no knowledge of any saltwater plants so any help is greatly appreciated. i wanna get this figured out because i have waited i long time for this moment haha, been converting the tank for like 6 months.

cerianthus

I dont know what kind of puffer it is that you have but I would like to recommend to relocte the puffer to another tank before attempting to convert to s/w.

juwanil

Ive got 4 green spotted puffers that have already been converted to full SW. they have been in the tank the entire time from .00 to .021 SG taking it up .002 SG each water change. It was a long process but well worth it. They are more active in the SW i find. Also i realize that 4 puffers for a 30 gallon tank is overkill but they are perfectly healthy with not a single nip on their fins, i rescued them from a LFS that had them in a tank with about 40 other puffers. Or are you saying i should take them out of the tank while i am switching the decorations?

cerianthus

No. If SG is already up there. just be gentle when adding substrate. In order to avoid too much cludiness, you can use large diameter PVC pipe of any other tube to pour the ssubstrates toward the bottom. Another word use them as sort of funnel to locate the new substrates thus can achieve this task without stressing the fish as much as it would be when substrates are poured from the top of water. As far as Decoation, yoou may do so at any time but just gently. It may be good idea to shut off all pumps when adding subtrates until finished.

juwanil

I like the pvc idea i think that would work quite nicely, I am definitely going to be giving the sand i am adding a thorough rinse before addign it to hopefully avoid any cloudiness. One more question i dont know anything about live rock so i was wondering if it would be safe to add live rock to the tank after the sand. There are alot of LFS in my area that sell cured live rock, that if im not mistaken can be added right into the tank. If i am wrong will someone please clue me in on how to do it? thank you so much for your help so far.