Cold Water Set Up

Since I live on the Olympic Peninsula, I would like to set up a cold water tank with native fishes and other creatures.

My first question (many to follow) is what would be a good size to start with? I will NOT be adding any 6 gill sharks!

Second question, no reefs here, so can I still ask?

Pam :-/

 

Welcome...I used to live in Port Angeles...been through Quilcene many a time and stopped for many a meal at the Timber House.

I also had a cold water tank for awhile when I lived up there. First issue is how to keep it cold. As you know the water around the Olympic Peninsula is pretty darn cool. You'll need a fairly large chiller for a tank of any size to keep the water cool enough. Otherwise you'll cook just about anything you try to keep. The good thing is virtually everything native is (NPS) non-photosynthetic so you don't need high lighting that uses a lot of electricity and creates heat. Also, since you don't have high temps in the summer it's a bit easier to keep the tank cool.

So, assuming you're willing to purchase a chiller and pay to run it (it's basically a small AC unit so they're not super cheap to run), the next step is feeding. The down side to the NPS livestock you'll have access to is they live in nutrient rich water which means they are almost constantly feeding. You'll need to feed very regularly and have some fairly major filtration in place to maintain water quality.

Lastly, I would suggest not using water from Hood Canal...because of all the septic systems up and down that body of water you're probably be better off mixing your own systhetic sea water. I used water from the straight for awhile and had issues with high phosphate...I'm sure Hood Canal probably has higher Phos due to the nature of the long narrow shape that limits water exchange with the straight.

It can be done, but it will be a bit of an undertaking. Honestly, in 20+ years in this hobby it was one of the more challenging tanks I've kept.

 

This guy's cold water tank is outstanding. Might want to shoot him a PM with some of your questions as I don't believe that he's a regular visitor to 3Reef:

http://www.3reef.com/forums/show-off-your-fish-tanks/check-out-my-coldwater-marine-tank-66600.html