Tip of the Day – 3/1/2012

Frag tanks and coral growout setups don’t always have to be sterile, sand-less, high flow aquariums decorated with sheets of eggcrate and populated with hundreds of frag disks. Sure, there are a myriad of benefits to going away from the sandy bottom and choosing to focus purely on function while maximizing growth rates, but many of these same features can also be achieved in a more natural looking frag aquarium. Try making the tank a little more visually appealing by ditching the frag racks and using large pieces of live rock that have flat surfaces, or even use large flat piece of rock. Place frags onto the rock structure and keep the natural look of things, but also keep water flow and space needed to grow in mind. If you want to ramp up the water flow but also want sand, try using heavier grains or having a faux sand bed. By going this route, it will be like having two beautiful reef aquariums, instead of only one that is for looks and the other more for growing corals instead of appealing to the senses.