Hey twood63! You have a great question here...I will be following along with this one since I am also interested in knowing how long our members have been 'in the hobby'. For myself, I have only been keeping fish with any gusto for just shy of two and a half years but only added saltwater to my resume about 13 months ago.
Regarding your questions about starting up a saltwater tank, I agree with most of the info and ideas provided thus far, but would add that there are a few different options as to the equipment you might need since there are a few different types of saltwater tanks; fish only, fish only with live rock (FOWLR), and a reef tank. While they are all generally follow the same principles, the equipment you might need would differ somewhat. For example, you wouldn't really need a huge amount of light over a fish only/FOWLR tank unless you had something which is photosynthetic like an anemone. You also may not need a filter as Kuli Loach points out, but you would then need either a few powerheads or one extremely effective version since the principles would be very similar to those which make an under gravel filter a viable option in that water is being moved past beneficial bacteria. I also agree with Kuli Loach in that if you plan to use powerheads and live rock as natural filtration, you would want to have at least one pound of live rock as a minimum and 1.5 pounds would be better. Too add to that though, you can also include live sand in that equation; making it 1 or more pounds of live rock and/or live sand per gallon of water. I also believe that the most common advice when using all natural filtration would be to use a deep sand bed (DSB) in the range of 3 to 4 inches of sand.
Just to clarify a little bit since I didn't see it mentioned yet, the reason why a 30 gallon tank would be better and probably more forgiving versus a smaller tank is because it is easier to maintain water quality within a larger body of water...hence the saying "bigger is better" truly applies in this case. Otherwise, I would also point out that...
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You would need...dechlorinate...
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Very true, you might need a dechlor conditioner, however, I am sure that if you look into saltwater any deeper than you are here, you will certainly hear a lot of people suggest the use of RO or some other highly filtered water source, in which case, you wouldn't need to remove chlorine with chemicals. In fact, I found out the hard way that some (not all) dechlor conditioners can do much more harm to SW livestock than good (e.g. stress coat).
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under 30 gallons so you do not need a skimmer
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...I do not completely agree with this statement since the need for a skimmer is increased or decreased depending on what you are trying to keep. For example, if you have a fish only/FOWLR tank with hardy fish like Tbx has in his chromis tank, you could 'get away with' skipping the skimmer, however, it cannot hurt to use one anyways. Conversely, if you want to keep a small or nano-reef, a skimmer would help out greatly as it relates to keeping sensitive corals.
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you test the water do water changes at least 2.5 gallons a month
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I also have to disagree somewhat with this statement as well since the amount and frequency of water changes are also Dependant on what you are trying to keep and a few other variables. Although, I do agree that we should be testing our water parameters frequently (arguably more so in a SW tank), which would be the best method of determining your water change schedule.
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that being said my lights are half of that total cost.
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To be very blunt, based upon my observations thus far in my aquarium lifespan, I believe that many people might get 'turned off' from the slightly skewed belief that lighting is extremely expensive in SW when in reality, that is not always the case. Don't get me wrong, there are some amazingly expensive light systems out there, and some SW enthusiasts really do need them, however, in a fish only tank, and even a FOWLR tank, we can use whatever we can afford and/or what provides us with the the best viewing pleasure. Obviously fish are not photosynthetic so they wouldn't need any specific spectrum or intensity of light and regardless of what we might think, live rock does
not need intense lighting to be effective either. So, that being said, don't get scared away just yet!
Overall, I think the initial costs are much higher with a SW tank, however, I have found SW to be no where near as hard to maintain as they are often advertised to be so there is that trade off. Also, even though I wouldn't suggest starting out too small, I do know that we can start up a SW tank with equipment which doesn't completely break the bank and upgrade as time goes by. In fact, it often suggested to 'cushion' the economic punch in the gut by purchasing equipment and supplies over the course of a year and then buy the tank last (so we are not tempted to rush things probably). To be honest, that was my initial plan as well, but then I ran into an unexpected financial windfall and could afford to buy everything I needed at one time.
Hope this helps clarify things a little bit. If you are really interested in finding out more regarding SW tanks, I might suggest starting by asking questions in the
Saltwater Aquarium Setup area of the forum. I think you will find it to be less difficult than you might have been told or heard.
