FishProfiles.com Message Forums

Well, first off welcome to the site . Really glad you stopped to find out how to start before you started!

I got into fish because my boss wanted some life in the office

Before you make your final decision on saltwater you should read up on how to care for and maintain the tank. Sure they look right but are you really ready to put in that much time, energy, and money into the tank?

Here is a FAQ on Saltwater http://fishprofiles.com/faq/sbegin.php. I've not kept saltwater personally, but I'm fairly certain that most people go with much larger than a 30 gallon tank (Tank calculator can be found under the interactive menu up there ^ I got 34 gallons (http://fishprofiles.com/interactive/convert.php?type=capacity) for you, minus what the substrate and decorations will take up and you're pretty much at a 30 gallon tank).
Additionally fish need room to swim, just because they're in a 20 gallon tank at the shops doesn't mean that is the right environment for them. Besides the fact that they grow up . Corals take a lot, a LOT of light, besides the initial cost ($200 or so plus bulbs) there's the long term cost of the electricity from running the lights 12+ hours a day. Pretty sure you'll also need a protein skimmer: http://www.bigalspets.com/Protein-Skimmers-Fish/b/3010431011


Did the shop you visited have any cichlid? A lot of the african rift lake cichlids can be just as bright and colorful as saltwater fish, though the small size of your tank will be a bit limiting again. Often times they wont be showing their full colors when they're in the shops because they're young, and often slightly stressed.

I'd suggest having a read through the FAQ's on this site Here's the one for fresh water: http://fishprofiles.com/faq/begin.php the important part for any tank is the cycling process: http://fishprofiles.com/faq/begin-cycling.php#cycle. Once you've read up a bit more on tanks, you might make a few more trips to the shop, and find others in the area to visit. Write down the names of the fish you might be interested in and look up their profiles http://fishprofiles.com/profiles/ to make sure they're the right size for the tank you have.

I'll move this thread over to the SW forums, hopefully you'll get some help there.


^_^

Edit: sorry the links look messy, I did have it looking nicer but somethings wrong so I had to go old messy way, at least they still work right !