The Opae ula shrimp Forum and online store

Hello everyone! I'm moving in a month and a half and when I do I can finally set up my tank. I have a ten gallon I'm going to be using, now I'm just trying to decide on the supplies I need to get. I'm planning on using black blasting sand as substrate because it's oodles cheaper than fish gravel and it will look pretty. I have a sponge filter I'm going to be using and a heater from a previous tank, not that I'll need it for the shrimpy babies considering I live in Florida, but I'll put it in just in case we get a cold snap. In my current apartment the bedrooms don't stay warm for love nor money and my old set up dipped to 50 (Google says 10 C) during one cold snap.

I'm not at all sure what I'm going to be doing as far as lighting goes. My tank is one of those starter kits with two dinky little LEDs, so I want to upgrade, but I like having a lid of some kind on it so I'm not sure if I should get a new hood or if there's some kind of stand-up, desk-type lamp that I can use instead.

I'm also planning on getting some marimo balls and potentially a few other plants. I'm hoping if I can get the plants now I can start slowly acclimating them to brackish water.

I'm a little torn when it comes to rocks, I'll probably look at getting something lighter to contrast with the sand, but is there any chance anyone knows how to check to see if a rock that's not intended for use in aquariums is safe (won't leech metals into the water) or should I stick to pet stores for that? Also I know wood is a no-go because it will lower the pH, but petrified wood is safe right? I wonder if coquina is an option...

And then animals, I'm still trying to decide how many shrimp I should get to start out and where I should get them from. I'd get them here, but like I said, I'm in the US. I'm debating asking some local places how much it would be to have them order some, it may be a bit more expensive per shrimp but there'd be no shipping and I'd be supporting local business. My reservation is that I'm not sure if they'd get bred shrimp or wild shrimp and I'd obviously prefer the former. The snails I can definitely get local though. Should I get them now as well to acclimate them to the salt or should they be good to just pop in?

Does all of that sound okay? Is there something big I forgot? Does anyone have any suggestions?

Anything and everything will be wholeheartedly appreciated!

@LibbyLoo Welcome to our forum! Your tank sounds like its going to look very nice with the black sand... i also have black sand in a few of my Opae ula tanks and it looks awesome with white ocean rock in it (Its called Texas holey rock) in the USA and it buffers your waters PH perfectly for the shrimp tank. Failing that i would go with lavarock as the shrimp love this too and it holds lots of beneficial bacteria. In the fish tank hobby we would normally test if a rock is suitable by dropping some vinegar on it and if it fizzes and makes noise it cannot be used as it will raise a tanks PH but we want the opposite with the Opae ula hobby You can buy some nice artificial rocks which look real but stay away from live rock as this has plants and living creatures in it that will die from the lack of full strength marine salt and foul your water.

I'd say purchase your shrimp from where ever you feel comfy with and id start out with 20 and see how well they do, if they thrive from the start why not add another 20? Any tank lighting will also be fine but i would buy a plug in timer as this will reduce the need to keep switching it on and off manually all the time (i have them as i am indeed lazy/forgetful lol)

If you have any more questions just ask away as we are all here to help, enjoy the forum!

Oh gosh that rock is gorgeous! I'll definitely need to find some, it may have to wait a bit for that though so I can save up the money. Unless I can find a deal somewhere.

I actually asked for a timer for Christmas (this tank has been in the works for a while) for that exact reason. I tend to be a bit spacy on that front too.

20 it is. Hopefully I'll be able to get the second batch pretty quickly. Waiting is the hardest part. Should I quarantine the second batch or it is okay to toss them in - after acclimating of course?

I wouldn't worry about quarantining them personally, let them go strait in.