Salt water fishies

I'm not getting any , any time soon but I was wonderin what the salt is and how you do it.

The setup is easy, but the lighting is dependant on the types of plants, the filtering is dependent on size of tank and type of fish, the ph in the tank and salinity will determine the fish and the plants. The reason a salt water tank is so difficult is that everything you add is dependent on everything else.

Here's a page on an easy setup to give you a few ideas, but some information is incorrect. You should do a fishless cycle rather than torturing some innocent but cheap fish.
http://www.bestfish.com/ssss.html

A page like liveaquaria.com will let you look up individual plants and fish and tell you their needs.

You could also fake a saltwater tank. Used a crushed coral substrate (you'll need to monitor ph) or just sand or fine, white gravel. Add artificial but realistic saltwater decorations. Then add freshwater fish that look exotic. Not all of these fish can be housed together. Electric yellow lab cichlids and blue cichlids look like damselfish, other african cichlids look exotic too. Tiger barbs and clown loaches add the striped effect that a clownfish would. Rainbowfish are pretty. Lyretail swords, especially in bright yellow, look great and add colour, but are hard to find. There are eels, pufferfish, and freshwater rays.