Starting a saltwater fish tank is one of those undertakings that many aquarists consider on and off for a few years before jumping in to this challenging, but very rewarding, phase of fish keeping. Done properly, a marine aquarium can be the highlight of your house – a carefully planned and painstakingly maintained ecosystem bursting with life and dazzling colors unmatched by any freshwater aquarium.

But setting up a marine tank can be a daunting task – between your decision to begin your saltwater adventure and your completed aquarium is a formidable landscape of high-tech sounding equipment and scientific terms. Add to the mixture the expense of saltwater fish, live rock, invertebrates and all that equipment, and you have the potential to sink a lot of money into what may ultimately end up a stinky mess.

Before you start down this road, you need to be sure to learn about everything you don’t know today. And a great starter book is The Simple Guide to Marine Aquariums. First published in 2002, this all-new second edition is a major revision to this bestselling guide, and features a brand new introduction addressing the rapid evolution in the marine hobby, plus an additional new chapter reviewing unusual and interesting saltwater setups and specimens.

The author, Jeff Kurtz, has been involved in the aquarium hobby for over 20 years, and a regular contributor to Tropical Fish Hobbyist magazine. He is also the writer/publications coordinator for The Toledo Zoo.

As with The Simple Guide to Freshwater Aquariums, this book is broken out into Four sections to walk you through the process of starting your Saltwater fish tank. A new layout and design makes the content easy to access and understand, while the updated full-color photographs help illustrate the stunning beauty of marine aquaria.

Part One- Getting into Marines
The author sets the table quite appropriately in this first section by describing the many benefits and challenges of starting and maintaining your saltwater aquarium, including reviewing equipment that can be reused from your freshwater setup, and discussing the reality behind why saltwater fishkeeping is much more expensive than its freshwater counterpart.

Part Two – Getting Started
This section introduces you to the basics of the setting up your saltwater aquarium, ranging from

Part Three – Stocking your Saltwater Aquarium
I personally enjoy the exercise of setting up the tank and making sure the foundation is properly set. But the fun really begins once you can start to populate your tank with real living inhabitants. This section is a great overview of the types of marine animals you can keep in your new saltwater setup, including:

Part Four – Care and Feeding

After you finish The Simple Guide to Marine Aquariums, you should have a very good understanding of the basics of getting started with your new saltwater hobby. If you are an experienced freshwater aquarist, you should be able to step in to saltwater with confidence, as many of the basic lessons of saltwater fishkeeping are better learned in a freshwater environment – if for cost alone. If you are new to fishkeeping, or have been away from it a while, I would personally recommend focusing on a fish-only saltwater setup, and avoid the Mini-reef which this book does make sound very simple.

The Simple Guide to Freshwater Aquariums (Second Edition) was first written in 2001 and has helped thousands of beginning aquarists get their first aquariums started.  The second edition updates this great resource to cover how fish care techniques have evolved, highlight some new equipment that has since come onto the market, as well as give an update to the already-clean and picture-rich first edition.

The author, David E. Boruchowitz, is currently the Editor in Chief of Tropical Fish Hobbyist magazine, and has been an aquarist and fish breeder for over half a century.

My original Simple Guide to Freshwater Aquariums is a well dog-eared version after the many times I have lent it out to friends or family that have asked me “What do I need to know before I buy my first aquarium”.

This book covers it all in an extremely easy-to-understand fashion and simple layout that makes for an engaging and hard-to-put down read.  It is packed with over 200 stunning fish, plant and tank pictures that will give the new aquarist a great idea of the range of available fish, plants and tank styles as the get started.

The second edition closely follows the outline of the original, which bodes well if you don’t already own the first edition.  The book is separated into four distinct parts to help get you started:

Part One – So You want to be an Aquarist?
The first part of the Simple Guide really serves as an introduction to the fishkeeping hobby, including the importance of succeeding the first time and how to avoid the most common mistakes common to the beginner.

Part Two – Sifting through the Hardware
The second section gives you a great overview of all the different types of required aquarium equipment, including tanks and aquarium sizes, lighting options, types of filtration (including undergravel filters, basic sponge filters, hang-on outside filters, Canister filters, Wet-Dry filters and others), maintenance equipment, heating options, substrate, fish food and a quick overview on the higher-end “Bells & Whistles”

Part Three – Time to get Wet!
You’ve done the research and have your basic aquarium equipment.  Now the guide helps you get setup by helping you decide where to place the tank, how to fill the tank and start your filtration, how to cycle your new aquarium, and how to conduct regular aquarium maintenance.

Part Four – Research & Planning
I thought this part might have been better placed before the Tank setup, but the Research & Planning portion of the guide helps you decide what type of tank you’d like, what type of fish to purchase, how to stock your tank, how to choose individual fish, and even provides a myriad of potential stocking schemes for your new aquarium.

If you are new to fishkeeping or want to get an easy-to-read book to get your kids or spouse interested in your hobby, I highly recommend The Simple Guide to Freshwater Aquariums.  It will help you avoid common mistakes and, in the end, save a fair bit of money as a result.