Lighting and Reef Tank Advice

[mettjl03]

This is my situation... About 2 months ago I decided to start adding live rock to my fish tank (which has been fish only for over two years). I cured the rock and put it in the tank and all was well. About 3 weeks ago I bought some more rock, cured it, and put it in my tank. Had no problems for the first week, then all of a sudden my tank broke out into a huge bacterial infect and the ammonia level increased to 0.50. To make a long story short, all of my fish died except 1. So I have now decided this would be a good time to start a reef tank. Yesterday I bought 40 lbs of live rock and put it in the tank. However, I really have no clue what I am doing when it comes to reef tanks because all of my experience has been with fish only tanks. I know I need special lighting but Im not sure what would be the best thing to buy. Could someone please give me some advice on what I need to get to make this reef tank successful? I currently have a 72 gal tank, with about 50 lbs of live rock, and 1 yellow tank.

Thanks,
Jessica

[scoop]

Welcome to TRT! (I'm amazed you haven't gotten any responses yet.) I think you need to post this is the General Reef Discussion section. NOt very many people check the lighting section. I don't know how to move it for you or I would. The lighting depends on what type of reef you want to go to. Do you want to keep lps, sps, softies? (Do some searches here to look at the differences.) Your die off is standard because the rock caused a cycle in your tank and your fish couldn't take it. If you're not sure what type of corals you want and do want to buy lighting, I'd recommend getting T5 lights. When you look for these, you need to get a fixture or retrofit that has individual reflectors for each bulb, costs a bit more, but worth it. Take some time doing searches, and re-post on the Gen Disc section and you will have a great experience with your reef.