Jorgies first nano tank!

[Jorgie7]

Hey hey! So I'm new to the forum and the salt water hobby. Back in high school I had a 55 gallon freshwater but I have always wanted a marine tank. So here is my first shot at one.

Items list: 10 gallon tank -donated

Korilia 240 pump

Hob filter- donated

10 lbs live rock ( Fiji pink)

Marineland led light ( literally what it was listed as )

Via aqua 50 watt heater

That's what I have so far, I set it all up last Sunday and hopefully I will be able to get 10 lbs of Fiji live rock and a bottle of bio spira to start my cycle. As for a stock list I'm considering a small clean up crew and two shrimps and two small fishes ( green clown goby and maybe a clown or a spotted goby). Prior to my set up I read up all I could on here to try and get things right but I would much appreciate any comments or suggestions! I also will be documenting the whole thing on YouTube (

). Any suggestions for some interesting corals I could add, I really have my heart set on a hammer or frogspawn but I don't know if I can do it.

 

Live sand*

[Jorgie7]

I just got home and did a water check since it's been a few days since it's been up and running and did a short video on it.

http://youtu.be/oxzag1BeBmI

[kush.]

what kind of coral are you planning on keeping? just lps like the hammers, acans, torch? if that's the case, that light may not be enough. It may be able to grow softies but i don't see lps thriving in it. if you have your heart set on led's, you should take a look at par 38's or something as i know a lot of people like those. And, I would recommend getting some more live rock and create a nice aqua scape that give opportunity for different coral placement. It will also help with the filtration as live rock is your primary filter.

I also noticed a water conditioner. I would highly highly recommend you buy distilled from a grocery store if you do not want to invest in an ro/di system. If you take anything away from what i said, the last one may be the most important lol

[Jorgie7]

what kind of coral are you planning on keeping? just lps like the hammers, acans, torch? if that's the case, that light may not be enough. It may be able to grow softies but i don't see lps thriving in it. if you have your heart set on led's, you should take a look at par 38's or something as i know a lot of people like those. And, I would recommend getting some more live rock and create a nice aqua scape that give opportunity for different coral placement. It will also help with the filtration as live rock is your primary filter.

I also noticed a water conditioner. I would highly highly recommend you buy distilled from a grocery store if you do not want to invest in an ro/di system. If you take anything away from what i said, the last one may be the most important lol

Hey thanks for the info! I do plan on buying some rodi from my lps the sell it for 25 cents a gallon so I won't be needing the conditioner I guess. The par reading is 130 at 12 inches under the light ( that's the bottom of the sand bed) should that be enough for some candy cane, xoas, and hopefully a hammer... And I should be getting about 10lbs plus the two lbs of dry rock I have in there. Would that be enough?

[kush.]

no problem . Just so you're aware the general rule of thumb for water quality is tap>RO>Distilled>RO/DI with RO/DI being the most pure but distilled works just as well. I still recommend buying the 5 gal bottles of distilled water from your grocery store, but its up to you. just don't use tap lol. Hopefully someone can chime in on the par readings as I'm far more familiar with t5's and mh requirements and know next to nothing about led's lol. And as for your live rock, a total of 12 pounds will be perfect. If you have the choice, make sure the live rock you buy is porous to allow for bacteria cultivation. the lighter the rock usually means there's more surface area for bacteria to cultivate.

[Jorgie7]

I'll be keeping that in mind when I but the live rock thanks! I'll post some pics when I get it in.

[Jorgie7]

So I finally made it down to my LFS and picked up 8 pounds of live rock and aquascaped a bit and I think I'm happy where things are at. Here is a pick with the light off, so question is how long do I wait for it to cycle since my legs told me the live rock is fully cured and I added some API QuickStart.

[Halo_003]

no problem . Just so you're aware the general rule of thumb for water quality is tap<RO<Distilled<RO/DI with RO/DI being the most pure but distilled works just as well. I still recommend buying the 5 gal bottles of distilled water from your grocery store, but its up to you. just don't use tap lol. Hopefully someone can chime in on the par readings as I'm far more familiar with t5's and mh requirements and know next to nothing about led's lol. And as for your live rock, a total of 12 pounds will be perfect. If you have the choice, make sure the live rock you buy is porous to allow for bacteria cultivation. the lighter the rock usually means there's more surface area for bacteria to cultivate.

Fixed. Correct though lol. And would be true as is if talking about TDS.

 

Tank looks good so far, just be patient during the cycle, figure at least 2-4 weeks.

[Jorgie7]

I don't know if you can tell in the pic I attached but here are some dark spots of algae on the rock ... Is this normal?

[cindyp]

it looks great! i'm new too, so can't answer your algae

question with authority. ha! but my live rock had some

color algae on it too.

[Jorgie7]

it looks great! i'm new too, so can't answer your algaequestion with authority. ha! but my live rock had somecolor algae on it too.

Thanks for sharing though! Mine has red, green, purple, pink, and some brown algae. But some spots are borderline black

 

Fixed. Correct though lol. And would be true as is if talking about TDS. Tank looks good so far, just be patient during the cycle, figure at least 2-4 weeks.

Even with the QuickStart? And how long should I wait before I introduce some clean up crew?

[Jorgie7]

Here is a pic with the lights on.

[Jorgie7]

 

Here is just a quick pic of my water parameter test today! This is tho days into the addition of the live rock with 8 hour light cycles and the power head on along with the hob filter but I did remove the filter floss today ... Should I add it back?

[zdes]

I used the wavepoint 12" blue/white 16 w clip-on LED for mine with a similar setup. Worked just fine with AGA rim and my frogspawn/condy anemone did great. Stay away from the LED snobbery

 

Just a heads-up: LED's, in my experience, do not grow coralline algae so if you are looking for coralline, get a PC bulb. Corallife has a 20w screw-in 50/50 bulb you can put in a desk lamp that works well for growing coralline. I went on 12 hour light cycles, though.

 

Keep in mind that in a nano, fish jump. I had a clown that went carpet surfing. Do yourself a favor and get a roll of replacement screen like for sliding patio doors/windows. It cost me like $10-$15. You can cut it to size and whatever shape you want. Everyone will tell you to do weekly water changes as well. I did a 2 gallon change every 2 weeks or so, when my nitrates were higher than comfortable, or when the algae grew too much and I wanted to scrub the rocks with a toothbrush. The more you can keep your hands out of the tank, the better, though.

[Jorgie7]

I used the wavepoint 12" blue/white 16 w clip-on LED for mine with a similar setup. Worked just fine with AGA rim and my frogspawn/condy anemone did great. Stay away from the LED snobbery

 

Just a heads-up: LED's, in my experience, do not grow coralline algae so if you are looking for coralline, get a PC bulb. Corallife has a 20w screw-in 50/50 bulb you can put in a desk lamp that works well for growing coralline. I went on 12 hour light cycles, though.

 

Keep in mind that in a nano, fish jump. I had a clown that went carpet surfing. Do yourself a favor and get a roll of replacement screen like for sliding patio doors/windows. It cost me like $10-$15. You can cut it to size and whatever shape you want. Everyone will tell you to do weekly water changes as well. I did a 2 gallon change every 2 weeks or so, when my nitrates were higher than comfortable, or when the algae grew too much and I wanted to scrub the rocks with a toothbrush. The more you can keep your hands out of the tank, the better, though.

Thanks for the info man! Defiantly put some worries to rest for me.

[Jorgie7]

Hey so I have keeping an eye on the tank closely and over the last week I noticed something growing in the tank at first it was just one small circle but now it seems like it's starting to multiply. Does anybody know what this is maybe a coral or some sort of algae?

[Jorgie7]

So I did a water test today and here are the results ... Looks like the cycle is on the back end... Hopefully small cuc will be introduced Friday. Here is a update vid with a shot of the results (

)

[Jorgie7]

Ere is a quick snap of today's water peramiters.

[Kijho]

Don't put any livestock in that tank yet mate!!

I've never seen nitrites that high before.

 

You've still got a tiny bit of ammonia, but this is still good progress. The ammonia has become nitrite. Now you gotta wait it out until that nitrite becomes nitrate. Once it's nitrate you'll be pretty good.

 

It looks like the rock you bought was 100% LIVE rock (not precured, not dry rock) and when you brought it home, tons of die-off happened and therefor this ammonia / nitrite spike.

 

Once this is done though you're gonna have a really strong tank...

 

Wait it out!

 

Two other things:

1. Are you using plain tap water with that conditioner? If so, I'd suggest not doing tap water. There's a ton of references around here if you search it up that advise strongly against it.

2. That LED looks really nice, however definitely isn't strong enough to support most corals! You need pretty specific intensities and specific kevlin scale. I'm using a PAR 38 Cree LED - Checkout my build thread in my below signature to see some pics! It was about $100, I'm sure you can find something similar down in the USA!

[Jorgie7]

Don't put any livestock in that tank yet mate!!

I've never seen nitrites that high before.

 

You've still got a tiny bit of ammonia, but this is still good progress. The ammonia has become nitrite. Now you gotta wait it out until that nitrite becomes nitrate. Once it's nitrate you'll be pretty good.

 

It looks like the rock you bought was 100% LIVE rock (not precured, not dry rock) and when you brought it home, tons of die-off happened and therefor this ammonia / nitrite spike.

 

Once this is done though you're gonna have a really strong tank...

 

Wait it out!

 

Two other things:

1. Are you using plain tap water with that conditioner? If so, I'd suggest not doing tap water. There's a ton of references around here if you search it up that advise strongly against it.

2. That LED looks really nice, however definitely isn't strong enough to support most corals! You need pretty specific intensities and specific kevlin scale. I'm using a PAR 38 Cree LED - Checkout my build thread in my below signature to see some pics! It was about $100, I'm sure you can find something similar down in the USA!

Thanks a ton if you didn't tell me I would have thrown in a few snails this weekend!

About the water, I did decide on buying from the store every time I do a water change... As for the huge spike in nitrites... I am using a old bag of reef crystals would this have something to do with it (it's about 3 years old) ... And I hunk i wol wait on getting the new light until I'm ready for corals and have a fish and invert tank for now. But again thank you very much man.

[Jorgie7]

Hey just posting a update I have decided to take the plunge and bought a T5 light fixture... Now the fixture has an acrylic lens over the lights does this mean that I shouldn't use a glass canopy on. The tank?

[Viking]

A glass cover can cut down on evaporation and will prevent jumpers, but it will limit gas exchange at the water surface and could trap heat, which can cause excessive temps in the tank depending on ambient conditions. A screen may be a better choice, you will have to pay more attention to the water level though.

And a + on the T5, I will be adding one soon to hold me over until I can settle down and play with some LEDs.

[Eclipse]

A glass cover can cut down on evaporation and will prevent jumpers, but it will limit gas exchange at the water surface and could trap heat, which can cause excessive temps in the tank depending on ambient conditions. A screen may be a better choice, you will have to pay more attention to the water level though.

Not necessary to buy a screen if you just point one of the powerheads toward the surface to increase gas exchange; it's not like the whole tank is covered, since you have the hang on back filter there.

[Jorgie7]

Thanks for the info guys! Here is a snap of my water pear tiers as of last night! If say it's almost cycled and this Wednesday the cuc will go in!

[Kijho]

Those high nitrates are a sign of the cycle progressing. Very high though - you got some super live rock to be getting this great cycle.

When you see that nitrate come down, drop some mysis in and see if you get a sky-high spike like this again. If not, good to go I believe!