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New to reef tanks


shan_tao

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As the subject line says, I'm new to reef tanks and to salwater in general. I kept gars and a jack dempsey in a freshwater tank years ago. A friend of mine is a reef tank enthusiast and he helped me set up my new tank 3 days ago. The tank:

 

2.5 g AGA

Live sand

2.5 lbs. cured live rock (1 lb that had cycled for ~4.5 years in buddy's tank and 1.5 lbs from lfs that has been cured 1 1/2 month)

Coaralife 9" 18w for lighting

Fluval 2 Plus in tank filter

 

 

3 days ago, I added the first lb of live rock from friends tank , and I added the 1.5 lb from LFS today. I have added nothing except what is on the live rock (as far as I can tell a couple featherdusters and several tiny pink looking corals that have lil white hair like things that come outof em.)

 

About an hour after I added the live rock today I ran some tests with the test kit I picked up:

 

Spec. Gravity: 1.018- 1.019

ph: 7.8

Ammonia: 0.50

Nitrite: 0

Nitrate: 10

 

My questions are:

 

1) My friend that I got the water and LR from tells me there's no reason to cycle the tank and I can run the lights 12 hrs a day to start because I used established water and the live sand and cured LR. What does anyone else w/ nano tank experience think of this?

 

2) He also thinks I could add a shrimp and some snails right away, even a few mushrooms. Again, thoughts on this - is he correct oe should I wait until tank better cycled/ balanced?

 

3) The spec. gravity is a bit low, and slightly high ammonia and nitarate levels. My question is should I just let the tank do its thing for another week and check levels again then?

 

4) From what I've read on here in the near future I'm thinking of changing to an aqua clear mini mooded into a refugium. I'm just curious to read more thoughts on this and was curious if I wait a while on the fuge if having macros in the main tank would be beneficial for keeping nitartes down.

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1) 12 hours of light per day = you havin tons of hair algae. try more like 8-10 hours per day. that will be plenty.

 

2) you need to wait for the cycle to finish. ammonia needs to be 0. then slowly add a few snails or hermits. you should not plan on keeping a shrimp in that size of tank unless you want to do sexy shrimp. all others will probably starve and get to big.

 

3) yes

 

4) perhaps, as long as you keep it under control.

 

please visit my "special note to newbies" thread in my sig below for some other good nano info.

 

also the ~~beginer faq~~ forum at the top of the begginer forum has some good info about the cycling process and when to add stuff if you need more specific detail.

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Increase your SG by performing water changes with higer SG water.

 

This Tank is small... so a couple inverts are about your stocking limit. Stay on top of perams. and get that under control before proceedeing.

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Thanks for the replies and directions to those two threads.

 

It's funny, and I guess to be expected, but I find a lot of conflicting information when consulting this and other forums, the LFS and my friend.

 

1) In the beginners FAQ, it says to start the lighting at 1-2 hrs a day and increase 1/2 to 1 hr per day until reaching 8. Should I restart the lighting schedule tomorrow at 1-2? Its run 12 hrs/ day for its first 3 days.

 

2) Another thing, I was under the impression by speaking with my friend that I wouldn't need to set up as slow as indicated in that FAQ (ie Adding rock and sand days 4,5, and 6) because I was using the LR, Live Sand, and established water from his tank. Is there any validity to that? I added sand followed by water extremely slowly and then LR all at once, as per his instructions. The tank was crystal clear within minutes of setup and has been since. Should I start over from begining, now would seem a better time than later, but I'd of course prefer not to.

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yes you will see lots of conflicing info. that's where your judgment comes in. 10-12 hours should be fine.

 

1) yah, i've never done that. a good idea if you are acclimating corals to new lighting, but otherwise, i never have heard of that or done it.

 

 

2) yes, you probably won't see much of a cycle since everything is established. that is werid that you have some ammonia though then. i would still wait a bit and see if that goes down. do some water changes to reduce the nitrates.

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Tested again today after doing a nearly 1g water change yesterday:

 

SG: 1.021

Ph: 8.0

Ammonia: 0

Nitrate: 0

Nitrite: 0

 

 

I've also noticed a lot more life in the tank since I set it up. I have what looks like a red bubble tipped anenome that likes to hang out on and behind the fluval filter. One of live rocks that I put in has many small zoanthids on it that I hadn't noticed before because of the positioning of the rock. There's also a tiny (very tiny) snail that I havn't identified and an isopod of the Idoteidae family, I believe. There are also small worm looking things that stick out of holes in live rock, along with lots of other tiny things that I can't identify.

 

Today I'm going to add two astraeas,two nassarius, and two scarlet reef hermits.

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Picked up 2 astrea, 2 nassarius and one scarlet hermit. The nassarius and the hermit are goin to town and one astrea is hanging out in same spot on a LR and the other staying in same spot on glass.

 

Guy at LFS tells me that at this point I don't need to be feeding anything in the tank - they'll eat microinvertebrates, algea , deritus etc. Is that true and if so at what point do you start feeding the zoas, the hermit or the anenome if he stays?

 

Speaking of the anenome, should i get rid of him now? Like I said I think its a rbta at least from the pictures I've looked through...but definitely not positive. He hangs out in between the suction cups on filter when tank is dark and moves to side of filter under lights when they're on.

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Guest nicoj122

get your SG up to 1.025 and your ph up a lil bit more. 8.3 is good, though 8.0 isnt that far off.

 

do you know what aiptasia is? keep an eye out for em. as for the anemone, wait until you have corals if it really is an rbta. otherwise just get him out. if its an rbta you could try and sell/trade.

i wouldnt feed the tank quite yet, since it might give you some negative results. wait a week or two and see how its doing before adding anything else. thats a real small tank and you dont want an ammonia spike. i might even try adding some bacteria to make sure you have enough. they sell it at the LFS as filter bacteria.

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I've read a bit about aiptasia. Does aiptasia ever have the bubble/ nipple look on its tentacles? Most pictures I've seen of aiptasia, the tips look sharp and pointed. I believe that I read aiptasia can be somewhat translucent. Is rbta also translucent?

 

The anenome in my tank is somewhat translucent and had bubble/ nipple looking tentacles that when stretched out a bit more pointed.

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