jayro

I'm fairly new with reef tanks and have added some soft corals and one SPS coral. My goal is also to get an anemone. I had my water tested today at the LPS and there are trace amounts of nitrite (less than .05) so I'm going to wait a few more weeks.

My concern is, I have only 15lbs of live rock in my 30g tank and am wondering if I need more live rock in order to add more coral or the anemone? It doesn't seem that I have a lot of flat surfaces on the rock to place the soft corals on, so is it okay to place them on the substrate? Totally confused. Any suggestions?

I have 3 very small Ricordea Florida, one of them came off of it's original stone and now seems to float around at times as it hasn't attached to the live rock yet (going on day 3...I keep grabbing it with my turkey baster and putting it back on the rock). Is there something I should do?

Angela_96

Nitrite is horrible for reef tanks, I would do waterchanges until you get that level under control. Also the tang you have in that tank requires a tank at least 75g to thrive. THat can contribute to the nitrite issues. I would def ad more live rock, but cured live rock.

If you want to get an anemone I suggest waiting until your tank is over a year old. SW reefs do not fully mature for a year.
Some softies like to be on the rocks, some can go on the substrate (like the mushrooms).

There are different coral glues out there, I would get some and glue the ricordea to a rock.

Hypnox

The short answer is that some corals need LR to attach to while some do not need LR to attach to. For instance, most mushrooms and ricordeas as well as zoanthids requires a solid surface to attach to. While such corals as Long tentacled plate corals will be fin sitting in a sand bed as they grow their own plate to sit on.

I would strongly suggest doing as much research as possible on the corals you would like to keep so that you know the type of environment they live in and how to best replicate it. As well as getting your chemical levels in line as they are likely stressing your existing corals and causing the floating issue with the ricordea. Corals are living colonies of creatures and if the colony doesn't like where it is it will do what it can to move to somewhere better.

harpua2002

If what I read in your Aquarium Info is your current stock list, that is an extremely heavy fish load for a 30 gallon. I'd imagine that you're going to have a tough time keeping your water parameters on track even with frequent maintenance. Also, the specific gravity is pretty low if it is at 1.021. Either of those factors could lead to corals not doing well.

jayro

All of my fish are babies, I hope that makes a difference. I started with a 30g tank to learn with. I felt like I finally mastered my FW tank so I graduated myself to a SW I've been working at this for almost a year now, but before spending the time and ultimate risk of harming any livestock, I wanted to start out small. When I someday (hopefully sooner than later) feel like I've figured out all the elements necessary to keep a SW tank, I'd like to get a much larger tank and will then transfer my fish so they have something to grow large in. Will my fish be okay for now since they are so small?

cerianthus

Use your judgement as far as overstock issues. I've seen/had way overstocked tank but done better than tank that was not properly maintained. Just stay on top of things and prepare for bigger tank as you may need to transfer some fish as they grow.

As fa as NO2 goes, unless level goes higher, would not do any water changes at this point. Perhaps you may be overfeeding?

Well established tank should not register nitrite even with slight overfeeding. Try controlling the amount and frequency of feeding if NO2 persists.

As far as corals goes, soft coral should be on the rock for them to attachand grow/spread. Since desir to have anemone in such small tank with corals, woould not put any corals on the sand/substrate as anemone might be doing walkabout/roam around causing damages if not klling corals left on the substrate.
I know it maybe hard to find right/proper places to mount all the corals but I used to attached (epoxy glue) small branch type LR to bottom of corals such as plate coral and stick the branch in tthe crevice and sucured it with bit more epoxy. It may look odd as far as position and way it may look but as things grow around it, it will look as natural as can be.
Another problem with psitioning corals on the sand is the fact the pssibility of presence of nightcrawlers/hitchhikers which may cause death/damges to corals but not when on the corals are positioned on the top of LR. Had few similar issues when species (Tridacna Clam for example) will be killed when left on the sand but not when positioned high up in the tank. Never found the reason for such loss but had an idea that it could've been snail/slug which relishes on the clams by boring into shells using acid. Like I said, just a suspicion due to tight holes left on the dead clam shells.

Use your imagination. YOu may even come with an ideas which can exceed others including mine. As they say, necessity is mother of invention.

Hope this helped and wish you luck.