Newb To Saltwater Tank Build

[xiholdtruex]

Looks so much better with th lights on

 

[stella1979]

Looking good!

 

[Culprit]

Beautiful!! It seems like this is turning into a RFA tank, I love it!

 

[xiholdtruex]

Beautiful!! It seems like this is turning into a RFA tank, I love it!

Yep it sure is, It going to be my little garden lol I want to add 2 or 3 more 1 per rock , then once they get situated I'm adding 2 porcelin crabs and some sexy anemone shrimp and watch them grow I get facinated watching the tank after work, and watching the two hermits fight

 

[xiholdtruex]

Got a few more anemones today to complete the anemone stocking love seeing the tank more colorful

 

[jamie carmichael]

Whoa you got some amazing corals there. Congratulations on your anemones too I'm sure your clowns will love them

 

[xiholdtruex]

Whoa you got some amazing corals there. Congratulations on your anemones too I'm sure your clowns will love them

Thanks you.Clowns unfortunatly do not host in these kind of anemones , But my future porcelin anemone crabs and sexy anemone shrimp will love thme

 

[xiholdtruex]

Fed all the nems today and clown for the first time with mysis shrimp and a turkey baster. The nems all took 3 or 4 shrimp and the clown gobbled up all the scraps and tried to steal some from the nems lol one cube of mysis holds more than I thought.

 

[xiholdtruex]

Was reading on the computer this morning and my son is very quite, go to the living room and this is what I find .......

 

[Wild Bill]

Good boy.

 

[xiholdtruex]

In orlando for my wifes disney 5k stopped at world wide corals to check them out, immaculate show room and tanks are impecable. All stock looked very healthy

 

[Culprit]

Lucky!! Looks beautiful

 

[xiholdtruex]

Had one of my anemones looking bad for a few days and detached and was floating around so I have one gonner rest are looking good, peramiters are good. spot on maybe a fluke.

 

[Wild Bill]

Looking for a new place, maybe?

 

[xiholdtruex]

Looking for a new place, maybe?

That's what I thought at first so I left it in there but then it was getting pale and it was a goner, the rest of the RFAs are good, 1 of my hermits died also, he changed shells to a snail shell then died shortly after. Maybe he injured himself, did a 30% wc to be on the safe side and fed the tank everything seems to be looking good now, anemones are slobs with the mysis shrimp lol they eat like piggies, and my clown is growing slowly but surely. I'm going to give it another week or so to make sure tank is stable before looking into getting some porcelin crabs if everything goes good.

 

[stella1979]

Be careful not to overfeed the nems. Don't want them getting gut rot. I made the mistake of walking into VIP for dry goods yesterday... got the dry goods aaaand, a new RFA and a blasto frag.

 

[xiholdtruex]

Lol that place is dangerous haven't passed by there in two weeks lol just looked back in my tank and could not find one of my rfas and then found this lol apparently his tentacles attached to this hermit and he was dragging him around graves him and turned my pump off to see if he reattaches

 

[xiholdtruex]

Lol that place is dangerous haven't passed by there in two weeks lol just looked back in my tank and could not find one of my rfas and then found this lol apparently his tentacles attached to this hermit and he was dragging him around graves him and turned my pump off to see if he reattaches

 

[xiholdtruex]

 

[xiholdtruex]

Idk how this is but I bought two hermit crabs in Jan, found 2 hermit dead and somehow I still have two hermit crabs I'm lost now lol

 

[Wild Bill]

Lol. It’s simple math.

 

[thesoulpatch]

They might have just molted

 

[Culprit]

Idk.... I found what I was pretty sure was a scarlet hermit body, it definitely wasn't a molt, it was ripped in half and you could see flesh, wasn't empty. But I still have my scarlet hermit like whaaaa? I'm thinking it came in on the LR?

 

[xiholdtruex]

Idk.... I found what I was pretty sure was a scarlet hermit body, it definitely wasn't a molt, it was ripped in half and you could see flesh, wasn't empty. But I still have my scarlet hermit like whaaaa? I'm thinking it came in on the LR?

That's what I was thinking but all my live rock was virgin and only ever bought rfas and the clown maybe that's what the only looks like

 

[xiholdtruex]

A little tank update, Lost a second RFA, He was lingering around for a bit then started hiding under rocks and I think he melted away because he is Mia lol All the peramiters I can check are solid, 0 ammonia, 0 nitrite and 0 nitrate. Starting to get a knarly looking cyano slime growing which I'm thinking is due to the rfa melting and dumping a bunch of nutrients in the water. other nems looking good so far, time to start more vigorous wcs to fix this issue.

 

[xiholdtruex]

After a water change and the lights have been on for a few hours

 

[Wild Bill]

Bring your nitrates up a little. Your colors will pop brighter. Everything’s looking good.

 

[stella1979]

Bring your nitrates up a little. Your colors will pop brighter. Everything’s looking good.

I'm working on that myself Bill, hoping it will help me with softies, but a little concerned for SPS. Mixed reef problems, lol.

 

[xiholdtruex]

Bring your nitrates up a little. Your colors will pop brighter. Everything’s looking good.

how much do you recommend?

 

[stella1979]

Hrmmm, I'm unsure about RFA's in particular, but I've read that nitrates over 5 and under 10 is a happy place for softies.

 

[Wild Bill]

what she said.

 

[xiholdtruex]

My lights starting to die on me, and the bulbs seem to be getting more expensive. One of the cooling fans is dead. What do you guys and gals think of removing the hood and using one of these atleast as a temporary solution to later upgrade Macegrow Led Aquarium Light-Aqua Knight 30W Touch Control Aquarium Led Lighting with 3W Cree Chips for Saltwater Fish Marine Nano Tank

 

[stella1979]

I wish I could be more help with lighting buy it's just not my strong point. That said, I know that 30W isn't a lot. At worst, your RFA's might lose some color, but the future upgrade could fix that.

How deep is the tank?

Lorekeeper runs a pico with lower lighting so perhaps he could help.

Edit: I do think an LED is a good idea for replacing your current lighting.

 

[Wild Bill]

try this one. Make sure you order the marine version if you do go for it.

 

[Lorekeeper]

Some will disagree on this, but I've had good luck with these bulbs:

They do take 15-20 days to ship, but they're cheap, run pretty cool, and are surprisingly sturdy. I can't speak for longevity over 6 months, but the bulb still works and is very bright. I'm running one of the 21W PAR 30's over my 5.5, so depending on your tank size, you can adjust from there. I'd classify it as a pretty medium light.

If you're wanting a bit more name-brand fixture, the one that Wild Bill listed is one of the options I considered while ordering lights for my upgrade. Decided to stick with what I have though, and order a second bulb to get better coverage.

If you have the skill, DIYing a fixture would give you the best cost-performance ratio, and you can get cheap, solderless LEDs that are Plug-N-Play.

 

[xiholdtruex]

Some will disagree on this, but I've had good luck with these bulbs:

They do take 15-20 days to ship, but they're cheap, run pretty cool, and are surprisingly sturdy. I can't speak for longevity over 6 months, but the bulb still works and is very bright. I'm running one of the 21W PAR 30's over my 5.5, so depending on your tank size, you can adjust from there. I'd classify it as a pretty medium light.

If you're wanting a bit more name-brand fixture, the one that Wild Bill listed is one of the options I considered while ordering lights for my upgrade. Decided to stick with what I have though, and order a second bulb to get better coverage.

If you have the skill, DIYing a fixture would give you the best cost-performance ratio, and you can get cheap, solderless LEDs that are Plug-N-Play.

All good options , worse comes to worse I could get the two par38 bulbs and use clip lamp lol , which seems to have good results, Till I can invest in the big boy lights down the line lol looks like the replacement bulbs for the hood are discontinued

 

[Lorekeeper]

I use a desk lamp for mine, and I'll just be using two desk lamps for my 10.

It's not pretty, but it gets the job done.

 

[xiholdtruex]

Sounds good, went to vip reef today, they informed me based on the pictures and info looks like I am having a phosphate issue and recommended I switch over to mixing my own salt water with aquaforest probiotic reef salt. And changing 2-4 gallon a week on my water changes. I need to buy a phosohate test kit lol I have been holding off and the time has come. If anyone had any other recommendations for salt to use let me know. Also picked up two more trocheus snails. The guy was telling me I could put 12 in a 12g but I think that's too much and they would starve once the food ran out. Let me know what your input is .

Thanks in advance

 

[Lorekeeper]

Personally, I don't trust what any store tells me. Even the best stores out there will promote their more expensive products, for the simple fact that they need the money. Not a bad thing, but you can save some cash.

I use Instant Ocean Reef Crystals, and I haven't had any issues. Phosphate kits are definitely a nice thing to have, and can clue you into some issues before nitrate really will.

Trochus would probably be alright with 8-12 in a 12 gallon, actually. Personally, I'd get some nassarius and some ceriths to have variety and help stir your sandbed. Just stay away from turbos! They'll redecorate your tank real quick.

 

[xiholdtruex]

I have been looking for some cerith and nassarius locally but haven't found any down here . stella1979 have you seen any locally?

Personally, I don't trust what any store tells me. Even the best stores out there will promote their more expensive products, for the simple fact that they need the money. Not a bad thing, but you can save some cash.

I use Instant Ocean Reef Crystals, and I haven't had any issues. Phosphate kits are definitely a nice thing to have, and can clue you into some issues before nitrate really will.

Trochus would probably be alright with 8-12 in a 12 gallon, actually. Personally, I'd get some nassarius and some ceriths to have variety and help stir your sandbed. Just stay away from turbos! They'll redecorate your tank real quick.

 

[Lorekeeper]

If you can't find any locally, I got mine from Saltybottomreefcompany.com. No DOAs, and that was in the dead of winter.

 

[xiholdtruex]

does anyone have any good experience with chemipure blue, was reading if you put a bag to big it could hurt the system ? does this sound right?

 

[stella1979]

I have been looking for some cerith and nassarius locally but haven't found any down here . stella1979 have you seen any locally?

There's a place near Kendall and 117th Ave where I got my first snails and they did have nassarius snails then. Honestly though, I don't recommend that store... especially after I saw them pushing mandarin fish on newbs. I only bought from them that once, 2 trochus and 2 nassarius. I acclimated them carefully but one of each didn't last the week. The 2 that did seemed like they were never very strong. As in, the remaining trochus didn't get around as much as we'd hoped, and it was difficult to feed the nassarius because he didn't want to come out of the sand, even when we were dropping shrimp at him. Anyhow, I believe the place has weak stock, and I'm down to three banded trochus myself, all from VIP. It might be worth calling and checking with Ocean View though. I don't get up to Bird Rd. much, but they have lots of inverts in my experience.

 

[xiholdtruex]

There's a place near Kendall and 117th Ave where I got my first snails and they did have nassarius snails then. Honestly though, I don't recommend that store... especially after I saw them pushing mandarin fish on newbs. I only bought from them that once, 2 trochus and 2 nassarius. I acclimated them carefully but one of each didn't last the week. The 2 that did seemed like they were never very strong. As in, the remaining trochus didn't get around as much as we'd hoped, and it was difficult to feed the nassarius because he didn't want to come out of the sand, even when we were dropping shrimp at him. Anyhow, I believe the place has week stock, and I'm down to three banded trochus myself, all from VIP. It might be worth calling and checking with Ocean View though. I don't get up to Bird Rd. much, but they have lots of inverts in my experience.

I might wait till I stock a cuc for the pico tank and just order a cuc and just grab a few for the pico and put the rest in the bigger tank.

 

[Jayd976]

I agree 12 is way too many they’ll starve. I’d personally only do 1 or 2.

 

[xiholdtruex]

So I'm currently performing operation remove any nitrate or phosphate or gunk from water that can throw my tank out of wack.

Wrapped a 20ppI sponge filter block in 50 micron floss mat and placed in the entrance to the over flow with two chemI pure blue baggies on top. have been pulling out the sponge and floss every 24 hours and rinsing it in Ro DI water to clean them out it's been 3 days and every time I rinse them out it's just pure brown water. Seems to me there is so much more in the water than we can notice even though it looks crystal clear.

Was thinking of putting some lps corals in the tank with the rfas, was thinking of starting with a war coral frag. What do you guys and gals suggest and where do you think in the tank would be good for the war coral.

Heres a pic of the rinse water looks like puree of detritus

 

[Lorekeeper]

Here's my experience with my war coral.

Got it in pretty rough shape, and stuck it in my tank in a pretty moderate light/high flow area. It did alright, but got knocked off the rockwork multiple times and seemed to have quite a bit of damaged flesh after a few weeks of being in my tank. I decided to glue it to the back wall of my tank (low light, low flow) and it's immediately started to repair damaged flesh and seems much happier. There's new growth all around, so I think it's doing alright.

So they're pretty hardy LPS, and in my case, it's really done best in at least a lower light situation. Keep nitrates under 10. The normal LPS stuff!

 

[xiholdtruex]

Here's my experience with my war coral.

Got it in pretty rough shape, and stuck it in my tank in a pretty moderate light/high flow area. It did alright, but got knocked off the rockwork multiple times and seemed to have quite a bit of damaged flesh after a few weeks of being in my tank. I decided to glue it to the back wall of my tank (low light, low flow) and it's immediately started to repair damaged flesh and seems much happier. There's new growth all around, so I think it's doing alright.

So they're pretty hardy LPS, and in my case, it's really done best in at least a lower light situation. Keep nitrates under 10. The normal LPS stuff!

Do they grow onto the glass ?

 

[Lorekeeper]

I hadn't found anyone gluing it to the back wall before I tried it, but it seems so. It's doing fine!

 

[xiholdtruex]

I hadn't found anyone gluing it to the back wall before I tried it, but it seems so. It's doing fine!

Sounds good to me was thinking of doing that also. Do chalice grow like this ?