My water's VERY cloudy!

[CFQTPye]

i'm just so worried about my livestock. i just set up my qt tank. do you think i should move my livestock into the tank?

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

How is the ammonia now?

That is the concern.

 

[CFQTPye]

Ok so Sunday I took my anemone's, clownfish and pipe organ and put them in the QT tank. I've been testing twice a day monitoring both tanks. After two days of running the UV light, increasing my flow etc. I saw no improvement. So sunday I did a water change and naturally saw a difference but still noticed minor readings on both Ammonia and Nitrite and about an 8 on the nitrate. Yesterday (exhausted from stressing about this) I did another water change and still saw no difference in my levels. As I was watching the water, I noticed ALOT of particulate floating around in the water... particulate that I believe (as a noob) should not be floating in the water and should be captured by my protein skimmer. Now I know I have a relatively new tank and all I keep reading is that new tanks don't have alot of protein so don't expect alot....

But I've had organisms living in the tank, a ton of algae that has come and gone and still no protein. So I tore apart my skimmer last night and saw that it wasn't running properly. I fixed and starting running it properly last night and woke up this morning to a near clear tank (after several dumps of the overflow in the skimmer) and NO Ammonia, NO Nitrite and NO Nitrate! Hallelujah!

Thank you all for your help and guidance while I struggled with this.

- Corinne