Am I… Skipping Some of the Uglies?

[litsoh]

I know that I’m going to be jinxing myself as soon as I post this, but I have to ask.

So I’ve had water in my tank for over two months now, and fish in the tank for about a month. I’ve heard all about the uglies starting up super early on in other people’s tanks, but in my case I haven’t seen so much as a hint of GHA or anything like that. At most there’s some film algae growing on the back panel of my tank which is already being picked at by my angel and swarmed by the copepods. Have I somehow stumbled upon the holy grail or something?

For reference I started my tank with 60 lbs of live sand, 80 lbs of dry sand, and a good amount of the caribsea life rock. Ammonia and nitrite are 0, nitrates at 10ppm, pH 7.8, and salinity 1.022-1.023

Now I’m fully expecting a fight with diatoms and dinos soon, but I’m just surprised I haven’t seen any of the precursors yet

 

[EeyoreIsMySpiritAnimal]

Just wait, they will come. Are your lights on yet?

 

[litsoh]

Just wait, they will come. Are your lights on yet?

Lights have been on ever since the fish have been in, but they’re not exactly a specialized/full spectrum light. It’s the stock lights that came with the tank, so some standard LED strips. The tank also does get some natural sunlight though

 

[Reef.]

Dinos are not part of the “uglies” you don’t want those.

The tank actually benefits from algae etc so don’t be wishing it away too fast.

 

[Mikeltee]

Keep the nutrients high. Dinos takes most new reefers out of the game. On the bright side, it keeps barely used equipment cheap and plentiful. I love it when they put their 10k setups on Facebook marketplace for 9k. 3 months later they accept $500. Lol

Good job on the pods. That's my strategy for my fresh sterile tank. I'm feeding 2ml/gal of phyto a day and I'm culturing 3 strains of pods.

Add cleanup crew slowly. You should only have a handful in there now.

 

[litsoh]

Dinos are not part of the “uglies” you don’t want those.

The tank actually benefits from algae etc so don’t be wishing it away too fast.

Some algae I’m forsure expecting to have/I want to keep. It just feels like it’s been a bit of a slower process than the freshwater tank I have for example. Now that thing gets algae growth back fairly quick after I clean

 

[litsoh]

Keep the nutrients high. Dinos takes most new reefers out of the game. On the bright side, it keeps barely used equipment cheap and plentiful. I love it when they put their 10k setups on Facebook marketplace for 9k. 3 months later they accept $500. Lol

Good job on the pods. That's my strategy for my fresh sterile tank. I'm feeding 2ml/gal of phyto a day and I'm culturing 3 strains of pods.

Add cleanup crew slowly. You should only have a handful in there now.

Yeah I’ve been overfeeding a little bit both for that and to make sure everything is able to get some food.

At the moment the only cleanup crew I have are the pods, I was waiting on a bigger growth of algae before trying to add any more cuc so that they don’t starve

 

[Mikeltee]

Yeah I’ve been overfeeding a little bit both for that and to make sure everything is able to get some food.

At the moment the only cleanup crew I have are the pods, I was waiting on a bigger growth of algae before trying to add any more cuc so that they don’t starve

You are doing it right my friend... you are measuring Phosphates too I assume. You didn't post the number. I also assume that you are using Hanna Checkers as well. You did your homework. That is rare around here!

Why such low salinity? NSW is closer to 1.026 and what most of us run. Do you plan on corals?

 

[litsoh]

You are doing it right my friend... you are measuring Phosphates too I assume. You didn't post the number. I also assume that you are using Hanna Checkers as well. You did your homework. That is rare around here!

Why such low salinity? NSW is closer to 1.026 and what most of us run. Do you plan on corals?

Oh believe me I’ve wanted a saltwater tank for a while so I’ve been watching videos and reading forum posts well before the tank was even bought haha.

I’m waiting on my LFS to get the Hanna Checkers in stock so I’ve been using an API test kit. Of course it isn’t the most accurate thing but I’ve had the water tested at my LFS and they’ve come back with the same results.

In terms of phosphates I’m running a fowlr so I didn’t think that I needed to worry about it as much. Of course it can’t be too high but I figure the nitrates would be a good indicator.

Salinity wise, I mixed my own salt water so I’m guessing I made a mistake in conversions when I was pouring in the salt. But again, no corals and fish aren’t as sensitive to lower salinity levels. I’m gonna slowly raise it up through water changes

 

[Mikeltee]

You want these Hanna checkers:
Alk
Calcium
Nitrate HI782
Phosphate HI774
Copper (for quarantine)

Measure phosphate and nitrate weekly until stable and then monthly is fine after a couple of months of no changes in measurement. Alk and Calcium can come later when you get coral. I highly recommend a kalk stirrer inline with ATO until you are ready for SPS. At that point you are ready for a calcium reactor. I ran kalk exclusively for 10 years but i didnt have sps. Magnesium is measured upon occasion but I'm not sure if Hanna makes one. I've only measured Mg a few times to dial in the proportion in my Calcium reactor.

People complain about the Hanna calcium checker but they aren't doing it right. For every measurement, you need to wipe the vial down to remove fingerprints as well as insert it exactly where you took the reference measurement. I line up the letters on the vial in the front. Most people make these mistakes and then whine that Hanna is inaccurate. Hanna checkers have recently been shown to be more accurate than the $80 ICP testing if used properly. I'd say 5% of the people around here use them properly. They can't even fill it to 10ml properly. It doesn't help that even Hanna's youtube videos use improper technique.

Be smart and quarantine all your fish!

 

[litsoh]

Alk and Calcium I won’t need. Even if I wanted to I wouldn’t be able to keep corals since they’re illegal to keep here.

But yes! All my fish are pre-quarantined from Dr. Reef and they’ve done a stellar job.

 

[Mikeltee]

Where do you live? I wasn't aware of any laws like that. I suppose if you live near a reef they don't want you picking at them in the ocean nor bringing in some invasive species.

 

[litsoh]

Where do you live? I wasn't aware of any laws like that. I suppose if you live near a reef they don't want you picking at them in the ocean nor bringing in some invasive species.

Hawaii, they’re pretry strict about it too so I won’t chance it. Apparently zoas are allowed to be collected but I’m not gonna go through the trouble since there are a lot of rules around it as well.

 

[Reef.]

Some algae I’m forsure expecting to have/I want to keep. It just feels like it’s been a bit of a slower process than the freshwater tank I have for example. Now that thing gets algae growth back fairly quick after I clean

Yeah I know what you mean, my first tank and this one I have just set up was the same, I even posted the same question as you, my tank didn’t really start to take off until it got a bit of algae, never did experience the “uglies” think it’s just a made up thing

 

[litsoh]

Yeah I know what you mean, my first tank and this one I have just set up was the same, I even posted the same question as you, my tank didn’t really start to take off until it got a bit of algae, never did experience the “uglies” think it’s just a made up thing

We're totally jinxing ourselves here LOL

 

[litsoh]

Yep my pods have pretty much demolished the visible film algae on the glass. On the bright side their population has continued to explode.