Completely new reefer asking for setup advice

[X-37B]

I’d personally skip the magnesium and potassium measurement for now.

I understand your view on mag but don't necessarily agree with it 100%.
For mag and K, like the others, it is always a good idea to have a baseline from day as a reference if nothing else.

 

[Wilbert]

2 is a good start you can always add more. I ran 2 on my 30g with good results.
First 4 settings at 100% and the rest at 50. This will grow anything.

And......

Thanks! This community is rly awesome

 

[Wilbert]

Update on the scape I made using Marcorock. I still got some small pieces to make it a little more appealing, and I still have to cover the epoxy I used (aquastick from Two Little Fishies) with superglue and sand/marco rock remains. My plan is to order a couple of pounds of wet live rock and work it in the scape, but Im not sure now if I should bite the bullet, and get some more marco rock instead and make this bigger. Please let me know your thoughts.

 

[Mr. Mojo Rising]

Personally I would add a few more rocks to add around the base to create some caves and hideouts and nooks and crannies for fish. Fish need to be able to hide their whole bodies to feel safe.

 

[Wilbert]

Personally I would add a few more rocks to add around the base to create some caves and hideouts and nooks and crannies for fish. Fish need to be able to hide their whole bodies to feel safe

That sounds valid. I am planning on either adding some more marcorock down there or adding some wet liverock.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

I understand your view on mag but don't necessarily agree with it 100%.
For mag and K, like the others, it is always a good idea to have a baseline from day as a reference if nothing else.

I don’t disagree with the idea that it is useful to know, I just think it is incorrect often enough to be more trouble than it is worth.

For folks who think they need to know Mg and K, I’d suggest using icp. Then that test and a sample retained at the same time can be used as a standard to validate both kit tests.

 

[Wilbert]

Personally I would add a few more rocks to add around the base to create some caves and hideouts and nooks and crannies for fish. Fish need to be able to hide their whole bodies to feel safe.

Ive added a bunch more rock all around, I hope the new inhabitants will appreciate the extra hiding spots :)

 

[Wilbert]

Small update, and first crisis purely because of my own lack of research. I bought an aqua medic easy line 300 system, but completely overlooked the fact that this is only and RO system, and does not contain any DI resin. I tested it today, and indeed, there is still 9ppm in my water. I bought a separate stage that can be added to the aqua medic containing DI, but that will only arrive tomorrow, while my wet live rock arrived today.

The live rock is sold to me as readily cycled and free of hitchhikers, so my original plan was to start the cycle in the display tank today. However, seen as 9ppm also messes up my salinity readings on the refractometer, I now temporary store the live rock in a bucket, instead of letting the rock dry in the box so the bacteria die off too. Im using the 9ppm RO water (its the best Ive got atm), salt mix, heater, wavemaker, and plastic cover against light to prevent algea growth in the bucket.

Not ideal, I know, but this way at least the rock will not dry in the time it takes for my DI resin to make actual 0ppm water. Would you guys recommend another strat, or is this an okay solution for say 2 days until I can start with my cycle with 0ppm water?

 

[Wilbert]

Quick question for everyone who knows about cycling.. I am currently following the program from Red Sea Reef Mature, where I have now completed the first 6 days of the program.

My tank has been running for three weeks now. I tried the cycling process in the beginning, dosing Ammonia and using live Nitrifying Bacteria, but upon dosing exactly like the product said, I could only get my Ammonia upto 0.3-0.4 ppm, and the (expensive) live nitrifying bacteria did not seem to do anything.
I did not want to go against the instructions of the bottle and dump in a whole lot of ammonia, so I told myself to be patient.

Long story short, ammonia was low and there was no nitrite building up at all.

I opted to try something else after waiting for a good while, and bought the red sea program.

With the program I was finally able to get my ammonia upto about 1.7 ppm, and the nitrite immediately responded to it by rising slightly too. Now, after only 5 days, the ammonia is back down at 0.5 ppm and the nitrite at 1ppm. Is this a sign that the initial part of the cycle is nearly complete? I was given to understand that this ammonia peak could last for weeks, not 2 days.. Im not complaining, but I want confirmation that I have not messed this up ;)

During cycling, the PH has been at a stable 8.15, the salinity at 35, the temp at 26 degrees Celcius (78.8 F), and the KH has jumped around a lot, but I dose it to 8.4. During cycling I have kept the lights off and kept the skimmer on, as well as running two SLW20's as powerheads. No filtering at all.

Visually, the tank looks exactly the same as it did 3 weeks ago when I put water in.

 

[Fish Fan]

I'm sure it's just me, but I'm not following what you're doing here

You started this tank three weeks ago, but as of today you're 6 days into the RedSea tank cycling program? How did you initially start this tank? It may be already cycled, which is why you're not showing much ammonia.

You did or did not use real, wet live rock from a Local Fish Store (LFS)? Did this rock ever dry out for an extended period of time?

 

[Wilbert]

I'm sure it's just me, but I'm not following what you're doing here

You started this tank three weeks ago, but as of today you're 6 days into the RedSea tank cycling program? How did you initially start this tank? It may be already cycled, which is why you're not showing much ammonia.

You did or did not use real, wet live rock from a Local Fish Store (LFS)? Did this rock ever dry out for an extended period of time?

Hi! I get this is confusing haha, my apologies

I started the tank 3 weeks ago and immediately dosed ammonia and live bacteria. That did not work as the ammonia wouldn't rise and the nitrites stayed at 0, even though I followed the instructions.

A week ago I started with the Red Sea program. The graph I showed is the data from the Red Sea program thus far.

I used cured live rock (never dried up) in combination with Marco Rock. I also used live sand.

 

[Fish Fan]

I used cured live rock (never dried up) in combination with Marco Rock. I also used live sand.

Then I believe your tank is cycled. If you used cured, wet live rock from a fish store, that rock is already cycled. I believe that's the reason you didn't see ammonia when you first started the tank, as well as why you're not seeing much for ammonia now. Add to that a health bit of test kit error, and I would believe you're cycled, especially after three weeks running.

 

[Wilbert]

Then I believe your tank is cycled. If you used cured, wet live rock from a fish store, that rock is already cycled. I believe that's the reason you didn't see ammonia when you first started the tank, as well as why you're not seeing much for ammonia now. Add to that a health bit of test kit error, and I would believe you're cycled, especially after three weeks running.

Alright, thank you! I am now convinced too that the tank is cycled, as the ammonia and nitrites hit 0 after 24 hours of dosing 2ppm ammonia.

However, I have a huge amount of nitrates, hitting 100 ppm. I have absolutely no phosphates in the tank (0ppm). As far as I understand, carbon dosing does not help when you have either phosphates or nitrates, you need both. My solution would be to just do 100% water change, the other to continue dosing carbon but also dose phosphate. What do you guys recommend?

 

[Fish Fan]

Others may have different advice, but if you have zero nitrites and are legitimately recording nitrate at 100 ppm, I would just do a large water change to lower that. Carbon dosing and other methods I believe would be unnecessarily slow at this stage with no livestock other than microbes.

You can raise phosphate by feeding more, in particular Reef Roids is good at bringing up phosphate. You can also dose phosphate in a few different forms.

 

[Wilbert]

Others may have different advice, but if you have zero nitrites and are legitimately recording nitrate at 100 ppm, I would just do a large water change to lower that. Carbon dosing and other methods I believe would be unnecessarily slow at this stage with no livestock other than microbes.

You can raise phosphate by feeding more, in particular Reef Roids is good at bringing up phosphate. You can also dose phosphate in a few different forms.

Yea Im using the Salifert test, and it is about as pink as one can get. I think I will just do the ~100% water change at this point. Thank you!

 

[Fish Fan]

Yea Im using the Salifert test, and it is about as pink as one can get. I think I will just do the ~100% water change at this point. Thank you!

The only negative I see to that is the work and cost of the new saltwater, but if you're good with it, I think that's the best thing to do.

Good luck!

 

[Wilbert]

So I think I have arrived at the well-known ugly phase, but I'd still like your ID on the algea I'm seeing.

The sand and rocks have turned brown, with small super brown spots on the left stone for some reason. Also, if you look very closely, there are some really long hairs in there too.

So from a quick search I think this is diatoms with beginning green hair algea. I'd love your take on surviving the dreaded ugly-phase, if anything. I turned the lights off for now as the algea appeared a week after turning them on.

Current livestock:
- 2x Turbo snails
- 2x bumble bee snail
- 2x Trochus
- 2x Nassarius
- 2x Red Hermits
- 1x cleaner shrimp
- 2x clowns (got them yesterday, doing great :))