First Tank - 16gal BioCube!

[SaltyShel]

Hey everyone! This is my very first saltwater tank and I’m so excited. I have always wanted one!
A little background, it’s a 16gal BioCube, previously owned. My dad got it for me, since he decided to downsize his 32gal (which he still hasn’t done yet lol), and didn’t change the rock, sand, or water that was already in there from the previous owner. My dad said it was already established, so he let it be. He put a White Stripe Maroon Clownfish in there, along with an urchin and some snails and hermit crabs. I had a dottyback but I don’t know where it went. I checked the rear chambers, floor, and looked around the rocks - no where to be found.
I have only had my tank for one week. The water test I had done at a local store said my Ammonia is 0, Nitrates 25-50, Phosphate 1, and salinity 1.019 as of 4 days ago. Today, I just added in about 1/2 - 3/4 of a US Cup of saltwater to try to bring it up! I haven’t done a water change this past week since my dad said he did one a couple days before I took it home. I want to get my nitrates down but am waiting another week for the water change to let it all settle, as suggested by a fish store, due to moving it.

I believe I have aiptasia, probably due to being preowned, and other than normal water changes, nothing else was changed or removed. My dad had it for 6 months before I was able to move it home with me. I have gotten multiple different answers, all conflicting, about removing aiptasia.

I know this is a lot of information!! I just don’t know what is or isn’t needed to be said (yet). I would like to get some coral, an anemone and one or three more fish, so I have pairs!
Advice is welcome, I want to learn as much as I can

I added some pics, along with an up-close picture of a rock (with my urchin in the background), because that is the rock with all the stuff (plants?) I’ve been told by 2 stores is aiptasia, but anyone who wants to confirm/deny, please do!

 

[Uzidaisies]

Hello! I’m happy to see your excited about your new hobby, there’s a lot to be excited for! A couple things you should address; Yes, those are Aiptasia. Adding that amount of saltwater is going to do nothing to raise the salinity, which you probably should do. Best to get that to 1.025-1.026 by most recommendations. I’m inexperienced with urchins, but in my opinion, the tank does not look very mature, and may not contain enough food for the urchin. If you’re not feeding it already you may need to start. I think urchins might also not tolerate less mature systems or swings in parameters well, so you may run into more problems with it there. I’m sorry to make it seem like there is so much wrong right out of the gate, but with some patience and dedication I’m sure you can have a successful tank! Oh, you also added a random picture of a shrub, looks like it might be a rhododendron.

 

[SaltyShel]

Hello! I’m happy to see your excited about your new hobby, there’s a lot to be excited for! A couple things you should address; Yes, those are Aiptasia. Adding that amount of saltwater is going to do nothing to raise the salinity, which you probably should do. Best to get that to 1.025-1.026 by most recommendations. I’m inexperienced with urchins, but in my opinion, the tank does not look very mature, and may not contain enough food for the urchin. If you’re not feeding it already you may need to start. I think urchins might also not tolerate less mature systems or swings in parameters well, so you may run into more problems with it there. I’m sorry to make it seem like there is so much wrong right out of the gate, but with some patience and dedication I’m sure you can have a successful tank! Oh, you also added a random picture of a shrub, looks like it might be a rhododendron.

Wow, thank you so much for all this info!! I’m really glad you’re telling me because I never would’ve known otherwise, and would’ve just been more sad if something went wrong that I could potentially have prevented! I suppose the food and salinity need to be the first corrections? Also, the reason I added such a small amount of water is because I got a hydrometer (can’t get a refractometer until next week) and the instructions said to let it sit for 24hrs with saltwater in it when you first take it out of the box. So I did that, used brand new salt water from the local fish store, made 100% sure there weren’t bubbles, and it was reading 1.027. So I got concerned because I would think that store would know to keep their salinity lower than 1.027…since they told me they keep their tanks at 1.024 - 1.025. But either way, I’ll add more water and look around the forums for urchin care info. I want him to be happy.
How do I make a mature tank? Also, what is considered “mature”? I feel like this tank looks pitiful, from an aesthetic standpoint… but I’m going to make sure I get it where it should be, even if the prior owner did/could not. I’ve been keeping the white light on mostly all day, and that dark, dim blue light (kinda like a black light I think) only on at night, so more algae grows for my clean up crew & urchin! It seems to be working. More is growing, but not very much yet.
Lastly, I don’t know how that shrub got on here lol but I took it down, thank you. Funny story, it was at my work - there was a huge wasp on top of a grasshopper, never seen something like that before so I took a picture lol.

 

[Angel_V_the_reefer]

Wow, thank you so much for all this info!! I’m really glad you’re telling me because I never would’ve known otherwise, and would’ve just been more sad if something went wrong that I could potentially have prevented! I suppose the food and salinity need to be the first corrections? Also, the reason I added such a small amount of water is because I got a hydrometer (can’t get a refractometer until next week) and the instructions said to let it sit for 24hrs with saltwater in it when you first take it out of the box. So I did that, used brand new salt water from the local fish store, made 100% sure there weren’t bubbles, and it was reading 1.027. So I got concerned because I would think that store would know to keep their salinity lower than 1.027…since they told me they keep their tanks at 1.024 - 1.025. But either way, I’ll add more water and look around the forums for urchin care info. I want him to be happy.
How do I make a mature tank? Also, what is considered “mature”? I feel like this tank looks pitiful, from an aesthetic standpoint… but I’m going to make sure I get it where it should be, even if the prior owner did/could not. I’ve been keeping the white light on mostly all day, and that dark, dim blue light (kinda like a black light I think) only on at night, so more algae grows for my clean up crew & urchin! It seems to be working. More is growing, but not very much yet.
Lastly, I don’t know how that shrub got on here lol but I took it down, thank you. Funny story, it was at my work - there was a huge wasp on top of a grasshopper, never seen something like that before so I took a picture lol.

Hey ! I’m glad you’re in the hobby and starting a rewarding but a very stressful hobby. I’m 19 years old and my tank has been running less that a year. Definitely something to keep in mind in this hobby is that :
1. patience is key to everything we do in this hobby. Good things never come over night
2. This hobby is expensive. You buy what you will give yourself. By saying that I mean, the cheaper you buy something, let’s say a cheap light, the less uplift and lifespan it will have.
3. I know you don’t have corals yet but when you do (even before you buy corals) stability is key in this hobby. Many time people will wonder why something has gone wrong in their tank, and they won’t even pull out a test kit.

This hobby is a very tiring one, and expensive one, especially if you’re a beginner who’s eager to have an aesthetically pleasing, and healthy reef tank with vibrant colors, stability, etc.
I would suggest you to look into buying and RODI unit. I’ve gone cheap on RODI units , and I’ve wasted hundreds of dollars on units that would read 0tds, yet poison my water with undetectable Chloramines. I would recommend a 6 stage unit from BRS (6 stage will give you pristine water, especially if you don’t know how many much chlorine, Chloramines your tap water contains.) it is vital you know what’s in the water you add to your tank or else you’ll have problems that ‘come out of nowhere’.

also, invest on some top tier test kits such as Hanna checkers. They take the guess work out of the whole hobby and give you numbers that you can trust.

feel free to reach out to me about specific questions on anything !! I was once a beginner (still am in reference to time in the hobby), however I’ve gone through the horrors and the beauty of the hobby and can help with starting off right !

 

[SaltyShel]

Hey ! I’m glad you’re in the hobby and starting a rewarding but a very stressful hobby. I’m 19 years old and my tank has been running less that a year. Definitely something to keep in mind in this hobby is that :
1. patience is key to everything we do in this hobby. Good things never come over night
2. This hobby is expensive. You buy what you will give yourself. By saying that I mean, the cheaper you buy something, let’s say a cheap light, the less uplift and lifespan it will have.
3. I know you don’t have corals yet but when you do (even before you buy corals) stability is key in this hobby. Many time people will wonder why something has gone wrong in their tank, and they won’t even pull out a test kit.

This hobby is a very tiring one, and expensive one, especially if you’re a beginner who’s eager to have an aesthetically pleasing, and healthy reef tank with vibrant colors, stability, etc.
I would suggest you to look into buying and RODI unit. I’ve gone cheap on RODI units , and I’ve wasted hundreds of dollars on units that would read 0tds, yet poison my water with undetectable Chloramines. I would recommend a 6 stage unit from BRS (6 stage will give you pristine water, especially if you don’t know how many much chlorine, Chloramines your tap water contains.) it is vital you know what’s in the water you add to your tank or else you’ll have problems that ‘come out of nowhere’.

also, invest on some top tier test kits such as Hanna checkers. They take the guess work out of the whole hobby and give you numbers that you can trust.

feel free to reach out to me about specific questions on anything !! I was once a beginner (still am in reference to time in the hobby), however I’ve gone through the horrors and the beauty of the hobby and can help with starting off right !

Thank you so much this definitely helps me understand a little better that I need to calm down lol. I’ve been so incredibly stressed out, trying to make everything literally perfect, that I end up questioning every step I take. I am so so scared to mess up and kill everything. I love animals so much that I became vegetarian almost 10 years ago lol. So needless to say, for me, a fish or even a snail, is a big deal to keep alive and happy. Also, I really love my urchin. He is so cool and carries rocks around on his head lol. I’m gonna get better testing supplies for sure, but I thankfully can go to the store down the road for free water tests if I need to, in the meantime. Do you think I should add more sand? Cause I was thinking I should. But i also want to make a little cave or something for my fish, but the rocks I have are big, bulky, and kind of just awful, imo. I would like to take that big one out but I was told it could cause a methane spike, so I don’t know what to do now.

 

[Staghorn]

So far so good. It seems your on the right path. In the mean time if you can’t buy a ro unit then your LFS may sell RO or you could do gallons of distilled water from the nearest Walmart. It may be a good idea to do a water change. That will help with the nitrates and the salinity. The very next thing I would do with this tank is to make a big effort to stop this aptasia before they spread more. Once your salinity is corrected I would suggest adding a pair of peppermint shrimp. They don’t always eat aptasia but since the tank is small they may work out. Otherwise there a allot of ways to kill aptasia. Probably the most effective is smothering them with a blob of aquarium epoxy. You want to make sure you cover them up and no pieces get out or are uncovered otherwise they will spread. After a month or so you can remove the epoxy. Best to take care of them now. If they spread it will be allot harder later. Good luck and keep up the good work.

 

[SaltyShel]

So far so good. It seems your on the right path. In the mean time if you can’t buy a ro unit then your LFS may sell RO or you could do gallons of distilled water from the nearest Walmart. It may be a good idea to do a water change. That will help with the nitrates and the salinity. The very next thing I would do with this tank is to make a big effort to stop this aptasia before they spread more. Once your salinity is corrected I would suggest adding a pair of peppermint shrimp. They don’t always eat aptasia but since the tank is small they may work out. Otherwise there a allot of ways to kill aptasia. Probably the most effective is smothering them with a blob of aquarium epoxy. You want to make sure you cover them up and no pieces get out or are uncovered otherwise they will spread. After a month or so you can remove the epoxy. Best to take care of them now. If they spread it will be allot harder later. Good luck and keep up the good work.

Thanks so much, this is great advice! I will definitely look into that epoxy, sounds like the easiest treatment method anyone has mentioned so far. A LFS told me to pull out all the rocks and soak them In RO water, then scrub the rock and change water weekly. But that seemed risky. They said I could get an ammonia or methane spike but should do a water change immediately after. In your opinion, doesn’t that sound like a lot of stress to put on the tank? I thought it did… either way, definitely prefer trying the route you mentioned

 

[Staghorn]

If are going to take the affected rocks out I would honestly just try and chisel out the aptasia. Dipping your rock in freahwater is going to wipe out the bacteria on those rocks I would advise against it. I know you mentioned methane a couple times. I think that if you have any trapped gases it probably will be hydrogen sulfide. In either case i’m sure you would be OK moving the rock around, to be on the safe side run some air stones and some carbon and you should be OK. By the way methane shouldn’t hurt anything in the aquarium as long as it’s not so much that it’s displacing the oxygen in the water. I really don’t think that that substrate would have enough decaying matter in it to cause that. I’ve seen methane produced in very deep freshwater planted substrates where there is a lot of decaying organic matter. But with all that being said you probably don’t have to remove your rocks. Keep up the good work

 

[Jedi1199]

If are going to take the affected rocks out I would honestly just try and chisel out the aptasia. Dipping your rock in freahwater is going to wipe out the bacteria on those rocks I would advise against it. I know you mentioned methane a couple times. I think that if you have any trapped gases it probably will be hydrogen sulfide. In either case i’m sure you would be OK moving the rock around, to be on the safe side run some air stones and some carbon and you should be OK. By the way methane shouldn’t hurt anything in the aquarium as long as it’s not so much that it’s displacing the oxygen in the water. I really don’t think that that substrate would have enough decaying matter in it to cause that. I’ve seen methane produced in very deep freshwater planted substrates where there is a lot of decaying organic matter. But with all that being said you probably don’t have to remove your rocks. Keep up the good work

First, Welcome to the forum and the addiction. You have been given some good advice so far. Read, learn, read some more, and when you think you have a clue, read more!! There is no substitute for knowledge and this forum is THE place to get it!! I wish it had been around when I set up my first salt tank.

OK, I am going to disagree wholeheartedly with Staghorn here...

Removing and washing the rocks will not, repeat NOT kill your beneficial bacteria! In fact, it may even benefit them!!

Take out the rocks, scrub the bejeezes out of them and get rid of the aptasia and any other gunk you don't want.

Don't believe me? Read this thread:

32g rework...

My 32g tank has been a real problem for quite a while now. I just cant seem to get the algae under control. Today I decided it's time to do a full rework on this tank. Pried off all the coral frags and removed all of the rock. Scraping all of the algae off the back as possible and scrub the...

www.reef2reef.com

Still don't believe? Get in touch with @brandon429 I am sure he will be more than happy to help you.


Edit: Note that the thread I linked to is my own. This is firsthand experience, not something I read and am parroting.

 

[SaltyShel]

If are going to take the affected rocks out I would honestly just try and chisel out the aptasia. Dipping your rock in freahwater is going to wipe out the bacteria on those rocks I would advise against it. I know you mentioned methane a couple times. I think that if you have any trapped gases it probably will be hydrogen sulfide. In either case i’m sure you would be OK moving the rock around, to be on the safe side run some air stones and some carbon and you should be OK. By the way methane shouldn’t hurt anything in the aquarium as long as it’s not so much that it’s displacing the oxygen in the water. I really don’t think that that substrate would have enough decaying matter in it to cause that. I’ve seen methane produced in very deep freshwater planted substrates where there is a lot of decaying organic matter. But with all that being said you probably don’t have to remove your rocks. Keep up the good work

Thank you for the info! I definitely have a lot to read about and to learn. I have a LFS that I do enjoy going to, the guy who runs it is always there and has put aside a lot of time to help me and advise me, and never makes me feel like I’m being a bothersome customer, when some other shops have given me that impression. It seems like I have more pests than anything… which is definitely not what i was expecting a week ago when I brought my tank home. I will do some research and see where it gets me. Thank you!!

 

[SaltyShel]

First, Welcome to the forum and the addiction. You have been given some good advice so far. Read, learn, read some more, and when you think you have a clue, read more!! There is no substitute for knowledge and this forum is THE place to get it!! I wish it had been around when I set up my first salt tank.

OK, I am going to disagree wholeheartedly with Staghorn here...

Removing and washing the rocks will not, repeat NOT kill your beneficial bacteria! In fact, it may even benefit them!!

Take out the rocks, scrub the bejeezes out of them and get rid of the aptasia and any other gunk you don't want.

Don't believe me? Read this thread:

32g rework...

My 32g tank has been a real problem for quite a while now. I just cant seem to get the algae under control. Today I decided it's time to do a full rework on this tank. Pried off all the coral frags and removed all of the rock. Scraping all of the algae off the back as possible and scrub the...

www.reef2reef.com

Still don't believe? Get in touch with @brandon429 I am sure he will be more than happy to help you.


Edit: Note that the thread I linked to is my own. This is firsthand experience, not something I read and am parroting.

Thank you, I certainly will be doing a bunch more research, since I’m still so new at this. The unfortunate part is that the aiptasia is not my only problem, so I don’t think I’ll be doing any rock removal any time soon. This tank wasn’t healthy when my dad bought it and it was never restored before he gave it to me. I guess since he didn’t see any of the pests, he thought it would be fine, and I’m sure I could continue to run it with all the pests and it technically would still be manageable, but that’s really not what I plan on doing or want to do. I want it to be healthy and correct, not sick. Thankfully my LFS is going to go over these issues in more detail with me so that will be some relief.

 

[Staghorn]

If are going to take the affected rocks out I would honestly just try and chisel out the aptasia. Dipping your rock in freahwater is going to wipe out the bacteria on those rocks I would advise against it. I know you mentioned methane a couple times. I think that if you have any trapped gases it probably will be hydrogen sulfide. And

First, Welcome to the forum and the addiction. You have been given some good advice so far. Read, learn, read some more, and when you think you have a clue, read more!! There is no substitute for knowledge and this forum is THE place to get it!! I wish it had been around when I set up my first salt tank.

OK, I am going to disagree wholeheartedly with Staghorn here...

Removing and washing the rocks will not, repeat NOT kill your beneficial bacteria! In fact, it may even benefit them!!

Take out the rocks, scrub the bejeezes out of them and get rid of the aptasia and any other gunk you don't want.

Don't believe me? Read this thread:

32g rework...

My 32g tank has been a real problem for quite a while now. I just cant seem to get the algae under control. Today I decided it's time to do a full rework on this tank. Pried off all the coral frags and removed all of the rock. Scraping all of the algae off the back as possible and scrub the...

www.reef2reef.com

Still don't believe? Get in touch with @brandon429 I am sure he will be more than happy to help you.


Edit: Note that the thread I linked to is my own. This is firsthand experience, not something I read and am parroting.

The advice given to her by the LFS was to soak the live rock in RO. From what I could understand in your thread is you rinsed the rock under tap water and then soaked in new salt water right?

 

[Staghorn]

Shel keep in mind Jedi is a very experienced reefer and in his thread he had to repeat the process later on because of a bacterial bloom. Since you are new in the game and wanting to keep this as simple as possible I would probably avoid soaking your live rock in reverse osmosis water

 

[TheSaltyNurse]

welcome! I used to have this tank. What kind of filtration are you running in the back? there are a few good modifications you can make. Personally, I would go ahead and do a water change to get those nitrates down and slowly bring that salinity up. As for fish, I wouldn't do more than 3. Maybe a clown pair and something that likes to hang at the bottom. keep us updated!

 

[Zoa_Fanatic]

Nice to meet you. I have the same tank and a biocube 32 running currently. If the dottyback you are missing was small there’s a good chance it’s hiding in your rocks if you haven’t taken them out or moved them to look. My 4” damsel gets lost sometimes in my 16. If you didn’t move the tank to look into the rear chambers from the back it’s possible he’s in the bottom of chamber 1. That stupid false floor keeps you from seeing all the way down if lookin from the top down.

That maroon clown is going to turn into a monster if it hasn’t already. They get really large as clownfish go and are one of the more agressive types. We had to give my dads away when it reached the size of a small bluegill and started harassing everything that came near its anemone. If you’re going to do more fish you’re going to have to get another clown and make it a small one. Like half the size of this one. If you stick with the maroons I would not do any other fish. The big females are the devil.

that urchin is super cool. For the aptasi, peppermint shrimp will eat them if all else fails. There’s also a nudibranch called a bergia nudibranch that only eats them if you can get any locally.

 

[Aqua Man]

It seems like I have more pests than anything… which is definitely not what i was expecting a week ago when I brought my tank home. I will do some research and see where it gets me.

Your Rock looks great to me. Coralline starting. You could remove that very top rock, it has the most Aiptaisia on it. Also looks like it’s about to fall unless it’s glued?
That’s a good looking urchin too!
I highly doubt you have any strange gasses building up anywhere since your tank has been moved recently!

Maroon clowns can get aggressive, I agree!

 

[Jedi1199]

The advice given to her by the LFS was to soak the live rock in RO. From what I could understand in your thread is you rinsed the rock under tap water and then soaked in new salt water right?

The preferred method in the Rip-clean is to do it in clean salt water, if I understand correctly. Perhaps @brandon429 can chime in here if I am mistaken. When I started that process, I had not intended a project of that scope, so I did not worry about some lost bacteria. That said, The rocks were cleaned and scrubbed under HOT running tap water, and were not put into the "soak" for at least a couple hours. If you see the link to the thread to Amalee's Rip clean, She did a LOT worse to her rocks than a good scrub under tap water, or a soak in RO.

My point is, established bacterial colonies are a LOT harder to kill off than most people believe. Part of what Brandon is trying to teach us all is that very fact. He is a far more experienced reefer than I and is basically the forum expert on all things "Cycle". If he says: "pour 7 cups of bleach, 2 cups of gasoline and do the hokey pokey and turn yourself around" I would believe him.. lol

Shel keep in mind Jedi is a very experienced reefer and in his thread he had to repeat the process later on because of a bacterial bloom. Since you are new in the game and wanting to keep this as simple as possible I would probably avoid soaking your live rock in reverse osmosis water

Thank you for the compliment. The reason I had to repeat the process is a combination of 1. I didn't get the rocks as clean as I should have. And, 2. I had a major event in the family that took me out of my normal maintenance routine. If you refer back to my thread and the picture of the bucket where the rocks were soaked you can see how cloudy and dirty that water is.. That is exactly the stuff that a rip-clean is supposed to eliminate. The very fact that THAT much dust and dirt came off while just sitting in a bucket tells me that I didn't get them as clean as I thought or SHOULD have gotten them.

For the record, the rocks on the 2nd go around got an even rougher treatment. I dropped them all in a bucket, sorted out the pieces I wanted to keep, cleaned them and left them dry on the counter until I drained and cleaned the tank and finished rinsing the sand (which had sat in a bucket of hose water for 2 weeks) and replacing it.

 

[brandon429]

It doesn’t seem harmful when white rock setups use the method Ive seen it used more than once.


certainly wouldn’t run it on cured rocks or ocean cultured ones like kp aquatics

typically on normal live rock it’s better to use a knife tip to precision remove unwanteds as the rock sits on the counter

rinse off in tap water

 

[SaltyShel]

If are going to take the affected rocks out I would honestly just try and chisel out the aptasia. Dipping your rock in freahwater is going to wipe out the bacteria on those rocks I would advise against it. I know you mentioned methane a couple times. I think that if you have any trapped gases it probably will be hydrogen sulfide. And

The advice given to her by the LFS was to soak the live rock in RO. From what I could understand in your thread is you rinsed the rock under tap water and then soaked in new salt water right?

Hey thank you for that, i actually haven’t rinsed the rocks yet because at first I wanted to get different opinions and now I’m just confused. I have no idea what to do or what is best. I’m afraid I’m gonna kill everything with all the issues that tank has. It’s beyond “bad condition”. To your other question, yes, I was told to rinse the rocks in RO DI for a week, pull out, scrub, put in new RO DI, and repeat for about a month. However, I didn’t do that. I never took them out. The reason is because I’m really conflicted with all this different info I got and there’s other problems with the tank that felt more important. Still stuck though.

 

[SaltyShel]

Shel keep in mind Jedi is a very experienced reefer and in his thread he had to repeat the process later on because of a bacterial bloom. Since you are new in the game and wanting to keep this as simple as possible I would probably avoid soaking your live rock in reverse osmosis water

Thank you, I really appreciate you telling me that! I had no idea lol. That’s part of the reason I didn’t wanna pull them out, is to preserve any good bacteria I have. Also, to prevent causing more issues than I already have. I have a lot of pests, my nitrates are high, and I don’t have a secondary tank. A LFS told me to nuke my tank but I don’t know if I trust that, since he also told me to KILL EVERYTHING in my tank, and to sell my fish & urchin. He literally told me to kill my GOOD animals… like the snails, hermits, coral, and to only save my fish and urchins life so I can sell them. Doesn’t sound right to me and is messed up to just kill them like they’re not living. They’re not hurting anything. The pests are a different story, though.