Hi fellow reefers. I hate that I'm introducing myself like this.. Been lurking for several months and joined the hobby with my first saltwater tank 8 weeks ago. I've been pretty much exclusively relying on my LFS owner for guidance through this process, but I'm starting to lose confidence in him.
I've got a 36 gallon bowfront reef tank with an Aquaclear 70 HOB filter and two Kessil A80s. It's been running for 8 weeks and I believe it was fully cycled. I watched my Ammonia and Nitrites come down to zero and my Nitrates drop to around 20. Sg is 1.25. I've got around 30 lbs of live rock, most of which came from my LFS, 4 turbo snails (started with 6) and 12 dwarf hermit crabs. After about 4 weeks when the tank was cycled, I started slowly adding fish and coral. First was a clown and a lawnmower blenny, then some zoanthids, then an anemone and tiger watchman goby, then an urchin and purple dottyback and sailfin tang (I now know my tank is not suitable for this guy), then a shrimp.
A couple weeks ago I had a green algae bloom that has not really subsided yet. The urchin is doing his best to eat it, and it's not growing back where he is eating it, but he's only made it to two out of five rocks.
The first problem I had was losing two turbo snails. I had the heater set to 80 degrees, so we think it was too warm for the snails. Now at 78, the remaining snails seems happy.
I am feeding flake food, pellet food, and an occasional block of frozen shrimp.
When I added the dottyback and sailfin tang, I never saw the watchman goby out again. He stayed in his hole under a rock permanently. Previously, he stayed there a lot but you'd see him out and sand sifting regularly. After 10 days of him not emerging, he finally came out one day and looked awful. He was half his prior size and was behaving erratically. The next morning, he was dead. Later that day, the purple dottyback was dead. This was unexpected - I hadn't noticed anything off with him. Yesterday I noticed the tang acting weird. He was a lot less active. This morning he was stuck to the filter intake. I thought he was dead, but when I nudged him away from the intake he swam a little. I expect him to be dead when I get home from work. All the coral seem healthy.
I tested the water when the two fish died on Saturday. For the first time in 5 weeks, the test appeared to reveal an ammonia level; I'm guessing around 0.25. Zero nitrites and Nitrates were up to around 40 ppm. I have the API test kit so these are all I am testing (plus salinity with a refractometer). My LFS owner recommended that I add a protein skimmer at 3 months and do the first water change at 6 months. He's only open Tues-Fri, so I haven't gotten a chance to talk to him about my fish dying. My gut is telling me to do a big water change, but I wanted to check with you guys. I will stop by my LFS after work for advice from him too.
I thought I was doing things right and I thought my tank was fully cycled. Obviously now I'm second guessing that. I really hate that these guys are dying. I would greatly appreciate any help and advice - I desperately want to know what I am doing wrong! I am really enjoying this hobby so far but this is rather discouraging.
I've got a 36 gallon bowfront reef tank with an Aquaclear 70 HOB filter and two Kessil A80s. It's been running for 8 weeks and I believe it was fully cycled. I watched my Ammonia and Nitrites come down to zero and my Nitrates drop to around 20. Sg is 1.25. I've got around 30 lbs of live rock, most of which came from my LFS, 4 turbo snails (started with 6) and 12 dwarf hermit crabs. After about 4 weeks when the tank was cycled, I started slowly adding fish and coral. First was a clown and a lawnmower blenny, then some zoanthids, then an anemone and tiger watchman goby, then an urchin and purple dottyback and sailfin tang (I now know my tank is not suitable for this guy), then a shrimp.
A couple weeks ago I had a green algae bloom that has not really subsided yet. The urchin is doing his best to eat it, and it's not growing back where he is eating it, but he's only made it to two out of five rocks.
The first problem I had was losing two turbo snails. I had the heater set to 80 degrees, so we think it was too warm for the snails. Now at 78, the remaining snails seems happy.
I am feeding flake food, pellet food, and an occasional block of frozen shrimp.
When I added the dottyback and sailfin tang, I never saw the watchman goby out again. He stayed in his hole under a rock permanently. Previously, he stayed there a lot but you'd see him out and sand sifting regularly. After 10 days of him not emerging, he finally came out one day and looked awful. He was half his prior size and was behaving erratically. The next morning, he was dead. Later that day, the purple dottyback was dead. This was unexpected - I hadn't noticed anything off with him. Yesterday I noticed the tang acting weird. He was a lot less active. This morning he was stuck to the filter intake. I thought he was dead, but when I nudged him away from the intake he swam a little. I expect him to be dead when I get home from work. All the coral seem healthy.
I tested the water when the two fish died on Saturday. For the first time in 5 weeks, the test appeared to reveal an ammonia level; I'm guessing around 0.25. Zero nitrites and Nitrates were up to around 40 ppm. I have the API test kit so these are all I am testing (plus salinity with a refractometer). My LFS owner recommended that I add a protein skimmer at 3 months and do the first water change at 6 months. He's only open Tues-Fri, so I haven't gotten a chance to talk to him about my fish dying. My gut is telling me to do a big water change, but I wanted to check with you guys. I will stop by my LFS after work for advice from him too.
I thought I was doing things right and I thought my tank was fully cycled. Obviously now I'm second guessing that. I really hate that these guys are dying. I would greatly appreciate any help and advice - I desperately want to know what I am doing wrong! I am really enjoying this hobby so far but this is rather discouraging.