IM20 - retuning to hobby, starting from ground 0

[hahahohol]

Week #8 update:
So far, corals are doing fantastic. I got a leather today (center-top), still haven’t opened. And the diatoms are not as furious as before.

So, it has been almost 2 months… and I still haven’t done a single water change (not even after cycling). My API test was showing 0 nitrate (garbage). I got a new test kit that shows 10mg/l of nitrate.


Question…
1. What should my nitrate reading be? I’d like to keep softies & some LPS.
2. Would you say it’s ready for 10% WC? (:

More updates coming soon…

 

[hahahohol]

4 months update:
It has been a while since I wrote. But here’s a “brief” update of where things are at.

The Good:
Tank is running stable. I still have a pair of clowns, a pair of pajama cardinalfish, a fire goby, pistol shrimp (always hiding), and CuC. But the most exciting part (which is what I enjoy about the hobby the most) is corals. Local reefers were sharing a bunch of frags with me lately. I now have frogspawn, mushrooms, reccordias, leathers, xenia, & gsp. They all seem to be doing fine.

The Bad:
My second YWG went missing. I can’t find him anywhere. Not in the back chaimbers, nor on the floor… can he be hiding under the rock with the pistol shrimp for a couple of months? I doubt it, but I don’t want to disturb the rockwork.

The green candy-cane coral died from brown jelly disease. IDK what triggered it. My frogspawn is doing fine though.

Also, I still don’t have any coraline growth. Perhaps my Magnesium test result IS accurate (600ppm) and part of the issue. What Magnesium product would you recommend?

The Ugly:
Algae. My tank is being overtaken by Ulva (sea lettuce). Astea snail, emerald & 3 hermit crabs seem to enjoy it, but they and don’t do much, tbh. I remove it by hand a lot, but that doesn’t do much either. I’m thinking of Hydrogen Peroxide dosing (1ml/10gal), but concerned about pistol shrimp. I know that spraying H2O2 on rock works (I tried before I had corals), but I can’t remove rock out of water. Any suggestions? Will taxido, tailspot belenny take care of it? Should I try dwarf angel? …we need a nano Tang, asap! Lol
My nitrates are 0! And they were 10ppm before Ulva outbreak.

But tbh, I prefer Ulva over GHA 100%. Grateful that I don’t have any GHA. Seriously!

More updates coming “soon”

 

[DatsoonDave]

So, this is not my first rodeo, but after a 6yr break it feels like I’m relearning everything from scratch. Kid’s are older and I feel safer returning to the hobby (hopefully no one will feed my fish play dough this time lol).
Anyway, I’m excited to share this journey with y’all especially that I’ll get to go back and look at the progress myself (hopefully).

Long story short, I got a chance to pick up used 20g IM tank with a bunch of goodies while we were on family vacation:

• Innovative Marine Nuvo 20 gallon tank
• DC Mighty Jet Return pump (526 GPH)
• Red Sea LED RL50
• Tunze Osmilator ATO
• Jabeo 01-10 wavemaker (new in box)
• eShopps nano skimmers
• Intank Floss holder

Everything was super clean and I got a really good deal on it, I think.

Question…
What container should I use for ATO water?

More updates coming soon…

I use that skimmer on my 20 Im. It's pretty darn solid.

 

[hahahohol]

Almost 2 years later, I decided to read my own thread … and WOW! I’m so glad that I was keeping track and was reporting the progress. Regardless of how many people read my updates, I can say that this ‘blog’ is beneficial for me. The reason is that:

The Bad:

• I no longer have a reef tank. In the spring of 2024, my family moved from northern PA to upstate SC. Because there were a lot of moving parts (& stress), I decided to sell all my livestock. Here’s what the tank looked like before it got dismantled
  

The Good:

• I still have the equipment & rock. Still need to bleach-cure the rock, though (it’s moldy and smells).
• I’m planning to restart the tank soon.
• There are multiple awesome reef stores nearby.

PS: If you’re reading this and have a ‘build thread’, would you share your link for inspiration?
If you don’t have one, why not? I strongly encourage you to start one (with lots of pics) - even if it doesn’t get much traffic, I promise you’ll enjoy going back to it :)
I’m telling you, we are forgetful creatures (like fish?) and need reminders.

 

[hahahohol]

The rock is going in!

The Good:

• The smelly moldy rock was hosed down and then bleach-cured for a week (10:1 ratio), rinsed, & dried under the sun.

…until I found out, is that


The really Bad:

• One should not use ‘No Spill’ bleach to cure the rocks. I knew that I should not use ‘scented’, but I had no idea that ’spill-free’ was a special type of bleach with ‘NO-NO’ features (because of additives to increase viscosity). I really didn’t know, tbh… but it was too late when I found out. If you read my thread you’d know that I'm not the sharpest pencil in the drawer. After bleaching, the rock was hosed with water in hopes to rinse detergent additive.. and then sat in fresh water for a few days …and under sun for few more days until the rock was completely dry.

PS: Has anyone ever used ‘no spill’ bleach before? What can go wrong if I proceed with this rock?

 

[Bryman]

Here's what Copilot (GPT-5) says about your situation:

A person on R2R used no-spill bleach in a 10:1 ratio to clean old rock. Afterwards he hosed it down and let it sit in fresh water for a few days, and then in the sun for a few days. Is this rock safe to use in a reef tank after using the no-spill bleach?

Great question — this is one of those reefing details where the type of bleach makes all the difference.

The Key Issue: "No-Spill" or "Splash-Less" Bleach​

• Standard unscented bleach (sodium hypochlorite + water) breaks down into salt and oxygen when exposed to air/sunlight. After a good rinse and dry, it leaves no harmful residue. That’s why many reefers safely use it for rock curing.
• “No-spill” or “splash-less” bleach is not just bleach and water. It’s thickened with surfactants (soap-like agents) to make it pour more slowly. Those additives do not break down into harmless byproducts like chlorine does. Instead, they can leave behind residues that foam in water and may leach into your tank, harming corals, fish, and inverts.

What This Means for the Rock​

• Even after rinsing, soaking, and sun-drying, there’s a real risk that surfactants remain bound to the rock’s porous surface.
• Reefers on forums like R2R have reported persistent foaming and “soapy” behavior in water after using splash-less bleach — a red flag that residues are still present.
• Unlike chlorine, which you can neutralize with dechlorinator (e.g., Prime, sodium thiosulfate), there’s no reliable way to neutralize or test for those surfactants.

Safe Practice​

• If the rock was treated with regular unscented bleach, the rinse–soak–sun-dry cycle would make it perfectly safe to use.
• If it was treated with no-spill/splash-less bleach, the safest answer is: don’t risk it in a reef tank. The rock may always leach unwanted chemicals.

Options if You Want to Try Saving It​

• Extended soaks in RO/DI water with frequent changes, plus aggressive skimming/aeration, might reduce residues — but there’s no guarantee.
• If you want absolute certainty, an acid bath (muriatic acid + water, outdoors, with proper safety gear) can strip the outer layer of rock, taking contaminants with it. That’s a last-resort salvage method some reefers use.

---

Bottom line: Rock cleaned with no-spill bleach is not considered reef-safe without extraordinary remediation. If you’re starting fresh, it’s usually better to discard it or repurpose it outside the tank rather than gamble with your reef’s stability.

 

[Bryman]

I have a good amount of extra new Caribsea LifeRock from my build that may be enough for your Nuvo 20, and I'd give it to ya if you were closer to IL. If you want to pay for shipping it's yours. Here is the post from my build showing what's left.

 

[hahahohol]

I have a good amount of extra new Caribsea LifeRock from my build that may be enough for your Nuvo 20, and I'd give it to ya if you were closer to IL. If you want to pay for shipping it's yours. Here is the post from my build showing what's left.

You’re kind

 

[hahahohol]

I’m getting mixed reviews regarding ‘detergent’ additive in ‘no-slash’ bleach. Some say don’t risk it. Others say that they used it on their rocks and did not see any issues with corals or live stock.
So I’ve decided to keep going, jump in…head first.

The Good:

• Rocks have been sun dried. No more bleach smell.
• Rock scape is in + aragonite sand

The Bad:

• After I added RO water to let the system run & settle down without salt, next morning I noticed that the back chamber was covered with foam :(

I’m planning to run it with fresh water only for another week and maybe do few more water changes in between. Тhen we’ll see… maybe I’ll keep going, add salt, or pull the plug :-/

Should I run it with carbon? Purigen? Would any media help absorb whatever the rocks could be leaching?

 

[MYCO Reefer]

Check out my and my brothers new coral website get you tank stocked for cheap http://mycoreefer.myshopify.com/

 

[hahahohol]

Bleached rock update…

The Good:

• After adding saltwater the water stopped foaming. Yay!

• I added Imaginarium biological startup and started ghost feeding feeding everyday

However, after a week of feeding…
The Bad:

• The water started having a blueish hue. I did a ‘white bucket test’ - it was blue indeed. I really think it’s the detergents leaking out of the ‘bleached’ rock
• The ammonia stayed 0 for the whole week. Maybe the Imaginairum bio-startup did its job, or maybe the detergent killed the bacteria - because the tank smelled new - and the dirty filter (filled with flake food) did not smell like saltwater tank …I had SW tanks before and dirty filters typically had ‘the ocean smell’)
• To be safe, I dismantled the tank. Threw out the rock & sand and deep washed aquarium & pump

But that’s not it. I don’t mean to leave on a really sad note…

The really Good:

• One good reef2reef-er graciously sent me his remaining CaribSea Rock and live sand. [B]Bryman[/B] thank you so much!!! Really appreciate your help, brother.
• Aqua scape is in… planning to start cycling asap. I’m just really hoping that there will be no more (major) hiccups going forward

PS: What ya’ll using to cycle the tank with dry rock? Bacteria in a bottle? Fish in or fish-less?

 

[Bryman]

The Caribsea LifeRock supposedly is sprayed with bacterial spores that activate once they get wet. The live sand also has bacteria. However, I also added Fritz 900 starter bacteria in 2 doses. In hindsight, I think I may have seeded too much bacteria as I had cloudy water for a few weeks - likely a bacterial bloom. Now, I'm actually dosing ammonium bicarbonate to try to get detectable nitrates because my biological filter is too strong! Hopefully adding fish in a few weeks will help.

To answer your question on cycling, I originally added a clean up crew and a cleaner shrimp after the tank cleared up, and have also been feeding lightly every other day.

 

[hahahohol]

Day 3 update…
The OK:

• After mixing salt and adding water to the tank, things got very cloudy:

…however…
The Good:

• After 3 days of rinsing the filters (2-3x a day) and letting things settle, everything finally cleared up.
• I was gifted a clownfish (my son made it) - do you think it’s too big for the tank?

 

[hahahohol]

Day 17 update…
The Good:

• The tank is cycled with live sand, CaribSea rock (dry, but apparently with added bacteria?), Imaginarium biological startup bacteria, plus ghost feeding
• We added our first habitats

PS: What should we name them? :D
Tom & Jerry
King Bob & Kevin (minions)
Ping & Pong
Zig & Zag
Wand & Wavy

 

[Luminous74]

Day 17 update…
The Good:

• The tank is cycled with live sand, CaribSea rock (dry, but apparently with added bacteria?), Imaginarium biological startup bacteria, plus ghost feeding
• We added our first habitats

PS: What should we name them? :D
Tom & Jerry
King Bob & Kevin (minions)
Ping & Pong
Zig & Zag
Wand & Wavy

I’m team Wand & Wave. Nice scape and beautiful clowns!

 

[hahahohol]

Day 33 update…
The Great:

• A coworker gave me a bucket of softies: Xenia, green Kenya trees, neon toadstool, branching GSP
• I could barely make room for it. I even had to toss a few stocks of Xenia out. Super greatful!

The Terrible:

• Wand & Wavy went to Valhalla

• A few days after clownfish were added to display both fish started showing white dots on head & tail. Then a few days later they got flakey stuff on their scales and white spots/patches on the face, near the mouth.
• The little clown stopped eating, hid himself for a day, then passed on the next. He lived only 13 days.
• The bigger guy got completely covered in white ‘snow’ like appearance (including on the eyes), but still ate. Then joined Odin the next day. He lived 16 days.
• Is it brook? Ich? Velvet? Something else equally frustrating?
• I wonder if I could have avoided this if I had a quarantine tank. Looking into it now. I really don’t want to repeat this experience.
• Running tank fallow :-/

PS: Do you quarantine your fish, inverts, corals? What is your protocol?

 

[Tahoe61]

That's frustrating, unfortunate and common. Give the tank more time, and set up a simple QT if able. It's always an advantage having a small QT running. You save money, live stock....
I have a coral and fish QT, both nano sized, and fully cycled.

 

[Rhetoric]

Welcome to the 20g club! Having a friend hook up is a great perk. I love how you "skipped" the empty frag phase.

 

[hahahohol]

2.5 months update…
The Good:

• The tank has been running fallow for 6 weeks…no fish, only 3 hermit crabs.
• The ugly stage is over.
• I sold off most of Xenia to make room for other coral.

• I got 10 gal tank that I’d like to set up for quarantine. Tank feels ‘lonely’ without fish, tbh.

PS: What coral would you recommend I look into?
PSPS: What’s a good quarantine protocol?

 

[Bryman]

Looking good! Some shrooms, torch/frogspawn/hammers, Acans would be nice in your tank. I personally avoid zoas but those would fit in nicely too.