New aquarium

[pwendlandt]

Hello!

So I’ve mentioned this before here but I’ll say it again, I am new to this whole saltwater aquarium!

I’ve had fresh water in the past but this is dealing with a whole other thing!

I have a few questions,

For contexts:
I have a 20 gallon (75 L) water box aquarium
I have installed an auto top off sensor as well
The filter and media is all in the back
(Sorry still not used to all the reefing terms)
My rock is rock made with resin (because where I live the live rock is horrible)
I added some live rock fragments to seed the live rock faster
I cycled my tank with the lights off
Added store bought live sand
My tank has been cycled for a month now

I added a cleaning shrimp two days ago and yesterday I added a cardinal fish


My question is, am I going to fast? How long should I wait to add more fish? What’s the wait time for adding coral? And also I saw a spike on my NO2 when adding the fish today and I was worried for them I added NITE OUT II

Here are a few pictures of the tank and the NITE OUT II and of my shrimp

 

[coralboi56]

Nah that seems like a good pace!

For future reference, when a tank has a storage compartment fro all the filtration, we call those All in One (AIO) tanks

 

[The_Paradox]

You can add coral and fish whenever you want now. If anything I would have held off on the shrimp.

 

[pwendlandt]

Nah that seems like a good pace!

For future reference, when a tank has a storage compartment fro all the filtration, we call those All in One (AIO) tanks

That’s what I thought just didn’t want to get the name wrong haha

 

[pwendlandt]

You can add coral and fish whenever you want now. If anything I would have held off on the shrimp.

Really that was the first think my LFS told me to get they said if “it lasts thru the night you did well” I don’t think they had much faith on me hahaha.

I’ve been told by so many different people and stores that I have to wait weeks to add a fish and months to even think about coral (I think I forgot to add I never went thru the ugly stage or at least not so far)

 

[The_Paradox]

Really that was the first think my LFS told me to get they said if “it lasts thru the night you did well” I don’t think they had much faith on me hahaha.

I’ve been told by so many different people and stores that I have to wait weeks to add a fish and months to even think about coral (I think I forgot to add I never went thru the ugly stage or at least not so far)

I think the most accurate answer is it depends how educated you are. 90% of common corals I see no issue with adding on day 1 if you have all the equipment and a little knowledge. Same for most common fish. Things like tangs, mandarins, etc being the exception.

At the end of the day I’ll bet money you kill something that’s preventable. We all did. I’d also bet waiting would not have changed the outcome. For certain things there is no replacement for experience.