New to saltwater and ready for corals

[Marty Fleskes]

This is my first thread so I will already apologize for the length of it. I'll try to give all the details you need. I had a 55 freshwater tank and a friend of mine offered up his 90 gallon saltwater set up for free. So off I went.

90 gallon - long tank (63") and high (24")
Eshopps RS-100 sump
Aqueon 950 pumps (2)
Aquatic Life Reef Edge 48" light
60 pounds of live reef sand
80+ pounds of BRS Reef Saver rock

Set up October 17th. Cycled completely and then began adding fish. I have:

2 Clowns
Six Line Wrasse
Diamond Watchman Goby
Exquisite Firefish
Yellow Eye Kole Tang
3 Blue/Green Chromis
Royal Gramma
Fire Shrimp
CUC

Most recent water tests are:

Ammonia - 0
Nitrite - 0
Nitrate - 5
Calcium - 460
Salinity - 1.024
PH - 8.2

I am ready to start corals and I thought my brain was getting too full with just the tank set up and fish, and then I started on the corals. I wanted some thoughts/advice on quarantine and introducing corals to the DT. My quarantine tank is a simple 10 gallon set up with HOB filter and LED light. See pictures below for the DT and a couple of corals in QT.

Here are my questions:

- I have Coral Rx and Bayer to use for QT. I have read a lot on each and it seems Bayer is more popular. Preferences and thoughts?
- With new corals should I be removing them from rock/plug/etc. anyway to help prevent pests? I have read a lot about eggs on those items even after QT. I'm just concerned about damaging or killing the corals trying to do this.
- How do I safely remove them? On the smaller coral in the picture I can easily take it off the plug but it is still attached to a small piece of rock. On the toadstool how do I safely get it off the rock?
- I have read several articles and posts on QT procedures and time frames. Any thoughts on how long to QT?

Thanks for any help or advice you can give.

 

[SDReefer]

Welcome to R2R and congrats on an awesome tank! To answer your questions:

• Bayer and CoralRx are two different dips, with people swearing by both of them. Use which ever you want.
• I wouldn't remove the coral from the plug unless it was a LPS/SPS coral. Just make sure that the water is mixed when you dip the coral.
• There's no easy way to remove leathers. You can remove the Zoa frag from the plug by pulling/pushing it off the frag plug since it's probably attached using Super Glue. Then, you would super glue it to your rock.
• I'm not sure that many people quarantine their corals. However, it would be a 76-day quarantine in a frag tank to be absolutely certain. You can check out the article here.

 

[reef lover]

Welcome to r2r!!

 

[Jason mack]

Welcome to R2R and congrats on an awesome tank! To answer your questions:

• Bayer and CoralRx are two different dips, with people swearing by both of them. Use which ever you want.
• I wouldn't remove the coral from the plug unless it was a LPS/SPS coral. Just make sure that the water is mixed when you dip the coral.
• There's no easy way to remove leathers. You can remove the Zoa frag from the plug by pulling/pushing it off the frag plug since it's probably attached using Super Glue. Then, you would super glue it to your rock.
• I'm not sure that many people quarantine their corals. However, it would be a 76-day quarantine in a frag tank to be absolutely certain. You can check out the article here.

Welcome to R2R
+1 for this . But I don’t qt my corals , I only aclimate temp then dip then into display too aclimate too light !
Happy Reefing!!
Mack

 

[Marty Fleskes]

Welcome to R2R and congrats on an awesome tank! To answer your questions:

• Bayer and CoralRx are two different dips, with people swearing by both of them. Use which ever you want.
• I wouldn't remove the coral from the plug unless it was a LPS/SPS coral. Just make sure that the water is mixed when you dip the coral.
• There's no easy way to remove leathers. You can remove the Zoa frag from the plug by pulling/pushing it off the frag plug since it's probably attached using Super Glue. Then, you would super glue it to your rock.
• I'm not sure that many people quarantine their corals. However, it would be a 76-day quarantine in a frag tank to be absolutely certain. You can check out the article here.

Thanks for the reply. I figured it might be easy to remove the Zoa from that plug so I will definitely do that. And I had also heard that the leathers are difficult to remove (easily anyway) and can't really be glued back on. I may just watch is a bit more in the QT and then dip once more before putting into the DT. The rock it is on will actually fit in a nice spot in the DT that I think will be good from a light and flow standpoint.

 

[Marty Fleskes]

Welcome to R2R
+1 for this . But I don’t qt my corals , I only aclimate temp then dip then into display too aclimate too light !
Happy Reefing!!
Mack

OK thanks. I will watch a little more in the QT and then dip again before putting in the DT. They seem happy for now in the QT and have been there almost a week. I'm just not sure if the light for the QT is good enough for any long term stay