Ready for Fish?

[psumms]

Hi all, I've been taking my time setting up my first saltwater tank, I think I'm ready for livestock but wanted to check I'm not making too many newbie mistakes...

I have a Red Sea Reefer 650 Peninsula with a total water volume of approx. 553 liters (122g) after calculating rock etc. Jut added an ITC ALR2 algae reactor with chaeto. Also, run a UV filter and carbon reactor. I've also gone down the Real Reef (manufactured) rock route Ultimately I'm aiming for a mixed reef, taking things nice and slow - despite my postman's daily no fish yet comments! (Tank is opposite the front door).

I've followed through the Red Sea Mature kit which I completed two weeks ago, around day 21 it suggests adding CUC and then slowly adding fish and coral - non of which I've done yet.

My parameters are:

• Ammonia: 0
• Nitrite: 0.7
• Nitrate: 15
• PH: 8.4
• dKH: 8.7

My plan is to continue with the Red Sea Mixed Reef Recipe, I'm currently dosing NoPoX and will today start KH/Alkalinity.

A couple of observations:

• I've had a clouding with slight yellowish tint for the past two weeks, this looks to have near cleared now.
• Is my nitrite level fish/CUC safe?
• I had only a very light dusting of brown algae on the rocks (nothing on sandbed), that's all but gone now. Wouldn't say it was a full diatom bloom by any stretch but possible the Red Sea Algae control kept that down?
• Over the past week, I've noticed a white mucus growing in several places, from what I've read this is probably more bacteria? (Photo attached).

So my question is, does this look ready? Was going to start with some blue/green Chromis and hermit crabs and keep monitoring progress.

 

[ScottR]

Looks really nice. I guess my only concern would be the presence of nitrites; the cycle probably hasn’t finished but looks good and you’re almost there. I’m sure that’s going to be a beautiful tank.

Also, looks like sponge growth in that first pic. Nothing to worry about.

 

[juanrmattos]

The Red Sea mature kit is an excellent program, but I’m truly glad you decided to wait a few days before adding bio-load... The cloud you mentioned is a bloom, with it you will begin to see a few light orange spots on your rock (Diatoms) and a few days after these will turn into green... That is when your cycle would be complete.

I understand the idea of this package is to mature your reef in short term, but 1. I would wait for the orange spots to show up to add snails and other cleaners (Red or Blue hermits, maybe even an emerald crab when green algae shows up); once you see bubble or hair algae, I would add fish as your nitrification process would be at its end... and 2. Keep your water changes (If any) to a 5 to 10 percent, many new reefers get itchy and change too much water which would result in restarting the cycle.

Best of luck!!!

 

[Paul B]

Hello and good morning. I know you bought all that stuff but I would eliminate the carbon and UV sterilizer as they are not needed and will severely increase the time when that tank will be healthy for anything. The sterilizer will kill bacteria that you are trying to grow and the carbon will remove bacteria and pod food.
I would also not use NoPox. The algae reactor and cheato is fine as it won't do anything because you have nothing in there to remove.

At one time we thought it was important to keep a tank sterile and clean. Now we find out that is the opposite way to go.

To answer your question, I would say No. The tank is to clean. Don't worry about that white stuff which could be bacteria (I doubt it) or sponge. It doesn't matter but you need more bacteria, pods, diatoms and algae to start a healthy reef.
(A skimmer would be nice but not needed yet)

 

[Redfoxtang]

Welcome to R2R!! The tank looks great!! I’m gonna +1 what @Paul B said. Tank is to clean for everything right now and possibly even cheato as you don’t have much nutrients to keep it alive! I would keep adding live bacteria and just go slow and everything will fall into place!! Good luck!

 

[psumms]

Hello and good morning. I know you bought all that stuff but I would eliminate the carbon and UV sterilizer as they are not needed and will severely increase the time when that tank will be healthy for anything. The sterilizer will kill bacteria that you are trying to grow and the carbon will remove bacteria and pod food.
I would also not use NoPox. The algae reactor and cheato is fine as it won't do anything because you have nothing in there to remove.

At one time we thought it was important to keep a tank sterile and clean. Now we find out that is the opposite way to go.

To answer your question, I would say No. The tank is to clean. Don't worry about that white stuff which could be bacteria (I doubt it) or sponge. It doesn't matter but you need more bacteria, pods, diatoms and algae to start a healthy reef.
(A skimmer would be nice but not needed yet)

Yes, all the kit! UV and carbon are now off. Have a Red Sea skimmer running. Thank you all for the advice, very much appreciated.

 

[psumms]

Follow-up question - Reading mixed ideas about lights on/off during cycle - its hard to decipher the good advice from bad sometimes!

 

[Redfoxtang]

This is a decent debate i guess you could say. Leave the lights on to get passed the ugly stage faster or leave the lights off and wait for micro fauna to grab a foot hold and not deal with as much diatoms and ugliness. This is always different from person to person!