Hello everyone
As of a week, I've been noticing something weird in my tank.
In the morning the water looks very hazy, with a white hue. I can almost see it physically move around in the flow.
By the time I get back from work, the water is (almost but not 100%) crystal clear again. And then the cycle starts all over again. Suddenly I started measuring the ever so slightest amount of nitrites again too...
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Having a RSM Nano, started it up now over 3 months ago. Life stock: a pair of occelaris', a Gramma loreto, three Torchus snails and one little sand sifting seestar. I also bought two cheap frags, as a sort of indicator organism: a Ricordea and a Montipora. Replaced the original skimmer with a Tunze 9001, added an extra power head of 1000 g/h. Using the Red Sea micron filtersocks (they get cleaned every 2-3 days) and I'm also using some reef spec active carbon. I'm using a glass cover to prevent the fish from jumping out, though this will be replaced by a sort of "netting" thing from Red Sea. Doing weekly 15% waterchanges with aquaforest reef salt. Water gets made in house with a mixed bed ion exchanger.
Water values
Ammonia: Nothing measurable
NO3 : 10
PO4 : <0.03
KH: 8.2
Ca: 420
Mg: 1400
Salinity: 1.025
The next two worry me a bit..
pH: 7.7, which is too low.
NO2: the ever so slightest coloration with my salifert test, so <0.1, but not zero.
The fish look healthy, eat well, are swimming around vividly and don't seem to be bothered about this at all (no heavy breathing, no weird behaviour, etc)
The two corals look happy as well, with the Monti looking very nice and fluffy with good polyp extension.
The star is also doing a good job of going through the sand. When it comes to the snails... That's a different story.
I bought 4, but one was already dead in the bag when I got home, which could have been an indication already.. The other three looked fine, but two of them went missing only days after introducing them. It's a small tank but I cannot seem to find them anywhere. I've been looking and searching in the weirdest angles, but nothing.. I also cannot seem to find any empty shells laying around on the sandbed either. The third one looks happy and is doing its job very well.
Three things:
- is that sudden spike in nitrite maybe a sign my two missing snails are actually decaying somewhere? Could it be that my little tank isnt established enough to deal with both the fish waste and this, causing the little amount of nitrite I can measure?
-Can my low pH come from the fact that I'm using a glass cover. Maybe this causes insufficient aeration -> lowers the pH?
-the cloudiness... Because it always seems to start at the end of the night at first I suspected it was coming from spawning snails, but it's going on for a week now, which sounds too long for me? It could also be a bloom of some sort of bacteria maybe? But I've never heard that this happens systematically overnight and clearing throughout the day.
Any thoughts? It is stressing me out a little bit right now, as I cannot seem to figure out what is going on and because "my enemy" is of the invisible kind, rather than algae or something else.
Any tips? What I was planning to do anyway is continuing the weekly maintenance and especially giving my tank time by not adding any animals (mostly talking about corals now, because fish wise I might be pushing the boundaries already) untill the situations "clears" ( ) .
Thank you very much for taking the time to read all of this.
Best
Niel
As of a week, I've been noticing something weird in my tank.
In the morning the water looks very hazy, with a white hue. I can almost see it physically move around in the flow.
By the time I get back from work, the water is (almost but not 100%) crystal clear again. And then the cycle starts all over again. Suddenly I started measuring the ever so slightest amount of nitrites again too...
-----
Having a RSM Nano, started it up now over 3 months ago. Life stock: a pair of occelaris', a Gramma loreto, three Torchus snails and one little sand sifting seestar. I also bought two cheap frags, as a sort of indicator organism: a Ricordea and a Montipora. Replaced the original skimmer with a Tunze 9001, added an extra power head of 1000 g/h. Using the Red Sea micron filtersocks (they get cleaned every 2-3 days) and I'm also using some reef spec active carbon. I'm using a glass cover to prevent the fish from jumping out, though this will be replaced by a sort of "netting" thing from Red Sea. Doing weekly 15% waterchanges with aquaforest reef salt. Water gets made in house with a mixed bed ion exchanger.
Water values
Ammonia: Nothing measurable
NO3 : 10
PO4 : <0.03
KH: 8.2
Ca: 420
Mg: 1400
Salinity: 1.025
The next two worry me a bit..
pH: 7.7, which is too low.
NO2: the ever so slightest coloration with my salifert test, so <0.1, but not zero.
The fish look healthy, eat well, are swimming around vividly and don't seem to be bothered about this at all (no heavy breathing, no weird behaviour, etc)
The two corals look happy as well, with the Monti looking very nice and fluffy with good polyp extension.
The star is also doing a good job of going through the sand. When it comes to the snails... That's a different story.
I bought 4, but one was already dead in the bag when I got home, which could have been an indication already.. The other three looked fine, but two of them went missing only days after introducing them. It's a small tank but I cannot seem to find them anywhere. I've been looking and searching in the weirdest angles, but nothing.. I also cannot seem to find any empty shells laying around on the sandbed either. The third one looks happy and is doing its job very well.
Three things:
- is that sudden spike in nitrite maybe a sign my two missing snails are actually decaying somewhere? Could it be that my little tank isnt established enough to deal with both the fish waste and this, causing the little amount of nitrite I can measure?
-Can my low pH come from the fact that I'm using a glass cover. Maybe this causes insufficient aeration -> lowers the pH?
-the cloudiness... Because it always seems to start at the end of the night at first I suspected it was coming from spawning snails, but it's going on for a week now, which sounds too long for me? It could also be a bloom of some sort of bacteria maybe? But I've never heard that this happens systematically overnight and clearing throughout the day.
Any thoughts? It is stressing me out a little bit right now, as I cannot seem to figure out what is going on and because "my enemy" is of the invisible kind, rather than algae or something else.
Any tips? What I was planning to do anyway is continuing the weekly maintenance and especially giving my tank time by not adding any animals (mostly talking about corals now, because fish wise I might be pushing the boundaries already) untill the situations "clears" ( ) .
Thank you very much for taking the time to read all of this.
Best
Niel