UNS 7g Nano Reef Build Thread

[LovinlifeinGuam]

Oh and you mentioned adding certain utilitarian fish to eat coral parasites...there won't be any coral parasites in the tank though so that's not necessary.

 

[ABQ_CHRIS]

Thank you! By controller do you mean something different than what comes with the heater? There's a little control box where I set my desired temp already

I think they meant something like an inkbird or smart temp. Heaters are timebombs and will eventually break. A monitor/controller is a bit of insurance.

On the subject of heaters 100w seems excessive for your tank.

 

[Coral Your World]

I want to looking at it now I have a ton of sand, I don't even know if my rocks are touching bottom. How would I go about doing that now?

Siphon it out. Don’t go deep sand bed on a nano tank

 

[leroytheboi]

Siphon it out. Don’t go deep sand bed on a nano tank

I just scooped it out with a cup and drained the water back in. Will update with pics in the am

 

[leroytheboi]

I think they meant something like an inkbird or smart temp. Heaters are timebombs and will eventually break. A monitor/controller is a bit of insurance.

On the subject of heaters 100w seems excessive for your tank.

Got it. I’ll definitely look into one

 

[leroytheboi]

Oh and you mentioned adding certain utilitarian fish to eat coral parasites...there won't be any coral parasites in the tank though so that's not necessary.

What fish would you recommend?

 

[leroytheboi]

Oh gosh, no, I did not interpret that from the BRS series on that at all lol. The ones I saw regarding this method were back when they did the BRS/WWC hybrid tanks. Some obscure advice in that series.

@leroytheboi, with a tank that small, I would do something like this:

Week 1 - 3
- lights off
- no corals
- no fish
- continue as you are doing
- grab a small piece of live rock from your LFS to add some beneficial critters to the tank. - golf ball size is fine

Week 4
- lights off
- no corals
- no fish
- bring a water sample to LFS or test yourself with a kit. I recommend the Salifert kit for NO3 (nitrate) to start.

If your LFS says good to go or your Salifert test is dark purple:
- do a 50-60% water change
- add a damsel or two (some cheap fish to keep some nutrients and poop in the tank)
- start feeding damsel a small amount daily

Week 5-7
- lights on at a low level for a photoperiod of 1-hour ramp up > 7 hours at 10-20% > 1-hour ramp down
- no corals
- say hi to damsel every day
- also, cry because your tank is ugly, and you have either algae, dinos, or cyano
- start doing 1-gallon water changes every week and practicing good husbandry like scrubbing algae/dino/cyano off rock and substrate etc.

Week 8-12
- lights on at a medium level for a photoperiod of 1-hour ramp up > 7 hours at 30-50% > 1-hour ramp down
- no corals
- sing to damsel every day
- cry a little less because you are past one of the algae/dino/cyano stages, and you finally have some confidence in yourself
- keep doing 1-gallon water changes every week and practicing good husbandry like scrubbing algae off rock and substrate etc.

Week 13-16
- hopefully, by this point, cyano is gone just from you having excellent habits of weekly water changes and testing
- net the damsel(s) and return to LFS - sing them a goodbye song
- get a few cheap corals
- get a clownfish to replace the damsel
- lights on at a medium level for a photoperiod of 1-hour ramp up > 7 hours at 30-50% > 1-hour ramp down
- monitor the tanks levels to make sure you aren't adding too much at once
- start aiming for a stable alkalinity, something matching your salt of choice
- keep doing 1-gallon water changes every week and practicing good husbandry like scrubbing algae off rock and substrate etc.
- if all is well at this point, its about stability in your parameters

Wow this is great! I’ll most likely follow this to the T thanks!

 

[LovinlifeinGuam]

What fish would you recommend?

With a 7 gallon tank you can't fit too much...most people probably wouldn't recommend adding more than a clown or two and some type of small goby...I'll let your LFS advise you on specific livestock. Is there anything in particular you had in mind?

 

[leroytheboi]

With a 7 gallon tank you can't fit too much...most people probably wouldn't recommend adding more than a clown or two and some type of small goby...I'll let your LFS advise you on specific livestock. Is there anything in particular you had in mind?

I wanted 2 clowns, a shrimp, a snail or two. I'll add a gobby to the list. Thanks!

 

[leroytheboi]

Updated tank, removed about 2/3rd of the sand. Made some changes to the rock layout as well. @B's Nano Reef how's the sand bed look?

 

[LovinlifeinGuam]

Looks good...you really don't want to be messing around any more than necessary while it's cycling though so just sit back and wait for the magic now...

 

[Coral Your World]

Looking good. Good luck with the cycle