When can a beginner add coral

[DEE’S reef]

When do you experts recommend when a beginner add coral.
I was told by some one with 9 years of experience to wait till my tanks 4 to 6 months and has some coralline algae on it that way the parameters are good for coral and my tanks healthy enough for corals. What your thoughts.

 

[bushdoc]

Basically yes, but I would stress more stable parameters, than timeframe. You need to learn controlling parameters and have necessary hardware, like dosing pumps, test kits etc. surely you should be over ugly stage. No need to wait for coralline algae if you want soft corals, zoas, but with SPS and LPS it is desirable

 

[castellanamattia]

When do you experts recommend when a beginner add coral.
I was told by some one with 9 years of experience to wait till my tanks 4 to 6 months and has some coralline algae on it that way the parameters are good for coral and my tanks healthy enough for corals. What your thoughts.

For my first tank I've added the first coral (which was a GSP; it can be any soft coral like a Kenya tree or laether coral) after 3 weeks. Growth of coralline algae is not needed at this stage. Looking back I would do it again.

 

[DEE’S reef]

Should I take the long road to hopefully saving money in future making sure parameters are good and stable I’ve tested everything but magnesium and calcium I need to still get those test kits.

 

[Mr. Mojo Rising]

The "by the book" answer is to wait a few months for the tank to stabilize, personally I feel that everyone is different. Do you have an idea which corals you want to try? Are you confident your tank can keep them alive? You know your tank better than us. Some of the easier weed type corals are very cheap, you can find them at $10-$15 a frag, so its not a big loss if they die, but if they survive, do you really want these type of weed corals in your tank? Next step up are regular but nice corals such as acans, favia's, pallys you can find between $20-$40 easy, even hammers and frogspawn you can find them in this price range sometimes.

If you're just going to put them in tank and see what happens then I would suggest to hold off and do a bit more research, its easy to keep anything alive really if you do the homework beforehand. If you did the research and feel confident then go for it! Good luck

 

[gabriellar]

Not an expert, just sharing personal experience here. I don't think I usually wait for 4-6 months before adding corals, except for my very first tank cuz I was a bit nervous. Later on, I had three more tanks and realized that, as long as you pass the phosphate/nitrate burst period and all parameters stabilize within a reasonable range, it's rather safe to keep some hardy soft corals like leathers and zoas. I would suggest adding cheap fish and invertebrates in your new tank for a few weeks as a pre-test before adding any other corals tho. They also help a lot in shortening the tank prepping phase because they produce waste. I also dose microbackter7 to help cycle new tanks. Previously, the above process took me on average about 1.5 - 2 months before I added corals.

 

[IceNein]

I personally think that after you have cycled your tank, and you have bought an initial fish, and you have gotten the handle on your maintenance routine, that it's probably ok to start adding "easy" corals.

But I also think it depends on how you do things. Are you that guy that wants to dump a full load of fish into your brand new tank? Probably want to hold off on the corals for a couple months at least. Let your parameters get nice and stable.

Did you just add one clown fish to a 75 gallon tank and do your recommended maintenance on schedule? You can probably put in zoas/leathers/mushrooms in a couple of weeks.

 

[Michael71]

When i did my tank i used live sand and actual live rock. Cycled old school which was add the shrimp, wait for ammonia to spike then pulled the shrimp, let ammonia go to zero nitrates climb. Did a 30% water change....then watched ammonia and nitrates for 2 weeks. This would have put tank at 30 days. Right about now diatoms showed up. I added a partial cleanup crew...all snails at this point. Let the tank do its thing for another 2 weeks. Added a pair of small percula clowns... waited another 30 days. Now at 75 days in. Had macro algaes and hitch hiker zoas and sponges showing up on live rock so added the rest of cleanup crew.. hermits and more snails... after 2 more weeks. Added first corals... mushrooms and an alveopora. This was at 90 days from start of cycle. No dosing of anything. I did a 17% water change weekly. From there on I added coral and fish in alternating 30 day cycles. Inverts as i saw the need or want. I checked my parameters every 3 to 5 days with the exception of ph and salinity.. i monitored them daily. This was a 30gal cube with about a 1 to 2 inch sand bed and 40 pounds if fiji live rock.

Hope this helps.

 

[DEE’S reef]

The "by the book" answer is to wait a few months for the tank to stabilize, personally I feel that everyone is different. Do you have an idea which corals you want to try? Are you confident your tank can keep them alive? You know your tank better than us. Some of the easier weed type corals are very cheap, you can find them at $10-$15 a frag, so its not a big loss if they die, but if they survive, do you really want these type of weed corals in your tank? Next step up are regular but nice corals such as acans, favia's, pallys you can find between $20-$40 easy, even hammers and frogspawn you can find them in this price range sometimes.

If you're just going to put them in tank and see what happens then I would suggest to hold off and do a bit more research, its easy to keep anything alive really if you do the homework beforehand. If you did the research and feel confident then go for it! Good luck

So a family member helped walk me through and set up the tank and he’s the one who gave a clown and a tang and I’m currently quarantining another clown and a Yellow Watchman gobie. So I’ve been researching but I’m kinda listening to the rules and advice he’s kinda of told me so far cause he’s has 9 year experience in saltwater.

 

[DEE’S reef]

Not an expert, just sharing personal experience here. I don't think I usually wait for 4-6 months before adding corals, except for my very first tank cuz I was a bit nervous. Later on, I had three more tanks and realized that, as long as you pass the phosphate/nitrate burst period and all parameters stabilize within a reasonable range, it's rather safe to keep some hardy soft corals like leathers and zoas. I would suggest adding cheap fish and invertebrates in your new tank for a few weeks as a pre-test before adding any other corals tho. They also help a lot in shortening the tank prepping phase because they produce waste. I also dose microbackter7 to help cycle new tanks. Previously, the above process took me on average about 1.5 - 2 months before I added corals.

What do you mean by phosphate nitrate burst. I also used dr. Tim’s like many other reefers. But I’ve been looking at Zoe’s cause they look cool.

 

[Michael71]

I believe he is talking about the period of time when your biological filter system (beneficial bacteria) is converting nutrients at a high pace but you dont have enough life in the tank to absorb the nutrients...ie macro algaes since we are talking pre coral introduction.

 

[DEE’S reef]

So is that what the nitrate and phosphate burst means

 

[Michael71]

I believe that what he means by that, yes

 

[kizzy89]

I was a little less patient than most, i added gsp, a favia, platygyra, zoanthids and a gorgonian a week after my tank was filled with water, tested parameters every day, used live rock and live sand. All of them are still thriving in my tank. If i were to do it again from scratch i would wait at the very least 3 weeks but that's my experience. I added more coral 2 months later, about a week apart for every coral or 2 added.

 

[gabriellar]

What do you mean by phosphate nitrate burst. I also used dr. Tim’s like many other reefers. But I’ve been looking at Zoe’s cause they look cool.

I believe he is talking about the period of time when your biological filter system (beneficial bacteria) is converting nutrients at a high pace but you dont have enough life in the tank to absorb the nutrients...ie macro algaes since we are talking pre coral introduction.

Yeah, precisely what Michael71 says. Also, new rock and sand can leach a certain amount of phosphate when they are introduced to the tank.

 

[Happy Clam]

Not an expert, just sharing personal experience here. I don't think I usually wait for 4-6 months before adding corals, except for my very first tank cuz I was a bit nervous. Later on, I had three more tanks and realized that, as long as you pass the phosphate/nitrate burst period and all parameters stabilize within a reasonable range, it's rather safe to keep some hardy soft corals like leathers and zoas. I would suggest adding cheap fish and invertebrates in your new tank for a few weeks as a pre-test before adding any other corals tho. They also help a lot in shortening the tank prepping phase because they produce waste. I also dose microbackter7 to help cycle new tanks. Previously, the above process took me on average about 1.5 - 2 months before I added corals.

You took the words out of my mouth, thanks G

 

[Happy Clam]

You took the words out of my mouth, thanks G