18g Nano Setup

The cycle is going well, refractometer is on its way and my light has arrived . Unfortunately, the bulb was broken in transit so I'll have to get a new one . It's no major disaster though because I'm not trying corals for a while yet. BTW if anyone knows where to get a 17" coralife 96watt 50/50 quad bulb with square pin in Australia or through a distributor who ships internationally please PM me.

My main question at the moment is about the cleanup crew. The tank stats are; NH3 0ppm, NO2 1ppm, NO3 10ppm. The cycle is nearly over but there's not much algae growth. What do I do? I don't want the cleanup crew to starve. How many snails, etc could I add safely so they'll still have enough to eat till there's more diatom formation?

Have you added any cleanup crew yet? You shouldn't have as you're still cycling, but if you have, dont add any more until you get some good diatom formation for them to eat.

No, there's nothing in there yet I'm just used to doing cycles on freshwater tanks where you have to stock them once the cycle finishes otherwise the bacteria die off. Do the nitrifyng bacteria in LR live happily without a constant supply of NH3? I guess they must since snails and shrimp don't exactly add much to the bioload on a tank.

Yes and no... There is constantly dieoff on LR even when cycled which will feed the nitrifying bacteria but it is minimal. The cleanup crew represent a very minimal waste load on the tank. Its not until you start adding fish that you increase the tank bio load. With a freshwater setup, early nitrate levels of 40-80ppm are not unheard of and also not toxic to the inhabitants. Therefore you can go through a fishless cycle, do your water change at the end, add all your fish at once and if the nitrates jump up to 40ppm, no big deal. In a marine setup, 40ppm is toxic, 20ppm is dangerous for fish only, and 10ppm is dangerous for most corals, so we have to be careful on adding our fish load too quickly. That fact means that the minimal amount of nitrifying bacteria present on "cured" liverock is enough to support one or two first fish and process their waste. As you SLOWLY add more fish and livestock the bacteria catch up each time.

Anybody know what builds little tubes out of grains of aragonite sand? These little sand tubes have popped up in my tank and seem to get a little longer each night. I tried to see one of their inhabitants/builders by night with a torch but whatever they were shot back in too quickly. I'm not worried about them I just think they're interesting. I'm loving looking at this tank and there isn't anything really in it yet.
BTW
NH3 and N02 have hit 0ppm, I'll do a large water change tomorrow and see where the nitrates are at.
Finally there's some diatom formation Hopefully the tank will be ready for a CC soon

My LFS didn't have many snails left, but I got the last trochus and several scavenger type snails like nassarius. The trochus is amazing though, it's taken 12 just hrs to hoover up half the algae on the LR.
Here's a pic of it in action.

Now the tank is cycled all sorts of things are starting to emerge from the rock. I've spotted the antennae of various mystery animals peeking out but haven't managed to get a better look at them. Lots of zooanthids are starting to open up too. Then this morning I spotted a tiny little sea star- it's a little over 1cm across and very well camouflaged.

I have a green clown/coral goby on hold at my LFS, but won't be putting him in until next weekend.

Lookin good so far. Those snails do a wonderful job

Looking good

Trochus snails are great, mine does a great job at cleaning my rocks

Dan

A green coral goby went in yesterday. I should have taken a pic before he disappeared into the rockwork . I wondering if they are diggers because I've noticed little clouds of debris being spat out from a space under the LR not far from where I last saw the goby. I got some more nassarius snails but one of them turned out to be a hermit. Unfortunately, not a nice one as it killed a bumblebee snail so its back to the LFS with him. Nothing else exciting has happened, but all the polyps that hitchhiked in on my LR are fully opened.

Sounds like everything is running nice and smoothly with your nano
Your clown goby is probably just constructing a burrow for him/herself. Can you keep an eye on her behaviour for me please? I might get one for my nano i just don't know what they do? Hide all day?

Keep up the good work
Dan

sf05, The goby dug a burrow almost immdiately and didn't come out of it for almost 2 days. Now it won't get off the glass I tried feding it but I don't know if it ate anything, it seemed obsessed with trying to get through the glass. It's very cute though and so pretty since it started settling in so hopefully it will calm down and start acting more naturally. I'll try to get a picture of it when it sits still.

Sf05 said:

Can you keep an eye on her behaviour for me please? I might get one for my nano i just don't know what they do? Hide all day?

Click to expand...

Mine sat in a clump of Zoo's all day and just watched life float by

Aquascaper said:

Sf05 said:

Can you keep an eye on her behaviour for me please? I might get one for my nano i just don't know what they do? Hide all day?

Click to expand...

Mine sat in a clump of Zoo's all day and just watched life float by

Click to expand...

sounds like some good fun. Might have to get me one but this firefish sure is boring

My second fish went in this weekend- a yellow clown goby. It's so samll, less than 1" long but very cute and with heaps more character than the green coral goby. It sits on top of the LR all the time. I gave them a treat of some live brine shrimp. The green goby stays in its burrow and jumps out to get any that swim by, but the yellow one chases them all around the tank. Someone else popped out with the lure of live food- a tiny mantis. It's around 2cm long and jet black with white marking on the edges of each segment. Does anyone know what species this would be and if its worth anything? It was looked awesome and was so cool to watch. I'd love to have one just by itself. Any idea how quickly they grow? I'd like to catch it before it gets big enough to hunt my fish.

I finally managed to get some pics of th new inhabitants (not very good ones though).
The yellow goby (you can see the green one in the background) this little fella is about a 1/4 the size of the green which is around full grown.

And the more reclusive green goby