No Going Back Now.

unlucky Barney

Thanks alot thou, some great info there , i will post results when i am done, thanks again.

Often times it's not that big a spike, especially if the rock is pretty well cured and you get it home in a reasonable time frame

Ok here is the test result

Its 0 ppm, i feel i need to honest about my live rock here, when i brought it, the tank about half of it came from had a bit of a smell to it, like rotten eggs, i know this goes against good advice to buy smelly rock but the rock was way cheaper than other places around where i live and when i smelt each piece of rock it did not smell to bad, the other half of the rock i brought was out of one of their display tanks. I took it all home in two poly big poly boxes and had it in my tank within half an hour. As i have mentioned before it seems full of life. No big spike would be great news to me

smelling sounds like it was uncured or maybe just semi-cured if it didnt smell too bad?

Hi all

Ok, I have been testing my water daily now and everything has remained very stable, Ammonia is still 0ppm, Nitrate is 0, nitrite is 0, the pH is still 7.8 and the sg is 1.025. Over the last 3 days the live rock has become covered in brown algee which by looking at other photo’s on here looks like diatom’s, its crept onto the sand and patches have appeared on the front and back of the tank.

I could not resist anymore and yesterday I picked up the first of my CUC, I got 7 turbo snails and 3 small red legged hermit crabs. The crabs have been very disappointing so far, after acclimatising them I released them in between the two reefs, they just walked off behind the rocks and I have not seen them since. The turbo snails on the other hand are amazing and have excided my expectations of them; they have already taken massive patches of algee away and have left the rock underneith looking white and pale purple, and in one place a bright green colour.

As far as that hitchhiker crab is concerned, well no need to worry about that anymore, I did not see it move for 3 days so I decided to see if it was alive and I gave it a very gentle prod, It just completely fell to bits, legs, pinches everything, must have just been a molt. Next week I will be on the look out for a shrimp or two to add to the tank, what are the best to get? I think someone mentioned here about phosphate remover for my filter to help control algee, i will be looking into this aswell, if anyone could tell me more about that, that would be great

I agree with Orangeshark about some of the rock being semi-cured at best, but I had no spike or anything, maybe the half that came from the display tank made a difference here?

Thanks
VictorMeldrew

my turbo snails are rubbish! Well...I suppose i only have 3 left now *vows to get revenge on hermits*

red legged seem to be quite shy (in my limited experience) but if you get more you'll see more of them!

VictorMeldrew said:

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Now I love that lighting! My tank is deffo smallfry compared to yours! Just wish I had the room for a set up like that to start off with!

Hey ! I always think hermit crabs are good for cleaning up crap behind the live rock! My turbo snails are also crap

I think you shud test your phosphates and get some phosgard i think its called!

my red legs started out like that. Now they are all over the show munching day and night. If you watch them you can imagine them with a knife and falk, napkin tucked in, talkin french, while they scoff some crap up. They dont take anywhere near as much off the rocks as my snails though. Its something else to look at.

BTW dont buy them from the LFS i would order your CUC from the internet! My LFS is £4.50/hermit and £2.50/snail. Found them at £1.90 and £1 on the net. £15 postage but if you buy a few things its more than worth it!

ben1987 said:

my red legs started out like that. Now they are all over the show munching day and night. If you watch them you can imagine them with a knife and falk, napkin tucked in, talkin french, while they scoff some crap up.

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lol why French!

I would agree though. The snails do a much better job on algae then hermits do, hermits will always tend to stay in the rockwork and in a tank that size a few hermits are going to vanish pretty quickly You will probably want quite a few more for a tank that size.

With regards to shrimp. I would recommend a group of peppermint shrimp (good for pest control with aipstia (spelling)). The two most common shrimp I see are fire/blood shrimp and skunk/cleaner shrimp. Both of them are really nice and you could get a couple of each if you wanted to. Sexy shrimp are also very cool but I never see them for sell near me. Also you could go for a pistol shrimp (and even a watchman goby + pistol shimp combination). All these shrimp are easy to keep, can be kept in groups and wont cause any harm. Peppermint shrimp "might" eat/nibble some polyp corals, mine I think where ok but I did have some yellow polyps that went missing a month or two after I added mine (my not be connected). you could keep all of these in your tank as well.

Coral banded shrimp "apprently" can be aggressive fairly agressive and harliquin shrimp are insanly cool but only eat starfish so can be very dificult to keep. Thats about the limit of my knowledge on shrimp but someone else might have some good suggestions.

Hi all, great posts, thanks very much.

I have decided to get two cleaner shrimp and will possibly add a blood shrimp at a later stage. The snails have done an awesome job clearing most of the brown algee so far although not on the sand, they have not left the rock as of yet. My water stats (tested today) are the same as previously posted but I now have a new problem, green and brown grass like algee which is growing like mad on the glass, sand and parts of the rock. I cleaned the glass, front and back a couple of days ago and it has come back with a vengeance. I am adding 250ml of rowaphos to my filter as soon as I get to the lfs and am doing a 25% water change tomorrow, is there anything else I need to do?

I have also selected my first two fish, unsurprisingly its clown fish, one Black Ocelaris and one regualar coloured. Any idea when I will be ready to add them?

Thanks
VictorMeldrew

VictorMeldrew said:

I now have a new problem, green and brown grass like algee which is growing like mad on the glass, sand and parts of the rock. I cleaned the glass, front and back a couple of days ago and it has come back with a vengeance. I am adding 250ml of rowaphos to my filter as soon as I get to the lfs and am doing a 25% water change tomorrow, is there anything else I need to do?

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Hello V, M
Is your tank still running on tap water / salt mix?
The reason why I ask is because tap water some times contains high concentrations of Phosphates, nitrates and silicates, so if you are using tap water your just adding unwanted elements that give rise to all types of algae blooms in saltwater systems, and it can also often contribute to persistent problems with higher than normal readings I think I have said this before {if so please except my apology but I think this could be your problem}
hope this helps john

Hello John
Yes mate I am still using tap water, well I filled the tank with it but I am yet to do a water change. I was planning on buying the RO water for the first few changes but I have worked it out to cost around £10 every change, more so if the petrol used to get to the lfs is taken into account, so without doubt I will invest in a RO unit in the next week or so. My water stats all seem to be perfect at the moment, do I need to do a water change at this stage? If so will it be ok to use tap water one last time or is it better to delay the change until I get the unit.

Thanks
VictorMeldrew

I forgot to mention my turbo snails seem to be multiplying they have little ones hanging on their shells.

Hi all

I have the day off work today so i thought i would post some pics. my camara works so much better in daylight. As i have mentioned before my wife and i have a side of the tank each to build on.

Here they are, we are now referring to each reef as, the west side (mine) and the east side (the wifes)



A closer look at each side



I have cleaned the glass, front and back and the algee situation does not look to bad, but i am sure it will come back quickly.

Thanks
VictorMeldrew

Nearly forgot, here is a couple of FTS.





Thanks
VM