My Switch To Saltwater.

[SkiFletch]

Sorry, I mis-spoke, I meant fan worms and christmas tree worms . Regular fan worms have the two half-circle fans. Christmas tree worms look like christmast trees. Its hard to tell if you have christmas tree worms or if there's just so many fan worms in there they look like christmas trees .

 

[Allen]

OK, thanks for the info - back to the testing

 

[Allen]

Added my first livestock today.

5 red legged hermits and a yellow tail blue damsel.

My snail seems to be producing baby snails - they are all over the place - but very small.

 

[Mr Miagi]

My snail seems to be producing baby snails - they are all over the place - but very small.

Your snail would have laid eggs, which have hatched, its common when they are doing well. Congrats!

 

[PaPeRo]

I assume your liverock didn't need curing?

 

[Allen]

No, it was already cured at LFS - a very short trip home and 1 week sitting in my tank and the levels were all fine.

 

[Allen]

When I was testing my water today, I found one of my hermits out of his shell, half eaten

Latest readings are as follows.

Saturday 10:00am PH 8.1 , Nitrate 5ppm, Nitrite 0ppm, Ammonia 0.00ppm, Salinity 1022, Temp 24'c.

Saturday 12:00pm Added 5x hermits and 1x yellow tail blue damsel.

Sunday 12:00pm PH 8.0 , Nitrate 20ppm, Nitrite 0ppm, Ammonia 0.25ppm, Salinity 1022, Temp 24'c.

Am I correct that the readings would increase as I increase the population.
Would the death of the hermit be due to the damsel ? The hermit remains have certainly been partially eaten.
Is a jump from 5ppm Nitrate to 20ppm Nitrate safe for the other hermits/damsel ?

 

[Mr Miagi]

Its true readings would incrrease, but barely if your LR was fully cured, because the damsel is only a small fish. Maybe soeone else canhelp you. As for the hermit, are you sure you still havnt got 5? One mght have molted, leaving a half, empty shell.

 

[SkiFletch]

the nitrate jump is fine, the ammonia jump is a little concerning... But you did just increase your bio load a lot with the damsel, give your tank some time to get accustomed to the new bio load and feed lightly every other day for a week

Also, are you sure the hermit didnt molt? Mine molt all the time and leave skind severywhere

 

[Allen]

Hmmm, maybe he did molt - I seem to still have 5 - guess I should have read the manual

 

[Allen]

Update:

After my levels seemed to sort themselves out, I added the following.

1x yellow tail blue damsel.
5x red legged hermits.

2 weeks later I added.
1x cleaner shrimp.
1x scooter blenny.
5x blue legged hermits.

I have noticed over the last few weeks a total of 5 hermit bodies ripped from their shells and half eaten - not just molts as I have 5 empty shells.

Tonight I witnessed the damsel knocking a hermit over onto his back.
The hermit then leaned right forward out of his shell to set himself upright and the damsel plucked him from the shell and proceeded to eat the rear end.

Is this normal damsel behaviour ?

Anyhow, I shifted the live rock and finally caught the little b'stard and he has been the first fish evicted from my tank.

Trouble is now the tank has stirred up a load of crap from the rocks being moved and I couldnt get them in the same position as before.

So its a little more peacefull, a whole new live rock layout and cloudy cloudy cloudy.

I guess its leave it a day and see how the remaining tank mates get over the last 90 mins of me moving rocks and stuff.

 

[SkiFletch]

They'll be fine, mine didnt mind the 3-4 hours of rock moving that I did to my tank

Never heard of a Damselfish doing that, but since they're aggressive little buggers I'm not exactly surprised. Sorry he got to all your hermits though

 

[Allen]

I know, was a real eye opener - anyhoodle, hes gone surfing down the white half-pipe - evil little b*stard !

 

[callell]

I know, was a real eye opener - anyhoodle, hes gone surfing down the white half-pipe - evil little b*stard !

instead of killing him you could have gave him to you local marine retailer

 

[tmreynolds]

I know, was a real eye opener - anyhoodle, hes gone surfing down the white half-pipe - evil little b*stard !

instead of killing him you could have gave him to you local marine retailer

I agree, you shouldn't have killed him, thats out of order