Order Of Livestock

[Crazy fishes]

Most people will say add your clean up crew once the tank has cycled, but then what comes next?? Fish? or maybe coral? I would like to have a mixture of soft and LPS corals and was wondering if it really mattered which corals are introduced first? Is there some kind of order which yields the best results? Also does anyone know of a place/site/article etc where care sheets can be obtained for fish and corals? I know that I want to keep a pair of percula clowns and a firefish, is this an ok selection?

As regards my coral selection I was thinking: trumpet coral, hammer coral, open brain coral, pom pom xenia and leather toadstool. A question mark hangs above sun polyp and torch coral. Both very attractive but will it be too crowded in the 24g nano cube, particularly for hammer and torch. What do you think, is it a or a ???

Regards

 

[andywg]

I always add everything at once: cured live rock, clean up crew and fish.

I have never really understood the clean up crew before fish system. There should b e a fair amount of die off from uncured LR, this would lead to a decent amount of bacteria to process ammonia. By then waiting for nitrites and nitrates to peak and fall, and then add the clean up crew and wait you will have lost a lot of ammonia oxidising bacteria.

 

[eschaton]

The traditional method is to introduce fish first, and then coral, but this may just be "conventional wisdom" and not actually true.

Check "Myth number 15" here

Personally, for my 55, I'm going to do a modified version of this (I have a few polyps and soft corals, so I can't do this exactly).

 

[steelhealr]

Eschalon...thanks for posting a great link. The area in black is EXCELLENT advice. I always take a lot of flak for telling people to wait weeks before adding corals. In addition, I love the comment about actinodiscus (mushrooms). We all stock softies so quickly yet these corals secrete a multitude of chemicals that WILL NOT show up on routine water tests. Yellow Fiji Leathers, eg, can secrete terpinoids when placed close to other corals, esp. LPS. Then, the "Coral Wars" begin and I truly believe that the loss of some corals is due to early and poor stocking. Another common bad combo is placing Devil's Hand in a nano tank containing LPS.

Although having a beautiful slice of the ocean in our homes is the aim of all of us....rushing it is not the way to go. We can only make the recommendation though.

SH

 

[Crazy fishes]

According to the 'suggestion' for the article that means you would have to wait 3 months before the clean up crew can be added to their new home?!! That is intriguing, how many people waited 3 months after the addition of live rock to make any new additions?
Surely 3 months is too long before adding of any other critters; the bacteria will begin to die again and another toxic cycling process will start. It can't feels like I'm trying to jump on to a moving roundabout. Also if I did do this the algae, which in the last 3-4 days has picked up its growth rate, will be out of the tank and filling a significant proportion of my room. I am truely aware that many people trying to establish reef systems try to move too fast but evolution took millions of years to create what biological systems are present today and it is totally implausible the author to make such suggestions. I am pretty sure that most, if not all, of the persons that use this forum have decent looking reef systems and did not take an eon to create it.

Many thanks for the link though much appreciated.

Regards

 

[steelhealr]

I am pretty sure that most, if not all, of the persons that use this forum have decent looking reef systems and did not take an eon to create it.

Many tanks here are under 1-2 years...that is not a living reef per se. Immediately beautiful? Yes. That's why no one can say they successfully kept a sea star if the star lives 8 months to a year. If you read the article again, you can understand what 'mature tank' means.

Losing a half a dozen snails isn't bad. If you've ever lost 2-3 corals at over $100, you'll have a better understanding of this and what patience means (I'm not trying to be mean or patronizing).

Remember also....that article is DIRECTED AT LARGE REEF SYSTEMS. I like to remind people that nano reefing involves SMALL WATER VOLUMES.

Beauty comes slowly. Disaster comes quickly.

Overly conservative?

Perhaps.

Stocking is a personal choice. SH

 

[dilbert]

What was mentioned in the article, too, was that at the beginning most people stock hardy and simple to keep animals.

For example, someone mentioned having kept zoas in a bucket in the boot of his car and so on. So why should they die in half decent tank, "mature" or not?

Look at my signature and you will find only creatures that are quite hardy. A damselfish may die if you fill the tank with beer and add rocksalt to it. If people get really problems with that kind of livestock then it has been sick already or people got really strange toxic substances in their tank with no way to test for.

I guess the article means with a "mature" tank that one that is able to house the more delicate species.

 

[Crazy fishes]

I understand the principles in the article and I also understand your meaning with regards 'living reef'. All I am saying is that in order to find the equilbrium that exists in a 'mature living reef' you need to have the components in the same system so that the balance can be found. Once the essential parameters are optimised livestoke should be put in. Getting to this stage shouldn't be taking three months for a nano. Maturity equates with longevity and stability, which requires all components of the system together and functioning as a unit.
The reef systems that we have in own homes should try to mimic nature as much as possible, but they will never be identical to the oceans and seas since they will always have an artificial element to them.
You are absolutely right in saying that there are a number of possibly important compounds in the water which we can't/don't test for but we don't have to. Nature has been finding balances a lot longer than humans have existed so if you straighten out the 'essential' elements then the rest generally will follow. In the medical profession this is a principle that is ingrained; 1) first do no harm 2) is there a problem 3) is it absolutely necessary to medal with the system to correct the problem 4) minimise the extent of the intervention.
A patient that is acidotic is NOT packed with bicarbonate to correct the pH but the underlying cause is dealt with and the acidosis corrects itself.
It is the same principles in the nano reef correct the essentials and the other chemistry will follow.
I am sorry if the analogies make it more confusing but I hope you catch my drift........ (medicine is my other great passion).

Kindest regards

 

[steelhealr]

Medicine is my other passion too. No one is saying to wait 2 years before doing your reef. The caution is to take time. Eg....have you ever tried to fight cyanobacteria when you have some nice corals in the tank? It's not fun. Nor hair algae or aiptasia. Sure...you can do it...but it's much simple to cross that path first. Cyano is nasty on some corals.

I can show you lots of pix of people with ace looking tanks 2 months after starting and show you the same tank 5 months later with half the corals dead. The cleanup crew can certainly go in pretty rapidly after cycling. They are a lot more hardy than we give them credit for.

On the flip side, what's wrong with adding your cleanup crew (whether it be crabs, shrimp, snails, etc)....and observe how they do for a bit? Then...add a fish...start feeding it...and watch how your nitrates go? When it stays under 10, then add another fish and repeat or add one hardy coral...and see if you can maintain it for a bit.

Again, we are dealing with small water volumes. We really aren't reef keepers but WATER keepers. I don't specifically recall the date but I think I waited almost 2 months before putting a coral in. But hey...that was me..and based on what was considered safe nano reefing.

It's a personal call if you think that's the way you want to go or not. It's easier to know that you can maintain under 10ppm nitrates with one fish, feeding, etc...than watch your LPS close up or bleach when it climbs to 30.

SH

 

[andywg]

I agree with SH on adding corals later. Every tank I have set up with reef level lights (my pred tanks have very little in the way of lighting) has gone through some issues within the first 6 months or so. As a result, while I question the order of fish and clean up crew, I do believe that both of these should be in the tank, and the tank be somewhat "settled" before adding corals.

 

[Crazy fishes]

So Dilbert you are saying after the ammonia and nitrite are undetectable and nitrate levels are down, you would add the clean up crew and fish (of course with intervals) and then let the tank 'settle' for about 6 months. Sounds a lot more appealing than leaving a tank devoid of any thing for 3 months. I think that is the way for me to proceed.

SH, do you work in the health profession? Just curious.

Regards

 

[dilbert]

I have already done so. But I have to repeat that I have only idiot-proof and hardy critters. I got only Zoanthids (with a large fleshy base, probably preferring low flow). They can do what they want in this tank. There won't be any other Cnidarians in this tank anymore.

When I got recently a cyanobacteria outbreak, the sandbed aorund their rock was covered in red but no red slime entered their rock. Maybe I was lucky only. I started remove sand covered by that slime but it was clear to me that this was a quite useless execise. But then the red slime went away magically after being fully present only for a week. I hadn't much headache with all that as I could have put the Zoanthids into a small emergency tank and even if they would have perished they were an offer of only GBP 7.50.

My view is that we are quite depending on water tests as excessive ammonia is probably the only thing we could see and smell. The ammonia/nitrite/nitrate thing is only the top of the iceberg as those are things that shouldn't be present at all.

But there it starts already. With the Dry-tab nitrite test i read 0.25 ppm (slightly pink). The API nitrite test said 0 (light blue), but the Dry-tab nitrite test with tapwater was 0 (colourless). The API nitrate test showed also 0, were the Dry-tab showed 20 ppm (and tapwater with the Dry-tab nitrate showed again 0).

I know from freshwater shrimps that there are people who set up one new tank after another and their shrimps always die. Mostly all at once what looks like intoxication, but sometimes also one after another, every day one or two. No one can help those people and they finally have to give up keeping shrimps. Other people keep the same shrimps without any problems and without any effort.

The more delicate your corals are the more important is getting a clue about trace elements and the water tests for those become even more dubious than the simple ammonia/nitrite/nitrate. I see this as a major problem.

Therefore, I you are still consumed with swings of salinity, ph, calcium, alkalinity, magnesium, and so on, my guess is it will very difficult to find why a particular coral isn't doing well. It can be chemical coral warfare but it could be anything else.

I'm not with the author of this article when he mentions dying fish and clean up crew at the beginning. What do you have to do to kill a healthy damselfish?

But my guess (I'm not a coral keeper) is that probably waiting some longer time and then inserting all the corals almost at once might be a better idea than inserting the hardy ones first. There were a few good reasons in this article that made it worth to read.

In the meantime, you could start quarantining the corals if you would have all the space. Maybe even in groups needs much tanks I guess.

 

[steelhealr]

Crazy..yes......

It is very difficult to see some of these nano reefs and not want one up running immediately and beautiful...and ooohh...ohhhh....ahhhhh. We just don't have the water volume to do it rapidly and safely. Again, not easy to be the 'naysayer'...but..I can only guarantee that...the slower you go..the less headaches you will have. Anyone can have a fully stocked nano tank up in 2 months. Maintaining it and keeping your expensive corals alive and healthy OVER TIME takes skill, attention to detail and commitment. It took me months..almost 2 years to get my nano tank here:

I can only recommend that you go slowly....your wallet will be the judge. SH

 

[Crazy fishes]

Nice reef ! I am aware that this is two years work; recently came across your 'I'm starting my nano post. By the way what ever happen to Parker? Is that metal halide lighting your using? Ever thought of incorporating some SPS, I don't see any?


Regards.

 

[steelhealr]

That is plain PC lighting and stock. One of my objectives, when I started out, was to prove that you can have a nice tank without metal halide lighting....that the average nano'er...with patience..can have a colorful enjoyable tank.

SPS take a lot of care, need high lighting and very good water conditions. They are difficult to care for in a nano tank (not impossible) and that is because water conditions must be and stay excellent. Again, not impossible with attention to detail and consistency. My tank would have to have a total hood mod or be replaced to keep SPS. Not my desire right now. My future desires include:
-a pico
-a coldwater nano
-eventually, cichlid tank.

As for Parker, she was actually going to be a mod here but personal reasons took her away. She returned briefly last year only to disappear again. In fact, her tank got me into nano reefing.....her thread...was pinned by me after she left.... 'in honor' of the work she did here.

SH