reefrunner
Contributing Member
Hello everyone, it's been about 8 years since I have kept any aquariums, and when I did it was reef aquariums rather than fish only.
My daughter convinced me to set up a tank so she could bring her clownfish she got in her marine biology class home. I thought, no problem, we have everything we need, and enough time to cycle the tank before school ends. So I set up the 20gallon long tank, it has a hang on the back sump and an aqua-c remora protein skimmer. It has a plastic coral decoration and a previously live rock (the rock had been dry for about 8 years and all decorations were bleached prior to placing in the tank) the tank has 2-14w actinic cfl lights and a 250w metal halide the lights weren't run at all for the first 4 weeks and now they are run only a couple hours out of the day.
A couple of weeks ago I finally received my test kit (I had been feeding the tank pieces of dead fish to cycle the tank, no inhabitants) and tested. Ammonia was 0 as was nitrite. I allowed my daughter to bring home a hermit crab to put in the tank, his name is Bob, and Bob is having a great time and appears to be doing well. But...there is always a but, the ammonia is now 8ppm and nitrite still appears to be 0.
My issue is my daughter has to bring home her clownfish on Monday. I am headed today to the "not so LFS" to, have them test my water and hopefully pick up some live sand and some cured live rock, and maybe make a hotel arrangement for the clownfish.
Does anyone else have any suggestions on kick starting this cycle in gear? Any help is greatly appreciated.
My daughter convinced me to set up a tank so she could bring her clownfish she got in her marine biology class home. I thought, no problem, we have everything we need, and enough time to cycle the tank before school ends. So I set up the 20gallon long tank, it has a hang on the back sump and an aqua-c remora protein skimmer. It has a plastic coral decoration and a previously live rock (the rock had been dry for about 8 years and all decorations were bleached prior to placing in the tank) the tank has 2-14w actinic cfl lights and a 250w metal halide the lights weren't run at all for the first 4 weeks and now they are run only a couple hours out of the day.
A couple of weeks ago I finally received my test kit (I had been feeding the tank pieces of dead fish to cycle the tank, no inhabitants) and tested. Ammonia was 0 as was nitrite. I allowed my daughter to bring home a hermit crab to put in the tank, his name is Bob, and Bob is having a great time and appears to be doing well. But...there is always a but, the ammonia is now 8ppm and nitrite still appears to be 0.
My issue is my daughter has to bring home her clownfish on Monday. I am headed today to the "not so LFS" to, have them test my water and hopefully pick up some live sand and some cured live rock, and maybe make a hotel arrangement for the clownfish.
Does anyone else have any suggestions on kick starting this cycle in gear? Any help is greatly appreciated.
