Can a tank cycle and not have an algae bloom? Otherwise how am I doing?

[gone postal]

I setup my 55 gallon about 2.5 months ago. I have 60lbs live sand, 50lbs live rock & wet/dry. I cycled with just the die off from the live rock. I waited about a month - didn't do any water checks during that time, but at the month period, my LFS said my water appeared fine, but that he'd still start off w/ a Damsel b/c he's never done the die off method and wasn't sure that the water had even started cycling.

So, I grabbed 2 damsels. I also put in a CUC of 10 nassarius snails, 5 nerite and 15 blue legged hermits. I let that run for about 3 weeks. I then added my clownfish. That was about 3 weeks ago, so yesterday I added a Lemonpeel Angel. I have yet to have an algae bloom. I thought it was almost guaranteed to have an outbreak - kinda signaled that the cycle was over, etc. All my fish are fine. I'm starting to get coralline growth and have lots of what appear to be little feather dusters growing on my glass (really small - spiral shaped shells).

I've tested the H2O several times over the last few weeks and amm=0, trite=0, trate=20 (stupid test strips I had made trate appear lower, but I just bought a quality solution test kit and it is actually 20, not the 10 the strips led me to believe). Last night trate hit 40, so I changed 15 gal. today and it's at 20 again. I'm going to do 15 more Sunday and every 3-4 days afterward until I get this down to 5 or less. Does everything sound okay? I bought the Lemonpeel on a whim and wish I had done some research ahead of time b/c I'm not sure that my tank is established enough for him. This is why I'm concerned w/ the algae. He has snipped at my algae in a clip, but isn't really taking to it nor is he taking to any of the flakes, granules, etc. Of course the LFS didn't mention his feeding requirements, habits, etc, but they are in the market to make sales. Especially $60 ones...

[Frankie]

That is how i cycled my tank and i never saw a spike either. No blooms or anything. You did well imo.
As for the nitrates, that is from adding to many fish and live stock to fast and feeding them. Slow down on the food. They don't need to eat everyday if they are healthy. I feed every other day with no troubles. My fish are fat and healthy. To bring the nitrates down keep up on the water changes and run the skimmer wet. Try not to use nitrate reducing chemicals yet. Let see if you can find the cause first.

[fatman]

Nitrate is the natural product of an active bio system. You have an active system that has developed well enough to convert organic wastes into nitrite and then nitrates. That is good. However you say you are also using a wet/dry filter. They are great at converting ammonia to nitrite then nitrate, actually to good for most reef tanks, and are therefore only recommended in fish only tanks or tanks with lots of big fish and predator fish that contribute huge waste loads to a tank. Wet/dry filters turn an ammonia into nitrates faster than the live rock or live sand, basically depriving the beneficial bacteria there from the food needed for their reproduction and even survival. Wet/dry filtered tanks nearly always run high nitrates. If you are planning on keeping invertebrates , coral or others such as shrimp, star fish, clams etc. I would seriously consider increasing the amount of live rock and removing the filter media from the wet dry. If your main desire is to keep fish then you do not need to worry a lot about high nitrates as fish are very tolerant of high nitrates. If you decide to keep the filter media in the wet dry I would seriously consider the use of a remote deep sand bed for denitrification or you will have a constant battle with high nitrate readings, even with regular water changes, as most live rock is not that efficient at denitrification, and all the fish will either poop or die of starvation, meaning feeding them is a necessity. However, most people feed their fish much to much food, so feeding every other day is a pretty good idea. Also do not feed dried/pelleted/freeze dried and thaw all frozen foods and feed only the particles and not the liquids. Once you get usedto the effects feeding your fish have on the tanks water parameters you can the consider try out dried food again, but expect more nitrate (anfd algae) problems with dried foods. A remote deep sand bed is much more sane than fish on a starvation diet or frequent large water changes. A remote deep sand bed is easy to set up as you probably already have an overflow if you have a wet/dry filter. If you have the capacity to do larger water changes they are more effective, however you water parameters (temp, Ph and salinity) have to more closely match when doing larger changes. Remember also, that protein skimmers actually remove waste before it breaks down into ammonia, nitrite, and nitrates, where as wet/dry and live rock and live sand just change the fish wastes into other compounds but do not remove them. Well the live rock will denitrify to a small extent. A thin live sand bed will do no denitrification at all, nor will a wet/dry filter. Personally, if I had to choose between more live rock and a skimmer (if you do not have one yet) I would definitely get a skimmer.

[gone postal]

Well, I woke up this morning to find my lemonpeel on its side on the bottom of the tank. It's not quite dead yet, but I moved it around w/ my net and if you get it into the water column, it just floats around w/ the current barely moving any fins and sinks back down to the bottom. Seems as if it's only a matter of time and I have to leave for work in 15 minutes. This will be my first loss and it sucks. All my other fish are doing great, so I don't know if he had problems to start with or if the water change just affected him in a way that didn't bother the other fish.

Yeah, I am planning on adding a skimmer and will probably do that ASAP. I'll also cut back the feeding to every other day. My intentions are for a fish only setup for now and figured I'd give the reef thing a try in a year or so - I want to get comfortable w/ maintaining a tank properly for awhile before I dive head first into something even more sensitive & complicated. I will of course be getting rid of the wet/dry at that time.

[lcstorc]

Sorry for your loss. That really stinks.


I would go ahead and get rid of the wet/dry now so your system doesn't depend on it. Remove them slowly over time so you do not shock the system.
Also, if you plan to go reef then start planning now. Example most angels are known for nipping corals. Not always but it is likely.

[fatman]

I would have taken the Lemon Peel back to the LFS. A fish that dies that soon after you bought it likely already had problems or was not properly introduced into the tank, but as you had no problems with the other tank inhabitants I would be more inclined to believe you bought a sick fish. Fish will tolerate very high levels of nitrate, high nitrtes would have killed your snails and crabs long before killing the Lemon Peel. A Lemon Peel is not considered an easy fish to keep, but even starving one to death can take weeks or more.

[lcstorc]

I could have been a cyanide caught fish as well. You might want to check with the LFS and see where they get their fish from and how long they had the fish. Usually cyanide takes a couple of weeks to kill the fish but it could have been in holding and transport that long and you got it right before it was going to die.
If they will do it, try getting the lfs to hold the fish a couple of weeks before you bring it home. Many will do it if you put a deposit on the fish. You may have already done this, but always have the lfs feed the fish before you take it home so you know it is eating.

[Frankie]

Are you agitating the waters surface at all? You said it was floating around in the current but i a wondering what your oxygen levels are in you system. It could have suffocated. I tend to agree with fatman that it was most likely sick but before we jump to conclusions i would love to see a picture of this system.

[gone postal]

Well, LFS (actually PetCo - not my usual LFS, but he didn't have any fish that I wanted) told me no returns when I bought the fish - at first I thought this was just protocol to remind customers and also b/c I was hesitant to buy the fish b/c I didn't originally go there for that exact fish. I felt comfortable though b/c I had seen the fish there a few days before, so I knew it wasn't one that they had just gotten in and it appeared healthy.

I took it home, put the bag in my tank for 15 minutes to match temperature and then spent the next hour - hour 15 adding small amounts of my water to his. I put him in the tank (2pm Thurs) and he seemed to do great. He swam around, picked at my live rock and I even saw him pick at my algae clip although he didn't seem to enjoy it - maybe was just curious and not really hungry.

When I got home from work 5pm Friday he was hiding behind the rock - normal behavior from my research. Shortly afterward though I found him laying on his side on the other end of the tank. I put my dip net down there to spook him and he got right up and took off - swam fine, but returned to behind the rock. I got online to see if it was normal behavior, but couldn't find much. I checked my levels and saw that all was fine but trate - 40ppm. So I did a 15 gal change at around 11. trate was down to 20ppm.

Awoke this morning and you know it from there.

Yes, my return jet is aimed upward to aerate the water surface. All other fish are still doing great. I haven't lost a crab or snail in the 6 weeks or so that I've had them.

I'd really love to find out why he died though. It was a beautiful fish and I'd love to have another, but guess I'll have to consider whether or not I want to go the reef route.