Here's tank 2 of 4. This one's a new endeavor (my first SW actually) so we'll see how this goes... haha lots to learn for sure.
Here's the basics, 65g, 60# LR, black substrate, 2 ocellaris, 1 maroon/ocellaris hybrid (Omen), 1 yellowtail damsel (Saban), 1 striped damsel (Demba), 1 cleaner shrimp (Pierre), 1 Fire shrimp (Henry, pronounced the french way "ohn-ree"), 1 turbo snail, 5 hermits.
Odyssea quad bulb T5 lights. 2 Actinics and 2 1000Ks.
The tank, LR, stand, sump, pump, heater, were given to me
and I've assembled the rest myself.
The LR came straight from another SW tank and should have been "cured" pretty well. Ran the tank for about a week, put Demba in there. (Used primed faucet water, and mixed own SW) Slowly added the other inhabitants including CUC over the next 3 weeks and algae has started to grow. The CUC is doing a pretty good job and then the other day we left the light on for entirely too long, and there was a hair algae manifestation (not too bad). kept lights off for three days and algae went down
I have alllll kinds of questions but I suppose I'll start from the top. Should I let this algae grow in order to let the bacteria grow and become self sufficient? (don't black out the lights for days)
I feel like i may have rushed into it before the tank was fully cycled and now there's 5 fish in there. I've been testing water the past 3 weeks (ph, nitrate, nitrite, ammonia) and the numbers have consistently been: ph 8.0, nitrate 0, nitrite 0, ammonia 0... there was a small period where the ammonia was a little high but never a significant "spike". There's little feather dusters growin on the rocks. I've attached pictures of the tank and rocks.
Next question is about the sump. The stand is vary narrow inside and the current Amiracle wet/dry Slim barely fits in there (8 inches wide). I dont use bioballs bc i read only bad things about em. I have the water coming down through the filter pad, over some LR. Heater's at bottom of sump and before water enters the return pump, passes through chemi-pure elite sack and back up to the tank. It's sufficient for now (I hope) but without the bioballs, it's pretty loud coming through the drip plate onto the water/rocks (i realize there should either be more rock or lower water level, sort of defeating the whole "drip" process). Also, there's also more micro bubbles in the tank than i'd like. I want to mod it to remove the drip plate and use a filter sock (reduce noise, make room for skimmer). Any thoughts or ideas about that?
If you read this whole novel i've just written, thanks. Bear with me, i'm a noob (but at least i have pics!!!)
Here's the basics, 65g, 60# LR, black substrate, 2 ocellaris, 1 maroon/ocellaris hybrid (Omen), 1 yellowtail damsel (Saban), 1 striped damsel (Demba), 1 cleaner shrimp (Pierre), 1 Fire shrimp (Henry, pronounced the french way "ohn-ree"), 1 turbo snail, 5 hermits.
Odyssea quad bulb T5 lights. 2 Actinics and 2 1000Ks.
The tank, LR, stand, sump, pump, heater, were given to me
and I've assembled the rest myself. The LR came straight from another SW tank and should have been "cured" pretty well. Ran the tank for about a week, put Demba in there. (Used primed faucet water, and mixed own SW) Slowly added the other inhabitants including CUC over the next 3 weeks and algae has started to grow. The CUC is doing a pretty good job and then the other day we left the light on for entirely too long, and there was a hair algae manifestation (not too bad). kept lights off for three days and algae went down
I have alllll kinds of questions but I suppose I'll start from the top. Should I let this algae grow in order to let the bacteria grow and become self sufficient? (don't black out the lights for days)
I feel like i may have rushed into it before the tank was fully cycled and now there's 5 fish in there. I've been testing water the past 3 weeks (ph, nitrate, nitrite, ammonia) and the numbers have consistently been: ph 8.0, nitrate 0, nitrite 0, ammonia 0... there was a small period where the ammonia was a little high but never a significant "spike". There's little feather dusters growin on the rocks. I've attached pictures of the tank and rocks.
Next question is about the sump. The stand is vary narrow inside and the current Amiracle wet/dry Slim barely fits in there (8 inches wide). I dont use bioballs bc i read only bad things about em. I have the water coming down through the filter pad, over some LR. Heater's at bottom of sump and before water enters the return pump, passes through chemi-pure elite sack and back up to the tank. It's sufficient for now (I hope) but without the bioballs, it's pretty loud coming through the drip plate onto the water/rocks (i realize there should either be more rock or lower water level, sort of defeating the whole "drip" process). Also, there's also more micro bubbles in the tank than i'd like. I want to mod it to remove the drip plate and use a filter sock (reduce noise, make room for skimmer). Any thoughts or ideas about that?
If you read this whole novel i've just written, thanks. Bear with me, i'm a noob (but at least i have pics!!!)
