1st inhabitants

[T Fades]

Hi All,

Started my 28g up on 1/1 (mixed water from LFS, 28 lbs of LR, 25 lbs of LS). It took two weeks for the cycle to complete (Am = 0, NI = 0, and NA ~10). I wanted to make sure the bacteria had built up some more, so I waited another week before adding any inhabitants.

So last weekend, I bought my first inhabitants (1 fire shrimp, 1 emerald crab, and 2 astrea snails).:bounce:

I have some frozen mysis cubes but have not yet fed the shrimp/crab. Not wanting to starve everything, I will give them a tiny bit of mysis tonight, but wanted to ask you guys if I am dangerously starving my shrimp/crab at the moment. Not sure when they were fed at the LFS, but it has now been 3 days since I brought them home.

Oh yea, I will definately thaw out some mysis in a shot glass and dilute it with some distilled water so I don't introduce chemicals from the frozen cube into the tank.

Thanks.
Tony

 

[Bifferwine]

You should feed them every other day or so. Normally, they will scavenge and eat whatever the fish miss. So until you get fish, you'll have to take special care to make sure they have food. Mysis is fine.

 

[Smitty]

+1 Biff.

 

[AmberSunrise]

Good for you for going slow and taking your time.

I also feed my little guys about ever 2 days with a piece of seaweed or a pellet.

 

[T Fades]

Thanks everybody!

Yea, I didn't want to stress the cycle/bioload, so I only added a few of the CUC at first. I plan on slowly stocking the rest of the inhabitants.

Speaking of the rest of the inhabitants, when all is said and done, here is what I was hoping to get. Any suggestions on how many of each of CUC?

Astrea Snails
Nass Snails
Emerald Crab
Fire Shrimp
maybe another type of shrimp (or should I just keep the 1 fire or maybe add a second fire?)

Fish wanted include:
B. Carndinal
maybe a Firefish
Goby of some sort
Any other suggestions?

Corals wanted include:
Frogspawn
Shrooms
Polyp colony
some other easy/relatively low light corals (recommendations?)

Thanks again.

 

[Aquatic]

Xenia coral is nice as well if you want to check that out. It's a moderate light coral though. What kind of lighting do you have for your tank right now?

 

[PringlesLFE]

mushrooms mushrooms mushrooms! When my nano was still running, I was obsessed with mushrooms. Sometimes you'll come across some really interesting and trippy looking ones at your LFS.

I also suggest replacing the cardinal with some sort of clown if you're into them. (Cinnamon, Tomato, Clarkii, Picasso, etc. etc.)
or the regular percs / false percs I guess..but the others are more interesting to me.

A while ago, I was really set on adding a Banggai Cardinal to the tank but I think it was Biff who told me they really don't do much and just kinda hover in one spot day in and day out....that's when I began noticing at fish stores...it's true...they're kinda boring.

Good luck!

 

[ErinCahir]

Add some zoas on that list!
You can get them in so many different colors!

 

[T Fades]

Excellent recommendations.

Will definately look into xenia and zoas.

Also, thanks for the heads up on the B.Cardinal being boring. Will have to think about other options.