Ok i have a 46 gal bow that i have had for a little over 2 years. For the first year the tank was pretty nice, but i started getting real busy with school and work and had no more time for it and everything died off except for my clown which i still have. Well about 2 months ago i decided to get everything back together and have a nice tank again. I have about 60-70lbs of live rock with about an 1/2" of crushed coral (Is this enough). I have a prizm skimmer with a wetdry. I will be replacing the wetdry with a fuge that i am making from a 10 gal aquarium using mineral mud. My question is i had my live rock out of the tank and washed with cold freshwater (I know bad move) and there doesn't seem to be anything living on my rock anymore. My question is how do i get the copepods and amphipods back again. Do i have to buy more live rock? This will be a reef tank with 300w hqi metal halides. If you guys could give me any pointers i would really appreciate it. Also if you need me to post up anymore info on my setup let me know because i know im missing some things. Thanks.
Redoing my tank few ?'s
- Thread starter Darkblue
- Start date
squibley2
Reefing newb
The thing to do with the rock is to put it back into the tank and if your CC is still in the tank and the tank has been running the stuff from the CC will migrate back to the rock and make it live again. On the other hand if the tank has been taken down then I would ditch the CC and go with a deep sand bed and then seed the rock with a few high quality pieces of LR and let nature do the rest.
Bifferwine
I am a girl
Yes definitely go with a deep sand bed instead of crushed coral. As for the pods, you might want to get a clump of chaeto (spaghetti algae) from your LFS for your fuge, there will probably be tons of pods in it (or at least there will be in time).
This weekend i'm rearranging my rocks anyway so i could probally get all the cc out and do sand as a substrate if that is what you recomend. What depth should the sand be is 1-2" good enough? With the live rock could i just get a few more pieces from the lfs and put them in to get all my little critters back? I really don't want to get rid of the rock i have now because im sure as most of you know it cost a lot of money.
Edit: just saw bifferwine's post.
Edit: just saw bifferwine's post.
squibley2
Reefing newb
Yes you can just get a couple pieces of LR this is what I was talking about when I said seed. As for the deep sand bed 1-2" would not be deep enough the average answer you get is 3-5" but some say at least 6" I run my tank at about 5".
squibley2
Reefing newb
The preferred sand is aragonite which is what the sand is around an actual reef. Some people do substitute but I would not put anything in your tank that did not come from the ocean. I used 2 40lbs bags and a 15lbs bag for my 55. I would rinse it well also to get the really fine stuff out or you will have a really hard time getting clear water. I used a piece of pipe on the end a hose and cut the top off the bag and then moved the pipe up and down in the bag. This worked better then any other method I found.
squibley2
Reefing newb
Well to answer questions like that we need a few more bits of info about your tank. For example everything! size, equipment, history, inhabitants, current water params, current maintenance stuff like that.
just a suggestion cc out dsb in, as for your life is the tank cycled? what kind of lights do you have on it now? You can very well go to the lfs and get some live rock and reseed everything how every if you dont have the proper lighting then alot of good stuff will not grow hope this helps.
Well my tank is 46 gallons with a prism protein skimmer, wet/dry (being replaced next with a fuge), uv sterilizer, Next week there will be a closed loop system on it also, 200w heater, 110w light with a 300w hqi metal halide coming in next week. History is well i guess its been setup for 2 years and recently about two months ago the water was replaced and the rocks cleaned. Current inhabitant is a clown fish Water parameters are
ammonia 0
nitrite 0
nitrate 40ppm
ph 8.4
temp 79-80
If you need anymore info just let me know. Thanks.
ammonia 0
nitrite 0
nitrate 40ppm
ph 8.4
temp 79-80
If you need anymore info just let me know. Thanks.
squibley2
Reefing newb
I would do a water change to start to get your nitrates down. 20 is the top end of where your nitrates should be. It sounds like your rock after having been cleaned is starting to come back to life. I would consider adding the sand bed on top of the CC don't do this all at once but do it slowly allowing the animals from the CC to migrate to the sand without covering them. I would say do about 10-15% of the sand at a time and do that every week. This will minimize the loss of bacteria and other life forms on the CC. Your PH is a little high but I would try to get your other params close first. I would start with either a weekly or bi-weekly 10-15% water change and see how your params shape up. With the new equipment on its way it sounds like you are on the right track! Let us know what other questions you have. You also might want to look into a different skimmer if the future as well.
Thanks i appreciate it. I'm actually rearranging my LR tomorrow along with a few new pieces. I will also be putting in my DSB tomorrow i won't be using the CC anymore. Right now i'm in the process of seting up my new ro/di unit so we'll see how that goes. What could be causing the jump in nitrite? I never had any signs of nitrite before.
squibley2
Reefing newb
The tank is being disturbed so the waste that was settled around the tank is now being stirred up and the tank is having a mini cycle. I would recommend that you use a small pump and blow around the rocks before you do a water change and see how much stuff comes up and into the water. You might be surprised, it is a good way to get as much crap out of the tank as possible.
nitrite is the last of the process of denitrification nitrite is considerably less harmful then nitrate and amonia, amonia turns to nitrate, nitrater turns to nitrite, being your nitrates are at 40 it is feeding your nitrites, thus being the reason for the nitrite increase. As mentioned above clear your waste out use a marine clarifier so that you get even small particles after your water clears at this point clean or change your filter pads/media then do a water change. You should start seeing a difference after that hope this helps.
Bifferwine
I am a girl
Actually it's the opposite Jelly, ammonia turns into nitrite, then nitrite turns into nitrate. Nitrate is the end product. Nitrate is less harmful than nitrite and ammonia. (Not trying to be a smart ass or anything) and nitrate is what accumulates in your tank. If your tank is done cycling, ammonia and nitrite will be at 0. And the only way to get rid of nitrate is to have an excellent protein skimmer and do water changes. Or use an additive like AZNO3.
If you are seeing nitrite it can mean many things: you overfed, you have too many fish, you do not have a high enough bacterial population to convert the nitrite to nitrate, something died in the tank, you disturbed the muck in the bottom, etc...
If you are seeing nitrite it can mean many things: you overfed, you have too many fish, you do not have a high enough bacterial population to convert the nitrite to nitrate, something died in the tank, you disturbed the muck in the bottom, etc...
