I need help lol
 

Hey everyone, my husband is buying me a 28 gallon nano tank for my bday :) It's the starter kit one from Pisces. However, in reading for over 100 hours about marine tanks I have myself so worked up I am not sure if I should get it at all for fear of doing something horrific :P I am going to list out what I was planning to do, and if any of you can confirm or correct my secisions I would appreciate it as I am getting the tank on Friday!!
Day 1 get kit, stand, refractometer and RO water (for such a small tank I am going to buy my water at the grocery store for now)
Mix salt and fill tank 2/3 full.
Day 2 go buy live rock and put in tank, add live sand and top off water. Let the sand settle and then fire up all filtration.
day 3 to ? Let tank cycle, testing water every couple of days until 2 to 3 weeks has past, performing 5% water changes weekly.
3 weeks later (or when I have good water readings for a few days in a row) go get a few snails, hermit crabs and shrimp (or should shrimp come later?)
Acclimate new critters and add to tank. Wait 2 to 3 more weeks testing water regularily and adding feed for shrimp doing 5 to 10% weekly water changes
Then finally add my 1st fish and 1st coral (one of each)

Sooooo, how am I doing?? Is there chemicals I should be adding?? I am so freaked out by all of the different advise I have seen out there :P

Thanks to anyone who took the time to read my small novel :)

Sounds good to me! You probably don't need to bother doing water changes while you are cycling though but it's good practice for the future.

I don't think you are doing anything wrong. My recommendation in this hobby is patience. I waited 4 or so months before buying any fish or coral. Clean up crews area different story, and I would say, look into that after the cycle.

You are on the right track. Take your time and research your livestock. Don't just buy anything, as it is alot harder to get them out later.

Welcome to Canreef and enjoy this great hobby! Oh yeah... FYI, things will happen that will upset you, it happens. We all have our stories, but again, just take your time and have fun.

Welcome to the forums!. As everyone else will tell you PATIENCE is the key in this hobby. Take your time and do it right in the first place. Your on the right track as far as everything goes.

However, do not add live rock in your tank and let it cycle. I would recommend curing your live rock in a rubbermaid container and then adding it to your tank later(this process will get rid of most of the critters that are within the rock). Or perhaps just buy Dry macro rock, its cheaper lighter and easier to work with. As far as the coraline algae goes, what you can do is for example get 15 pounds of dry rock and you would seed it with lets say 5 pounds of live rock.


I have a 46 gallon bowfront tank with about 20 lbs of dry rock and 10 lbs of live rock which I cured. My tank has been running for 4 months and let me tell you my dry rock already has coraline algae (purple stuff) growing all over it. Here is a link on how to cure live rock http://www.liveaquaria.com/general/g...ral_pagesid=59

Good Luck!

I would be picky with the live rock. For less headaches IMO buy cured live rock vs. fresh live rock. Maybe someone from Calgary could point you to one of the local shops that has some nice rock in stock. Unless you are know what to look for I would avoid buying "used" live rock. Not always but generally people don't want to sell their quality live rock.

I bought my live rock from a local LFS that stated its "Cured" and ready to go. However, I'm a very skeptical person and didn't want to risk my investment and find out later that there are critters in my display tank. Once I cured my rock let me tell you I found a lot of interesting stuff(critters etc) that came off the rock, so good thing I went with my decision to cure the rock regardless of what they told me.

Some good points stated above. If you use dry rock and buy a piece of cured rock with no bad critters, there will be a better chance of not introducing things you don't want. Like: Pistol or mantis shrimp, bad crabs, etc.

I myself didn't do this, and can tell you that I have some fairly large crabs, of the yucky variety. So far no issues, but you never know. Also I do have the odd occassion of clicks, thought it was a mantis/pistol, but then thought maybe a crab. Don't know as I never saw what is making the sounds.

This route will mean taking more time before introducing livestock, but you may be happier for doing it.

Thanks so much everyone for the welcome, and for the advise!! I appreciate it :) I was figuring I would get my live rock from Pisces as they give a discount o your 1st purchase of it when you buy a tank from them. They carry cured, cultered live rock. I am wanting to take this very slowly as I know that is the key to minumising catastrophe lol. So the couple things nobody has commented on that I still feel sketchy on, are, is it ok to use grocery store RO water? I just would rather wait a bit before investing in a RO DI unit of my own. Also, chemicals needed for a healthy reef and when do I add them, or do I at all? And then the shrimp with a cleaning crew if I supplement their food? Or do the shrimp come in once there are fish :)
Thanks again everyone!! You guys are awesome!!

I would think twice if I were you. The so called "cure" rock pisces sells didn't look cured to me the last time I saw it at their location. The rocks were covered in aiptasia....

1). As long as the TDS reads 0 the grocery store Ro water should be sufficient.

2). Chemicals needed all depend of what you are going to be keeping in the tank. If you use "seachem" salinity salt mix their brand already has all the supplements needed for a healthy reef in their batch. However, you will very closely need to measure everything. I suggest you do a lot of reading to make sure you understand what is needed and how everything works http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2007-03/rhf/index.php#5

3). Once your tank is cycled and your ammonia and nitrates read 0 you can carefully add a clean up crew then.

What is this word you guys keep referring to?

Pay ------Shunce?

But it's more FUN to just flush money down the toilet while screaming "YAHOOOOOO" and pulling hairs out one at a time. :wink: