The tank has been set up for a month now. Diatom bloom cleared up nicely after about a week and a bit and some algae has started to creep in.
Just after my last post we had a chromis mysteriously disapear. Not entirely sure what happened to him. Parameters were checked the day before he vanished and no ammonia or nitrite were present, all the fish were eating and active the day before. Is it possible for large hermit crabs to get the drop on sleeping fish? Ended up with a small <0.25ppm spike in ammonia (was lighter than the 0.25 but still tinged green). Tried to find it and pulled apart some of the rockwork but was no good. Was able to get the parameters under control before any damage was done.
And you know what they say, if you get your rock the way you like it and move anything, you'll never get it back the way you had it before. I salvaged the left side of the tank but the right side is sorta a rubble heap now lol. Im sure it will all work out in the end.
Ive noticed that coraline algae seems to be growing extremely fast on some of the rocks. The same rock that was cleaned ever so nicely by the snails is now really pink!
I took Mindys advice and bought some GFO, threw 3/4c of it it in the sump in a bag. I figured today id do a full range of tests on the tank and everything is looking pretty normal for a new tank from what i can tell. I got a Nyos test for my phosphate since the api has such a huge range.
0ppm ammonia
0ppm Nitrite
10ppm Nitrate
0.025 Phosphate
240ppm calcium
125.3ppm KH (7dKH?)
8.0 pH
1.025 salinity
I think once we get the nice lights on the tank and start to buy some real corals we will have to get a better Alkalinity, and Calcium test. The range on the reading chart and adding drops to a vial just seems so inacurate, i have no idea how close my readings really are. What does everyone else use?
I also cut back on how much the tank is being fed. they only get 1/2 a cube of food per day. None of them appear to be starving and i dont see as much settling onto the sand. Whatever does the cleaner shrimp seems to grab pretty quick.