20g High setup - first saltwater tank

[Myka]

Your tank looks great!! I love that you used live rock instead of dry rock! Where did you find such nice live rock?

I think you're on the right road by planning bigger water changes. I own an aquarium servicing company, and the smaller the tank, the bigger (percent-wise) the water change depending on bio-load. Most nano tanks are overstocked compared to the equipment running them though. In-sump skimmers are vastly better than nano skimmers, so you are always limited. What the equipment can't do, you must do manually. On 10-gallon tanks I do 40-50% per week. In the beginning you don't have to, but as the tank progresses and you stock it more, larger water changes will definitely help.

With a nano tank, make sure you're topping it up EVERYDAY, better yet is top it up in the morning and in the evening. Fluctuating salinity makes all the parameters fluctuate (they concentrate with evaporation, then dilute when you add RO).

Which light are you using now? The Prime is a nice option, but at 24" you also have the option of using a T5 fixture which would be my first choice, especially someone new to the hobby. A 2-bulb fixture over that tank would be great. Aquatic Life makes one with a built-in timer. The included bulbs kinda suck - I'd replace them with ATI bulbs.

[604reefer]

The live rock came from J&L aquatics in burnaby, I have purchased everything except the skimmer (used) there. I had read some negative reviews about the real reef rock, but figured I would try it out as the rock at King Ed and Aquariums west looked gross. I just grabbed 3 big pieces without thinking about how they may fit together... doh! Went back and picked up a couple pounds of small pieces to make a more "natural" look.

I did a 6g water change last week, but aiming for 4g weekly which is 20% and see how it goes.

I'd really like to keep frogspawn, torch, bubble, polyp, or brain coral - love the way the torch and frogspawn sway in the water. The tank has a POS aqueon light hood that came with the tank lol. I don't have any experience with T5. How does the look compare to an LED like the AI prime? I kind of like the idea of being able to customize the colors/look to my taste. With a T5 I know you can get different bulbs, but no idea how it would look. The aquatic life/ATI combo is really reasonable though!!

Originally Posted by Myka

Your tank looks great!! I love that you used live rock instead of dry rock! Where did you find such nice live rock?

I think you're on the right road by planning bigger water changes. I own an aquarium servicing company, and the smaller the tank, the bigger (percent-wise) the water change depending on bio-load. Most nano tanks are overstocked compared to the equipment running them though. In-sump skimmers are vastly better than nano skimmers, so you are always limited. What the equipment can't do, you must do manually. On 10-gallon tanks I do 40-50% per week. In the beginning you don't have to, but as the tank progresses and you stock it more, larger water changes will definitely help.

With a nano tank, make sure you're topping it up EVERYDAY, better yet is top it up in the morning and in the evening. Fluctuating salinity makes all the parameters fluctuate (they concentrate with evaporation, then dilute when you add RO).

Which light are you using now? The Prime is a nice option, but at 24" you also have the option of using a T5 fixture which would be my first choice, especially someone new to the hobby. A 2-bulb fixture over that tank would be great. Aquatic Life makes one with a built-in timer. The included bulbs kinda suck - I'd replace them with ATI bulbs.

[Northern Reefer]

Welcome to this fantastic.... and as others have said... wildly addicting hobby! Be prepared for some hick-ups along the way as the learning curve never ends....read read read and don't get discouraged when your get get different algae blooms! Its all part of it. Go slow and test regularly. Forums are a great place to see what equipment works best, how to solve issues and all the questions that arise! People are always supportive and helpful.

Side note.... I too decided on reel reef rock (J&L) in my new setup and have been extremely happy with it. Half regular and half shelf and trust me.... all those shelves fill quickly as tanks mature!

[gregzz4]

Heya
When I suggested to raise the heater to the waterline on the heater, I was referring to the manufacturers water mark on the plastic body below the control knob. If there's no water mark, just raise it up so the waterline in your tank is about halfway between the top and bottom of the plastic on the heater control body.
Essentially you want to get the so-called 'sealed' plastic portion of the heater out of the water as much as possible, but without exposing the glass to a dry environment.
This will also make it easier to adjust as you're not putting your fingers in the tank.
Hopefully the suction cups allow you to do this and have the control knob clear the trim on your tank.

[604reefer]

Update:

Here is a picture of my tank on Saturday a few hours after adding an ocellaris clownfish.



It's still really good to me! There's two snails that aren't moving, but aren't dead. Parameters are all in check, pH 8.2, ammonia/nitrites 0, nitrates 10. I'm not quite sure what to make of it. I also had another buildup of protein scum on the surface again and used a paper towel to remove most of it. Hoping my skimmer will do the rest, but definitely hard to find the sweet spot.

Going to try and take a picture every Saturday just to see the progress.

[604reefer]

No tank shot update - it looks pretty much identical to last Saturday!

I lost 3 snails this weekend, one cerith, one astrea and one margarita. Two died of "natural causes" (I think me flicking them off the water line for fun might not have been a great idea) and one to murder! One of the hermits decided that, despite having many empty shells to trade up to, the black cerith shell looked best. So most of the day Saturday this guy was eating the snail and there is no trace!

The protein film on the surface comes and goes, but seems to be a lot better since I removed the koralia powerhead and just left the sicce at one end pointed towards the other.

I ordered a Radion xr15w PRO G3 off a US forum today. Ships tomorrow or Friday - really looking forward to this!!

[604reefer]

Time for an update!!! Much has changed in the tank.

Another murder by the hermits of a snail this week! I have to feed these guys a bit more....

I added a Radion gen 3 XR15w Pro to the tank last weekend! It looks awesome, but makes it tough to take pictures!! The fish look really great under the light, especially the chromis. They still seem as happy as can be. My mom bought me a black clown today, JL finally got some in . Also bought a bubble coral, but the lights are out to reduce SPIKE's stress. Looking forward to it tomorrow and will take a picture to update.

Still have the brown algae kickin around on the rocks, but have noticed coralline in a few spots slowly growing.

Thanks to "The_Reef_Man" for hooking me up a frogspawn frag and blue mushroom yesterday!! It's one head, but it exploded when I put it in the tank, same with the blue musroom.. Really excited to add these - no longer a coral virgin!

Here are some shots:

Tank before adding coral - barnacle now gone


(Lights out - just added)


Frogspawn


Blue Mushroom

[604reefer]

I guess it's time for a 6+ month update!

So far so good... (touches wood) everything seems to be getting along nicely. One thing that drives me a bit crazy are all the spirorbid worms, seem to come in on a hammer plug and really took off. It also seems if I keep salt mixed for more than a few days diatoms or algae grows in the bucket, annoying and not sure why. Tried vinegar bathing everything, but still happens. I'm wondering if my 5ish month old RO/DI has a bad filter? Diatoms flared up a ton about a month ago, was cleaning like crazy everyday. Now it just seems to flare up for a day or two then die down again.

Fish
My clowns still scrap each other and my black one Spike gets beat up from time to time. Fins don't look too bad though. The clowns are pooping long string again, going to feed some metroplex tonight. The blenny calmed down after a few weeks and just perches on top of the rocks all day. My chromis just surfs around the tank, loves to go down to the sand bed and weave between the coral and the glass, pretty interesting to watch.

Coral
Well I quickly fell in love with Euphyllia as you'll see. I'm up to 6 hammers, 2 torches, and the frogspawn! Something about the way it all sways mesmerizes me. The lime green hammer has almost finished splitting completely, the purple/green hammer has grown to 3 heads from 1 and the frogspawn and bleached hammer (bought like that lol) appear to be splitting right now as well. My "trophy piece" is supposed to be a "bright orange" hammer I bought online, but it's looking pretty peach - grrrr. The light green hammer has taken showstopper instead, it's gone from about 1" across to 3-4" across, I keep moving the lime green hammer right to give it more space!

My indo torch has completely branched off one head and in the process of branching into 3 total from the one when I got it. The tonga torch was getting rocked by the indo torch, so I finally moved it and it looks really happy. It's not got the greatest color until the blues turn on and then the streaks of orange really show.

I also picked up a hulk leptastrea? I don't know, it was 20 bucks and looked cool. It's grown a bit in the few weeks I had it.

I managed to nearly kill my favorite mushroom. I moved it and then I thought I saw worms crawling all over it. Scraped it off, THEN looked it up online and saw they're mesenterial filaments... oops. It's still alive but very very very unhappy. My 2 blue mushrooms have morphed into 6 and my orange one is now two.

There's an acan in the tank it aint lookin so hot, gonna have to give it a good feed.

I let my dumb inverts tip the bubble coral without picking it up quick enough, laying on the sand caused the tissue to start receding. It looks generally healthy now, but waiting to see if recession stops. Womp womp womp.

Inverts
My inverts are boring, except HOOVER the conch and my fire shrimp are sweetttttttttt.


Pictures


Tank at 6 months to the day (2 weeks ago):


Green Hammers:


"Orange" Hammer (5 days in my tank):


Feeding time!

[604reefer]

Thanks photobucket for totally selling out to ads. Here are the photos re-uploaded from the last post.

Pictures

Tank at 6 months to the day (2 weeks ago):


Green Hammers:


"Orange" Hammer (5 days in my tank):


Feeding time!