Canreef Aquatics Bulletin Board

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- Nano Tank Talk (http://www.canreef.com/vbulletin/forumdisplay.php?f=22)

- - I need help lol (http://www.canreef.com/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=85433)

If you were in EDM I'd give you the extra live rock I have for free. It would be enough to for your nano for sure. It's just not very purple as it's been in the sump for awhile.

Going to Edmonton anytime soon (or better yet, Bonnyville?)

Quote:

Originally Posted by reefgirl189 (Post 706347)

Thanks for the offer hun!! But I haven't been to Edmonton in years!!! We have been thinking of taking the kids up to the mall sometime...but nothing concrete for plans :P

Quote:

Originally Posted by FFGirl (Post 706298)

A lot of places I went to told me that I should add my cleaning crew inside of 2 weeks!! I told them I would rather be safe than sorry and wait for longer

I would wait until you absolutely need it and not before. You need to buy specific critters for specific problems. No sense buying something if the problem isn't there. I have never been a fan of buy 5 of these, 5 of those, 10 of these etc.

I would wait a little bit before adding a shrimp..I find they are a little fragile, but are very cool

Good to know about the shrimp! Thanks :) I will for sure hold off on them then :)

Quote:

Originally Posted by FFGirl (Post 706183)

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!!

You won't need to add any chemicals to your tank for some time. Any good salt will have what you need to cycle your tank, keep fish and soft corals. When you start adding LPS or SPS corals they will start depleting calcium and other minerals from your system. The salt you use may still be sufficient and you should never add any chemicals to your tank without testing the water to see if you actually need to or not. As far as shrimp go I would wait until your tank is fully cycled and ready for fish. Shrimp are great for getting excess food that makes it by the fish and scavange enough food that you don't have to purposely feed them.

Quote:

Originally Posted by fishytime (Post 706230)

I would agree with almost everything said, except for the dry rock....I hate dry rock....it will cause you nothing but trouble and I will bet my life that Marko rock is not lighter than good live rock....it is basically petrified live rock, so I seriously doubt it will ever have the capacity to be as good as live rock.....dry rock could take anywhere from a couple monthes to a year (or more) before you will be able to count it as part of your biological filtration.....for the 25-30 pounds that you will need for that size tank, I would bite the bullet and get all live rock.....start a tank with 100% live rock and you need to be patient, start a tank with dry rock and you will have to be REALLY patient....I know others will chime in and say that they never had any issues with using dry rock, but I work at a LFS and see and hear about the problems on almost a daily basis...

+1!

I am a firm believer that true liverock is the lifeblood of your system. Personally, I like using really fresh liverock when cycling a new aquarium. Usually the liverock will kick in the cycle for you. You may get a few bad crabs, the odd shrimp but I really think the good (different shades of coraline, nice macro algaes, good critters) outweighs the bad. I usually leave the sand out for a weeks if I go this route. This way you can easily siphon out any "crap" that falls off the rocks while its curing. Get in there and give them a shake or hit them with a powerhead/turkey baster to flush out as much die off as possible.

Liverock is def a tricky subject.... gonna get a lot of opinions on this one. Either way you go take your time, sounds like your on the right track :thumb:

Quote:

Originally Posted by Triggz (Post 706710)

Thanks so much for the advise :) I do want to go the live rock route :) I never thought of leaving the sand out to keep clean up easier :)
All of you guys are awesome :) I so appreciate all of the time you have all given me!!!

So YAYYY!!! I am off to go and buy my tank this afternoon!! I am very excited in spite of the fact that all it will be today is a tank full of salt water lol....but tomorrow will come some live rock!!!

Quote:

Originally Posted by FFGirl (Post 707407)

How has it gone? Is it set up?