Help!!

[arakeel]

Hi everyone
I am very new to keeping seahorses (this being my very first marine setup) and I have had 2 Southern Knights for 3 days now and one of them isn't looking very healthy and is very pale. Could someone plz help before I lose him???? Whats wrong with him and how do I fix him??

Also new to this forum stuff so plz forgive me :fish2:

[cichlid nutz]

How long did you cycle the tank before introducing the seahorses?
Amount of flow?
Other inhabitants?

[arakeel]

We had the setup for 3 weeks and was told when purchasing the water that it was all fine to go as it was aged water. There is nothing else in the tank at all just the 2 southern knights. I have tested the water and it all seems fine (i had to get the KH levels up before they went into the tank but that was all sorted before i put them in)

[Lateralus]

Well it doesn't sound like the tank cycled then. It just sounds like they had you put some dirty tank water into your setup. Water that's "aged" is useless when setting up a tank because the bacteria thats job it is to break down your initial waste lives on a surface area like live rock, live sand or even a used filter sponge. The initial cycle works like this. Once the tanks set up with water, you toss in your bacteria source preferably a live rock. Then add in a source of ammonia, you can use fish food or a store bought shrimp. Once that starts rotting you'll start seeing ammonia rise is your tank. As a result the first bacteria in the cycle will start to multiply to feed on the ammonia to break that down into nitrites. Now a second group of bacteria begins to develop and breaks nitrites down into nitrAtes. Once you are no longer seeing and ammonia and nitrItes in your system the tank is cycled. You can then manage the nitrAtes through periodic water changes and or macro algae that consumes the nitrates to grow.

[bnumair]

there is no such thing as aged water. lfs will sell u dirt as gold.
check for ammonia and nitrites i bet u they are high as ur tank is not cycled.
if thats the case then i doubt ur horses will survive the cycle. i would return them or take them to some other fellow reefer with established tank till ur tank cycles and gets on track.