A NCAA athlete's 26 bowfront slooow build

[jmacc702]

Originally Posted by heranatomy

i love your naked clown--so cute! and im loving the aquascape, it looks so neat

Thank you!!

Question for everyone else.. How long does it normally take for nitrites to go down? I haven't added any organic material since the initial start of the cycle, should I add more?

[Willster]

How often are you doing water changes?

[jmacc702]

Originally Posted by Willster

How often are you doing water changes?

I haven't done a single water change, I was under the impression you are only supposed to add top off water during the cycle. Am I mistaken?

[Charley Diesing]

Originally Posted by jmacc702

I haven't done a single water change, I was under the impression you are only supposed to add top off water during the cycle. Am I mistaken?

You should do 10% water changes every week. I would go with 3 gallon a week. That will keep your Nitrates in check...

Something has to take your nitrates out...
There is several ways to do that. Macro algaes absorb nitrates. a good Protein skimmer will take out some. And of course water changes!

From the initial cycle often times the Nitrates are high. So doing a 50% water change is suggest to to make a dent in those nitrates!

Hope this helped.

[jmacc702]

Originally Posted by Charley Diesing

You should do 10% water changes every week. I would go with 3 gallon a week. That will keep your Nitrates in check...

Something has to take your nitrates out...
There is several ways to do that. Macro algaes absorb nitrates. a good Protein skimmer will take out some. And of course water changes!

From the initial cycle often times the Nitrates are high. So doing a 50% water change is suggest to to make a dent in those nitrates!

Hope this helped.

All great information! Much appreciated, but my issue is with the nitrites not nitrates at this moment. Although in sure I will have a nitrate issue at some point lol

[moore1811]

Originally Posted by jmacc702

All great information! Much appreciated, but my issue is with the nitrites not nitrates at this moment. Although in sure I will have a nitrate issue at some point lol

Well this means your nitrifying bacteria are still building up. It's composed of four basic steps.
Ammonia: Ammonia (NH3) initially enters the system via biological waste. These wastes may come from fish poop or dead organisms which are decaying in the tank. These wastes mineralize into the compound ammonia. Ammonia is a very toxic compound. Bacteria which colonize rock and sand surfaces utilize ammonia as food and convert it into a new compound called nitrite. Ammonia should always measure zero in a fully cycled tank.

Nitrite: Nitrite (NO2) is only slightly less toxic than ammonia. Fortunately, there are other types of bacteria that also colonize sand and rock surfaces which consume nitrites as food and convert them into nitrates. Nitrites should always measure zero in a fully cycled tank.

Nitrate: Nitrate (NO3) is a relatively harmless compound. Nitrates tend to accumulate in the reef system if it is not setup correctly. Fish can tolerate fairly high nitrate levels, but most corals do not. Nitrate is also a plant fertilizer, so its accumulation can lead to algae problems. The brute force way to control nitrates is to do large water changes and therefore dilute the nitrate levels, but there is a better, more natural way to deal with nitrates. Nitrates in a fully cycled tank should ideally remain at zero, but up to about 20ppm is acceptable. Higher levels may lead to issues with coral health or algae growth in the tank. Some corals may actually benefit from the higher nitrate levels, but they are atypical.

Nitrogen: In a properly setup reef tank, the nitrates can be further processed by special types of bacteria which convert the nitrates into harmless nitrogen gases which escape into the atmosphere. When the process includes this step, the nitrogen cycle is completed and the tank will maintain zero nitrates without significant water changes or the requirement for specialized external equipment to remove it from the system. The key to this final step is to provide oxygen poor areas of sand or rock. The bacteria which perform this last step of the process only live in oxygen poor (anaerobic) areas of the tank. The surest way to establish these anaerobic areas is to include a sand bed that has sufficient depth and sufficiently small particle size to restrict water flow in the lower areas of the bed.

So basically, you're in between steps 2 and 3 if Nitrites are your problem.

[Willster]

What they said haha.

[jmacc702]

Cycle is finally complete. Drip acclimating some snails and hermits. Have yet to get any new fish for QT or otherwise. ImageUploadedByTapatalk1341627552.534773.jpg

[jmacc702]

Over the past couple of weeks I added a pair of clowns, a candy cane coral, and a small zoa frag..

I added a cleaner shrimp today and that's about it as far as updates go.

Sorry for the iPhone pic but it's all I have lol ImageUploadedByTapatalk1344908196.576689.jpg

[jmacc702]

I have two sps frags (birdsnest I believe), An orange/purple lobo that has small flecks of green, A small frogspawn, a blastos frag, a bubble coral, a duncan frag, and some zoas. All are still small but have plenty of room to grow.

I also have my pair of clowns, a royal gramma, red stripe dwarf angel, an emerald crab, a skunk cleaner shrimp, and my CUC..

[jmacc702]

iPhone FTS.. It's all I have. Its looks kind of rough but it's getting there slowly. ImageUploadedByTapatalk1348869447.680747.jpg

[mgproudfit]

Did I miss something? I thought you had a B&W clown along with a naked clown? If you still have those, in conjunction with your ocellaris pair, you're a brave man. Most folks strongly recommend to only have 1 pair max in any small-ish tank.

-Matt

[jmacc702]

Unfortunately my naked and b&w clown died in QT. It was 110% my fault and a very tough lesson to learn. :/ that naked clown was my favorite!!

[mgproudfit]

Originally Posted by jmacc702

Unfortunately my naked and b&w clown died in QT. It was 110% my fault and a very tough lesson to learn. :/ that naked clown was my favorite!!

Ah bummer, that sucks! If you don't mind sharing, what happened?

-Matt

[jmacc702]

Originally Posted by mgproudfit

Ah bummer, that sucks! If you don't mind sharing, what happened?

-Matt

I had to go out of town for a weekend and thought I could sneak by for a few days without a water change (my QT was bare, no beneficial bacteria) and I came home to two dead clowns. I assume it was from ammonia poisoning. I still bang my head on the wall for it, I got that naked clown for $20.. Idk what they're worth but I feel like thats a steal! Not to mention they were my first saltwater fish, so naturally I was super attached. No use crying over spilled milk I suppose, you live and you learn.

[aydemir]

Nice tank man, will definitely be following this thread. I had a similar experience with my clown, but he hasn't passed yet, hopefully he recovers...
Also, the aquascape is sick! I didnt read thru the whole thread, what kind of lighting do you have?

[aydemir]

O btw for the pics when I take pics with my phone, I find that the built in 'cloudy' option for white balance gets rid of the bluish tint, my phone is a samsung galaxy s2