dunl

Actinics are good for purple coraline growth. I'd keep that for now. And wait until you get something in there with a hint of blue or green on it even....it'll glow like no freshwater fish you have ever seen.

Your welcome. If you put a post on canreef looking for some and mention that you are new, most likely one of the veterans in your area will have some they can spare free of charge, or maybe even $5. Speaking of which, please update your location. Otherwise, no one knows where you are without asking.

It doesn't necessarily reduce water changes as much as it helps to stabilize things. I know some freshwater people like to change their water on a regular basis, bit I was always of the opinion that unless it was dirty or had rising levels of something, it was probably fine. Saltwater can get very expensive if you are changing it regulary too....monthly should be fine if it is stable.

Those are some awesome pics...love the scorpion fish.

the liverock was out of the tank for an hour and half tops.... completely submerged the whole trip

You might be fine then.

i've been doing research for about a year and half now on salt water tanks

Excellent....you should have a good grasp of the basics then.

and i was planning on getting a scooter blenny (dont know if its the same thing)

Nope, they're both blenny's, but different feeding habits. Scooters eat the pods that live in the algae..best left to a large (120+) experienced setup that has lots of pods growing.

how long do you think the cycle will take? about a week or so?

It might not even cycle at all. Check with a test kit to be sure.

also, i saw at big al's they keep some green stringy stuff in the filter... i read its suppose to keep nitrates down.

what is this stuff and does it need a light source( looks like a plant)

Chaetomorpha - it's a type of algae. Grows fast in the right types of lighting. Most people sell it cheap or free, as it can grow quite quickly. Hardy too....some members on canreef used to mail it to each other in a padded envelope.

http://www.google.ca/images?hl=en&safe=off&q=chaetomorpha&um=1&ie=UTF-8&source=og&sa=N&tab=wi&biw=1280&bih=935

JORG is right, should be no problem having them pair up again.

And don't grab them with your hands....they're not called bristleworms for nothing, and those will go right under your skin.

Ok, first of all...congrats.

Secondly, if there was a few hours between the live rock coming out of the tank and going back in, you're most likely going to have a small cycle from some die off of bacteria in the rock. Extremely common, nothing to worry about....just don't put any livestock in there.

Less lighting until the cycle seems complete will help keep the hair algae in check. If you want to get rid of it all, one of these will work:

They're called a lawnmower blenny, and John Deere has NOTHING on these guys. He'll clean a 1.5" growth of hair algae on everything in your tank within two days. I never worry about hair algae, because I like to keep one of these guys usually (I'll transfer him between tanks if he's picky, but usually the pigs eat everything they can once the hair algae is gone).

Let everything settle before you vacuum it off the sand. Another tip is that if you want lots of nice purple coraline algae growing on the rocks is to turn off the powerheads, scrape some of the existing coraline off and let it float around the tank, wait an hour or two, then turn everything one again.

Have you had a chance to do a lot of research? If so, great. If not, make sure you check on everything before you do it just in case. Not much more difficult than freshwater, but there's just some things that you need to know.

What would you do to quarantine them? They freeze in minutes on the ice and are dead by the time I throw them in......

Good chance they could have some bacteria, and as for quarantining...it takes too long for them to be useful as feeders. So you're taking a chance....only way to use live feeders and be really safe is to raise your own, I'm afraid.

Also, you don't NEED a sump. They're great to have, but you can get by fine without them. Just remember that all the filtration (well, almost all) comes from the live rock. Just make sure the water keeps circulating through the tank very well, be VERY slow to stock it, and don't overfeed.

CBG's tank is just an example of a very awesome nano tank setup. He might be a beginner, but as you can see if you know freshwater very well, you can make an easy go of saltwater with your prior knowledge and some good research. With nanos, there is less water, so there is a potential for things to go somewhere in a handbasket very quickly if something happens. Think of his sump as almost doubling the water capacity.

Now think of a larger tank....say a 120 gallon 6ft. Build a nice stand, and put a 90g 4ft in it for the sump, and hide all the pumps, filter media, crabs, mantis shrimp, more live rock, lighting for a refugium to grow pods for a mandarin goby,etc (whatever you don't want in the top tank) and you now have a combined total of 210 gallons in that system. Much more stable if one little thing dies. Depending on the stand, you can build endless combinations for sumps. Only limit is budget, size, and imagination.

Here's a good excellent thread.

http://www.canreef.com/vbulletin/showthread.php?threadid=70778

Is there a recipe for creating marine water /// ROwater and marine salt / how much salt per gallon of ro water

I know this is basic stuff / however I have never done salt before....

Sooo I have a million questions that I need answered by someone experienced and trust me it is apreciated as the litterature on the net is a little confusing.

TY in advance

What you need is a refractometer or hydrometer to calculate the level of salt in the water, or salinity. With this tool, you take a reading of the salinity, and add more salt if needed. BE CAREFUL. You can't remove the salt - sounds silly, I know, but it's really easy to add too much. Refractometers range from cheap to expensive....I use cheap, because that's what I am.

One thing to know about mixing saltwater is that it is caustic for the first 12-24 hours....you can actually burn livestock with new saltwater. So it must sit for a while first. It's also quite cloudy and takes some time and a lot of mixing to dissolve all the salt; therefore, quite easy to add too much salt as you can't see the huge amount that is sitting at the bottom until it's too late. But make sure you have lots of freshwater or RO water on hand, and you can mix and match that with your saltwater to achieve a perfect balance. If you have some saltwater premixed and left over, you now have some left for your next water change, and you can add some RO to that to get it to the correct level.

What you REALLY need is a mentor close by. Easy to ask and answer questions on the net, but so much easier to visit with people or have people come by and show you some tricks and things. I bet if you posted on canreef asking for a mentor, someone close would step up to the plate and nursemate you through the starting processes. It is extremely confusing reading things on the internet. You have all sorts of info out there from really precise, to a very stupid video years ago from a large continent wide retailer showing how to take a fish bowl, throw in some water, pour in some salt, toss in little Nemo (with his scales now burning and sizzling) and voila! You have a finding Nemo fish tank (please return tomorrow for a new fish :chair: ).

Canreef is a much more friendly place to new people than it was when I first joined....probably just a bad time and I hit it during that time. There are quite a lot of good stores up in Edmonton now to get livestock and advice from than there were five years ago too.

HTH.

Thank you

No problem. You could also check to see if anyone has some filter media you could get some dregs from....if you were closer, I'd have some floss you could strain out into the tank to get some bacteria going. Makes a mess, but it can either be filtered out or water changed out.

When curing live rock is it possible to move the process along by installing a temporary filter that has been cycled material from a fresh water tank.........

NO. The bacteria are different strains.

or is it possible to use the fishless cycle procedure with pure amonia to speed up the process or cycle the tank even before the live rock goes in?

YES, you can. :smokey: Some people will toss in a piece of shrimp and let it decay to kickstart things, but ammonia works fine and I would think quicker.

I'm new to these, but I'd concur, having done a lot of research. The bright red ones are the females. The batch I have right now - the males have NO red on them whatsoever.

Yes it would but it continues to happen. I'm sure the mods get paid well so a little extra work shouldn't hurt to much to make this site better

Members policing the site also helps to improve things. I'm afraid I've spent my huge mod salary on removing "Good deal!!!" posts from the classifieds section. :smokey:

Sounds like a good reason for you Edmontonians to go shopping.

Welcome aboard Bill.

Take care everyone and enjoy your holiday...we want to see you all back here safe and sound.

Have you ever looked into saltwater clams? Much more expensive setup, but....

http://www.aquacon.com/clams.html

Welcome aboard!

Welcome aboard!

Once their yolk sacks are gone I feed NLS I have turned into powder in the coffee grinder. (Don't tell my wife)

Let us know if her highlights improve, okay?

nah, no interest in africans (i assume you are speaking of cichlids). although they are beautiful they aren't for me.

No problem. I feel the same about some others myself. :smokey:

i'd have a floor to ceiling rack of 20 longs if i could! great footprint for just about any smaller fish, and it's nice to not get wet armpits when scaping, lol.

thanks for all the great comments everyone

Looks great. :thumbs:

There ARE some African species that will fit into a 20 long if you wanted to try some.

Why not just toss a few pellets in? They will probably like the NLS better anyways. Iv never seen a community fish that did not accept NLS almost instantly.

The problem is that they have been spoiled and don't see the pellets as food. Or even seem to see them at all. The food can hit them on the way down and there is no response.

:smokey:

One more thing you can try is to put some pellets into a pepper grinder, and grind it up so that the grinds float on the top of the water. About as close to flakes as you can get. Hopefully that works.