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Adding the first coral and fish: what's the current practice?


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  1. #1

    Default Adding the first coral and fish: what's the current practice?

    As we start up my daughter's tank, she is anxious to add coral and eventually fish. She asked me when is it safe to start adding livestock, and honestly, I drew a BLANK! It has been a LONG time since I have started a tank from scratch, and, to be honest, not sure of the current best practice.

    When I set up my current tank about 5 1/2 years ago, it was with established liver rock, new water, and was supplemented with BioSpira. I literally added the rock, BioSpira, coral, and fish -- partially due to an emergency situation, it literally happened over a 2 hour period. And everything thrived. No losses.

    Practices in this hobby change rapidly. Thought I would query the masses to see what is new in tank start-up philosophies.

    • What is your thinking on when you add your first coral?
    • Are you old school, buying mollies or damsels to cycle the tank?
    • Or get skimmer gunk from someone's tank, toss it in your setup, then wait until ammonia hits 0 before adding livestock?
    • Do you buy something to establish the tank, like BioSpira or something else?


    thx!
    Detroit's oldest large LED tank! Est'd Jan 2005, went LED June 2009. 6' wide 130g reef, Sunbrite T10 LED tubes (3xGen 3 and 1xGen 1), mostly SPS, but chalices, other LPS, and a few softies too.
    http://pjr-reef.blogspot.com/

  2. #2
    XSiVE - Reefkeeper
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    Well as always.. "it all depends" but you know that..

    Are you starting from 100% scratch?

    I've always been the impatient type, and as far as tank set-up i've never lost anything.. I figure toss in at least 25% of the rock as established stuff, throw a cube of frozen food or something else that will decompose (like a shrimp) in there to kick-start it, and let things go for a couple of weeks... run the skimmer with no cup so the inside gets broken in but you arent actually pulling anything out for now. I never liked the 6-8 week crap, I could never wait that long

  3. #3
    jolson10450 - Reefkeeper
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    i always use liverock and try to get already cycled water to put in there. So when you do a water change in your big tank, take the water from it and put it in her tank and that should help speed up the process a bunch. i also do not turn lights on until ammonia and nitrite hit zero and also i never do a water change until nitrites and ammonia are at zero. once they are then i do a 50% water change. at which point i let it sit for a day or 2 then test to be sure they are still at zero and your nitrates are coming down from the past few days when you have been checking it. I then turn on the skimmer after the entire process and 50% water change. i cycled my 29g in 10 days complete cycle from scratch to 20 nitrates which was good enough to add fish and inverts IMO. I wait until things plane out better before adding coral probably a week or 2 after starting with low end stuff like kenya trees etc... i do 20% water changes per week until nitrates drop down to 0-5 then switch it back to every 2 weeks.

    good luck and i hope she likes it!

  4. #4

    Default

    Quote Originally Posted by XSiVE View Post
    Well as always.. "it all depends" but you know that..

    Are you starting from 100% scratch?
    The tank has about 18 gallons of water from my established reef. The other 30 or so is freshly-made from Reef Crystals.

    The live rock is (and will be, once we add more) cycled rock.
    Detroit's oldest large LED tank! Est'd Jan 2005, went LED June 2009. 6' wide 130g reef, Sunbrite T10 LED tubes (3xGen 3 and 1xGen 1), mostly SPS, but chalices, other LPS, and a few softies too.
    http://pjr-reef.blogspot.com/

  5. #5
    XSiVE - Reefkeeper
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    Personally I'd consider it ready to go.. my only hangup would be the status of the skimmer break-in if you're using a skimmer on it.

    I considered your LR for frags post, but even the LR in my sump, I cant really guarantee it doesnt have Majano on it at the moment and the last thing I want to do is give your daughter's new tank a head start on nuisances
    Last edited by XSiVE; 07-24-2010 at 08:38 AM.

  6. #6
    CR Member
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    I would just wait for the ammonia to drop and start adding things slowly. I used all cycled rock, and no water from an established tank. I used damsels and regret it. They where a pain in the arse to get out after I was done cycling. It took me about a week or two for the ammonia to drop, then I added corals and fish slowly. Especially the fish. I've had it set up since mid April, and still not done adding fish. I will add one or two, then wait a few weeks to add anything more fish.I haven't lost anything yet.

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