General Reef aquarium questions?

Question

I just started a reef tank (after over 10 years of being out of the hobby) and i don't know what chemicals/supplements i need to add to the tank and also, what i need to do. here is what i have at this point. the tank 50 gallons and has been running for a week now. I have a skimmer, pc lights, sump, 60 lbs of live sand, 70 lbs of live rock, 3 damsels, 20 hermit crabs, and a few mushrooms that were given to me (don't know if they'll live, but we'll see). i'm dosing calcium, iron, strontium...and i'm using mixed salt...meaning, it came in a bag. i know that i want to add iodine, but i can't remember what kind it was that the skimmer doesn't pick up, and also what else do i need to add? can i keep basic corals like mushrooms at this point? also, what else can i add to speed up the coraline algae growth? i know i can add that stuff purple up, but it seems that all it had was calcium, so i didn't see a point. any suggestions on anything else would help too. thanks.

Answer 1

First I want to say congradulations, the second thing is why in the world if your tank is only a week old do you have fish and so much live rock already? YIKES. Your tank will need to mature

Tank maturity seems to be even more of an issue without the sand bed. The sand bed just takes some time to get enough nutrients in it to sustain populations and stratify into somewhat stable communities and become functional. So, here's the tank reason, and then I'll blow into some ecology for you. When you get a tank, you start with no populations of anything. You get live rock to form the basis of the biodiversity - and remember that virtually everything is moderated by bacteria and photosynthesis in our tanks. So liverock is the substrate for all these processes, and also has a lot of life on it. How much depends on a lot of things.

Mostly, marine animals and plants don’t like to be out of water for a day at a time...much less the many days to sometimes a week that often happens. So, assuming you are not using existing rock from a tank, or the well-treated aquacultured stuff, you have live rock that is either relatively free of anything alive to begin with, or you have live rock with a few stragglers and a whole lot of stuff dying or about to die because it won’t survive in the tank. Some, if not most, rock exporters have a “curing process” that gets rid of a lot of the life to begin with and some of this is to keep it from dying and fouling further, but some of it would have lived if treated more carefully.

From the moment you start, you are in the negative. Corallines will be dying, sponges, dead worms and crustaceans and echinoids and bivalves, many of which are in the rock and you won't ever see. Not to mention the algae, cyanobacteria, and bacteria, most of which is dehydrated, dead or dying, and will decompose. This is where the existing bacteria get kick started. Bacteria grow really fast, and so they are able to grow to levels that are capable of uptaking nitrogen within...well, the cycling time of a few weeks to a month or so. The “starter bacteria” products give me a chuckle. Anyone with a passing knowledge of microbiology would realize that for a product to contain live bacteria in a medium that sustains it would quickly turn into a nearly solid mass of bacteria, and if the medium is such that it keeps them inactive, then the amount of bacteria in a bottle is like adding a grain of salt to the ocean compared to what is going to happen quickly in a tank with live rock in it.

However, if you realize the doubling time of these bugs, you would know that in a month, you should have a tank packed full of bacteria and no room for water. That means something is killing or eating bacteria. Also realize that if you have a tank with constant decomposition happening at a rate high enough to spike ammonia off the scale, you have a lot of bacteria food...way more than you will when things stop dying off and decomposing. So, bacterial growth may have caught up with the level of nitrogen being produced, but things are still dying...you just test zero for ammonia because there are enough bacteria present to keep up with the nitrogen being released by the dying stuff. It does not necessarily mean things are finished decomposing or that ammonia is not being produced.

Now, if things are decomposing, they are releasing more than ammonia. Guess what dead sponges release? All their toxic metabolites. Guess what else? All their natural antibiotic compounds which prevents some microbes from doing very well. Same with the algae, the inverts, the cyano, the dinoflagellates, etc. They all produce things that can be toxic – and sometimes toxic to things we want, and sometimes to things we don’t want. So, let's just figure this death and decomposition is going take a while.

OK, so now we have a tank packed with some kinds of bacteria, probably not much of others. Eventually the death stops. Now, what happens to all that biomass of bacteria without a food source? They die. Some continue on at an equilibrium level with the amount of nutrients available. And, denitrification is a slow process. Guess what else? Bacteria also have antibiotics, toxins, etc. all released when they die. But, the die-off is slow, relative to the loss of nutrients, and there is already a huge population, and yet you never test ammonia. "The water tests fine.” But, all these swings are happening. Swings of death, followed by growth until limited, then death again, then nutrients available for growth, and then limitation and death. But, every time, they get less and less, but they keep happening – even in mature tanks. Eventually, they slow and stabilize.

What's left? A tank with limited denitrification (because its slow and aerobic things happen fast) and a whole lot of other stuff in the water. Who comes to the rescue and thrives during these cycles? The next fastest growing groups...cyanobacteria, single celled algae, protists, ciliates, etc. Then they do their little cycle thing. And then the turf algae take advantage of the nutrients (the hair algae stage). Turfs get mowed down by all the little amphipods that are suddenly springing up because they have a food source. Maybe you've bought some snails by now, too, or a fish. And the fish dies, of course, because it may not have ammonia to contend with, but has water filled with things we can't and don't test for...plus, beginning aquarists usually skimp on lights and pumps initially, and haven't figured out that alkalinity test, so pH and O2 are probably swinging wildly at this point.

So, the algae successions kick in, and eventually you have a good algal biomass that handles nitrogen, produces oxygen through photosynthesis, takes up the metabolic CO2 of all the other heterotrophs you can’t see, the bacteria have long settled in and also deal with nutrients, and the aquarium keeper has probably stopped adding fish for a spell because they keep dying. Maybe they started to visit boards and read books and get the knack of the tank a bit. They have probably also added a bunch of fix-it-quick chemicals that didn’t help any, either. Also, they are probably scared to add corals that would actually help with the photosynthesis and nutrient uptake, or they have packed in corals that aren't tolerant of those conditions.

About a year into it, the sand bed is productive and has stratified, water quality is stable, and the aquarist has bought a few more powerheads, understands water quality a bit, corallines and algae, if not corals and other things are photosynthesizing well, and the tank is "mature." That's when fish stop dying when you buy them (at least the cyanide free ones) and corals start to live and grow and I stop getting posts about "I just bought a coral and its dying and my tank is two months old" and they start actually answering some questions here and there instead of just asking questions (though we should all always be asking questions, if not only to ourselves!).

So, ecologically, this is successional population dynamics. Its normal, and it happens when there is a hurricane or a fire, or whatever. In nature though, you have pioneer species that are eventually replaced by climax communities. We usually try and stock immediately with climax species. And find it doesn't always work.

Now, the "too mature" system is the old tank syndrome. Happens in nature, too. That whole forest fire reinvigorating the system is true. Equally true on coral reefs where the intermediate disturbance hypothesis is the running thought on why coral reefs maintain very high diversity...they are stable, but not too stable, and require storms, but not catastrophic ones....predation, but not a giant blanket of crown of thorns, mass bleaching, or loss of key herbivores.

This goes to show what good approximations these tanks are of mini-ecosystems. Things happen much faster in tanks, but what do you expect given the bioload per unit area. So, our climax community happens in a couple years rather than a couple of centuries. Thing is, I am fully convinced that intermediate tank disturbance would prevent old tank syndrome.

My advice on starting tanks is to plan the habitat you want. Find the animals and corals you like. Learn about the tiny area of the reef you will try and recreate, and do not try to make a whole coral reef in one tank. Then, purchase the equipment required to emulate that environment. Then, add the appropriate types of substrate (sand, rubble, rock, whatever) and wait long after “your tank water tests fine” before you add fish and corals. First, add herbivores and maintain water quality. Water changes, carbon, skimming, alkalinity, calcium. Keep the water of high quality, even for things you can’t test for. Wait a few months and enjoy the growth that will happen. Then, add some of the species that you plan to keep….invertebrates and corals. They help create the environment, and also photosynthesize, add biodiversity, stabilize nutrients, etc. Then….then….add fish. The fish will have a reef as their new home. They won’t be stressed by this variable bouilllabaise of water and a strange habitat that keeps changing as things are added or die. They will have a stable tank with real habitat, and then the original concept you imagined will have happened.

With that being said, I use nano reef A&B. This adds everything you need to your tank with no guess work or bottles of various chemicals. That is really all you need. It also contains a buffer to keep the PH where it needs to be for corals and live rock.

You really shouldn't even consider corals until your tank has not only cycled but matured. There will not be enough bacteria to support it. You may want to reconsider as well the amount of crab life you have since the hermits will attack the soft corals if there isn't enough food in the tank.

Honestly, let your tank run as is for a while and see what happens. As I mentioned, your live rock is slowly going to die off when the ammonia spikes hit. If you have any other salt questions feel free to email me and I will do my best to help you.

Answer 2

Depending on the quality of your salt mix and your water source, and your frequency of water changes, you may not need to dose much of anything.

Salt mixes can vary greatly - some are dried sea water, so they have everything that would naturally occur (plus some pollutants that don't!). I use synthetic sea salt, but even these vary in their trace elements. Some are okay for fish-only tank, but, like you, I keep a variety of inverts & soft corals, so look for trace element content. Calcium, strontium, and magnesium will be used up fairly rapidly, but with frequent water changes, you'll be replacing them. I only add an iodine supplement (Kent) to my tank with Xenia. I do (or at least attempt!) 25% weekly water changes in all my tanks - if I have to miss a week on a marine, I'll add a dose of Kent's "Essential Elements" which adds the four above, plus manganese, iron, molybendum, and potassium.

I bring up water source because if you're using RO water, the calcium and magnesium will be decreased. I use OsmoPrep to bring it back up. I also use kalkwasser to increase my calcium and keep the pH up around 8.4 - I also have some macroalgae (Caulerpa, halimeda, some others) that like the extra calcium & high pH.

Your mushrooms should be okay with your set-up. As long as you pH is 8.3-8.4, you should only need to add calcium to get the coraline algae going.

I'd get rid of the damsels unless these are what you want to keep - these are pretty territorial and will harrass anything else put into the tank. If you want to keep something in the damsel group, green chromis are peaceful and can be kept in a school or the ocellaris, percula, and skunk clows are more semi-aggressive and you could keep one of the species as a pair.

Answer 3

You shouldn't have to dose right now, everything is in the sea salt.
I start dosing with bio-cal AFTER 2 months, it has all 70 trace eliments needed and will speed up Coraline algae.(get a good calcium test kit)
I would lose the damsels they are NOT NEEDED, your tank will cycle very quickly with the live rock and sand.
With That much live rock(AWSOME), I'm Willing to BET that The Mushroom Polyps will survive but I usualy wait for about 2 weeks.
Try this site.
http://www.captivereefing.com/index.php
While you are on the site you may find some of my pics, Most of them are from 5-6 months running, there are a few when it was going through it's ALGAE STAGE.LOL(It's going to hapen to you too)lol.
Good luck and enjoy.

Answer 4

Man, this is the wrong place to ask a question like that! You already know more about marine tanks than 99% of the people here, including me...

If I were you, I would try going to a saltwater website and asking there. They would have many more people who are actually conversant in marine terms and how to get a reef tank up and running.

Here is a link to "The Reef Tank." Check it out.

http://thereeftank.com/forums/images/trtheader5b-800/images/trtheader5b-800_05.jpg

Are you sure you don't have a cichlid question? I could actually help with that....

Answer 5

DanielleZ and copperhead are the two most knowledgable about salt water on this site. Listen to them.