Lucky Lefty
New member
Hello all,
First let me say thank you as I've been aggressively reading through these forums for the past 3 months learning as much as possible about my new found love/hobby.
Ok, so to start, any newbies like myself may learn a thing or two from my mistakes so far. 3 weeks ago, after spending quite some time building my tank stand and prepping my tank with a beautiful new background, matching gloss black acrylic overflow box covers, with black silicone of course to match, I was finally ready to fill my tank.
So here we are, 3 weeks ago, trip to the LFS to make my first substantial purchase. 2 bags of aragonite live sand to seed my already thoroughly washed dried sand that I cleaned over a period of a week, 2 new filter socks, 26 lbs of gorgeous cured Fiji live rock and of course, 165 gallons of saltwater.
Get home, pour in my live sand, wife and I design the live rock, and we begin pumping in water. This is when the fun gets turned up a notch. As the level of the water gets near the edge of the overflow boxes, I hear a large splash/bubble sound from the other side of the tank. It almost sounded like something jumped in the water. Me, my wife and my friend all said "what the hell was that?!". My incredible logic lead me to say "I don't know, maybe it was air trapped under the sand?" :sad2: . Roughly 5 minutes later, when I couldn't seem to realize why the water was dribbling over the edge of the overflow, I saw complete horror on my friends face as he glanced at the ground near the tank. He didn't even say a word and just ran for the pump. Still dumbfounded, I looked down to see a fine bead of water curling at the base of my tank stand on the carpet of my living room. Upon opening the cabinet door I shut earlier to walk around and check for leaks upon filling, I found my sump box overflowing and about 3 inches of water in the bottom of my stand. JOY. Then it hit me, the air bubble wasn't in the sand idiot, it was your damn return lines dipped into the tank with loc line siphoning all the water in the tank into my sump.
After about 35 gallons of water spilled onto my carpet, and complete panic set in, I drained the tank to just above the sand, put my live rock in a styrofoam box with a pump and heater and had my awesome brother and friends arrive in what seemed like minutes, and carry my tank and stand together about 15' across the room to a tiled floor. Next morning I took the wife to Lowes, she picked out some wood grain ceramic tile, and we began installing it that night and worked the next 3 nights working after work to finish it. That Friday I mopped down the tile like a madman to clean the grout off, had some great friends help carry the tank all the way back across the room and I was back where I started and have learned an immense amount of why and what I did wrong and what I need to do to prevent it from happening again.
So this is where I am, and I hope some one out there makes it this far into reading to help me realize if this is going right.
The rock sat in the box for 5 days and I know almost anything on it pretty much died. I also think the old heater i stuck in there got too warm the last day or 2 in the box and may have had the rock at 90 degrees or even higher. The sand was very foamy the first 2 or 3 days as I stirred it up 2 or 3 times a day, but on the 4th and 5th day it barely made any foam if at all.
Filled up the tank with the water I pulled out originally, which by the way in had to use every last drop of saltwater I had to have enough water to cycle through. Started testing 2 days after cycle and my levels have been pretty much identical since. Ph at 8.0 , ammonia at .25 , nitrite at .1 and no nitrates. Water is at 1.025 salinity and the tank has been 81 degrees since it warmed up around the end of day 2.
Today I found a sponge we noticed that had grown on the rock since I had to put it in the box has nearly disintegrated. I found an empty clam shell in the rock I'm assuming died while in the box, and there are about 4 coral skeletons (I'm guessing) on the rock.
I'm all about being patient, but is there anything I should be doing to get the tank going, or is it already going? Is now the time to start feeding the tank?
I guess I'll end there for now. Congratulations, you made it.
Thanks, greatly appreciated.
First let me say thank you as I've been aggressively reading through these forums for the past 3 months learning as much as possible about my new found love/hobby.
Ok, so to start, any newbies like myself may learn a thing or two from my mistakes so far. 3 weeks ago, after spending quite some time building my tank stand and prepping my tank with a beautiful new background, matching gloss black acrylic overflow box covers, with black silicone of course to match, I was finally ready to fill my tank.
So here we are, 3 weeks ago, trip to the LFS to make my first substantial purchase. 2 bags of aragonite live sand to seed my already thoroughly washed dried sand that I cleaned over a period of a week, 2 new filter socks, 26 lbs of gorgeous cured Fiji live rock and of course, 165 gallons of saltwater.
Get home, pour in my live sand, wife and I design the live rock, and we begin pumping in water. This is when the fun gets turned up a notch. As the level of the water gets near the edge of the overflow boxes, I hear a large splash/bubble sound from the other side of the tank. It almost sounded like something jumped in the water. Me, my wife and my friend all said "what the hell was that?!". My incredible logic lead me to say "I don't know, maybe it was air trapped under the sand?" :sad2: . Roughly 5 minutes later, when I couldn't seem to realize why the water was dribbling over the edge of the overflow, I saw complete horror on my friends face as he glanced at the ground near the tank. He didn't even say a word and just ran for the pump. Still dumbfounded, I looked down to see a fine bead of water curling at the base of my tank stand on the carpet of my living room. Upon opening the cabinet door I shut earlier to walk around and check for leaks upon filling, I found my sump box overflowing and about 3 inches of water in the bottom of my stand. JOY. Then it hit me, the air bubble wasn't in the sand idiot, it was your damn return lines dipped into the tank with loc line siphoning all the water in the tank into my sump.
After about 35 gallons of water spilled onto my carpet, and complete panic set in, I drained the tank to just above the sand, put my live rock in a styrofoam box with a pump and heater and had my awesome brother and friends arrive in what seemed like minutes, and carry my tank and stand together about 15' across the room to a tiled floor. Next morning I took the wife to Lowes, she picked out some wood grain ceramic tile, and we began installing it that night and worked the next 3 nights working after work to finish it. That Friday I mopped down the tile like a madman to clean the grout off, had some great friends help carry the tank all the way back across the room and I was back where I started and have learned an immense amount of why and what I did wrong and what I need to do to prevent it from happening again.
So this is where I am, and I hope some one out there makes it this far into reading to help me realize if this is going right.
The rock sat in the box for 5 days and I know almost anything on it pretty much died. I also think the old heater i stuck in there got too warm the last day or 2 in the box and may have had the rock at 90 degrees or even higher. The sand was very foamy the first 2 or 3 days as I stirred it up 2 or 3 times a day, but on the 4th and 5th day it barely made any foam if at all.
Filled up the tank with the water I pulled out originally, which by the way in had to use every last drop of saltwater I had to have enough water to cycle through. Started testing 2 days after cycle and my levels have been pretty much identical since. Ph at 8.0 , ammonia at .25 , nitrite at .1 and no nitrates. Water is at 1.025 salinity and the tank has been 81 degrees since it warmed up around the end of day 2.
Today I found a sponge we noticed that had grown on the rock since I had to put it in the box has nearly disintegrated. I found an empty clam shell in the rock I'm assuming died while in the box, and there are about 4 coral skeletons (I'm guessing) on the rock.
I'm all about being patient, but is there anything I should be doing to get the tank going, or is it already going? Is now the time to start feeding the tank?
I guess I'll end there for now. Congratulations, you made it.
Thanks, greatly appreciated.
