Define: Established.

[LJA]

Well I've had some great skill in the past 8 months with my first reef tank (I mean luck), with my 29G setup I have maintained a mixed reef consisting of various LPS and soft corals along with my four fish and everything has been great so far. The only fatality I've had was one of the two chromis' that I added to my tank at first which died within about an hour. The other one did fine but was eventually caught and sold back to my LFS to make room for my other fish.

I've done a lot of research and have decided I have enough knowlegde to try some more difficult corals and inverts. I would like to purchase an anemone for my clownfish pairs but am unsure if my tank is stable enough.

Consistantly these are my parameters:

Ammonia: 0
Nitrite: <1ppm
Nitrate: < 1ppm
PH: 8.3 - 8.5
SG: 1.024-1.025
Tempurature: 80-82 F
Calcium: 450+
Alkalinity: 7-8dKH
Magnesium: 1400+


One problem that I do have is a slight growth of cyanobacteria on the sand. It started up about a month ago with the addition of a few new peices of coral and LR. I have it under control (not preading) but is a RPITA to get ride of. I'm considering using a chemical solution like chemi-clean or whatever the red slime remover one is called.

Current tank Inhabitants:

Black O clown
Orange O clown
Coral Beauty Angel
Purple Psuedochromis
Coral Banded Shrimp
Misc Snails
LPS , Softies , Mushrooms


29G Tank
29G Sump
Fuge
DSB
PO4 Reactor
ATO with KALK
Octopus NW-200 Skimmer
T5 HO Lights

I have enough lighting, but would it be wise to add an anemone now? is there anything else I can do to kill the cyanobactera (would a chemical be ok to use?)


I appreciate the help.

 

[SteveJakubiec]

I wouldn't use a chemical to control the cyano. Just reduce your lighting, do water changes, and watch your feeding habits as that is introducing phosphates to your system. Are you using RO water? That would help greatly. I noticed you didn't list your phosphates you might want to test for that.

You nitrite is a little high, maybe problem from adding the new live rock, was it fully cured before it was added?
To be on the safe side I would try to focus on controlling that first, and getting those nitrites to zero.


Good Luck,
Steve

 

[an411]

Yeah I did more frequent water changes and tried to get out as much as I could manually and left the lights off for 3 days corals are not going to be happy but they will live and it kicked the nasty cyano on the sand issue. I think that you are ok to add an anemone 8 months is sufficient in my opinion

 

[Sk8r]

no chemicals to cure cyano: you'll crash your tank, imho. Imprecision with dosage on nano-tank, lack of skimming. Just forget it, turn the lights out on it a few days when it bugs you: do that before you get a nem, however, as you really have to mind your stability when settling in a nem.

 

[seapug]

Try a phosban reactor and GFO to help with the Cyano. I would not add anything else to the tank until the cyano is under control and your nitrite levels are undetectable. A fully cycled tank should never register measurable ammonia or nitrite with a hobby test kit.

 

[IslandCrow]

If your test kits are showing any detectible nitrite in an 8 month old tank, my guess is that the test kit is bad, or more likely, you're just misreading the results. Overall, your parameters look OK. I agree with waiting until that cyano goes away. Using some GFO is certainly a good suggestion. I, personally, would recommend waiting at least a year for an anemone if this is your first tank. Many people recommend 6 months, which is probably fine to mature the tank, but I'd say the owner of the tank needs at least a year of maturity in your basic reef husbandry. Some people get anemones early and get lucky. I'm one of those who got an anemone too early, and then struggled for almost a year before I really got it right.