New 29g BioCube Questions

[Indy597]

Hey everyone,
I've been lurking on here since 2007 and am just now setting up my first reef (slow learner I guess). Anyway - I've got some questions that I hope are fairly simple.

1. I've had the tank set up for 12 days now w/ 27lbs of the best looking purple encrusted live rock I could find locally. lots of little critters all over it. Unfortunately there were a couple Aiptasia popping up - I put a couple peppermint shrimp in there and they started ripping into them in about 30 seconds...I haven't seen one since the first night I put them in....anyway, temp and parameters are stable:
.026sg
78-79deg F
0ppm ammonia
0ppm nitrite
trace nitrate

So my first question is: is there any reason I should continue to wait to begin slowly stocking the tank? My LFS guy said its good to wait to allow all the microinvertebrates to reproduce and establish themselves but you all know how hard it is to wait especially when the tank seems to be stable.

My second question is what order shoudl the tank be stocked? Corals first, then cleaning crew, then fish?

Finally... what hours should I run the lights? I've heard about a dozen different opinions on this. Right now actinics turn on at 11am, full lighting at 12pm, full lights off at 8pm, actinics off at 9pm...I leave the LED moon lights on all the time, I dont see any reason to have those on and off on a timer....is this timing schedule ok?

thats all for now...looking forward to your feedback.

Thanks!

 

[Denbf58]

have you seen an ammonia spike yet ? the tank needs to cycle if it did not start with lr try adding some food to the tank you need to see ammonia then nitrite then nitrate when you get all 0's your good to go CUC first corals then fish

 

[abulgin]

How long have you had the live rock in the tank? I assume it was fully cured? If so, then you probably won't see any cycle at all. That's the beauty of fully cured live rock (and why you pay more for it!). You can start adding animals now, but I would go very slowly. I would add your cleanup crew first--probably 6 hermits (red legged and/or blue legged) and 6 snails (I like Ceriths and Astrea). You could also add a single, small fish, but you could also wait a week from the time you added your live rock just to make sure that everything is settled. I wouldn't add corals for a couple months. You'll have much better success/luck with corals if you wait until your tank ages a bit, allowing the critters that came in on the live rock, such as the pods, to multiply. Also, I can guaranty you that you will soon go through a diatom bloom (brown scummy film covering sand, rocks and glass). This will go away in about 2 weeks on it's own--don't freak out. I would at least wait until your diatoms are gone. You'll also likely see a cyanobacterial/red slime outbreak during the first year. If you're doing everything right (using RO/DI water, weekly or bi-weekly water changes, not overfeeding, good internal flow with no dead spots, etc.), the cyano will eventually go away--don't go nuts and buy every phosphate remover in the universe to try and beat this the first year. Note that every living thing needs some phosphate to live, so you don't want to remove 100% of it. Anyway, remember to be patient.

 

[Michael]

if you never posted here http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&postid=14804437#post14804437 and introduced yourself then consider your self an alien:lol: seriously though if the rock was cycled when you bought it then you may never see a cycle and so you could start adding livestock