The beginning of a trek

[GPWS2K]

Hi all!

After pouring over as many threads as I could and trying to absorb as much information as I could, I've decided to purchase my very own stomatopod; G. smithii to be exact. Here's the catcher though:

I have never owned a saltwater aquarium, let alone a live reef tank! :lol:

So! I'll be hitting it head on with two fronts: Caring for an awesomely aggressive inveterate, and caring for an awesomely finicky miniature see of coral.

What my initial setup is: a 55 gallon tank for my main tank, a 10 gallon separate tank that will be later used as a sump tank or for just a food starter tank (I plan to spoil G. smithii on a healthy diet of entertaining crabs), and two live rocks, one for each tank. My LFS has supplied me with a 'starter pack' of sorts, giving me livesand, sugar sized 'dead' sand and fauxcrete rocks as an add-in bonus to the filters/pumps/salt/heaters I purchased.

Well, I'm off to find an appropriate container to transport/salinate/declorify my water so I can get this water-zoo on the road. I'll see if I can get pictures posted of my poorly lit living room by tonight. Just wanted to let everyone know that they had another member floating around!

Thanks!
Jack

 

[hpmcbroom]

GPW :beer: welcome :beer:
to reefcentral I understand your interest as I share it I recently purchased a Peacock mantis and he is doing great but may I suggest that before you bring your fella home give your tank time I did'nt wait long enough and he is doing ok but my tank is still going thru mini cycles. I know he is doing great he feeds well and is coming out more often but I think next time I'll wait longer.

 

[GPWS2K]

I'm thinking I'll wait a good 3-5 weeks, or until the parameters of the tank start to change less than 2% per day. I haven't ordered my smithii yet, so I really don't have a rush other than seedeing the fauxcrete rock. I have a feeling that won't be too difficult, though.

 

[stepho]

Welcome aboard.

I would recommend using RO/DI water instead of dechlorinated tap water. The water treatment doesn't remove everything, it leaves all the heavy metals (including copper), phosphates, nitrates, etc. Plus its hard to tell what else might have leaked into your water supply (pesticides, fertilizers, etc.)

 

[Thurge]

Howdy. Glad to have another mantis fan.

Something I recommend to everybody is to pick up a copy of The Conscienceous Marine Aquarist by Robert Fenner. Its a good book on the basics of keeping a marine aquarium. It also includes some more advanced information so its good for beginners and more advanced keepers.
There are other good, basic books; but this is my favorite and you can even find it at Petco/Petsmart.

 

[Koshmar]

Thurge is correct, I have that same book sitting on my shelf at home. I started out the exact same way you did. No experience with aquariums at all. I just read as much as I could for about six months and went straight into a mantis reef, got some moré mantids (4 at one time) graduated to cuttlefish, went back to mantis shrimp and loved the ride. This hobby taught me so much, though expensive you have embarked on an interesting adventure. Welcome.

 

[GPWS2K]

Hey guys, thanks for the welcome!

The tanks have started to settle down a bit, the 10 gallon is already clear as can be and setting at good salinity, 1.021. The larger tank is still somewhat of a sandstorm and at 1.022 salinity, so I'm quite a happy newbie-reef keeper at the moment.

stepho: Would a cheaper, under-sink version of this work? I happen to work at a hardware store and know that my plumbing section has a 3-stage reverse osmosis system for about $35. Other than time and time between filter changes, what benefits would a larger system offer?

Thurge/Koshmar: I'll be running to PetSmart tonight to see about that book, probably a niche of the hobby I should actually put a little coin down. As for the overall cost of the hobby, I've found that it's not so bad for my position. I'm getting most of the expensive equipment from a local college, as they are upgrading to larger appliances/tanks. I've had the chance to realize a quite small start up capitol for this hobby, as my tanks have been free. What I'll be eventually have a chance at inheriting:

Another 55g with stand
A 100+ gallon tank (offered to me at a low price) with metal stand
Pre-built sump with micro bubble filters
Protein strainers (2), both large enough for 100 gallons of water
Four 10 gallon stand alone tanks with heaters, headers, and cascade filters.

How much of this I will actually pick up and utalize remains to be unknown, But I have a feeling I'll at least pick up the two large tanks and two more small tanks to use as sumps.

As a question: What do you guys use as aquascaping tools? I have a fear that putting my arm in the tank will contaminate it, so I'd like to put my deadrocks in with something that is a little more... Clean. Also, I need to move some sand around as a large washout area was created when pouring in water mix.

Jack

 

[teddyzaper]

you can use your hand it wont do anything at this stage. if not you can use a glove, they sell them at marine depot and other aquarium stores online. try and get the harder blue and orange ones if you are going to get one, but honestly you should just use your hand.

 

[re_sjo]

I strongly recommend that if you intend to run a sump in the future, that you go back and implement that change now. It's a royal pain to do in the future and using overflows and stuff isn't always reliable.

 

[GPWS2K]

Well, it's been a little over a month now and I think one of the tanks is ready, but I want some second opinions.

The larger of my two tanks has a light coating of brown/red all over the sand and most of the rock, and the WQ tests look like:
Nitrite 0ppm
Ammonia 0ppm
KH 143.2pmm
Nitrate 0ppm
Calcium 340mg/L
Phosphate 0ppm

During the curing time, though, there was no huge bloom of green algae, leading me to think that the tank is not ready.

The 10g tank has nearly the same readings (125.3ppm KH instead) but has had a HUGE green algae bloom that isn't going away.

Any thoughts? Is the 55g tank ready for a mantis?

 

[Koshmar]

The red and brown stuff is probably cyno and diatoms respectively. Nothing to be concerned about, all new tanks have these. Low nutrient levels, decent flow, lower photo periods will slow the grow. In time it will go away if you do everything correctly. My tank was seeded with rock and sand from an existing reef tank so I practically had no cycle and added livestock in ~10 days with no problem. Your tank is ready IMO considering you said it was seeded in a similar fashion. The algae in the 10 could be from high light levels and phosphates. You can test 0 for PO4 and still have enough for algae to utilize. No big deal really, most tanks have an algae bloom anyway early on. I'd wait a bit on the ten though just cuz it's a smaller tank. Kh = kdh maybe? Been so long since I monitored kdh so I can't remember proper levels. Everything else looks good. Are you sure those tanks were never treated with copper? Are you topping off with RO water?

 

[GPWS2K]

The KH test in my test kit said it measured water hardness, or calcium hardness. I don't know if the tanks had been treated with anything beforehand as I got them used.

Unfortunately, I don't have a RO system to utilize, so I'm just treating my city water and letting it set about a day or so before adding it.

Thanks for the insight, I'll start trying to source a smithii now
Jack

 

[jhoskins]

I let my tank cycle a few months before adding mine and still had to cage him in my 29gallons as my 50gallon was still doing mini cycles.

 

[Koshmar]

Not sure how you're treating it but that could be why there's an algae bloom and cyno. Best thing would be to get an RO unit. Relatively expensive up front but it will save you in the long run. If the tanks have been treated with copper, inverts could die, especially mantis shrimp. Might want to test for copper first. I guess it couldn't hurt to wait longer for minicycles but I think you're fine. Cycles depend mostly on how you set everything up and nutrient levels versus bacterial population.