How do I know if my newly purchased live rock is CURED???

[Anonymous]

water change and less fish. I am not a tang police kind of guy but I have a 46 with a flame angel and 2 clowns. I got rid of a tang that out grew his home quickly not to long ago but probably should have sooner. That is probably your issue. Just a bit of a bioload overload.

 

[dnorton1978]

Can i just "ride" this thing out???????
Following is a detailed summary of the past 3 days..

Saturday consisted of my normal weekly water change of 8 - 10 gallons. I cleaned extra good this time moving around rocks and cleaning under. I put everything back, and added new rocks, about 10 lbs. Later i deteted some nitrite, about .15% or so. The next morning, Sunday nitrite was normal. I rechecked all chemicals and found everything normal (amonia, ph, SG, Nitrite) except nitrate. The nitrate was .20. Sunday i did a water change of about 15-18 gallons. The nitrate was down to maybe .15 % and everything else normal. I notice last night (sunday) my corals were mostly closed. I assume it is from all the water changes, and being moved around. Sunday i prepared another 20 gallons of water for a water change today(monday). THis morning i got up at 6:30, and did the 20 gallon water change. An hour later i checked some levels(did not have enough time for all daughter had to go to school) ph 8.2, SG 1.25, and nitrite was .20 . I did not get to check amonia or nitrate. I went back to the LFs that sold me the rock, and we had a long talk. He again assured me the rock was cured and had been in his tank for at least 1 month. His advice was to watch the NITRITE and if it got around .50 let him no and he would give me something to help. He told me not to panic. Perhaps i am over reacting a tad. Never had this problem, but am not handling it very well.

Here is some extra information that may not have been supplied on my system.
For water circulation i have 2 maxi jet 900's. My sand bed is about 2 - 3" deep. I still have the sponge and filter floss in my canister and over the back.. I am aware that my over the back is not hip, i may not even need it, but i thought extra cant hurt. In my fluval i have charcoal that is good for 6 months, however i change it after 3. I clean my sponges every couple of week with salt water.
I do weekly water changes. I clean out my skimmer colection cup every 3 days or so.


Can this problem correct itself with my filters, and live rock. Also i do not plan on feeding my fish for a couple of days....I have another 20 gallons of water sitting in a bin with air, and a powerhead. I will not touch anything today. I will only check my chemicals tonight and thats it. If a water change is needed it will be done tomorrow night (tuesday)..



So there it is.. give me your feedback and tell me how my filters are out of date and how bad they suck..... I can handle it... Actually i cant. I think i am going to spring for a gold fish in a bowl....

 

[Anonymous]

I would recommend continued water changes like has been mentioned already. Ensure that you are letting the new SW "stir" for 24 hrs. As was stated before it lets the water completely dissolve the salt and lets things balance out. The key to success in pretty much anything with reefing is to take it slow. Don't over react and listen to the advice of the old reefers on here. Lawdawg and Jim have been giving great advice. Just contiue to do as they instruct and it should come out fine. As far as your filters go, I don't use any type of filter floss or bio balls or any such as it has a tendancy to trap detrius and if left un cleaned will cause nitrates to rise. I just use the sand rock and skimmer. You did say you have a 55 g right? If so you may want to get some bigger powerheads or something to give you some more flow. 2 900's doesn't sound like a whole lot to me for flow.

 

[dnorton1978]

Thank you for the input. I am also glad to hear that the other two are giving the right advice. Now my fluval has a big piece of foam in it as well as some bio material inside. Are you saying it is a good idea to remove those??? As well as the filter floss in my out dated over the back??? Also if anyone else can chime in on this as well it would be appreciated.. Not that i doubt you, just prefer to hear various opinion's and reasons before i make my final decision.. Thanks guys.

 

[Anonymous]

Do your water changes! You'll be ok. You need to age the salt after you put in water.

but ALWAYS age your salt water at LEAST 24 hours before you use it

This will keep your PH in good standing.

Good luck and don't freak out!

 

[Anonymous]

well, unfortunetly i did not read your last post until after i did ny change today. However, i did just set up another bin with about 25 gallons of fresh water treated with amquel. I believe you said to add the salt 24 hours later? Well i just want to fully prepare it for tomorrow. What is the major issue with not aging your water?? i am sure there is a few. 8O . Again thanks for everything MAnny you came and you saw..lol. thank you

First things first. My name isn't Manny , I am a much nicer person :lol: Manny is someone who posted in the Sump-my sig is a SUmp forum joke of sorts.

Ranger pretty much summed up what I was going to write about lettting the water age. As I posted, when you make up saltwater it doesn't just "disappear" and be unstantly chemically stable. It takes time for all the chemicals to fully dissolve, and level out. So, putting "raw" water into your tank can cause problems, noteably shock/death for some more sensitive inverts-like starfish, some snails, etc. It doesn't always happen, but why chance it?

Secondly, as I posted the more air you put into your water before you add salt, the higher, more stable the PH will be. Try it some day. Take plain water, take a PH reading, put a good airstone and air pump on it, let it bubble for 24 hrs and test ph again...

But, reading your post-you said you put Amquel in your water? Are you using tap water??? If so, guess where your nitrates can be coming from?

 

[Anonymous]

So there it is.. give me your feedback and tell me how my filters are out of date and how bad they suck..... I can handle it... Actually i cant. I think i am going to spring for a gold fish in a bowl....

:lol: enhance your calm young Padiwan! Patience, nothing GOOD ever happens FAST in a reeftank.

First things first...if you are indeed using tap water I'd check and see if that's how the extra gaack is getting in your tank. Lots of time city water is chock full of garbage. Secondly I would indeed remove ALL the media that can trap detruis and make nitrate.

Third, lets look at how you feed, and what you are feeding so let me know what's what with that.

The best solution is to never put excess nutrients into a tank and if you can;t help it to export those excess nutrients (what the bacteria can't handle) quickly via skimming and/or water changes.

 

[dnorton1978]

I no evryone uses their high dollar ro di whatever water units, but since day one i never did. And until the past weekend never had trouble. Perhaps i am lucky. And most would probably agrre to that. But yes i use TAP water (the horror) 8O. I checked all my levels this morning before work and they are as follows
Nitrite 0
Nitrate .15
ammonia 0
Ph 8.2 - 8.3
SG is about 1.24 - 1.25
calcium is high though about 540... What can i do abou that?

As far as what i feed and my habits i am sure everyone is going to eat me alive here but here we go...

I feed some times with the the green lifeline(frozen)
Ocean nutrition formula 2

Omega 1 marine flake

Spirulina aquarium flake food(green algae)

Noramlly i feed one of the flakes in small portions about 2 x daily.

Lawdawg what is your take on putting plant life in the tank...

As you can see my levels have gone back to normal for the most part . One last question, by taking out the sponge and floss where does the debrit and crap go when sucked into the filter??? Does it not go back into the tank??? i dont fully understand how that would be a benefit... Thanks

 

[dnorton1978]

I ment HIgh tech. on the ro di thingy... for all i no they are $5. Thanks

 

[Anonymous]

I no evryone uses their high dollar ro di whatever water units, but since day one i never did. And until the past weekend never had trouble. Perhaps i am lucky. And most would probably agrre to that. But yes i use TAP water (the horror) 8O. I checked all my levels this morning before work and they are as follows
Nitrite 0
Nitrate .15
ammonia 0
Ph 8.2 - 8.3
SG is about 1.24 - 1.25
calcium is high though about 540... What can i do abou that?

As far as what i feed and my habits i am sure everyone is going to eat me alive here but here we go...

I feed some times with the the green lifeline(frozen)
Ocean nutrition formula 2

Omega 1 marine flake

Spirulina aquarium flake food(green algae)

Noramlly i feed one of the flakes in small portions about 2 x daily.

Lawdawg what is your take on putting plant life in the tank...

As you can see my levels have gone back to normal for the most part . One last question, by taking out the sponge and floss where does the debrit and crap go when sucked into the filter??? Does it not go back into the tank??? i dont fully understand how that would be a benefit... Thanks

Did you test your tap water to see exactly what's in it? You should, it may surprise you.

As far as feeding, make sure you thaw the frozen food, and rinse it with either tank water or plain water to get rid if the excess nutrients on it.

Now, the benefits of RO water have been discussed to death, so you can either do a search, or I would start up a new thread (this one's getting a bit lenghty) to get people's opinions on it. One point I will make is that RO units aren't that expensive, when you consider that the water you put in to your tank is the basis for everything else...think about it. You'll spend many times the inital cost of a decent RO unit on livestock, why is it people get hung up on spending money to make the "air" those animals breathe the best possible?

As far as adding plants as nutrient export, that has also been done to death here and you can search out threads for that (or start a new one) but IMO it has some limited usage but is by no means a cure all.

Lastly, the idea of removing the filter media is simple, all that does is trap detrius, which gets stuck there, where rots and produces waste products. Now the biological bacteria we use in the tanks to eat that stuff is several different types. The type that produces nitrate like the exact environment that a canester or bioball provides-so they flourish and guess what happens? They produce lots of nitrate.

If you remove the media, yes the stuff can get get whoosed back into the tank. But if you keep up on tank maintenance that really doesn't present too much of a problem. You want to minimize the yack you put into the tank, minimize what gets produced as waste in the tank and export those nutrients before they become a problem.

The idea really isn't to have the crap running around your tank, it is to change say the filter pad weekly or canister filter media BEFORE it gets a chance to degrade. Most people won't do that, figuring the filter magically makes stuff disappear . Think about it , what's the difference if you leave the yack in the filter to degrade, or if it is still in the tank?

 

[dnorton1978]

All very well put.. You must be a real lawyer.. or peraps a retired one.
As far as spending the money, i am not opposed. I do have a couple of alternative's for that. At home we have a filter on our tap water that comes from the refriderator, is that sufficient for a water supple. Second, what about going to walmart and buying the purifed drinking water(spring water) and using that?

When i feed the frozen food i noramly put it in a cup with tank water, then dump it in the tank. Do you have plants in your tank, and if so why or why not. You seem to have a lot of useful information. Thank you for sharing everything.

 

[Anonymous]

The spring water at walmart is not quite filtered enough. You are better off with the "windmill" machines you see on street corners. The best bet (b/c you know your filters are changed when needed) would be RO/DI unit. You can get them for $65 - $150. Just keep a log on when you should change your cartridges.

When feeding frozen food, you might want to strain (after defrosting) with a net b/f puting the food in your tank.

 

[Anonymous]

All very well put.. You must be a real lawyer.. or peraps a retired one.

close...I've worked in law enforcement and civilian law. I'm on my third career now, working towards my nursing degree, thanks for the compliments.

As far as spending the money, i am not opposed. I do have a couple of alternative's for that. At home we have a filter on our tap water that comes from the refriderator, is that sufficient for a water supple. Second, what about going to walmart and buying the purifed drinking water(spring water) and using that?

In a nutshell, an RO unit simply removes everything except (99% or so depending on the unit) pure water. Phosphates, nitrates, heavy metals, chlorine, chloramine, etc. get taken out and yes they are in your tap water you drink everyday. Some peoples tap water is much better than others, which is why I said to test yours. Those refridg flow thru filter units don't take out much except chlorine and some heavy metals.

A decent RO unit can be had for $100-$150 for what you need. As far as buying RO water from the grocery store yeah that does work but it's not worth my time or effort to grab the jugs, go out and buy it when I can have it anytime at home. I have done that when I didn't have an RO unit, but I found I maintained the tank lees because I had to go and buy the water! Besides, I like having a ton of water around in case I need to change water in a hurry.

Here's a really interesting thread that mentions both tap water tanks and plant life, so happy reading!

http://www.reefs.org/phpBB2/viewtopic.p ... ght=plants

When i feed the frozen food i noramly put it in a cup with tank water, then dump it in the tank. Do you have plants in your tank, and if so why or why not. You seem to have a lot of useful information. Thank you for sharing everything.

Bad idea. The juice from frozen foods is chock full of phosphates and other goodies that fuel algae. Get a brine shrimp net (fine small net) from your LFS, thaw the food, put it into the net and rinse it off before you feed. Simple prevention of a problem is best IMO.

As far as plants, I feel they have a place in certain tanks but in a refugium more than the main display. But there are (few..well one person here actually) who advocate plants as the be all and end all but IMO he tends to mixed up his facts quite readily so read with caution

Here's some lively discussion:
http://www.reefs.org/phpBB2/viewtopic.p ... ght=plants

 

[dnorton1978]

Thank you as always. Thank you chrissy. I appreciate all the help. THe net idea is great, and makes perfect sense. Oh lawdawg what do you think about my feather duster and xenia post? Are they dying?

 

[dnorton1978]

Lawdawg,

My problem is fixed everything is normal. However, I do have one more question. Over the course of 3 days i ended changing more than 55 gallons. I noticed today that i am starting to get some brown algae growth on the 3 new rocks i added prior to all the nitrite problems. Does this mean i am going to start the cycling process over again? If so or even if it is just a mini cycle, how long do you think it will last? THanks in advance.

 

[Anonymous]

No, I don't think it's cycling again per se, could just be more die off from those rocks, you can take them out and swish them off next water change, try to get the excess gack off them.

 

[dnorton1978]

Is it a bad idea to do my normal weekly water change this weekend? I am asking because of all the water changes alst weekend? thanks

 

[Anonymous]

I'd test the water, let the values lead you. Since you're xenia is acting up, if the water params are okay I'd let it ride.

Did you test your tap water as of yet? I'm curious is all.

 

[dnorton1978]

Nitrite 2.0
Nitrate 20
Ammonia.25
I am sure that is bad.. The nitrate test kit i have is for saltwater only.

I noticed i am getting some brown algae on the back glass as well.

The water levels are still looking good. My xenia is still questionable. All other corals are 100% back to normal...

 

[Anonymous]

So what do you think may be fueling the algae growth and other problems with nitrite/trate in your tank?

Xenia sulks for periods of time. Unless it slimes up and disappears I wouldn't worry too much about it.