92 Day Old tank and new questions

[patmayo]

I have a 49 gallon bowfront ag tank with about 40 lbs of liverock and fish only at this time. I have some botton polyps that are starting to grow. Actualy about 6. I only have 4 fish. 2 clowns and 2 blue damsels and a cleanup crew. I went through a brown algae outbreak but now have zero algae. The tank has been up 92 days. I have an aqua c remora skimmer and a fluval 404 cannister with carbon and the bio media. I have foam in it as well but I am slowly taking the foam out. Ammonia and nitrite is zero and has been for a long time. The nitrate is running around 30 to 40 and that is my reasoing for taking the foam out of the fluval. I am trying to get the nitrate to below .05. I am currently doing 4 gallon weekly water changes. By the way my substrate is crushed coral. Ph varies between 8.0 and 8.4. I have not measured any other parameters.

I recently purchased an Orbit HP Compact Flourescent light with 384 total watts. It has 2 ea. 96 watt dual daylight 6700K/10000k bulbs and 2 ea. 96 watt dual Actinics 420nm/460 nm lights plus the lunar lights.

The tank is 18 inches deep and the lights are mounted on the legs which makes them a total of 21 inches from tank bottom to lights. I can sit the lights on the tank but to do so I would have to get a chiller and I don't want to do that. (These lights get hotter than I thought they would even with 2 fans.

I have no sump or refugium because I have no room in the stand or anywhere else.

I have several questions:

1. Are these lights sufficient to house any corals that I might want to have in the future, including the hard coral types?

2. What would be the best course of action to lower the nitrates?I have a lot of patience and realize the tank is new and needs to age and get stable. (Nitrates especailly)

3. Is there such a thing as a HOB refugium that will work for this application?

4. What would you recommend that I do next that would give me the most bang for my limited bucks?

Thanks in advance for your help. I am trying to get as much knowledge as I can on this setup. The idea is that after a couple years of success with setup I would like to upgrade to a 135 gallon flatback hex.

Thanks,

Pat

 

[ChrisRD]

Hi and :welcome:

Some answers to your questions...

1. That should be enough light for most stuff. The most light demanding clams and hard corals generally do best under halides though.

2. The canister filter is probably part of the problem IMO. You have enough live rock and a decent skimmer so you shouldn't need any additional bio filtration. Personally, I would use the canister to run carbon periodically (say a few days a month) or maybe for detritus removal for an hour or so right after blasting the rockwork with a powerhead, but I would not run it continuously unless it's going to be cleaned very frequently (at least weekly).

The other potential issue is your substrate. In the pics it looks like pretty course stuff. Course substrates will generall trap detritus which in turn will lead to water quality issues like elevated nitrate and phosphate levels. It's OK to run with a course substrate if you vacuum it regularly but nowadays most reefers prefer finer substrates (or none at all) that don't trap as much gunk (less maintenance for the aquarist).

3. Yes, companies like CPR make them. Check one our sponsors' websites (link at top of page) like Marine Depot or Premium Aquatics. They carry them.

4. If you don't have an RO/DI unit I would start shopping around for one...

HTH and JMO.

 

[fungia]

if you can add two more pcs you can keep almost everything but two 96 watts are enough for many corals.

if you dont have algae problems, dont worry too much about the nitrates, it is not very toxic. but it is a good idea to keep it down so you dont ever get algae problems. are you using reverse osmosis? you maybe adding nitrates to the tank when you do water changes if you are using tap water. i agree with chris, the best place for money is a ro/di filter then two more pc lights.

 

[ChrisRD]

Look again, it's a 4 X 96 watt fixture. :wink: