14g biocube cleanup crew question

[Prest0nC]

Hi,

I just setup my first nano a week ago and I believe things are going smoothly. Yesterday, I went to my LFS and purchased 1 cleaner shrimp, 4 astreas, 2 scarlet hermits and 1 zebra hermit. Will this be enough to keep my tank clean? Do you recommend adding anything else?

As I am new to saltwater I do not know how efficient these little critters are. Some insight would be great!
Oh and I am starting to get some diatoms and red algae in my tank, possibly due to high phosphate levels?? What would be the best way to lower them?

nitrates/ammonia are 0
ph 8-8.2
temp: 78
1.024


Thanks a bunch!

 

[Bored4ever86]

It might be phosphates, are you feeding the tank? Live rock source/cured? Used sand?

I'm curious if you ever had any ammonia, seems way too fast for your cycle to be finished already. The algae growth is probably the reason your not registering any nitrates, the algae is taking it up as fast as its being produced.

also there's a ton more info we'd need before we can answer whats causing the diatoms....

 

[bigblue141]

I would toss about 20 hermits and 20 assorted snails in there for a CUC. The hermits will eat the snails and some of the hermits will eat other hermits, or they will just die off. They are $1 a piece, eat lots of left overs. That makes them pretty cheap when considering salt water animals.

 

[Prest0nC]

It might be phosphates, are you feeding the tank? Live rock source/cured? Used sand?

I'm curious if you ever had any ammonia, seems way too fast for your cycle to be finished already. The algae growth is probably the reason your not registering any nitrates, the algae is taking it up as fast as its being produced.

also there's a ton more info we'd need before we can answer whats causing the diatoms....

I haven't fed the tank anything. The only thing in there now are a couple polyps that came attached to the live rock when I purchased it in addition to the clean up crew I mentioned. I purchased 13 pounds of fully cured live rock from a local reefer. The sand, on the other hand, is brand new. I was told that it is just better to purchase new sand and "seed" it.

If my tank is still cycling, then I will not put anything else in it until the algae bloom dies over. Will the spike in algae be harmful to all the stuff in my tank when it j-curves? My lfs told me that I could start slowly putting stuff in a couple days after adding live rock if it is fully cured, as long as I watch water parameters closely. Please let me know. Thanks!

 

[bigblue141]

The point of "cycling" a tank is to introduce ammonia into your tank so the bacteria chain starts.

If you never put anything to cause the ammonia to be present you won't get your tank to cycle until you put your fish in. Bacteria multiply quickly and die off quickly. That's why you add stock slowly. They bring in more ammonia (waste) so the bacteria need to adjust to the higher bio-load. When the waste is not there, the bacteria will go into a dormant state. So if you leave your tank empty for a period of time, you will have another cycle as it takes some time for the bacteria to come out of their dormant state.

 

[TJL]

Hey Welcome to the site and to reefkeeping. As far as starting the break-in process Ryan (bigblue) pretty much nailed it... without any imput of fish and/or food to supply a quantity of ammonia there won't be a significant cylcle. The Cycle is the neccessary process to reach a balance of bacteria-to-livestock. Do you have a list or idea of what you ultimately want to keep in your system. Being a relatively small system it will be even more important to go slowly and choose your livestock wisely for compatability. Could you please let us know your lighting, flow amount, skimming and wish list of livestock as to give us a better understanding of your set-up.

Todd

 

[Prest0nC]

Hey Welcome to the site and to reefkeeping. As far as starting the break-in process Ryan (bigblue) pretty much nailed it... without any imput of fish and/or food to supply a quantity of ammonia there won't be a significant cylcle. The Cycle is the neccessary process to reach a balance of bacteria-to-livestock. Do you have a list or idea of what you ultimately want to keep in your system. Being a relatively small system it will be even more important to go slowly and choose your livestock wisely for compatability. Could you please let us know your lighting, flow amount, skimming and wish list of livestock as to give us a better understanding of your set-up.

Todd

Thanks a lot for the advice. My aquarium has been running for nearly two weeks now and there have been no accidents thus far (knock on wood). The algae/diatom blooms have regressed and my inverts are all alive and kicking, a great sign.

In the 14g Biocube:
1 24 watt PC 10000k (I think.)
1 24 watt PC actinic (Is this the blue spectrum bulb?)
I upgraded my flow to the Maxijet 1200
I also have the Biocube protein skimmer (Even though I don't hear very good things about it)
13lbs of LR
7lbs Sand

As for livestock:
3 hermits
1 cleaner shrimp
4 astreas

Small frags of: frogspawn, a couple different zoos, pulsing xenia, gsp, a shroom, purple clove polyps and a couple small pieces of orange monti.

I understand that the lighting isn't strong enough for clams or sps, but I was wondering if there were any other cool corals (lps/softies) that would make a good addition to the tank.

As for fish, would I be able to fit:
A small ocellaris clown
Helfrich Firefish
and a small goby or blenny.

I don't know much about the different species of gobies or blenny's. If anyone has suggestions to a type they are particularly fond of please let me know!

Thanks