noob to marine 14 gallon biocube

[Danyen]

Yeah, most people put it in the first chamber

[DarthOcellaris]

Originally Posted by TheBeak

6-10 inches? guess their out of the question for me then... if I put one in the middle it could reach the whole tank...

the hammer and frog's i've had easily reached that far I was constantly needing to either frag them or the neighbors LOL

edit.....let me rephrase this..I've even got myself rereading this statement....6 - 10 inches DIAMETER ...3 - 5 inches on either SIDE. Sorry to confuse things like that. As they get bigger, and they grow fairly fast, you need more space around them.

[aquawolf]

Yeah, those corals are like the old AT&T commercials they like to reach out and touch someone, usually to the detriment of that someone.

Good luck with your entry in the nano build off and welcome to TRT as well!

[fish.freak]

Originally Posted by DarthOcellaris

welcome to the build off and to TRT

good start corals are leathers, mushrooms, palys and even zoanthids like Kelli ( dobejazz ) stated. Lps corals are a fairly easy coral for beginners....Frogspawn and a Hammer coral are the two that really come to mind. Like kelli said though, give them at least 6 - 10 inches around in all directions because they have 'sweeper' tentacles that will sting the neighbors.

I have not noticed this with mine, I just leave a 2-3" buffer and it seems ok. My torch is even within an inch from my green birdsnest, not that i recomend that but, they are both still thriving.

[rhinokio]

Originally Posted by Danyen

Yeah, most people put it in the first chamber

first? in with the filter pad? not sure if there is enough room in there.

[rhinokio]

i'm looking thru the other entries here and i'm feeling a bit out classed, I've got a pretty nice fresh water tank 120 gallon with a custom made back ground made from carved foam coated in concrete. contains 2 large oscars, a bristle nose pleco and a handfull of tiger barbs and giant danios

but this salt water tank is such a different beast. I've got 10 tiny hermits in there working over time to get my live rock nice and shiney, the amonias flatlines, and the trites seem to be on the way down. hope to get it able to hold snails by this weekend, then perhaps order a mushroom pack from s&f .

again can someone verify does the heater go in the first comp with the filter pad? or should i remove the filter pad and let the live rock and clean up crew do that work?

[DarthOcellaris]

Nice tank!!

[reefermike1]

thats what i would do, take out the foam and bioballs, theres no need for them. then u can put your heater in the back compartment if u wish.

sounds like youre doing it right, especially coming on here and asking questions... some of the info ive found on here has been very valuable.

nice freshy tank too!

[aquawolf]

Remove the filter pad and bio balls and you will be good to go.

[rhinokio]

sweet! i'll rip that junk out tommorow when i get to work and put my heater back there. would there also be room for one of the skimmers made for biocubes? i'm about to go nuts waiting for these nitrite levels to go down! if there was a way to instnalty cycle a tank i'd pay big fat dollars, i have more moneys than i have patience.. that does not mean i have lots of money,, just much less patience

[rhinokio]

i have buncha small fine particles floating around in the water with the current. will this ever settle down?

to try an get rid of the particles, after i removed the bio balls i stuffed some fibre padding i had laying around into that chamber hopefully get that out

oh when i removed the bio balls this little plastic grate thing came out, a rectangular piece of plastic with little vent slots in it. it was somewhere in the bottom, i could not figure out where it went to put it back

is this a big deal?


currently my params are
am 0
nitrite .5
nitrate 5
ph 7.8
calcium 440
phosphate .25 or lower
kh 440

nitrites being a jerk
ph is a tad on the low side.. guess i'll pick up some stuff today to try and bump that up

[rhinokio]

i'm begining to suspect that one of my live rocks. may just be "rock" i didnt know any better when i got it just picked out some pieces that looked cool, it was all in the live rock tank. one of the pieces is smooth and really white
its the one on the bottom right in the image on the front page. it does not have all the green gunk and stuff gtowing on it.. is this ok? is it still producing the right kind of bacterias?

[kimsie]

It will be fine - even if it was just base rock - it will become live in time and you have plenty of live rock in there to supplement it. Now - that's just my opinion - maybe someone else with more experience will chime in!

[DarthOcellaris]

Originally Posted by kimsie

It will be fine - even if it was just base rock - it will become live in time and you have plenty of live rock in there to supplement it. Now - that's just my opinion - maybe someone else with more experience will chime in!

yup...

Don't forget...just because you don't SEE life on it doesn't mean that it's void of it ...the more porous that rock in question is, the more bacteria it holds and that's the life you need

[rhinokio]

grrrr 2 full weeks and the nitrites have still been teetering around .25 i'm about to go apecrack bonkers to get some critters in this thing