my first reef (10 gallons)

[ibanez2k]

I'm cycling my first reef tank right now. So far everything is going great. Ammonia is dropping and nitrites are beginning to rise. I'm showing a small amount of nitrates on the test too which I found interesting. I'm not sure if that's normal to find this early in the cycle but everything is looking perfectly normal besides. I decided to start with a 10 gallon as I'm living in a small apartment right now and space is a bit of a factor. Right now my tank specs are:

Aquaclear 20 filter
2 Hydor Koralia Nano powerheads
1 small heater I picked up at Walmart
12 lbs live rock
10 lsb live sand
Water temp is 78F
SG is 1.025

Here are a couple pics. Any advice is greatly appreciated as this is my first reef tank and I want to get it off on the right track. Thanks!

[Loverotties]

Looking good! and good luck with it!!

[ibanez2k]

Weird. My ammonia levels in the tank were dropping last night but were still pretty high (about 3.0). They dropped to almost nothing over night. Is that normal and perhaps just because I have a small tank? I was using a thawed shrimp to get the ammonia up and just removed it yesterday afternoon because the ammonia was up around 4. I'm guessing that's good if the tank is able to rid itself of ammonia in about 24 hours. Am I correct on this? Thanks!

[Damsels R Cool]

Originally Posted by ibanez2k

Weird. My ammonia levels in the tank were dropping last night but were still pretty high (about 3.0). They dropped to almost nothing over night. Is that normal and perhaps just because I have a small tank? I was using a thawed shrimp to get the ammonia up and just removed it yesterday afternoon because the ammonia was up around 4. I'm guessing that's good if the tank is able to rid itself of ammonia in about 24 hours. Am I correct on this? Thanks!

some people might argue and say your cycle would be shorter but i would at least wait a month (it would painful waiting but it's worth it in the end)

keep on top of your top offs
and watch out for over stocking

pm me if you need anymore help i also run a 10 gallon (8 Months now)

[ibanez2k]

Originally Posted by Damsels R Cool

some people might argue and say your cycle would be shorter but i would at least wait a month (it would painful waiting but it's worth it in the end)

keep on top of your top offs
and watch out for over stocking

pm me if you need anymore help i also run a 10 gallon (8 Months now)

Thanks, I'm going to give it a few more weeks at least. I want to watch the levels and make sure things are stable before I start adding inhabitants. Thanks for the info. Good to hear from someone else with a 10 gallon.

[nanogurl]

I have two 8g nanos and both cycled fully in under two weeks. A lot of it will depend on your LR and how far along the curing process was when you bought it. If you got it someplace where it had already been in water for a few weeks, yes it's normal for your cycle to be short or none at all.

By adding the shrimp you introduced ammonia. When you took it out, it went away, or at least it's possible. I would def give it more time and keep testing your parameters. That will give you your answer.

I would also replace the cheap heater with a quality one like a Jager. I say this bc in a small nano, if it malfunctions your chances for disaster are much greater in a small amount of water. It would not take much to overheat and kill everything.

Your rock is nice. Should be a beautiful nano in a few months =)

[ibanez2k]

Originally Posted by nanogurl

I have two 8g nanos and both cycled fully in under two weeks. A lot of it will depend on your LR and how far along the curing process was when you bought it. If you got it someplace where it had already been in water for a few weeks, yes it's normal for your cycle to be short or none at all.

By adding the shrimp you introduced ammonia. When you took it out, it went away, or at least it's possible. I would def give it more time and keep testing your parameters. That will give you your answer.

I would also replace the cheap heater with a quality one like a Jager. I say this bc in a small nano, if it malfunctions your chances for disaster are much greater in a small amount of water. It would not take much to overheat and kill everything.

Your rock is nice. Should be a beautiful nano in a few months =)

Thanks for the advice. I've been kinda thinking I should replace the heater anyways. It just kinda makes me nervous sometimes. I've been experimenting a little with perhaps using a small fan on the water surface to give the water a little more airation..?. I don't know. But if I experiment much with the water it drops the temperature of the entire tank 1 or 2 degrees within only a couple of hours. I guess thats to be expected with a nano given the smaller volume of water. I'd rather get a heater I KNOW is going to be reliable.

Even though I'm new to the reefkeeping hobby I don't mind being patient and I even haven't minded throwing the money at it. As it probably is with most who get into this hobby, I have always loved and have been facinated with the ocean and it's life and the thought that I can even have a small piece of it's beauty in my home makes all the effort it takes worth it.

I hope one day, when I have the space for it, to start a MUCH larger tank. For now though, I see this 10 gallon as a VERY good start and, if it's true what everyone says about larger tanks being much easier than nanos, I'll gain ALOT of experience and knowledge I can use to make my larger tank that much more phenomenal.

[nanogurl]

Nanos rule! IMO they are even better then larger tanks in a lot of ways. You can get some sexy shrimp or pom pom crabs or even anemone crabs and you get to actually see them instead of them getting lost in bigger tanks.

I have all of those in one of my 8g nanos as well as a goby/pistol shrimp pair and it's really fascinating to watch everyong in their own lil world =)

I would not blow a fan into the water to make ripples, it will cause a lot of evaporation. It would be better to aim one of your powerheads or pumps upwards to cause agitation IMO.

[kv2wr1]

Love the rock! Where did you get it?

[aquawolf]

Nice looking tank and nanogurl has some good advice for you as well.

Best of luck as you continue the journey into the depths of this addiction.

[ibanez2k]

Wow, let me update this. It's been a bit over two months since I've had this tank up. It cycled rather fast so I just dove right in and began adding stuff. Got a couple leathers (finger and umbrella), some striped green mushrooms, some yellow polyps, a small frag of pink birdsnest (I know, probably not the best for this tank but I got it early and hadn't researched too much at the time although it's suprisingly doing quite well), and 3 small colonies of pulsing xenia I just got. I have two fish, an Occelaris Clownfish and a Blackbar Chromis. My cleaning crew consists of 4 red-legged hermits, 1 scarlet hermit, 3 nerite snails, 4 onyx nassarius snails, and 4 tonga nassarius snails. I've been adding only a couple items at a time and things have been going very smoothly. I keep up on tests and water changes and everything appears to be going great. It's been a blast as this is my first reef. Lots of fun. Not even quite as difficult as I thought it would be. Only thing is the small pulsing xenia colonies I have only recently added just 4 days ago. I have them attached to the frag stone they were on on my sandbed right now. The first couple days they were pulsing away but day 3 they were a bit closed up, now today one of the colonies appear to be melting away. Around the polyp stems the flesh is turning yellow and falling off in places and they are no longer pulsing as much. Are they going to be okay? I hope so. Anyways, here's a pic of the tank now.



My thanks to all the experienced hobbiests on this site for sharing with us newbs your wisdom and knowledge! Many, many thanks! I've learned so much just reading these forums.

[Dragonist]

Dragon says Add ZOAS!!!!

[ibanez2k]

haha, I want to add zoas actually and most likely will soon. My wife has been my hold up on those right now. She's read horror stories and thinks they'll poison us and we'll all die. I'll get her off the kick soon enough though.

[Dragonist]

tell her to look @ pics of other peoples reef...on the forum...and they are still on the forum!

[ibanez2k]

Just thought I'd update on this tank since I haven't in a while. I can't post pics right now but I will very soon. The tank is doing GREAT! My clown and blackbar chromis are still doing wonderful and are a little bigger than they were in the picture a few posts back in May. The finger leather has skyrocketed. I'm going to have to frag it as it is now much taller and nearly getting close to reaching out of the water when it's fully expanded. The pink birdsnest you can see in the back there is about double it's size from this picture and has branched out all over. The rock on the far right now has pulsing xenia spreading across a good portion of the top (from the tiny piece on the plug in the sand on the bottom right of the picture). My yellow polyp rock had an outbreak of hair algae and was pretty much covered for 3 months while I was fighting it. The algae has all gone away for good now and the polyps are recovering nicely. I had a with 4 heads of green striped mushrooms on it. That rock now has only 3 on it, one of wich is an original one. The one's that fell off have now been migrated to other rocks and spread also. I now have 9 of those things in various places around the aquarium from the original 4. The only coral I have that hasn't really grown at all is my green umbrella leather but it still looks very healthy. I'll post a pic soon so you all can see.