busa1340
New Member
Hello all...
This my first post being a saltwater/reef tank owner and looking forward to your patience with my following questions.
So I purchased this tank after years of wanting to be in this hobby and for the love at staring at beautiful coral and fish.
My buddy owns a LFS, (98% saltwater and a few fresh water fish/supplies)When I called him to tell him of the situation he mentioned "it's diatoms". Unfortunately he's very busy and I'd hate to constantly bother him with things I can learn from this site. I want to learn a lot and hope everyone can help me along the way.
My tank has been up and running since 6/23/12 with no problems til Monday 7/2/12. Now this is where it takes a turn.
The day before, my girlfriend wanted a bigger empty shell from another LFS for a bigger hermit crab in the tank. I put the shell in and the next day I had tons of brown powdery looking stuff on top of my eductors in tank. Not to mention something resembling tiny little whiskers in a bunch of different spots while sticking to the glass.
My other issue is, I have this tank in a corner along a wall that gets about 7 hrs of straight sunlight on said wall.
There is also 2 double-hung windows next to it. My temps have varied from 77.4 to 81 degrees. I decided to put a fan along side
of it to push the hot air up and away as it beats through my windows. A little while ago I decided to put up some aluminum foil in the closest windows to the tank to offset the ambient light and added heat.
I tested my water today for the second time and Ph was 8.2 and everything else was 000.
Now can the sunlight cause this algae build up or is it the empty shell that possibly caused this? I took out the eductors today and scrubbed them down, also cleaned the glass. As far as pumps and all that, everything is stock except for the carbon filter. Also, there is no skimmer in it as of yet cause he was out of stock when I went there. I tried to attach a picture to show location of tank and natural light coming in, but the site would not let me upload it.
There are about 10-12 hermit crabs along with 26 lbs of LR and 10 lbs of sand.
Any and all help would be greatly appreciative and hope that I can help someone along the way.
Thanks
This my first post being a saltwater/reef tank owner and looking forward to your patience with my following questions.
So I purchased this tank after years of wanting to be in this hobby and for the love at staring at beautiful coral and fish.
My buddy owns a LFS, (98% saltwater and a few fresh water fish/supplies)When I called him to tell him of the situation he mentioned "it's diatoms". Unfortunately he's very busy and I'd hate to constantly bother him with things I can learn from this site. I want to learn a lot and hope everyone can help me along the way.
My tank has been up and running since 6/23/12 with no problems til Monday 7/2/12. Now this is where it takes a turn.
The day before, my girlfriend wanted a bigger empty shell from another LFS for a bigger hermit crab in the tank. I put the shell in and the next day I had tons of brown powdery looking stuff on top of my eductors in tank. Not to mention something resembling tiny little whiskers in a bunch of different spots while sticking to the glass.
My other issue is, I have this tank in a corner along a wall that gets about 7 hrs of straight sunlight on said wall.
There is also 2 double-hung windows next to it. My temps have varied from 77.4 to 81 degrees. I decided to put a fan along side
of it to push the hot air up and away as it beats through my windows. A little while ago I decided to put up some aluminum foil in the closest windows to the tank to offset the ambient light and added heat.
I tested my water today for the second time and Ph was 8.2 and everything else was 000.
Now can the sunlight cause this algae build up or is it the empty shell that possibly caused this? I took out the eductors today and scrubbed them down, also cleaned the glass. As far as pumps and all that, everything is stock except for the carbon filter. Also, there is no skimmer in it as of yet cause he was out of stock when I went there. I tried to attach a picture to show location of tank and natural light coming in, but the site would not let me upload it.
There are about 10-12 hermit crabs along with 26 lbs of LR and 10 lbs of sand.
Any and all help would be greatly appreciative and hope that I can help someone along the way.
Thanks
