Everything is all Wrong....Right?

[kcobain111]

hi i'm cycling my tank i got alot of good advice from my LFS for my freshwater tank but....i also got alot of OLD advice for my saltwater tank i was told
undergravel filter which will be removed tonight
use mollies to cycle which i hear is bad
i was told i HAD to have special lights for my LR which i hear is false (i will get the lights when i start coral)
i was told to use CYCLE product which is good bacteria but then realized it's pretty much useless
he also told me to use crushed coral but i actually asked about that and used sand instead
i have 10 lbs of live rock no live sand and 30 lbs of LR coming within a few days
along with 6 mollies which now i don't know what to do with...the tanks is cycling and they seem to be doing fine and having lots of babies heh (5 females-1 male) i don't know what to do with them?
should i try to give them to someone else and replace them with a shrimp.....i'm gonna put the new 30lbs of live rock into the tanks since it's only a week into the cycle i mine as well just tank cycle it.
i will be getting a skimmer as of thursday or friday
i'm testing the water and everything seems to be doing what it's supposed to be doing but i have crappy dip sticks for my tests i'll be getting a master kit with my skimmer
Anything i'm missing or anything i'm doing wrong?
I've learned a lot off this site and feel confident everything is going right but i still want to get any input i can get

 

[ctgretzky9]

Congrats! It's an expensive hobby that will take away all of your social time and make you wonder why the hell ya just didn't get a goldfish bowl or a really cool screensaver.
Besides that, it's awesome!
In any event, you WILL need good lighting if you plan on keeping a reef tank, and to a lesser degree a fish only with live rock (fowlr). If it is fish ony, any lights will for the most part do.
First things first...use the live rock to cycle your tank, along with a peice of raw, peeled shrimp. That's right...grocery store trip to seafood department. You want to jump start the tank wth a biological breakdown, and between the raw shrimp and LR, you'll be starting it quick. I would NOT put anything live in ther yet...patience is the key in salt water!
Get a good test kit. Also get a hydrometer...the plastic ones are inaccurate, the refractors are much better but cost around $50 or so. Test for salt first. Test for amonia, nitrates, nitrites, and ph to start. You wil be looking for reults in THIS ORDER:
Ammonia will spike like crazy, this will recede and wil be replaced by Nitrites beginning to spike then recede. The nitrates will begin to appear -This is when you can begin adding some livestock...start slow! Most people I know start with (as I did and it worked great!) a few hermit crabs, a few snails, and a couple of inexpensive fish. Make sure to check your salinity all the while.
Once your nitrates have gone down to around 40 ppm or so you can begin adding-slowly- a fish here or there.
Do not add anemone or coral for a long while-they need perfect water.
A great link is here to read up on more that was very well written on these boards: https://www.saltwaterfish.com/vb/show...threadid=80022
Hope that helps for now

 

[dalerich]

The mollies can be given back to the LFS. They should be happy to resell them to another starter. So far you have done everything wrong and the extact same mistakes that I made before I started asking questions and reading. The point of that statement is you have corrected it. The thing that you need right now is time. You started your cycle with the mollies finish with the mollies. Test your water with the new kit and watch the parameters. keep up the good work. The mollies are good starters and the cost is cheap. I would let the tank cycle and don't add any more stuff right now. (except live rock). Live rock will help cycle the tank. Your tank will cycle it's one of the laws of nature. People thought I was crazy 55 gallon saltwater tank and 6 black fish oh boy look at the colors. HA! HA!

 

[kcobain111]

Haha thanks for all that info i will be giving the mollies back to the fish store and getting a shrimp after that i will just wait and let the cycle run it's course i have a fish i want list that i will post later on and let people rip it apart and tell me why I can't have those fish together but it's all about doing it right the first time for me so i take any info i can get

 

[rubberduck]

welcome to the hobby. i see u found out to not listen to your lfs early, it took me a loss of over 100$$$$ before i figured it out

 

[sammiefish]

i used mollies on my first tank 15 years ago... I really liked watching them breed like crazy!!! It was very interesting... They never seemed to exhibit any stress from the cycle but... you know... many people feel it is mean to use live fish to cycle ... and thats fine... and it did cycle the tank quite nicely (but slowly)... so there was never very much of an ammonia spike... I just added things slowly... the live rock (if not cured) will cause an ammonia spike so maybe you dont want to add uncured LR to a tank with mollies in it... otherwise... good luck...