Feeling Lucky

[pangdonger]

I have been reading some of the other newbies threads and and consider myself lucky that I have not experienced some of the problems they have had.
My tank is a 75 gl, 90 lbs live rock, 60 lb live sand, w/d sump with skimmer, two powerheads, and is at nearly a month in operation.
After the third day I had the usual diatom algae, using a turkey baster to combat the outbreak and it went away as fast as it came and that is the only thing so far that has raised the hair on my neck.
I ran it a week before I added anything, starting with two b/g chromis, three days later I added two clowns, and this past Thursday, I added a reef cleaner package, royal gramma, and bi-color blennie. Everything is doing great.
My live rock has alot of coraline algae on it that is growing and spreading and has lots of hitchhikers on and in it.
I have alot of young starfish, dwarf feather dusters, sponges, worms, ( one that is going to give me trouble that a couple of users said is a, "eunicid?"), and when I turn the lights off, I have hundreds of "bugs", (copepods?) swimming and crawling around my rock.
I plan on adding more LR when my lfs gets some more appealing pieces in for the reef setup I want. My lfs has been great and even recommended this site.
They have an outstanding selection of healthy livestock and have even cautioned me to be more patient. They maintain several reef tanks on public display in our area and I consider myself fortunate to have them on hand for any problems I have.
I test my water everyday with test strips and all the numbers are good. Did my first 20% water change yesterday and plan on a bi-monthly schedule for that. I need to get more and better testing kits.

 

[kanicky]

Wow! Love all the corraline algae on the rocks

Sounds like you're off to a good start, but definitely don't go too fast.
Take your time and enjoy what you have

It's nice to hear a good "LFS story" for once. We're lucky to have two fish stores here in Jax that we trust and that seem to really be looking out for their livestock. They refuse to sell fish/inverts to people that they know won't be able to sustain them, even if the people are willing to pay good money. That's the kind of store I like.
Anyway, good luck, and happy tanking! :happyfish

 

[renogaw]

sounds good. if i might offer a suggestion, your rock needs to be spread out a little bit more. fish love to have caves they can swim through, plus you want water to move through out the rock.

 

[petjunkie]

Looks good, I wouldn't add anything more for a while and buy better test kits, I used test strips for a while and they were way off, not really sure what they are good for but it's not saltwater at all. Mine were the 5-in-1 test strips, now I use Sailfert.