New to hoppy with a few ?'s

[chris_44]

Hey everyone just started this hobby sunday after reading on here and researching for about a month. My wife and I bought a new aquapod last sunday and bought 20 lbs of live sand and 22 lbs of LR also salt water from the LFS and started are system that night. After reading on here I heard of people putting a raw shrimp into the tank to start the cycle. I did that and its been about 3 days since I put the shrimp and now theres a clear looking layer around the shrimp and I tested my water all week ammonia has been at .25 now at .50 and nitrite was at 0 now is at .25 and nitrate was also at 0 a few days ago now is at 20. Temp is holding at 76. Is eveything ok overall? Also when if I do at all take the shrimp out? Also when I bought my LR I bought some what he said was dead coral and now it is turning brown on some areas. Sorry to be so Worry some just don't wanna mess this up. Any help woukd be great. Thanks :help:

 

[saltn00b]

hi welcome to the boards. you are going about it the right way by taking your time and researching everything, so you will take to this hobby like a fish to water! give it another 2 days or so to get that ammo nice and high, then take the shrimp. it will get white and funky looking that is normal. any new rocks you buy will change colors as they get get green and red and purple coralline algae , which is a good sign of maturity. you also may get diatom algae bloom which is brown coating on everything. its gets pretty bad over a few days and then dissappears over a two weeks or so. Very normal for new tanks, and you will never see it again as long as you dont use anything but RO /DI water (no tap)