newbie questions

[fishstick4sale]

i agree with nissan and others here.
remove the damsels those r only good to start a tank in my opinion they r too aggressive and believe me i turned my tank upside down catchin those punks i had. they bullied my fish around an chased them. second for the redslime if you want to speed it up goto your lfs buy redslime remover works perfect (i done it a few times in the past) and do a water change a couple days after u dose unless told otherwise. redslime can build up from trates and also not good enough current i believe and other conditions just not good ones.

 

[1buckeye_fan]

i've also ordered a powerhead to get the water moving some more...
what is a good number of hours that I should have the lights on for?

 

[fishstick4sale]

thats up to u also, coral i was told only need 4-6 hours of light.. some people leave there lights on all day sheesh. mine i leave mine on for 8 hours aday 30 minutes of those 8 r nothiing but actinic to get that sunrise sunset look.

 

[1buckeye_fan]

i'm addressing the lights, water flow by the end of the week.
what I'm not sure of..can I treat the red slime and ich at the same time with everything still in the tank without killing it all?

 

[nano-newb1983]

Originally Posted by 1buckeye_fan
http:///forum/post/2968191
i've also ordered a powerhead to get the water moving some more...
what is a good number of hours that I should have the lights on for?
What kind of powerhead you get?
Also about the lights. I would start by having them on for 5 hours, and as time goes on and alge starts to go away have light on longer. JMO
Another thing you could do to help with the alge is take the rocks out of the tank and srcub it in some saltwater with a toothbrush. Good time to do this is during a waterchage and use the water you took out to srb the rock in
Scrubbing the rock helped me ALOT. I used to have tons of alge, and after a few scrub downs i won the battle
good luck

 

[1buckeye_fan]

I bought a Koralia Nano - (260 gph - 3.5Watts). I don't want to create too much current in this 12 gal. tank that the fish get overcome.
Going from a 13 to a 32 w light seems like alot of light. Its not going to hurt the fish?
Scrubbing the rock? That'll kill all of the tiny feather dusters that have grown on the rocks not to mention all of the other little critters.

 

[nano-newb1983]

Koralia nano will be perfect
Your fish will be fine with the light change
I srubbed mine and didnt kill off anything(that i know of LOL), most of the critters hide inside the rock anyways... Maybe if you didnt wanna scrub the rocks you could UP the clean up crew
Whats your clean up crew like right now?

 

[1buckeye_fan]

three hermit crabs and three snails

 

[nano-newb1983]

If i were to get a CUC for your tank i would get:
5/10- Nassarius snails
10- Astrea snails
add more if needed

 

[1buckeye_fan]

really? twenty snails in a 12 gal. tank?

 

[nano-newb1983]

Well try 5 nassarius 1st, then up them if sand still a bit dirty
I got 35+ snails in my 24g

 

[<scuba steve>]

For the first week keep the lights on for less than you did with your 13 watt, so if the 13s were on for 8 hours keep the 32s on for 6 for a week or two.

 

[1buckeye_fan]

my plan is setup a light system that is on a timer using the new 32w light retrofit and four led lights (2 blue and 2 white)
My thought is the following
2 white led from 7-10am
big light from 10am - 8pm
2 white led from 8-9pm
2 blue led from 9pm - 7am

 

[<scuba steve>]

That sounds fine, I have 2 blue leds on all night.

 

[fishstick4sale]

by big light u mean your main tank light right? i would cut down on that alot thats 10 hours of light. remember coral only need about 4-6 hours. for ur tank ill treat the easy stuff first and it takes 2 days to be gone the redslime and a waterchange after those 2 days. next is your ich theres something i used to cure mine, ill get the name for u.

 

[fishstick4sale]

2 blue leds keeps that moon effect.
i leave my main light on from 10am-7pm but i dont have problems we say cut down on yours alot because u have to rid of ur problems. then u can start cutting them up as u improve water quality and so on... i know its tough sometimes you just wanna see the fish lol i went through it all

 

[1buckeye_fan]

I'm more worried about the ich! the slime I can deal with and its not hurting anything right now. Can ich affect my anenome or soft corals?
This is my first tank, EVER! and I'm learning so much. I look forward to building a bigger tank someday but I want to make sure that I can get this 12 gal. running nicely for sometime before I go bigger.
The biggest thing I've learned so far

is that you must have a QT!

 

[<scuba steve>]

Ick can only affect fish so your inverts are safe, but treating ick with copper will kill every invert and never let you have any inverts in the tank again.

 

[1buckeye_fan]

couple more questions...
- if I make up a bucket of salt water, how long will it keep?
- when doing water changes won't the new water throw your numbers out of wack? and thus put a stress on your fish and inverts?
- any tricks to catching fish when your tank is full of rocks they can dart into?

 

[fishstick4sale]

water changes dont stress fish in my opinion just scares them cuz were messin around an stirring stuff up, unless u have a sump, i think of it as getting a batch of fresh air new water nomore pissy doodoo swimmin water for them...if your mixing your own make sure u use r/o water to cut down on future problems, the new water will affect the nitrates which will bring them down. plus mixing your own is good and better than buying from LFS that have ocean water thats garbage water just adding nitrates back in which your trying to remove. plus i find it that the salt mixed water had nutrients and special stuff i guess u can say so i heard.
catching fish now thats a problem, i caught my damsel i had to starve my tank for 4 days and put a cube of frozen mysis on my net and kept it close to the glass an waited until he crept in and snatched it against the glass.
treating your fish with copper can b dangerous never ever dose your tank with copper u will destroy everything an u wont b able to use the tank untill you bleach it.