I recently bought a 55 gallon tank from my local shop before really doing any research on water (lol) im now informed that RODI water is beneficial to your tanks life, I filled my tank with tap water, added live sand, and then a solution of start and marine stabilizer. I plan to buy live and dry rock tomorrow and let a shrimp decay in my tank for a day or so, will I be ok to leave that water and then buy AN RODI system in the next two weeks and do a water change about three weeks from now before adding fish to my tank? thanks !
tap water question
- Thread starter flobup
- Start date
beaslbob
Well-Known Member
From what I hear if you're gonna have delicate corals you need RO/DI. For fish and other inverts RO/DI is not needed.
I would recommend you add macro algaes like chaeto in some kind of refugium. The refugium can be just a simple 1/4" sq plastic grid partition to separate the livestock from the macros. The macros will balance out and stabilize the tank. For instance, they will consume ammonia directly then nitrates plus phosphate and co2 while returning oxygen and fish food. One effect is to not require the rotting shrimp stuff. In fact, you could wait a week, and add a single male molly, and then don't add food for a week. After that feed a single flake per day. At least you will have something swimming around after a week.
my .02
I would recommend you add macro algaes like chaeto in some kind of refugium. The refugium can be just a simple 1/4" sq plastic grid partition to separate the livestock from the macros. The macros will balance out and stabilize the tank. For instance, they will consume ammonia directly then nitrates plus phosphate and co2 while returning oxygen and fish food. One effect is to not require the rotting shrimp stuff. In fact, you could wait a week, and add a single male molly, and then don't add food for a week. After that feed a single flake per day. At least you will have something swimming around after a week.
my .02
