Coral questions in new tank

[johnd651]

Just finished cycling a ten gallon, and got some frags from some of the people in town. I put them in, and now am not sure if they look good or bad. it looks like ammonia, nitrite, and nitrate all went up after i put the frags in...this possible? Pictures are as good as i could get them with a point & shoot. by the way, ID's would be nice too, if i got them wrong....

Frogspawn...it does have green tips and is waving. it looks good, i think.


Orange digi...one looks better then the other. The really orange one is in direct flow, the other one is not. Should I move one of them?



Purple encrusting monti. its been out like this for 2 days now, should it be? will it get more purple, it does look a little brown.


Zoas. They are tiny, the mother colony looked real good, compared to this. Whats wrong? or do they need time? (there is also a tiny aptasia next too it...perfect excuse for a peppermint shrimp)


Open brain. i really want this one...how fast will it grow?


HITCHHIKER ...looks like RBTA with green tips. It was fully open when i put it in. but has since closed up. has moved around the rock a little, is there anything i can do to help it along? its tiny


Green digi (?)... it been up like that for two days. i like the way it looks. liveliest of all i think


thanks all

[Tuscaquatics]

Slow down, you're going way too fast. You put coral frags in there that are going to die with ammonia and nitrites present.

Get them out and into a stable tank until you get this one settled down.

[johnd651]

thats the thing...the tank was cycled for 2 weeks, and had been settled for a few days, and i noticed the spike after i put the corals in. i have no other tank to put them into which is the other issue. water changes are the only thought?

[bnumair]

u set ur tank up for disaster. thats way to fast to put so many corals in barely ready tank. i do no recommend any corals for atleast 6 months old tank and stable.
i agree with the post before me

[bnumair]

also when u say tank is ready and settled what do u mean by that?
whats ur
salinity
ph
temp
amm
nitrite
nitrate
cal
alk
mag
have u checked all that? then what kinda flow do u have and what kinda lights? i hate for u to spend all this money and frags and then they start dying.

[Reefman29]

Same hear, especially the sps stuff. You really need to slow down. Every reef tank needs one thing, PATIENCE.

[johnd651]

i know patience is important, and i am not new to the hobby. i had moved and set up my first nano tank using water and rock from someone elses tank. not fresh from the start, i think this might have been a bad idea and threw off the readings

but i have the following before i put the coral in:

salinity 1.025
ph 8.2
temp 79-80
amm 0
nitrite 0
nitrate 20 mg/L
cal 400
alk 10
mag ?

after i put the corals in ammonia and nitrite went up ...everything else is within range
amm 0.5
nitrite 0.5


im running PC's with about 150-200 gph

[Pufferpunk]

No way will PCs support SPS corals.

[johnd651]

i figured that the PCs would not be enough for SPS...they were given to me free ... i am thinking about possibly getting a MH or getting rid of the orange digi

[Pufferpunk]

In addition, the brain coral you like so much & the green birdsnest (your last pic), need more light.

Also, pic #3, looks like green star polyps, not a purple monti.

[Alysiak00]

I 100% agree with pufferpunk. Also I think a mh will cook your tank imo

[Paco]

Originally Posted by Pufferpunk

No way will PCs support SPS corals.

Not true. It's a 10 gallon tank -- at that depth if he's using the right bulbs he'll be fine.

Do you have fish in the tank too?

Your Amm and Nitrate went up because when you moved a lot of corals in there they all started making mucus (from being moved, handled, in the air). All that mucus is biological material, which your tank might not have had before -- so you might not have actually cycled.

If you just let a bucket of water and dead rocks sit with a powerhead for a few weeks -- it's not cycled -- it needs biological activity to occur so there's a reason for nitrifying bacteria to colonize.

HTH.

[MCary]

My cycles have always been 4-8 weeks, not 2, Any increased bioload can start another cycle. SPS frags will often be brown or turn brown right after you put them in the tank. This is their base zooxanthaliae algae, They will develope their color based on the light in the new tank and a few genes. Probably the Frogspawn also, Its when the brown goes away that you need to worry.

[cdeboard]

Yeah... wow. Fresh 2 week old 10 gallon with a brain and other sps.
We have all been there with the newb cycle. Slow down. See if an LFS can take your corals temporarily until you get the tank up and good to go. Just an idea.

Ohh and +1 those are some really brown green star polyps.

[TampaReefer79]

Yeah, you don't have any purple monti there. You say you just finished the cycle of the tank, how did you accomplish this? It looks like you used dry rock, which won't cycle the tank. Also, what kind of substrate is that? Having a local reefer or fish store close to you hold these corals is not a bad idea. Or get them on craigslist and sell them until your tank is ready. You don't have anything there that isn't easily replaced for $5.

Also want to add, the frogspawn doesn't look too hot. And once you get situated within the hobby and know what's going on, I doubt you're going to like your frags attached to old dead coral skeletons.

Some tips if you'd like them: Get rid of the background. Go either plain blue or plain black or none at all. Get rid of the old coral skeletons unless they are in a calcium reactor. Get an overflow box/sump/skimmer. Then you can get the heater out of the tank itself and add some volume to the system. (if you have room) Check the bulbs in the light fixture. Is the fixture new? If not, how old are the bulbs? Upgrade the old powerheads. Those powerheads with a few hundred gph shooting out of a pinhole are really worthless compared to what's out nowadays.

[ir_danno22]

agree with all above. throw a few live rocks in there to help with the cycling. 4-6 weeks minimum.
keep reading and doing your research online or in books before you move further. there's no such thing as sustainable instant gratification in this hobby, just patience. definitely have someone hold on to your corals while it's cycling properly, then read and research some more. you'll be glad you did.

[johnd651]

thanks for the help...i do appreaciate it

sorry...i keep forgetting people cant read my mind. i did a reading this morning and ammonia and nitrite dropped from last night. im am not totally new to the hobby, just to corals. i did not use 2 week bucket cycled rock and throw coral in

i cycled the rock for about 2 weeks with dry and live rock in a bucket (the live rock is actually behind the dry stuff), with the powerheads and all. i then put them in the 10 gallon, with about 7gallons of established water out of a SW tank up for a couple years now, and about 10lbs live sand. i cycled this for 2 weeks. i got the ammonia spike, then the nitrite and finally the nitrate. i added the coral, and yes i did see them secret stuff. this is when i got the mini ammonia and nitrite spike. but it seems to be going back down. (normally i would have started with fresh everything and waited longer, i got the spikes sooner, and i thought that was because of the used water).

as for the lighting, I am using a orbit fixture, with 2 65W PCs. I had done a total refurb on it (light was free, all i paid for was replacement ballasts), so its running 2 new ballasts, i added blue leds for the night, and its running a 460nm actinic and 10000k (should i use different bulbs???) i have thought about MH but heat is an issue as well as the price of a new light. the ones that will need more light will go higher up. i dont mind stacking the rock up more.

i know the background is tacky, but i dont want the hassle of painting it/removing the paint and thres a mess behind the tank that im hiding. i just used what i had laying around. but when i get back out to the LFS, im gonna look for a plain black/blue background

i do have a HOB skimmer, and a small AC70 type fuge as well.

the powerhead is brand new. i know it only puts out 104gph, but i also have to K2's that are not being used right now. Should i use them? i just left them out because they are a bit bigger, and i wasnt sure if that would be a little to much flow.

[ir_danno22]

i'm using 2 koralia nanos on a wave maker that came with my nanocube, the k2's will be too much. the nanos provide enough flow to not stir around the corals. i cycled same way with my 10 gallon using a few pieces of live rock and dry frag rocks from Bulk Reef Supply, the cycling went pretty quick with the live rock and the dry rock didn't have anything on them so that was easy. i got rid of the sand bed in the display because my yellow tail damsel kept kicking sand everywhere, the sand is now in my fuge. i ended up buying a bunch of frag squares from BRS and tiling the bottom of the tank. it looks good but holds the dirt and detritus under the tiles. i have pictures of my fuge in my albums if you're interested in dropping a few bucks to make a refugium and house chaeto and equipment out of site. if you're going to cycle that quick again, try using BioDigest Probidio (bacteria in a glass vial), it really gets things going from my own experience.
i'm sure your lights will do fine for what you have since the 10 gallon is pretty shallow. i'm just using a single 20K LED tube i rigged to the stock canopy/cover. i got my setup at petco and the rest of the specialty stuff online, local stores or home depot.
as far as a background, just stack a bunch of rocks toward the back, they'll become live and part of your filtration system, plus they cover up the mess behind the tank.
what's the plan for the 55 gallon tank? i'm sure it won't be empty for long.

[johnd651]

i just moved into an apartment, and am waiting until i move into a house to setup the 55. itll be where everything goes from the 10, and then more. the k2's, t5 lighting, etc is stuff that i have for the 55

i do want a sump/fuge, but space, and not being able to drill around the apartment is the issue.

i dont plan on cycling like that again, it seems to have given me more of a headache then its worth...ill just stick with the old method

[johnd651]

Originally Posted by MCary

My cycles have always been 4-8 weeks, not 2, Any increased bioload can start another cycle. SPS frags will often be brown or turn brown right after you put them in the tank. This is their base zooxanthaliae algae, They will develope their color based on the light in the new tank and a few genes. Probably the Frogspawn also, Its when the brown goes away that you need to worry.

i was wondering what is a bad color???

most of the stuff is starting to turn green, the brain blue, and the zoas purple orange.

the one digi is turning an orange/red, the other one though is starting to turn white at one end, and orange at the other