New Nano tank

[OldsaltinNC]

Hi all...I am pretty much a newbie here although I did have a salt water tank about 25 years ago but so much has changed and forgotten, so I consider myself a newbie with salt water tanks. I have been reading all the wonderful information that the members here have posted and I am really looking forward to reading all the great experienced information. I have tried to search and pick through the posts, but just don't seem to find exactly what I need to know.
I have been doing tons of reading about setting up a nano reef tank, so I think I might be partially equipped with some of the knowledge that I need, although with the conflicting info I get each time I ask my LFS, I'm not sure if I really know anything at all.
First off, I thought I read, and I thought the LFS confirmed that during the cycling of my tank I should be doing water changes. He now tells me that I shouldn't have done that. I have the tank set up about 8 weeks now and have done 1-1/2 gallon water changes each week since inception. My question is, should I continue water changes? He told me to wait another month to do any, and that is scaring me. I have some fish in the tank and now some coral frags. I am worried that if I don't change some water, it can be detrimental to my critters. I do testing for ammonia, nitrites and nitrate each week. I have never seen any spikes in these tests. He told me he thought I didn't because of the live rock I added in the beginning. My fish all look healthy and the coral seems to be doing well too.
My second question is the filtration. He told me not to clean the filter for about 6 months. When I look down at the sponges I see lots of uneaten food. I don't want to pollute my tank, so should I be cleaning the sponges, etc?
Question 3....The tank came with bio balls for the filter. He said to keep all the filtration items that the tank came with. I read on line that I should remove the bio balls for a reef tank. Suggestions?
I have lots more questions, but I will leave it at this for now.
Thanks in advance for anyone reading and answering my questions.

[Azedenkae]

Hey mate, welcome to the forum!

Firstly, you shouldn't have done water changes during the cycle, but that is more so in regards to how fast your tank cycles. Doesn't matter now, since it is cycled (according to you). So that's all cool. Now that it is, do water changes to your heart's content.

Secondly, what is your phosphates measurement?

To answer question #2: Sponges, give it a rinse whenever it is dirty. What else do you have as part of your filtration setup? And I do mean things in the filter, and also how much live rock and sand you have. Oh and what size aquarium?

As for question #3: Yes and no, bioballs can harbour both ammonia- and nitrite-reducing bacteria, but not nitrate-reducing bacteria. If you have something else to reduce nitrates, then that's fine. However bioballs aren't the most effective anyways, so a.) upgrading to something more porous can increase the biological filtrative capacity of your tank and b.) can potentially harbor nitrate-reducing bacteria.

[Goldndoodle]

I had a 24G nanoCube back in 2005 that lasted a couple years until I took it down when I moved.

I setup a 28G nanoCube last December. I'll let you know my experience with the smaller systems, and hopefully it will help you out ...

1) As long as you have fish in the tank, you should be doing water changes weekly. Ideally, you should be changing about 20% of the water each week. As long as you do that, you'll keep most of your problems at bay, and your water chemistry should be good. Your LFS is right that you probably did not get much of a cycle because of the cured live rock you used. My 28G nanoCube did the same thing - but prepare yourself, eventually you're going to see some algae blooms - it's natural. Your tank, sand, live rock, etc. are starting to rid themselves of some stuff they don't need, and that's going to result in algae. Changing water will help to minimize that though.

2) You should be changing filter floss every couple of days. Your instinct is right, if you don't change it, the stuff on it just rots and causes more problems. Get into a habit of changing filter floss regularly. Buy another sponge or two. Take those out every couple of days too, rinse them in some reverse osmosis / deionized water (RODI). Put the second one in, while the first one dries for a couple of days. Just keep rotating the sponges like that - but throw the floss away and use new floss.

3) Get rid of the bio-balls! If you have an all in one system - like a JBJ nanoCube or a BioCube, checkout inTank - they sell custom media baskets for all in one systems. You can put your sponge and floss in the top chamber, some chemicals (I use Purigen and PhosGuard) in the second chamber, and some carbon (I use ChemiPure) in the third chamber. If you start using chemicals, you have to get in a routine for changing them as well - I change ChemiPure every 3 weeks, Purigen once every other month, and PhosGuard once a month (on the opposite month from Purigen).

Hope that helps!

Good luck! And have fun!!

[gone fishin]

Goldndoodle gave some pretty good advice IMO. Good luck

[Goldndoodle]

Thanks for the compliment Tony!

I've done pretty good with the smaller systems - I'm hoping that experience helps with the bigger system now!

[gone fishin]

It will help greatly. Things usually just happen a bit slower in bigger tanks. Attention and patience are your friend.

[OldsaltinNC]

Thanks everyone for the suggestions.
As far as the current filtration, there is 3 sponges, a ceramic ring bag, an activated charcoal bag and the bio balls. I will check the site for some replacements for the bio balls.
I've been through the algae bloom....under control now.20150127_110028 (442x640).jpg
Woke up and found this critter crawling around. Good or Bad??

[OldsaltinNC]

OOPS, asked before I researched...guess its an asterina starfish. Saw varying opinions to them being good or bad. Suggestions?

[Goldndoodle]

Take a pair of tweezers, pull the asterina stars out, and give them a ride on your local water ride - FLUSH 'EM!

They are surprisingly hard when you grab them with a pair of tweezers.

Pull the ceramic rings and the bio-balls. Nothing but detritus traps that then end up turning into other problems.

Sponges, filter floss, chemicals help a lot more with the little systems.

[gone fishin]

I personally have never removed them and have not seen them do anything. With a new tank you may see a big boom of them but then they will dwindle depending on food sources.

[skeeter_ca]

I believe those are usually considered bad. I think they nibble on corals.


Don't the ceramic ring bag and the bioballs do basically the same thing(biological filtration). I think the ceramic rings are considered better because they have micro size pores that can help reduce nitrates, but true both are detritus traps.

skeeter

[Mishri]

I don't like running filters on my saltwater tanks. Just a skimmer. I would only add a filter if I wanted to run media such as phosban (or other phosphate remover) or chemipure. I would remove all sponges and other "bio media" from it. I only run high quality carbon if I absolutely had to (Water clarity issue, need to remove chemicals). Carbons will add phosphates to your water. If you want to keep the filter you might be able to put some little pieces of live rock in it.

As other said, Once you add fish, do weekly water changes. If your ammonia is too high with fish in it do daily or even hourly water changes to keep it down to reasonable levels during an initial cycle.

If you add fish and corals slowly you wont have to worry about ammonia, test it sure, but you shouldn't need to do any abnormal water changes. There is no reason not to do a weekly water change as our tanks will continue to cycle. That's what some people tend to forget, your fish are always adding ammonia to your tank which needs broken down, the initial cycle is building up that bacteria to break it down to nitrite then to nitrate.

[lifeoffaith]

I have several Asterina's in my tank. I do not have corals, but from what I'm told, the ones to watch out for are the green tinted ones. They do a great job with algae removal from the glass. I have also pulled out a number of the regular ones because they were starting to multiply. I did not pull them all out though.

[OldsaltinNC]

So, would you guys suggest putting a protein skimmer on this small tank? Any suggestions how and what kind?
So, are you saying pull all sponges, bio balls and ceramic rings from the filtration system? If no protein skimmer, what will be filtering the water with none of the above media in it??
Thanks again