getting rdy to put coral in my tank

As stated above you can increase the pH by increasing surface agitation or hooking an airline up to a power head.

Test for pH the same time each day, preferably in the later afternoon when it will most likely be it's highest.

You may want to go the dry rock route with some cured live rock to seed the system. It is a lot cheaper and you cut way down on nasty pest.

Do you have a test kit ? If not get a decent one.

You did the right thing by asking and researching, because the fish store if going to try and sell you many things you do not need nor want. Keeping asking the questions and research all livestock before purchase.

 

ya i need to take it slow and i think the next thing that i have to do it to buy a good light bad part about that is it is around 300 dollars for a good light and then look into adding liverock

do you think i could add 5lb or live rock then 2 weeks later add another 5 lb and do it like that or should i just buy it all in one and put them in all in one.

 

Typically you would put all the Live Rock in the tank you want to use. Don't worry about your PH until your Live Rock has cycled. Once you add the live Rock you will need to feed your tank. I prefer the cocktail shrimp. just put 1 or 2 in the tank and let them rot. This will start your Live rock cycle and you will then test for Ammonia, Nitrite and Nitrate. You will watch all 3 spike and then return to zero. When all 3 are zero you are ready for fish, inverts. Then get all you perimeters in line then you can add coral

J

 

If your getting live rock I would put it all in at once. You don't want to add live rock after the first time as it may stretch out your cycle.

If you are going with dry base rock (which I recommend) it doesn't hurt to add it in small quantities but you will want a good amount to begin with as this is where the bacteria that consumes ammonia, nitrite and nitrates will grow.

 

wow this is getting so cool there is so much to this then i thought and i'm loving every min of it. i can't wait to get started.

 

I wouldn't worry about the light just yet,better to get your rock and aquascape the tank to your liking.As mentioned above,using dry reef rock(base rock) is much cheaper.This base rock will become "live" naturally when beneficial bacteria make they're home in it and begin to multiply.It just takes a little longer to cycle the tank this way as the bateria need a little more time to reach a large population.Patience is key to having a good experience with a new tank!!

 

Im going +1 with the advocators of using base rock, it is cheaper and more importantly you dont get any of the nuisances (aiptasia, Majono, crabs, pistol shrimp, hair algae, bubble algae etc etc) that you can and often do get with live rock

but live rock has its appeal, it looks more natural quicker (base rock takes a while to colour up)

if you go live rock, then IMO, you dont want to use lighting to soon anyway and I have often set tanks up, with live rock and no lighting and left it like that for 12 weeks, before starting the lighting
the reason for this is - when you start the tank you will have the nutrient spikes being talked about above and these combined with lighting make great conditions for some of the nuisance algaes decribed above

keeping the tank dark, whilst cycling with live rock, can help to prevent severe outbreaks IME

so if you go Live rock - buy that now, and wait a couple of months before purchasing those lights

Steve

 

wow steve thanks a lot for everything that was a lot of writing that you did for me and i tank you so much.