RedSea Max 130D a long winding road

;D Well with the Kids hounding me for a Tank and still unable to find a 125+Gallon setup ( I am being picky) we ended up getting a Red Sea MAX 130D. This will stop the kids from saying when are we getting a tank Dad.

My intentions are to start building up some corals and small reef fish that I will move over when I find the larger tank. Also this tank will be a good learning tool for the kids. Also found out my wife's camera takes some really nice pictures.

This is just in it's first couple days of life. I added 6 damsels and 20 lbs live sand, and some old base rock from one of my old tanks when I lived up North.

Can I start looking for live rock or wait a couple weeks? I did some reading but people were all over the place as to when to add it in. Since things will spike again when I add the live rock is there any reason to wait.

As always your opinions are what I value the most and has proven to save me money which my wife really likes.

 

did you cycle the tank? If you are using the damsels to cycle the tank, you should have only added 1, definitely not 6. Usually you can just use the lr to cycle the tank. I would add it, aquascape it, then let the tank sit for a few weeks to cycle, then start adding livestock, but add it slowly. By adding 6 fish at once to an uncycled tank you just increased the bio load tremendously with no way of getting rid of the ammonia and nitrites. You mine as well just add the lr now, it won't hurt any more.

 

Just make sure the LR is either cured, or just dry base rock. Otherwise if you cure LR from the ocean in the tank right now you might lose the fish. You could also try adding a small amount of live sand to augment the bacterial colonies.

 

+1. Live rock should all be added first, before anything else. If its not cured, you can use that to cycle your tank, but I still like to use a single yellow tailed damsel in order to do that. The blue damsel might be ok, as are yellow tails, but all the other damsels will have to be removed later on as they are just too aggressive. That is if anything survives. I would take the fish back, get the rock, and go from there. Since your going for a reef tank, you are going to need to aim for about 2 pounds of live rock per gallon.
By any chance are you going off of Saltwater Aquariums for Dummies Vol. 2?

 

Just going off old memory from about 10 years ago where my lfs had me cycle my first tank with fish. OK so maybe I should not have gotten six Damsels my bad. My intentions are to trade them in for credit towards other fish once cycled.

I was aiming for about 45lbs of lv to start but see you mentioned 2 lbs per gallon so I will keep that in mind.

Did you guys mix the type of lv when you got it or did you buy all the same type?

PackLeader ..I appreciate your input except for you last comment but maybe it was deserved.

 

I am sorry if it sounded rude, but it wasn't meant that way. The way you are currently cycling the tank is detailed in that book, all the way down to using 6 damsels specifically. Its a book I owned. IMO its a horrible book and caused me to loose my tank and fish numerous times early on, before thankfully stumbling upon this site and getting the tank on its feet. So it wasn't at all meant to be a negative or derogatory statement at all. Like I said, I used that book in the past; its just that it gives horrible advice/techniques IMO. That's why I was asking.
The problem with your set up is that you really don't have much to cycle. Without the rock in there, there's not much to harbor the beneficial bacteria that establishes the cycle. Sure the substrate and decorations will harbor some, but the majority of the waste breakdown happens within rock. General rule of thumb is a pound per gallon for fish only, and a pound and a half to two pounds per gallon for a reef.
As opposed to what type of rock - I used mostly base. It will be everything that live rock will, without the risk of harboring all the pests that can come along with live rock. Not too mention it costs about half or even less than live rock Just use a few small pieces of cured live to seed the system, and be a little more patient than you would with live.

 

Cool. LMAO I thought the book comment was a shot at me being stupid. I will have to get myself some base and LR and go from there.

Thanks and no hard feelings

Chris

 

LOL, no, not that at all. Actually, I am a fan of a lot of the different "for dummies" books, just that one saltwater vol 2 is terrible. ;D

 

I like to get all the same kind, I just like the uniformity. I prefer fiji rock, it has more nooks and crannies then florida rock. However, it is really just a personal choice.

 

I also like the Fiji.