Tony and Kelly's 55 gallon build

After 3 months i decided to go from a 34 gallon to a 55 gallon and thought i would start this thread.

Since I began the first tank a 34 gallon Red Sea my wife started to gradulally get into the hobby. At first she wanted nothing to do with it. Last weekend I found a great deal on Craigslist for a 55 gallon overflow tank and complete set up. I jumped on it and on Sunday we began the move of the tank. It took pretty much the day to move both tanks and reset them up. We also had to move the 34 gallon (about 15 feet) to make room for the 55. The move went well with no deaths. Sorry no pictures of the move. It was over 95 degrees when we moved the tank so I tried to get it done as quick as possible.

Now that the 55 gallon is set up she is completely hooked. Started to read all my books and reading on line. She even started to make a list of fish and some corals she would like. She understands the cycle process but is having a little problem with patience. She even bought her first fish. A skunk Dottyback. It is in the 34 gallon for now while we wait for the water params to get better in the 55.

I figure the 55 will go throught at least a mini cycle with the move. Ammonia did go up a little but came back down. Nitrite looks good but Nitrate is at 80. Phosphates at .5 and PH is 8.0.

The 55 does have 2 fish in it. They came with the tank. A Blue Damsel and Domino. Both are doing great as are the misc. hermits and snails. Even the starfish is doing well. I really expected him to not do well but he just crawls all over the place. Not sure what we will do with these guys when we start moving the livestock from the 34. Going to try and give them away. We will se what happens.

I will post more info later

The set up came with skimmer and bio ball filter set up. Also has pleny of pumps.


When we first set the tank up the water was very cloudy so we could not see very well. We just put the rocks in to get water flowing again. We had powerheads in the buckets the rocks were in during the move but wanted to get the tank going. Here is what it looked like at first. I took this picture after it clrared up a bit.


This is after the wife arranged the rock. We also got some magnets to hold the powerheads in place (suction cups were not holding) to keep up the flow. We still have more to do. There is about 40 pounds of rock from my 34 I will be putting in this tank as well. So the end that is low will be built up whe the transition takes place.

The paint job on the cabinett could be better but my 6 year old wanted to help with something and he was assigned the duty of painting. He loved it. The move turned out to be a family work together day. Even the 14 year old helped without complaining. It was nice.


This is what the tank looks like from the back when in the pool room. We wanted to make sure that the tank could be seen from multiple rooms in the house.herever you are in the downstairs part of the house you can see at least a section of the tank.

 

looks good. it makes things a little easier when the spouse is onboard with things.

 

Yes it does.

 

looking good

 

Thanks, still have a long way to go.

 

After 10 days an and a number of water changes my mitrates are still very very high. A bright red. I have done 4 10 gallon water changes with no help at all. I then did a fifty percent change. Nothing.

When I moved the tank I used the old sand/crushed coral. I cleaned it using fresh saltwater. The tank is starting to have a bad smell. I have transfered the fish to a friends tank (a domino and a blue damsel) I put snails and hermits in my other tank for now.

I am thinking the old sand is my problem. It smells pretty bad. I am thinking of taking all the water out and the old sand. Replacing the sand and adding all new Saltwater from the LFS. I will rinse my rocks off with fresh saltwater and then put back in. Rock is cured and has been in the tank for a year and a half.

Will this solve the problem? can I expect a major cycle or a minor cycle? All other water params were in great shape. Ammonia and Nitrites were 0 as was phosphorus. PH was 8.1 Nitrates were between 80 and 100. Nothing in the tank seemed to be bothered. Starfish was moving around and fish were eating and swimming. Crabs and hermits just doing there thing.

Also can you put a sepent star and a brittle star in the same tank? I can bring him (brittle) to my buddies tank but I will not get him back. Once he gets in the rocks he will be there forever.

thanks in advance for your help.

 

umm. are you cycling? quite didnt get how you got the nitrates.

 

No. I don't think so as the ammonia and Nitites are 0 and have not moved in 10 days. When I moved the tank I kept the rocks and the sand in containers that has powerheads in them. As i do my tests the only param that is off is the Nitrate. I used most of the old water only had to add about 4 gallons. i expected a small cycle from the move. Just cannot get the nitrates down. after the move i did notice alot of dead what looked like brine shrimp in the water. The only real problem i ran into during the move is that it was very hot out and the water warmed up quite a bit.

 

Well we pulled the trigger yesterday and moved the inhabitants from the tank, drained it, replaced the sand and used new water from the LFS. I like the look much better with sand and am going to let the tank cycle out as if i am starting from scratch. I did put about 2 cuos of sand from my other tank to help move things along. To make myself feel better i took a cup of the old sand and put it in a fresh gallon of water, ran a pump for a day and checked the nitrates and they were through the roof. l

Nitrates dropped to between 10 and 20. I still used the rock that was in the tank so i am thinking that is why Nitrates still around but they are a much better level. Just going to let the tank do its thing and check the water params and wait out the cycle and then start moving things back in.

My son (4) could not wait to have fish in it so now he has taken some of his Nemo stickers and placed them on the glass. We have about 10 fish on it.;D Looks funny but at least there are fish oh and a dinosaur???

 

Loved this! maybe we should give stickers to all newbies going through a cycle to ease their anxiousness to have fish in a tank!