cleaning questions

[lilismom1]

when i do water changes i've been rinsing all the sponges with tap water and changing the filter pad in the wet/dry. should i not be doing all of them at once? and am i destroying the good bacteria with the tap water? if so, how do you do it? sorry for all the questions.

 

[reefrunner69]

If you have a bioballs in your wet/dry (or other bio media), I think it's fine.

 

[lilismom1]

no, i took them out! since then i've noticed that all the green algae has died out is there a correlation?

 

[reefrunner69]

no, i took them out!

That's usually a good thing, provided you have enough LR to provide enough surface area for colonization of nitrifying bacteria, obviously you do, so I still say it is fine to do it all at one time once per week, or even more often if your feeling ambitious

since then i've noticed that all the green algae has died out is there a correlation?

Absolutely, you are now allowing your rock to denitrify as well as nitrify

 

[lilismom1]

i have about 90 lbs. of fiji for a 72 gallon. i plan to add more but i read somewhere that you should have at least half of the tank filled as a ballpark. is this true? what do you think from the pic? most are all rather large, heavy pieces except the tonga which i don't really count.

 

[fishfreek]

Tank looks great BTW.

The more porus the rock the better. SOmetimes going by lbs is hard to judge the true bio filtration capacity since a 10lb rock can be dense and small or porus and light so the net surface area can be drasticly different between the two. Fiji rock is usually more porus than dense so I would say having 90lbs of rock is a good amount. Maybe another 10-20lbs if you want to build the tank up more.

 

[lilismom1]

Tank looks great BTW

thanks alot. it's my first one and i'm having such a great time developing it, largely due to all of you who have taken the time to give such great advice. it can be pretty intimidating when you're a newbie!

 

[melissfish]

Tank looks great, any advice for a fellow newbie :?

 

[lilismom1]

read, read, read! and take your time. there seems to be many ways to accomplish the same thing so talk to as many people as you can to figure out whats right for you.

 

[astride13]

Did you buy those Green Stars this week? They look exactly like a rock that I was going to buy and missed out by 10 minutes from Coral Seas.

 

[lilismom1]

sorry for not getting back, i've been out of town. to answer your question, no. i prefer to buy in person. picking them out is half the fun!

 

[astride13]

Coral Seas Pets is a store is Fort Lauderdale. They had some GSP that I saw. I went back to get them the next day, but I missed them by about 10 minutes. They looked just like the ones in the picture you posted.

 

[lilismom1]

i got them at reef life in hollywood a couple months ago. i haven't bought anything from coral seas yet, it's a little far for me. they're tanks are really nice though. i was going to buy some haiti rock from them, actually i still might.