55G Saltwater Tank

[Royal Pein]

I'm pretty new to this, spent about a month learning and understanding how everything works.
So far I have the tank running for 3 weeks. I have 50 lbs of live sand and about 60 lbs of live rock. I have a sump which I'm using as a refriguim.

 

[carey]

Welcome to the forum!

You have some really nice rockwork going on in there .

Looks great!

How close are you to finish cycling? Are you adding an ammonia source and testing?

 

[Royal Pein]

I've tested my ammonia levels its already low. It was pretty high about a week and a half ago. Just waiting for my nitrites and nitrates to go down.

 

[spoonman]

NitrItes will go down but nitrAtes will go up. When you have 0ppm ammonia and nitrItes and high nitrAtes, you are finished. Then you will do water changes to get the nitrAtes down and you are ready for livestock.

 

[Tank2379]

Wow.. Thats look way better than my 55G when I started saltwater... Looks great 55G is not a bad setup to start with a Saltwater tank. Good choice

 

[Royal Pein]

I'm just waiting for my nitrites to go down. For now my ammonia is between .25 and 0ppm, my nitrite is 2ppm and nitrate is at 20ppm.
I checked this morning. Since I made my sump into a refrugium, I plan on getting some macroalgae to reduce my nitrates levels. But I'll still do my water changes.
Hopefully it'll go down before the weekend.
How much of a water change is good? I was thinking about 25% of a water change.

 

[carey]

I do anywhere from 15% to 30% water changes, depends on the tank and the testing results as well as how ambitious I feel that day! lol

 

[Royal Pein]

Did my water change. Ammonia and Nitrites is at 0. Nitrates is at 10ppm.
What type of invertabrates is best. I have 2 red legged hermit crabs and 2 nassarius snails. I have 2 Turbo snails and 2 blue legged hermits getting here tomorrow.
Also by this weekend I should get my macro algae for my refrigium. Will the macro algae help in reducing the levels of nitrates?

 

[kdpuffer]

Macro will help reduce nitrates but remember to trim it often cause if you don't it will stop growing and absorbing nitrates and worse it will release the nitrates it has absorbed back into the water. I love your rock scape it looks awesome. I am working on a 55g myself. A recommendation from what I have read and heard is to skimp on crabs for your CUC and get more snails. The hermits tend to like killing snails for their shells and have a tendency to climb on and irritate corals.

 

[Royal Pein]

I don't plan on having many hermit crabs. The most is 5. So far I have 3 Turbo snails and 5 Nassarius snails. As time progress I will add more Nassarius snails. Maybe a maximum of 10.
As for fishes, I plan to have blue tang, clown, carpenter flash wrasse, 2 firefish, a dottyback, and a goby.
Is it too much or is it okay?
Corals will come later, maybe after 5-6 months.

 

[Royal Pein]

Had to change my aquascaping, needed to make more holes so all the rocks bow have circulation going through them.

 

[JustinKBreen]

I would rethink the blue tang, they need a huge tank. Also the dottyback could be a lil on the aggressive side, better to add the most aggressive fish last.

 

[kdpuffer]

I would rethink the blue tang, they need a huge tank. Also the dottyback could be a lil on the aggressive side, better to add the most aggressive fish last.

Second that, blue tangs get a foot long and a 55 is no place for them. A kole yellow eye is a maybe as they get 6-7 inches. I have a 55 and I am going to get a kole but some would advise against it. Also keep in mind that tangs are very ich prone so have a quarantine ready, personally I would skip quarantine to reduce stress but if you get an outbreak treat it fast. I actually added a kole last weekend and after 5 minutes it was swimming around happily and grazing. By morning it was toast-ich, my clowns even got it but they recovered on their own without treatment.