Nicki's 50 gallon starphire seahorse tank!

[obscurereef]

Hey people, how's life? Hope it's going great. Well, this tank be for my mom, to put in her office, but I'll be the one doing all the work. The main attraction will be one male and female H. Kuda seahorses. Tonight I'm going to buy a whole 50 gallon starphire rimless cube setup (that's a lot to say) off of a guy from a local reef forum.

My issue now is I have a 20 gallon tank set up w/ corals & a couple fish. The 50 gallon is going where the 20 is now. Should I put the livestock in buckets and put them in the 50 after I put in the new sand/rock? Or should I set up the 20 gallon somewhere else and dose ammonia the 50 w/ ammonia to make sure it's cycled after the big move. Basically what I want is for things to not die

One random question. Why are hermit crabs (except scarlets) not compatible w/ seahorses?

Here it is now. Looks crappy b/c yesterday I had to move the aquascape to catch my candy hogfish & damsel.

Here's the tank I'll be getting.

 

[blert]

Seahorses are a difficult lot and they need a tall tank. Small hermits will likely end up eaten by the seahorses and larger crabs will likely end up eating the seahorses. All in all, a seahorse tank is quite an advanced project probably not well suited for a workplace tank that you can't access any time you want.
There is good info in the net regarding keeping seahorses. Here's a good place to start...
http://www.advancedaquarist.com/2004/12/fish2

 

[obscurereef]

Seahorses are a difficult lot and they need a tall tank. Small hermits will likely end up eaten by the seahorses and larger crabs will likely end up eating the seahorses. All in all, a seahorse tank is quite an advanced project probably not well suited for a workplace tank that you can't access any time you want.
There is good info in the net regarding keeping seahorses. Here's a good place to start...
Aquarium Fish: Seahorse Care: A Basic Guide To Starting Your First Herd — Advanced Aquarist | Aquarist Magazine and Blog

They are difficult and require much care. I didn't believe you when you said the seahorses would eat the crabs, but after looking it up it's true. Surprising since their mouths are so small, and they seem so...peaceful .

It's a home office so it's an easily accessible tank. If it was in a workplace, I would agree with you that they wouldn't get the attention/care they needed.

I've already researched loads. I would not go into this adventure blindfolded. Seahorse.org has been a very helpful source for me, but that site looks great too. There's still a ton left to learn though.

I was actually ordered the 2 seahorses from Seahorse Source a couple days ago and they would have arrived today, but I put off my order for a couple weeks after talking to Dan, the owner. He was very helpful in supplying useful information. He was explaining to me that it's best to have a 30+ gallon tank for seahorses, not so much the size they get when mature, but that they need to be in a tank with a lot of filtration and a skimmer. With my 20 gallon, I only had a HOB filter for filtration. Also, low flow for a seahorse tank is a myth. In the wild, there are places where seahorses thrive where the current is very strong. Also if there's a lot of waste in a seahorse tank, it makes sense that having a strong enough current to keep that debris suspended.
In his experience when he put seahorses in a tank with much stronger flow that the seahorses became much more active.

This is my 3rd saltwater I'm setting up, so I do have some experience. It's not like I've always wanted seahorses and I'll throw some in the tank and food and hope they'll do well. I know the time and care they require and am prepared for that . Thanks for the advice.

 

[obscurereef]

Here'a a little update of how it's looking now in the garage. Nothing leaks and it's working great. Still have to take everything out of my 20 which hopefully won't end in disaster.

 

[obscurereef]

Finally it's all set up! Took the whole day, but it was worth it.

But what should I do about my fish and corals? Theyre in a styrofoam box w/ a filter right now. There are a few live rocks, but most of the rocks had been dried out. Live sand too and I'll add chaeto from my established tank, but it's still going to probably cycle. Should I dose ammonia to test when the cycle is done or should I add everything in when the parameters are good?

 

[obscurereef]

Today I added enough ammonia to reach 1 ppm. Also put in a dirty filter sock from my other tank and some chaeto. Ammonia is going down but nitrite & nitrate is still 0. Bought some corals that will be going into the tank. They're not really seahorse friendly, but if there's enough macro algae maybe they will steer away from it.Red chalice, yellow milli, a zoa and a lot of branching Gsp.

 

[paul87]

Looking good! I like that milli you got.

 

[obscurereef]

Thanks I've never seen a yellow milli, but I do really love the color. In the picture it looks greenish, but it's a baby yellow.

 

[obscurereef]

Dont know if anyone is following, but Ill keep posting updates to record my journey. Kind of fun to look back on projects. So heres whats going on. Tank is still cycling. Thought it would be much faster. I've been dosing only 1 ppm for the last 3 or 4 days. Tank is starting to get diatoms! Closer to being done.

Also some crazy discovery! A mushroom(?) on one of the rocks. This rock had been nearly dry, being left in a dry bucket for 2 days and yet this coral (hopefully) is still alive! It's been through a lot but it looks really healthy now despite me dosing ammonia. Tough stuff.

Lastly, the temporary tank went without a light or heater for 3 days! Yikes...it's pretty hot so the temp stayed at 74F, perfect for seahorses. Corals aren't super happy but they haven't died. The old light hanging from a ladder... The fish have come out and gotten used to their styrofoam home.

I really want this cycled already...

 

[paul87]

Im following buddy. Looking good!

 

[obscurereef]

Thanks


I've been dosing 1ppm of ammonia almost everyday. I thought the tank was cycled so I added a few corals but I guess it wasn't since the next day there was an ammonia spike. Finally now the levels are steady and I'm acclimating everything to go in the 50. The second pic are the levels of the temporary styrofoam tank. Yikes!

 

[obscurereef]

Well, today was not so good as I found my helfrichi firefish dead . Bad day when a $100 fish dies. The blenny is still okay, but looks stressed still from the move.

I have a huge problem being that even though I was cycling my tank for 3 weeks (adding 1 ppm ammonia & using old sponges from my established tanks), the readings seem to be at:

Ammonia: .25 (yikes! How are things still alive? I'll get my water tested at a store to make sure)
Nitrite: 0
Nitrate: 10
pH: 8.1
salinity: 1.030 (high I know, but working on it)

The ammonia is the main concern so I've bought some nitrifying bacteria. Better than doing nothing and letting things die.

If there is anything else I can do to get rid of ammonia or cycle the tank faster other than what I'm doing, I'd love to know! Thanks.

 

[obscurereef]

Got some awesome buys yesterday. A red and orange sponge and a sea pen. The sea pen moves sometimes which is really cool to watch. Going to fix the aquascape and placement of the corals, but here's how it looks now. Also ordered macroalgae.

Anyone have suggestions/references for green, yellow, or fancy marine plants?

 

[Billbug68]

Don't know how I forgot to sub to this. Lookin good. I'm looking to add some sort of red macro to my tank as well.

 

[czwicky]

Just so you know you should add more like 20ppm a day of ammonia to cycle. 1ppm is going to keep you a very very weak colony of bacteria.

 

[obscurereef]

Don't know how I forgot to sub to this. Lookin good. I'm looking to add some sort of red macro to my tank as well.

Appreciate the feedback. Dragons breath is my favorite, but can't find it in stock at my LFS. My problem will be too much red lol.

 

[obscurereef]

Just so you know you should add more like 20ppm a day of ammonia to cycle. 1ppm is going to keep you a very very weak colony of bacteria.

I've never heard of adding 20 ppm ammonia. On the bottle it says not to exceed 5 ppm. I've always read 4 ppm makes a strong cycle. I should have added 4 ppm, but I instead added only 1 ppm a few times to check if it was cycled. The parameters are all good now, but it's pretty dangerous if something dies. I agree with you that it has a very weak bacteria colony so thats why I ordered nitrifying bacteria. Don't know if it will solve the problem, but I'm sure it will help.

 

[Billbug68]

I've never heard of adding 20 ppm ammonia. On the bottle it says not to exceed 5 ppm. I've always read 4 ppm makes a strong cycle. I should have added 4 ppm, but I instead added only 1 ppm a few times to check if it was cycled. The parameters are all good now, but it's pretty dangerous if something dies. I agree with you that it has a very weak bacteria colony so thats why I ordered nitrifying bacteria. Don't know if it will solve the problem, but I'm sure it will help.

Yeah, I've never heard of 20. That's quite excessive... Haha

 

[czwicky]

I've always cycled with 20 ppm haha. Never seemed to cause any issues and I've always had a extreme colony of nitrifying bacteria. I tend to go a bit over the top most of the time though sooo...

 

[Billbug68]

I've always cycled with 20 ppm haha. Never seemed to cause any issues and I've always had a extreme colony of nitrifying bacteria. I tend to go a bit over the top most of the time though sooo...

Of course you can cycle with that much pure ammonia. But I think once you stop dosing and add stock, only enough BB that can be fed by the waste from your stock will be sustained. I guess you could do that so you can add more stock right off the bat, but then I'm sure it takes way longer to cycle and build that much BB.