Mae17 said:
I believe it's called nano 16g Nuvo aquarium. It was nice because I have never had one before and it came with the filters and lights so it made it so easy. All I did was add LR and LS and RO. Let it run for a week (which my fish guy told me was ok.. Idk if thats good or not) Then after that week I went back to him and he tested my water
Ph 7.8
Am 0
Ni 0
Na .10 (which I can't tell if it's .10 or 10 his hand writing is bad)
Salt 1.021
So he let me buy two clown fish, 6 snails and 6 hermits
So far so good. He Also gave me iodide, liquid calcium, and strontium & molybdenum to put in 2times a week (very small amounts)
He also told me to do 20% water changes 1 time a month.. Idk if that's ok but he seemed to know what he was talking about. He was the owner of the store too.
P.s. I tried uploading a pic of my tank but it won't work :[
Hi! Welcome to AA.
I agree with Con that you might have been given bad advice. And the fact that the store owner "let" you buy some living things to put in this tank after only a week leads me to believe that he isn't looking out for your or your fish's best interest. Did you ever have an ammonia or nitrite spike? Your tank is likely not cycled after only a week unless you were able to seed it with filter media from an established tank. That means your clowns, snails and hermits might not make it through the cycle they're about to experience.
Even if they do live, its going to be very unpleasant for them because ammonia burns their skin and gills and nitrite out-competes oxygen, so they cant breathe well. Air stones generally aren't used in SW, but while the nitrites are high, you might want to drop in an air stone to increase the oxygen in the water to prevent your fish from gasping for air.
You're really gonna need liquid test kits for ammonia, nitrite and nitrate. There's a master test kit you can buy that will also test for pH and alkalinity. If you want your fish to make it through this, and I'm assuming you do, you'll need to test ammonia, nitrite and nitrate every day for a couple of weeks, and if ammonia or nitrite get above 0.25, you'll need to change out some water to lower it to that level. Ammonia and nitrite can and do kill fish. I'm sorry if this is coming across as harsh at all, it's really not intended to be. If you test every day and do the needed water changes to keep ammonia and nitrite below 0.25, your beautiful clowns might make it through the cycle. When ammonia spikes and drops to zero and nitrite spikes and drops to zero, then your tank is cycled.
After 2-3 more weeks, you should be cycled and then I would do 10-20% water changes every week, not monthly. After you're cycled, ammonia and nitrite should always be zero, and nitrate should be kept below 40, but closer to zero is always better.
Good luck and let us know if you have any questions along the way!!