Water changes help

[vpadfsu]

im a noob. I just setup a 10gallon salt water tank. Yes i know 10 gallon is a bad idea but i have no choice. I go to school in the caribbeans and i have one last semester and this is all i could find down here. I brought mineral salt mix from home, aqua clear 30 filter, and no protein skimmer. All stuff that goes in my tank is from what i go find myself.
~Week 1 i added water (bottle water) and about 4lbs of live rock let it cycle for week.
~Week 2 i added sand from bottom of ocean near the reef.
~Week 3 i added star fish(spiked orange-red), purple fan coral, Fan worm, small fish(either a tang, butterfly, damsel)
~Week 4 i added coral hermit crabs (4), bartholomea annulata, fish(no idea what it is but it changes colors from silver to silver with green to silver with yellow depending on what hes doing..eating...attacking hermit crab...)

Now the big question: (I have no syphon, just fan the sand floor time to time)
How ofter do i do water changes?
How much water do i sub out in each water change?

 

[melosu58]

These are my personal acessments about your thread.
1) How was you able to cycle your tank in a week? What let you know it was cycled?
2) A starfish needs a very mature and stable tank which usually takes about 6 to 8 months, longer for a starfish that size. Starfish go around the tank feeding on microbes. That size star needs to be in a much much larger tank.
3) If you do have a tang or a butterfly fish any research at all would have let you know that it can not be in a 10 gallon tank.
4) As far as the sea fan it`s going to need plenty of plankton. Enough that your ten gallon tank will get quite fouled up with excessive nutrients causing algea problems. I dont know what kind of lighting or flow you have but it needs to be moderate to high on both of them.

In retrospect, I`m not trying to mean or anything like that but you said earlier " I just setup a 10gallon salt water tank. Yes i know 10 gallon is a bad idea but i have no choice." I really disagree with your statement. You do have a choice. Your other choice would have been to say, Hey these inverts and fish are not going to make it in that size tank so let me wait till I can do things right. Not to sit their and say I`m going to do it anyway no matter how my tankmates suffer. I know it looks nice now but a yr from now I would say not. Like I said I`m not being ugly but a little research goes a long way. Also I`m NOT saying in no way that you cant have a 10 gallon SW tank or even Reef tank. There are many people that do but their inhabitants of those tanks are compatible to that size tank. Dont take this as negative critisism but a chance to say lets research this out and find out what we can do.

 

[intimatecple]

Wow!!! Well said Melosu.

 

[nanoluvr]

ditto on Melosu. I have a 10 gallon. all the animals are happy, and it's a very stable aquarium. I've forgone many animals I would have liked to kept, but wouldn't survive, must less be happy (which is important), in that tank. 10 isn't too small.....heck, I have a 3 gallon reef tank. You just have to have a game plan, and know what you're doing before you get going on it. I say take your wards back to the sea where you got them, and then start over. If you don't, I fear you're going to be losing most, if not all of them anyway. It's better that they survive. After that, reasearch all the articles that are available to you via this website vis a vis starting as new aquarium. We'll all be more then happy to help you out along the way. We all started as beginners at some point. I wish you luck..

 

[vpadfsu]

anyways

Im pretty sure you guys have 50 gallon or plus tanks and have fail and kill many things. When i do get back to america and theres a walmart or a fish store yes i will take your advise and go do the process right. But lets get real. I live on an island probably big as the neighborhood u live in...took me 3months to even find a fish tank and its 10 gallons so instead of telling me im fail. Let me learn from this 10 gallon tank before i kill $1000 worth of stuff in a 50 gallon.

Anyone with a 10gallon tank please let me know how often you do water changes and how much of the water do you change out.

 

[CaptainAhab]

FWIW I'd rather you not kill anything regardless of the price. 20% a week PWC minimum but you're fighting an uphill battle. Use a hose to siphon out.

What are you going to use for SW mix when what you brought runs out?

 

[vpadfsu]

I bought a huge bag before i came down here. Im here till May and then im put everything back in the ocean when i come back to good old america. Dam i miss walmart and mcdonalds...
Captainahad thank you so much. I just got some more more Fan worms today to help with the tank.

 

[MCluett]

Its not that they dont want to help you learn its that they dont want you to learn at the expense of your tanks inhabitants. You can sucessfully have a 10gal SW tank but you must look into what inhabitants you want. Judging by the your oictures it looks like it is a damsel which is better then it being a tang or butterfly. What are you usig for lighting? and filtration? Also if you want to increase the success of your tank you should probably get some more live rock. Also water changes are usually done weekly but if your tank hasnt actually cycled you will want to be testing your water daily and maybe doing 20% water changes daily. Remember no one here wants to put you down they are only trying to ensure that your SW experience is a positive one for you and your tank mates


Matt

 

[asudavew]

Wow!!! Well said Melosu.

Agreed.

 

[vpadfsu]

YA i understand mcluett u just being honest. When im not reading biochem all i do is read forums and learning. Def buying a 50 gallon when i get back...just i dont really have a choice right now. All i have is a mask, snorkle, and pair of fins as of right now.
I went out yesterday and got about 8lbs of live rock. I left them out and spraying them time to time with salt water. Im brush the rocks tomm and rinse them again. Then do same process again and put them in 3 days from now make sure everything is dead off the rock.
The star fish is loves eating my brown algea.
The lighting i have is from back home marine store...fluorescent made for this tank.
Filter is an aquaclear 30. i have it on high so current is kicking. The fan coral had some dead spots from when i first got it but over the past week the dead spots have grown back.
I feed my fish very carefully so that theres no waisting.
My bartholomea annulata I gave him small piece of shrimp every 3 days.

 

[CaptainAhab]

In many way I envy where you are and what you're trying to do

 

[thincat]

Since you live so near to the ocean and plan on such a short term for this 10g tank. Get your saltwater from the ocean and change 10-20% everytime you go to the ocean. 3-4 juice bottles of seawater would work wonders for your tank.

 

[GhostKnife]

I hope all goes well!

 

[vpadfsu]

so u telling me SW from ocean is better than bottled water mixed with mineral salter? I was scared of contamination...

 

[buddha_red]

in a perfect world ocean water would be the best, but sadly your right about contamination in alot of the worlds oceans. It would depend on how clean your waters are and compare them to clean bottled water. I think i would stick with bottled water if it were up to me.

 

[melosu58]

I agree that contamination is a big risk. I`ve heard others say you`d have to go out a couple miles to get water that is OK to use.

 

[thincat]

She's in St. Kitts/caribbean It's an island. All I was saying is with a tank that small it would be better to do as many water changes as she can. And I dont think her seawater is that bad. I know it's best to filter seawater first as we do in Hawaii. We run it through a sandfilter down at Sand Island and also at the Honolulu AQ.

 

[vpadfsu]

sounds way more complicated then getting bottled water and plus the risk of contamination.

 

[thincat]

find a clear easy spot, fill container with water-dump it into your 10g tank. I don't see anything hard or complicated about that. Unless this tank is just an experiment and you are seeing how long your inhabitants will last in a 10g!

 

[vpadfsu]

lol thanks thincat