Am I overstocked?

[ReefMan692]

120 gal tank 20 gal sump 60x24x18

6 reef chromis
7 small clowns
3 Lyretail Anthias
1 Citron Goby
1 Watchmen Goby
2 Mandarin Goby
1 yellow tang
1 PBT
1 Royal Gramma
2 Blue Devil Damsels (they are ornery but harmless)
3 Bangai Cardinals
1 Cardinal
1 Lawnmower Blenny
1 melanarus wrasse
4 peppermint shrimp
4 emerald crabs
20sh snails
10sh hermits

The fish... they look beautiful -- its what i wanted to see or at least I thought. But now im wondering if I would ever be able to control the bioload of all of this for keeping corals.

My fish have mostly done great, but ive delt with all manner of uglies the past 4 months and im getting frustrated.

I put in a lot of work and time on maintenance. A considerable amount. It feels like spinning wheels though!

Recently ive

Running sump with a floating scrubber (recently added because ive had some serious nutrient issues and couldnt get macro going on its own in the fuge), an octo skimmer 110 -- using filter socks and also have a 36watt UV although not helpful for bioload.

I run gfo and carbon in dual reactor that is at least when its not getting clogged up from tank slime but i maitenance it fairly regular. I did start neglecting it when it was cloging daily but never more than a week or two between maintenance. Here lately ive actually been replacing the gfo almost weekly.

On top of gfo i have been using phosguard as directed (maybe too much at first?).

On top of phosguard in the past week ive been using a liquid phosphate remover.

Yet still every day I wake up and test phosphate at 0.2 ppm (too high!)

So now I am wondering is it my bioload that is causing it or something else?

I figure its medium to high on fish but also Im not sure that its "too high" since most of the fish are of the smaller variety.

I guess what I am looking for is someone to come tell me "your fine its gonna be fine" but Im doubting it!

 

[ReefMan692]

Personally i think i Bombed my tank early on with some overzealous purchasing of snails and hermits.

Over a few months in the beginning i think i added 100s of them and quite frankly there are not 100s of them alive any more. The wrasse is responsible for a lot of snail deaths but not sure responsible for all of them. Also hermits kill snails some times.

Honestly wish I never bought any "cleaners" or rather very limited amounts but early on I think i was a bit... well. Dumb!

 

[dimitrinivo]

120 gal tank 20 gal sump 60x24x18

6 reef chromis
7 small clowns
3 Lyretail Anthias
1 Citron Goby
1 Watchmen Goby
2 Mandarin Goby
1 yellow tang
1 PBT
1 Royal Gramma
2 Blue Devil Damsels (they are ornery but harmless)
3 Bangai Cardinals
1 Cardinal
1 Lawnmower Blenny
1 melanarus wrasse
4 peppermint shrimp
4 emerald crabs
20sh snails
10sh hermits

The fish... they look beautiful -- its what i wanted to see or at least I thought. But now im wondering if I would ever be able to control the bioload of all of this for keeping corals.

My fish have mostly done great, but ive delt with all manner of uglies the past 4 months and im getting frustrated.

I put in a lot of work and time on maintenance. A considerable amount. It feels like spinning wheels though!

Recently ive

Running sump with a floating scrubber (recently added because ive had some serious nutrient issues and couldnt get macro going on its own in the fuge), an octo skimmer 110 -- using filter socks and also have a 36watt UV although not helpful for bioload.

I run gfo and carbon in dual reactor that is at least when its not getting clogged up from tank slime but i maitenance it fairly regular. I did start neglecting it when it was cloging daily but never more than a week or two between maintenance. Here lately ive actually been replacing the gfo almost weekly.

On top of gfo i have been using phosguard as directed (maybe too much at first?).

On top of phosguard in the past week ive been using a liquid phosphate remover.

Yet still every day I wake up and test phosphate at 0.2 ppm (too high!)

So now I am wondering is it my bioload that is causing it or something else?

I figure its medium to high on fish but also Im not sure that its "too high" since most of the fish are of the smaller variety.

I guess what I am looking for is someone to come tell me "your fine its gonna be fine" but Im doubting it!

you definitely are on the higher end of fish stocking, i wouldn't add anything else. I counted 31 fish, which is a lot, however you are correct that most of those fish stay small. As long as you dont add anything else and you stick to your schedule of maintenance you should be fine. However my biggest concern for you is water quality as your gonna be using a lot of food in that tank, thus there's gonna be a lot of waste. test nitrates and phosphates regularly and be prepared to rehome some fish if you cant keep up on the water quality.

 

[Zionas]

I do see some other problems with your stocking list:

1. Clowns- I don’t know if your intention was to create a Clown harem, but if not / if you’re not experienced I would highly, highly recommend only sticking to a pair. Generally unless you’re experienced Clowns will eventually kill each other off for dominance until there’s a dominant pair.


2. PBT- Your tank’s a bit too small for one. The Yellow Tang’s fine but a PBT needs a bigger and longer tank.



The rest of your list does look on the heavy side for fish, but as long as you keep up with maintenance and have the means to support them why not?

 

[Paul B]

You are probably overloaded if you have a new tank which seems you do.
If you need to use all those chemicals to keep parameters in check (almost) you are unfortunately heading for a letdown.

I also have a 120 and probably have the same load of fish but I have an old tank. A healthy tank will be able to process wastes all by itself with no help from GFO, liquid phosphate remover etc.

 

[guylaga]

Not to beat a dead horse, but the PBT needs to be re-homed eventually as they will get to big. It was also mentioned but the clown population needs to be reduced as well.

Take care of those two things and your fine as far as fish population goes, maybe removing some of the clowns (they are dirty fish anyways) and the PBT you could add back in a Bristle tooth tang.

As far as nutrients go, you didnt mention NO3, so assuming your only issue is phosphate likely your rock work has absorbed quite a bit.

I personally would stay the course with regular filter sock changes (every two or three days), take the GFO off line for now (IMO GFO is for maintaining a low but measurable amount but not for removing alot of it from the water and rock). Start dripping LanthumCloride about 10ml mixed with a gallon of RO into your drain heading to the sump with a 10micron or smaller filter sock at the end and change it out every other day.

Reduce your feeding a bit and skim heavy. It will take a while to get all of the bound up phosphate out of the rocks but you should see improvement in a few weeks to a month.

Like PaulB said your tank is probably new so it is going to take some time for it to find balance, put up with those uglies and eventually your going to be set.