Rob's Reef
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Yeah I would add a small powerhead in there also. Flow is good and it helps keep detritus from settling on the rocks and sand...
I made several rookie mistakes, help me set things right.
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Oldsalt01
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Sit back, take a couple of DEEP breaths, and slow down. Also, don't let some of these harsh posts offend you. We were all new to this obsession at some point, and some of us forget how exciting a new tank can be. Everything I've read here in reply to your questions is right on, but you can't rush the process. You just made the mistake of: 1) relying on your lfs to guide you, 2) wanting your tank up NOW. The most important thing to look at right now is the ammonia. Keep that level low (<.5 ppm) and you (and Nemo) should be OK. I've found that an airstone with a moderate flow will help dissipate the cloudiness. The star polyps may or may not handle the ammonia shock. One question; are you using tap water or RO/DI water to mix your salt? Depending on where you live some water systems add Chloramines to reduce bacteria levels and pipe corrosion (I don't have a clue as to water parameters in Japan). If you have the option buy RO/DI water and mix your own salt (cheaper) or pre-mixed saltwater from a lfs. Ya might want to look around for another lfs too. The one that you talk about doesn't seem to have their stuff all in one bag, or they're only interested in your $. One other suggestion; if you have a local reef society, JOIN IT! The members will help you through the early stages, and later they can be a great resource for frags and info on corals you can keep.
Kresimir_72
Community Member
What I read looks like your LFS is prick, know nothing about this and want only your money.... on the other side you are going tooooo fast and toooo big for tank that size and "age"....go slow and read about live stock, water and parameters, .....add some mising hardware and it will be yust fine in time... ;-)
ngvu1
Valuable Member
I don't pay much attention about what you did wrong because most of us have made similar mistakes and some are even worse 
. There are 2 things you did do right; one is joining this forum and another thing is posting your problems so other experienced refers can help you.
My suggestion is patient and research before making a move.
Good luck to you and I hope to see you around in the future with a success story to tell.
. There are 2 things you did do right; one is joining this forum and another thing is posting your problems so other experienced refers can help you.My suggestion is patient and research before making a move.
Good luck to you and I hope to see you around in the future with a success story to tell.
such a positive guy.I don't pay much attention about what you did wrong because most of us have made similar mistakes and some are even worse
My suggestion is patient and research before making a move.
Good luck to you and I hope to see you around in the future with a success story to tell.
+1
Oceansize
Active Member
As you've probably come to appreciate since starting this thread, this hobby is more about taking care of water than it is about taking care of fish. As long as you take care of your water, the fish will take care of themselves (other than feeding of course).
Therefore, I've personally found it more helpful to think of myself as an amateur water chemist than a fishkeeper. This is why everyone is telling you to go slow. The chemistry of water within a closed system such as an aquarium is usually going to be very unstable without the intervention of somebody who generally knows something about water chemistry and more specifically the nitrogen cycle. Compared to other sciences, this is a relatively new one (captive reef chemistry) so we are all pioneers to a certain degree. No one can tell you with confidence precisely how your tank will react to various changes, there are too many variables. So "Go Slow" is the best most of us can come up with.
Bottom line: make sure you can keep a fish alive for a few weeks/months before adding more. And make sure you can keep THEM alive for a few weeks/months before moving on to more delicate species, esp. including coral. Any change you make, including adding live rock, is going to change the chemistry of your tank and will take time to rebalance itself. Personally, my tank has been cycled for four months and I'm still a long way from being done stocking it. I'm adding no more than one living thing every two weeks, and that is only because I consider myself slightly more advanced than a beginner. For a beginner, that is too fast. IMO of course.
Before I ever bought a fish, I bought "Saltwater Aquariums for Dummies". That was a great primer, and I recommend it. Had you read that first, you would have avoided all of these initial (yet still common) mistakes, such as adding fish before you were certain that the tank was cycled and before you had any test kits. It's just a primer though. This website is a great place to round out the rest of your knowledge, once you know enough to know what questions to ask.
Therefore, I've personally found it more helpful to think of myself as an amateur water chemist than a fishkeeper. This is why everyone is telling you to go slow. The chemistry of water within a closed system such as an aquarium is usually going to be very unstable without the intervention of somebody who generally knows something about water chemistry and more specifically the nitrogen cycle. Compared to other sciences, this is a relatively new one (captive reef chemistry) so we are all pioneers to a certain degree. No one can tell you with confidence precisely how your tank will react to various changes, there are too many variables. So "Go Slow" is the best most of us can come up with.
Bottom line: make sure you can keep a fish alive for a few weeks/months before adding more. And make sure you can keep THEM alive for a few weeks/months before moving on to more delicate species, esp. including coral. Any change you make, including adding live rock, is going to change the chemistry of your tank and will take time to rebalance itself. Personally, my tank has been cycled for four months and I'm still a long way from being done stocking it. I'm adding no more than one living thing every two weeks, and that is only because I consider myself slightly more advanced than a beginner. For a beginner, that is too fast. IMO of course.
Before I ever bought a fish, I bought "Saltwater Aquariums for Dummies". That was a great primer, and I recommend it. Had you read that first, you would have avoided all of these initial (yet still common) mistakes, such as adding fish before you were certain that the tank was cycled and before you had any test kits. It's just a primer though. This website is a great place to round out the rest of your knowledge, once you know enough to know what questions to ask.
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I suggest you back out and start with a freshwater for around a year and then start to research saltwater tanks ,no corals for a few months then if you feel you are then comfortable with your education and financially ready to move forward start with one damsel after cycling your tank if he's around for a couple months, move forward. I know this is hard to hear but from the way you talk it's obvious that you are a long way from success. Not meaning to offend. Hope you can handle real talk. Good luck
Update:
Cloudiness went away, installed a power head, coral was opening up again, nemo was doing normal, it seemed like every thing was going to be okay.
'till a few hours ago. I didn't look at the tank for 2-3 hours and boom.. white dots everywhere. I did research 'till now (It's 5:30 am in the morning, will not have sleep for work) and seems like Nemo has ich.
But the white dots on the glass aren't ich, I've read that ich is only visible through the human eye when it is in it's "cocoon" process. But the ones on the glass are moving, and sometimes even quite quick, checked and they are not spiral (the normal white dots that you can get for reef tank). So it seems to be something else then ich that I do not know yet, I still have small time of research time ahead.
Cloudiness went away, installed a power head, coral was opening up again, nemo was doing normal, it seemed like every thing was going to be okay.
'till a few hours ago. I didn't look at the tank for 2-3 hours and boom.. white dots everywhere. I did research 'till now (It's 5:30 am in the morning, will not have sleep for work) and seems like Nemo has ich.
But the white dots on the glass aren't ich, I've read that ich is only visible through the human eye when it is in it's "cocoon" process. But the ones on the glass are moving, and sometimes even quite quick, checked and they are not spiral (the normal white dots that you can get for reef tank). So it seems to be something else then ich that I do not know yet, I still have small time of research time ahead.
if he is lethargic and looks like he is going to kick the bucket. a tap water bath for 8 minutes will do wonders.
but you will still have to treat that tank. you are experiencing impatience first hand.
Newtybar
Active Member
I actually think you are doing fine now.
Started off kind of bad and rushed the cycle, but you did a lot of good things to recover. Copepods are a good thing.
Test your water daily at this point and you should be good. Maybe do 10% water change every other day for a week then move to weekly.
Started off kind of bad and rushed the cycle, but you did a lot of good things to recover. Copepods are a good thing.
Test your water daily at this point and you should be good. Maybe do 10% water change every other day for a week then move to weekly.
ngvu1
Valuable Member
Pods are not showing up on the glass when the lights are on. They are not white either. I have not seen pods on the glass often even at night. They walk on rocks at night a lot however. I don't know what is white on glass and moves like pods......
How bad does the clown look? Does it breath fast? Keep temp at 80 helps the clown fights the ick off. The clowns are tough and he might be able to recover from a light ick problem without your intervention if he is eating and active
When was the last time you change water?
How bad does the clown look? Does it breath fast? Keep temp at 80 helps the clown fights the ick off. The clowns are tough and he might be able to recover from a light ick problem without your intervention if he is eating and active
When was the last time you change water?
My last water change was 5 days ago. I do a water change once a week.
Anyway, I haven't read about clownfish be able to fightoff the ish themselfs. The white dots disappeared but that makes it only worse, means that the parasite has grown to the next level..
The problem is.. In 3 weeks I have to go Belgium for 14 days (not as holiday)(I know somebody who can feed nemo and do a water change once), and curing the ich will take 8 weeks so I will not be able to do his, and the only QT tank that I can make will be in the bucket, I'm not sure if nemo can survive in a dark bucket for this long, I guess this will cause a lot of stress.
Not sure what I should do then.. maybe call LFS, see if I can pay him to take care of nemo.
Hogan
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Hello, I too started with a 6 gallon tank and after much trial and error and a lot of similar experiences that you're going through, the tank is now stable and going on 5 yrs old. So I have some comments and suggestions. First though, let's get to your concerns.
It is fairly common for fish to get ich after a stressful ordeal because their immune system is weakened much like we get sick when our immune system is weakened. In my tank (I have 4 from the 6 gal to a 180 gal) I have found clownfish to be very harsh when it comes to ich and all of my clown fish have gotten better on their own. In my opinion as long as the fish is eating and active, leave it in the tank and let it fight it off. By doing a quarinteen and moving the fish around, it causes more stress and can make the fish worse. If the fish isn't eating well and is acting lethargic like mentioned above, then it's time to take some more serious measures. One simple thing you can do now if is feed the fish garlic (most of the pellets and such have garlic in them.) There are many people who swear that garlic cures ich and many who say that it doesn't. I've never found a study that says it curses it, by my personal opinion is that it helps because the fish like the taste and so they eat better which helps them get better.
A couple of questions: how are you mixing your salt? In your original post, it says you added the water to the tank and then added salt. I just want to make sure your not mixing the salt in your tank. That would be bad. Good mixing practice is to mix it the day before and to make sure it matches the tanks temp and salinity before putting it in (eventually it's good to check alk, cal, etc. but at this point I don't think it's necessary.)
How big of a water change are you doing? A weekly water change is great. On my 6, I found that 1 gallon (so about 20% was the sweet spot.)
Things I learned on my 6. (Keep in mind, my 6 is a spa tank.). 3 fish is too many. It doesn't matter what kind they are, the tank can't support it and it will crash. 2 is ok depending on the fish.
Top off with ro water. To keep the parameters stable, I ended up buying an autotop off because the little evaporation changes the water volume so much, I was topping off the water twice a day by hand to keep it stable (don't use salt water for the top off! Common newbie mistake)
A power head was too much flow. You probably have a little return pump. I found it worked much better to upsize that if I wanted more flow because adding a power head was just to much flow and took up to much space which is at a premium in a 6 gal!
It's easy to overfeed which causes the tank to crash. With only 1 or 2 fish, it's easy to just put in 1 pellet or 1 from mysis to the fish and then watch them wat it. I fed them till they're full and then stop. That way there is no extra food. Even a little bit of extra food in little tank cause a huge nitrate spikes.
Hopefully that novel of a response is of some help...
It is fairly common for fish to get ich after a stressful ordeal because their immune system is weakened much like we get sick when our immune system is weakened. In my tank (I have 4 from the 6 gal to a 180 gal) I have found clownfish to be very harsh when it comes to ich and all of my clown fish have gotten better on their own. In my opinion as long as the fish is eating and active, leave it in the tank and let it fight it off. By doing a quarinteen and moving the fish around, it causes more stress and can make the fish worse. If the fish isn't eating well and is acting lethargic like mentioned above, then it's time to take some more serious measures. One simple thing you can do now if is feed the fish garlic (most of the pellets and such have garlic in them.) There are many people who swear that garlic cures ich and many who say that it doesn't. I've never found a study that says it curses it, by my personal opinion is that it helps because the fish like the taste and so they eat better which helps them get better.
A couple of questions: how are you mixing your salt? In your original post, it says you added the water to the tank and then added salt. I just want to make sure your not mixing the salt in your tank. That would be bad. Good mixing practice is to mix it the day before and to make sure it matches the tanks temp and salinity before putting it in (eventually it's good to check alk, cal, etc. but at this point I don't think it's necessary.)
How big of a water change are you doing? A weekly water change is great. On my 6, I found that 1 gallon (so about 20% was the sweet spot.)
Things I learned on my 6. (Keep in mind, my 6 is a spa tank.). 3 fish is too many. It doesn't matter what kind they are, the tank can't support it and it will crash. 2 is ok depending on the fish.
Top off with ro water. To keep the parameters stable, I ended up buying an autotop off because the little evaporation changes the water volume so much, I was topping off the water twice a day by hand to keep it stable (don't use salt water for the top off! Common newbie mistake)
A power head was too much flow. You probably have a little return pump. I found it worked much better to upsize that if I wanted more flow because adding a power head was just to much flow and took up to much space which is at a premium in a 6 gal!
It's easy to overfeed which causes the tank to crash. With only 1 or 2 fish, it's easy to just put in 1 pellet or 1 from mysis to the fish and then watch them wat it. I fed them till they're full and then stop. That way there is no extra food. Even a little bit of extra food in little tank cause a huge nitrate spikes.
Hopefully that novel of a response is of some help...
Thanks for your reply!
He is swimming normally now (while the dots were on him he was doing a little strange and fast breathing), and breathing normally. He also eats, but about you said about giving only one pellet, my pellets are reeaalllyy small, when I put it in the water (2-3) he mostly only finds one and the rest drifts away and then he goes down again (not sure if he ate enough with one really small one though). So should I just drop one in the future?
I'm mixing my salt with tap water in the bucket 24 hours before the water change, I averagely change about 20-25% of the water.
Topping off goes automatically with some neat thing I found where you have to attach a water bottle (not salt water in the bottle, I know that doing this will cause the salt to go higher as salt does not evaporate)
Thanks for all help!
He is swimming normally now (while the dots were on him he was doing a little strange and fast breathing), and breathing normally. He also eats, but about you said about giving only one pellet, my pellets are reeaalllyy small, when I put it in the water (2-3) he mostly only finds one and the rest drifts away and then he goes down again (not sure if he ate enough with one really small one though). So should I just drop one in the future?
I'm mixing my salt with tap water in the bucket 24 hours before the water change, I averagely change about 20-25% of the water.
Topping off goes automatically with some neat thing I found where you have to attach a water bottle (not salt water in the bottle, I know that doing this will cause the salt to go higher as salt does not evaporate)
Thanks for all help!
if they are lethargic and barely eating. i would suggest a tap water dip. he is on his way out.
8 minutes. then slowly raise the salinity to solution over the course of 15 min or so.
it will give immediate relief and the white things will pop off.
this will not fix your main issue with the tank or any ich that has burrowed
8 minutes. then slowly raise the salinity to solution over the course of 15 min or so.
it will give immediate relief and the white things will pop off.
this will not fix your main issue with the tank or any ich that has burrowed
Well, there are no white dots on him anymore, do I still have to do the tap water technique? I've read that this is a horrible technique and should only be applied if your fish is full of dots. As it will then help a little.
