My Corals are mad at me

[Rugops]

So I got myself some new corals yesterday and a new fish. So here is how it went:

- Woke up to find that my royal gramma and my mandarin gobies died.
>Royal gramma died likely because of stress. The male goby probably from starvation despite that it was barely starting to eat frozen foods. The female had a bacterial infection in her tail.

- When I finished acclimating everything yesterday, my frogspawn was sliming like crazy (but I think this is a likely reason why everything is mad). I have carbon running.


On the plus side:
- Zoas and palys are opening sort of.
- GSP is opening
- The nem I have looks fine as well.
- Snails and conch I got are fine
- Clowns are hungry

NOTE: PO4 is at 0. Should I feed?
pH is low but I am running aeration. It usually is at the 8.1 - 8.0 range.


Parameters:

 

[Rugops]

 

[Troylee]

And the tank cycled when? Lol. You’re showing 2 weeks of testing and using tap water.. no bueno..

 

[Rugops]

And the tank cycled when? Lol. You’re showing 2 weeks of testing and using tap water.. no bueno..

The tank has been cycled 8 weeks prior to adding stuff (clowns added 4/1/2023). I just left it alone. The testing is when I believed it was cycled and it didn't have anything but chaeto and slowly starting upping parameters.

I use water conditioner and filtered water.

 

[Troylee]

How did you cycle it? Looks pretty new.. nem wasn’t a good call with a young tank either.. what do you have for lighting and flow? Have you checked your ammonia?

 

[Rugops]

How did you cycle it? Looks pretty new.. nem wasn’t a good call with a young tank either.. what do you have for lighting and flow? Have you checked your ammonia?

Started off with just setting it up and letting it run. I used live rock, cheato, and added bottled bacteria (with nitrifiers).

Ran it and checked NH3 until it was at zero and there was nitrates produced. I started the google sheet a lot later.

Yes. It is at 0. PO4 is at 0 too.

I use the AI Blade. It is on acclimation mode so it is running 24% right now.

 

[Troylee]

With all the diatoms I’d guess it just barely completed a cycle.. you gotta stock it slow or you’re just throwing money away and killing stuff.. nothing looks happy in the tank besides the nem of all things and it will most likely wither away over time.. what are using for lights and flow? Params look okay on your sheet..

 

[Gtinnel]

That frogspawn doesn’t just look mad it looks like it’s dying.
I strongly recommend that you slow down on adding stuff. Give your tank time to mature before adding new inhabitants especially when some of them just died.

 

[Cichlid Dad]

Rodi is a must in a reef tank imo. I add coral to a new tank and did fine, but they were only soft coral, it took 3 months before my euphyllia started to look good in my tank because I put it in way too early.

 

[Rugops]

With all the diatoms I’d guess it just barely completed a cycle.. you gotta stock it slow or you’re just throwing money away and killing stuff.. nothing looks happy in the tank besides the nem of all things and it will most likely wither away over time.. what are using for lights and flow? Params look okay on your sheet..

Flow is turned off minus the return pump. I use the CWP-5000 (Jebao).

Lights are low at the moment.

Yeah. Rapidly stocking is probably my fault. Softies are doing ok at the least.

 

[Rugops]

That frogspawn doesn’t just look mad it looks like it’s dying.
I strongly recommend that you slow down on adding stuff. Give your tank time to mature before adding new inhabitants especially when some of them just died.

Definitely. Probably won't get anything for a while after this.

 

[Troylee]

Flow is turned off minus the return pump. I use the CWP-5000 (Jebao).

Lights are low at the moment.

Yeah. Rapidly stocking is probably my fault. Softies are doing ok at the least.

Understood but what lighting are you using?

 

[Rugops]

Rodi is a must in a reef tank imo. I add coral to a new tank and did fine, but they were only soft coral, it took 3 months before my euphyllia started to look good in my tank because I put it in way too early.

That isn't within my capability. It was too early.

 

[Rugops]

Understood but what lighting are you using?

The AI Blade.

This but at 20%.

 

[Troylee]

The AI Blade.

This but at 20%.

Not sure the size of your tank or how many blades you have but you might wanna turn that up a little bit..

 

[Rugops]

Not sure the size of your tank or how many blades you have but you might wanna turn that up a little bit..

Just one. I raised it to 45%.

 

[Rugops]

Thank you guys for the help. Really this one is on me. Got a little too excited. I am fortunate to say that most of my pieces are within the Free - $30 range.

I have 1 torch that was like in the $90 range and another at the $60 but it was on its way out ($90) since I moved it to the substrate to make room for better looking stuff. I have a NY Knicks but it is looking ok, just a little irritated.

The frogspawn was $20 as the nem. The guy was giving them away too.

So I guess I will up the aeration for the pH and uh wait I guess.

 

[Rugops]

UPDATE:
My favorite pieces are opening!

 

[Lavey29]

I agree with the others that you are moving way to fast and sounds like you realize this mistake which is good. Patience is critical in this hobby. Please do not add mandarin fish until you have a very well established tank ecosystem that can support that type of fish. Typically this is around the one year mark.

 

[Gtinnel]

Thank you guys for the help. Really this one is on me. Got a little too excited. I am fortunate to say that most of my pieces are within the Free - $30 range.

I have 1 torch that was like in the $90 range and another at the $60 but it was on its way out ($90) since I moved it to the substrate to make room for better looking stuff. I have a NY Knicks but it is looking ok, just a little irritated.

The frogspawn was $20 as the nem. The guy was giving them away too.

So I guess I will up the aeration for the pH and uh wait I guess.

I did the same thing when I first setup my tank. I went to a lfs every weekend and for many weekends in a row I would buy a fish. It eventually caught up to me and I ended up killing everything in the tank. After I let the tank sit empty for a while I began only adding fish and coral occasionally, and was much more successful.
It’s hard to resist the urge to get new fish and corals (especially when you find them for good prices) but in the long run adding stuff quickly will usually lead to failure and make the hobby less enjoyable. Slow and steady wins the race.