Please Help!

[IndianaReef]

I have been cycling my 40 gallon (150L) tank for about a week now in which I bought about 4kg of live rock and 5kg of dry rock. In the past week spot algae on my glass has been forming, slugs have started to appear, and hair algae. Looks very alive to me! Is it acceptable to add a few crabs and snails to my tank as my nitrate has fallen to 0, my ammonia is dropping relatively fast, and my Ph is almost at 8.4 (8 right now). Only asking because it seems like there is a lot of life already in there and wouldnt mind a clean up crew ddoing the dirty business for me. Additionally, I made the mistake of pouring my crushed coral substrate in after my water was already in the tank, and now the water is a milky colour. I am going to do a 50% water change, but are there any other methods to stop this from happening (I did prewash my substrate). Thanks

 

[Nigel35]

Wouldn't do a that big of a water change it will screw up the PM's you have right now which are looking good. It would be good to add a clean up crew. I suggest a few turbo snails which will eat the algae down to the roots and it won't come back.

 

[Nigel35]

would have been best to add the sand first just happens sometimes...

 

[BeltedCoyote]

Just give the system time. The cloudiness doesn’t warrant such a massive water change and as Nigel said above it will only serve to mess up your parameters

 

[PatW]

A fifty percent water change will not get the particulates out of the water. If you have a sump with filter socks, that will do the trick. But any form of mechanical filtration will remove the particulates (assuming the filter is fine enough) in rapid order if the water turnover is high enough. I have filter socks on my tank and if I cloud up the tank, they filter out particulates pretty quickly.