RE-entering the battle

[SFKINNC]

After moving this past December, I’ve begun to re-establish my Biocube 32 and my 10 gal “quarantine/hospital/isolation” tank: Previously my ‘cube held a few fish, a few mushroom corals and snails. It had about 50 pounds of what had been dry rock covered in pink coralline algae. I rinsed out the tanks, letting the coralline algae dry where it was. I washed the rock with my garden hose, soaked it in fresh water for about a week, let it dry in the sun, and packed it in a Rubbermaid bin until a couple of weeks ago.

The 10 gal quarantine tank was equipped with one small HOB power filter and one under-gravel reverse-flow filter using crushed coral substrate.
The cube was outfitted with the original 50 pounds of dried rock, about 25 pounds of “live” sand, the cube’s original led lights, and the cube’s original filter setup with fiber “scrubbing” pads substituting for the now hard-to-find filter cartrides. I used liquid “quick cycling” bacteria to “jump start” both tanks.

I added 5 fish: 3 pajama cardinals, a firefish, and a gramma loreto to the quarantine tank (QT) and soon moved the cardinals and the firefish to the cube to get them away from the gramma who was harassing them in the QT.

I began to see diatoms growing in both tanks, so I added a clean up crew consisting of small hermit crabs, nassarius snails, astrea snails, cerith snails, and Mexican turbo snails. I put only 2 or 3 crabs and 2 or 3 snails in the QT.

My question is: Now that I have all this too-hastily-acquired livestock, What’s a good feeding regimen until the tank begins to mature? Help me out, please!

 

[MaxTremors]

After moving this past December, I’ve begun to re-establish my Biocube 32 and my 10 gal “quarantine/hospital/isolation” tank: Previously my ‘cube held a few fish, a few mushroom corals and snails. It had about 50 pounds of what had been dry rock covered in pink coralline algae. I rinsed out the tanks, letting the coralline algae dry where it was. I washed the rock with my garden hose, soaked it in fresh water for about a week, let it dry in the sun, and packed it in a Rubbermaid bin until a couple of weeks ago.

The 10 gal quarantine tank was equipped with one small HOB power filter and one under-gravel reverse-flow filter using crushed coral substrate.
The cube was outfitted with the original 50 pounds of dried rock, about 25 pounds of “live” sand, the cube’s original led lights, and the cube’s original filter setup with fiber “scrubbing” pads substituting for the now hard-to-find filter cartrides. I used liquid “quick cycling” bacteria to “jump start” both tanks.

I added 5 fish: 3 pajama cardinals, a firefish, and a gramma loreto to the quarantine tank (QT) and soon moved the cardinals and the firefish to the cube to get them away from the gramma who was harassing them in the QT.

I began to see diatoms growing in both tanks, so I added a clean up crew consisting of small hermit crabs, nassarius snails, astrea snails, cerith snails, and Mexican turbo snails. I put only 2 or 3 crabs and 2 or 3 snails in the QT.

My question is: Now that I have all this too-hastily-acquired livestock, What’s a good feeding regimen until the tank begins to mature? Help me out, please!

It’s hard to give you a definitive answer because it depends on a several things. If the fish are in good condition, I would start with feeding once a day (the food should be pretty much gone in 30 seconds, the two minute thing is way too much), and then monitor nutrient levels to increase or decrease. If they are in poor condition, I would start feeding three times a day and do water changes as necessary to keep nutrient levels reasonable. But it also depends on the species, some species need fed more often (the species you have will be fine with once a day).

 

[Tired]

You should feed your fish a minimum of once a day. Smaller, more frequent meals are better, but not required for what you have. Preferably, cycle between various good-quality foods, to give some nutritional variety. Rinse frozen foods before feeding, unless you want to add additional nutrients and small particles that feed filter-feeders. Which you might!