have set up two new salt tanks in the past year with limited succses. I have always have fresh water tanks and wanted to dive inbto salt Sterted out with a 29 biuo cube that has done pretty well with out too much die of and soft corals doing weel. 6 months ago I set up a 72 bow front with sump with limited success. have lost many pricy fish due to ick I think???? have been having trouble with high nitrates for a long time and very little coral growth. any ideas where to start over?????????
New to this site and saltwater in general
- Thread starter roger scholl
- Start date
Need more info. Tank info, filtration, lighting, flow, etc......I would highly recommend starting out slow and then working up to pricey anything. This hobby takes a lot of dedication and time. Start with a few beginner fish/corals and try to keep them alive. After 6 months and you feel a little more comfortable add something new. Patience patience patience young danielmson.
The 72 is the one with the high nitrates. lts of live rock in tank and sump, two inches of crushed corral in tank. protene skimmer but no sand in sump, have taken out bio balls as recomended and added live rock in sump. I now have a nitrate mat covered by a charcol mate and covered by a media filter. all levels read good except for nitrates, today the read at 50
IMO even 50ppm Nitrate shouldn't kill most moderate to hardy fish. I would retest and/or do back to back big water changes to get them down if they're that high...but...you said you think you have Ich in the tank? IMO something else is probably killing the fish. Google "wetwebmedia Ich" and read about, look at pictures, see if you think that is the problem.
Do you overfeed? Do you change your filtration media/pads as needed? Do you use carbon? Do you use a heater?
I had to google "nitrate mat", all I could find was an Acurel product that doesn't have much information about it on the net. IMO you may want to ditch that and go for something more proven in nitrate reduction.
Do you overfeed? Do you change your filtration media/pads as needed? Do you use carbon? Do you use a heater?
I had to google "nitrate mat", all I could find was an Acurel product that doesn't have much information about it on the net. IMO you may want to ditch that and go for something more proven in nitrate reduction.
Welcome,
get rid of that crushed coral its only good for back fill in your yard it is most likely your problem and get a redundant test kit to make sure your readings are correct I have tested wrong a lot it happens if you have ich your options are limited. do you have inverts? But need to know water params.
get rid of that crushed coral its only good for back fill in your yard it is most likely your problem and get a redundant test kit to make sure your readings are correct I have tested wrong a lot it happens if you have ich your options are limited. do you have inverts? But need to know water params.