MadReefer

I really like sea stars, but everything I read tells me not to use them. I found some safe ones and added them. I almost never see them.

Hind sight and I would not have bought my two serpent sea stars. I'll sell them to you if you want them. Two banded serpent stars.

Just my opinion, leave the linkis out.

This is not as long of a move as I did, but it's bigger. It would be best if you could setup a running system to place everything into after moving but before you can setup the full system. This could be rubbermaids or something. And if you could move it in parts it would be easier. It's hard for me to give better advice without knowing more details about the livestock and hardware that is to be moved.

It's a big move, take your time if you can.

I just wanted to post a couple pictures of what I found under my live rock. I think that this kind of stuff is one of the most important aspects to a maturing tank. I was trying to sell this, but now that I see this I might wait until I really need to sell before I do.

Copepods are smallest and have the best chance of living. Algae eating isopods can live but probably sometimes die. Big amphipods probably die more often but the small ones probably pass right through. I don't know for sure, but I know it feeds the corals and fish.

You can cut worms and starfish and make two worms or starfish. They may or may not live, but there is a chance they do.

I never see anything get chopped and I have thousands of pods in my refugiums, it probably happens though.

If they go in, they could be chopped. They can live through being chopped.

Bigger stuff gets chopped. But it's all the little stuff you want to go through and it lives. Even when stuff gets chopped it feeds stuff.

I think pods and refugiums are more important than most people think. Pods are trying to reproduce all the time and this makes a lot of nutrient rich, yet not rotting, coral food. I think there is a lot going on in refugiums that can't be seen. I wish I had a microscope.

I added a background so you can't see the wall behind the tank.

Here's some new corals I traded for.

I think what they are saying is that it sinks slowly.

That is why I suggested Formula Two Pellets, they sink and are great for veggie eaters like blennies.

The blenny might work, I'm not sure what else would fit that niche.

As for the sixline, there might be another fish that is similar but less aggressive. I don't have experience with them but a swissgaurd basslet might be good.

I'm not very experienced with fish. I was just passing on what I've heard. Each fish has its own personality and you might get a great one or a terror.

I use Windows Live Messenger to call other computers, never tried it to a phone.

I wouldn't buy this. JMO

The stalk type is xenia. If not it's waving hands coral.

I have this, my fish like it.

But I also have something that my old blenny and all my fish like even better. Ocean Nutrition- Formula Two Marine Pellets. I'm not sure that it's any better but I will buy it again.

dsoz makes some good points here. You might want to rethink these fish. Blennies have great personalities and can be very nice fish, but they can also become a pain. Why is it that you want these fish? Not that they wont work, but there might be a better option.

I think two would be fine at once. Just don't feed too much early on.

Thaw your frozen mysis and other prepared food on a paper towel to remove the phosphate juices.

Excellent point Jay!

I read about this over and over and never did it thinking it couldn't mean much. But I think it really helps and I'll never go back to not doing it.

I'm in Corvallis.

I have some for free unattached. Or for the price of the rock attached.

I added some new corals.

Water changes remove organic wastes that slow bacterial growth also, but you don't want to kill other life while you increase your bio load and bacteria.

If the bacteria are in low numbers, you have to add bio load slowly to let them catch up.

If you have high bacteria numbers now, and you don't add a high bio load, the bacteria will settle back to lower numbers based on the bio load.

Both ways you should add to the bio load slowly so that you don't overwhelm the bacteria or swing into instability.

You seemed to be watching your ammonia and nitrites very well, you are on the right track. I would say that all die off from live rock is over and you have a lot of bacteria ready to work. A few snails to remove hair algae from your display, skimming to remove excess proteins before the break down, and chaeto to take up nutrients would be a good thing now. But it will be 6 months before the system is very stable, I'm not saying that you have to wait that long to add fish, but it's better if you could.

I wish I could have waited; my first tank was up for a week and a half before I added my first fish. Good thing they were hardy fish, I still have them. But even after a few months I added more delicate fish and lost them and I think it was because my system was new. Now I know better.

I hope this helps and doesn't confuse. I have snails for sale and chaeto for free if you want to drive to Corvallis.

I have a ton that is free. The problem is that I'm in Corvallis, that's about 2 hours south of you.

Cycling a reef tank is not so much science as art. Some say it doesn't need to cycle at all if you add LR. Some say it takes less than a week to stabilize.

I feel it's not about cycling but giving an opportunity for the little stuff to grow. Pods, macro algae, sponges, and other hitchhikers take time to grow and it's that stuff that you want to give time.

If you used quality live rock you were probably ready for life sometime the first week.

Also, I think a skimmer should be run from day one.

JMO

Edit- I wanted to add- The reason to run the skimmer, fuge and lights from sometime in the first week is to give the life in there a better chance to live. Same reason to do water changes, you don't want to poison the life that is on the rock with the dead rotting life on the rock.

The only reason for this is so that bacteria have a chance to grow at a maximum rate. If you have chaeto in the system it will take ammonia out of the system so less bacteria will grow. The problem is that if you have hair algae, it is doing the same thing but in a bad way because you don't want hair algae.

Another bonus to chaeto is that it will bring bacteria and pods and other good stuff into the system.

I was always told that once any algae of any kind starts to grow on the rock, it is time to start adding snails.