New to SW, sick damsel

[sacrificetheory]

Hello! It's been a while since I've been around, and I just acquired a new SW tank. My LFS closed down, had a big sale, and since I worked there for a while I got a bigggg discount on everything. I got a 20 long with a Penguin HOB, elite heater, about 10 lbs of live rock, 4 blue leg hermits, around 6 narcissus snails, 8 turbo snails and a domino damsel.
For some reason it keeps automatically putting me into italics so bare with me.
Anyways, I also got a AP saltwater master test kit, calcium test, hydrometer, Aquavitro Alpha and some tetra marine flakes.
The problem is my damsel, it's back fin looks absolutely awful and it's losing some color. I thought it had ick so I tried a freshwater dip about 6 hours ago and it's fin keeps looking worse. It's acting normal and eating like a hog. I have a few blurry pictures for you.
Also, any recommendations would be awesome. It's FOWLR at the moment, but I'd love to have some easy corals.
Water parameters are as followed.
Ph- 8.2
Nitrate- 40 ppm
Nitrite- 0 ppm
Ammonia- 0 ppm
Calcium- 440 ppm
As for lighting, I have a double Hagen GLO with a marine glo and power glo bulb.

[Cerianthus]

Although pic is somewhat blur, it does not look that bad. What is SG & temp? How long has it been since adding LR/fish/Inverts?

I would stop f/w dip without any certainty as it may impose more stress on fish.
I never done s/w fish in f/w dip for 6 hrs although some may survive long dipping time than others.

[sacrificetheory]

Oh no! He was only in there for about 2-3 minutes. I was meaning it was done 6 hours ago!
SG is 1.024, I'm assuming that's what you mean? Temp is right at 78.
I apologize for the blurry pictures. My digital camera is dead so those are cell pics.
The base of his tail fin is what I'm referring to? I'm not too savvy on SW fish, I just have what came with the tank. I got the entire set up and everything mentioned for about 120 bucks. Also, the live rock and inverts are everything already in the tank. It's been set up for at least a year or longer.

[sacrificetheory]

Well, I woke up this morning and the damsel was stuck to the filter and all of his color was gone. I thought he was dead but when I grabbed him from the filter he was breathing heavily. He can't move and now I've lost him, no idea where he is in the tank. I'm afraid something is going horribly wrong and I'd like to eventually have some clowns and firefish. Bah.
Btw, I did a 10% water change yesterday. I don't have an RO unit and my nearest LFS is 2 hours away since the one near me closed down. But! The tap water I used is filtered and I used that Alpha stuff.

[Cerianthus]

Hope he/she is OK

[sacrificetheory]

I'm pretty sure it's dead. I can't find it anywhere. Bah. I don't even know what I was thinking buying the tank, I'm just so enthralled by fish and always wanted a SW tank. As far as making sure the tank is disease free, how do I go about it?

[greech]

So was this tank one of the stores diplay tanks or sis you put this together? Was it set up and fish added all on the same day? Where did you get your water and how did you acclimate the fish to your tank? Looks like you are using a hydrometer so it is possible it was not accurate and your SG is off or significantly different from that of your LFS's.

It is very possible the fish was in somewhat poor condition when you got it and the stress from changing envionments took it over the edge.

Don't give up on the tank. You have the makings of a nice little nano there. Damsels are fairly resilient fish so disease would not be my first concern. Hopefully some more info on your part will help determine the cause of the damsel's demise so you can figure out where to go from here. In the mean time, I would not add anything else to the tank (especially since it sounds like it is still cycling).

Edit: If it is fact dead, you should remove it.

[sacrificetheory]

It was a display tank at the store for about a year or more. Everything in the tank now was in the tank when I purchased it, including water. I did a 10% water change the day after I put the fish in because he started looking sickly, maybe that was a mistake? The store had an RO unit so that's what the water was originally, but I used filtered tap water and put in that Alpha stuff to remove chlorine, chloramines, nitrite and nitrate.
I got the fish the day after setting the tank up from the same LFS I got the tank. For the acclimation, I used one of those little plastic clip on boxes to put the bag in, opened the top, and put in about a tablespoon and a half of water every 15 minutes.

I'm sorry I'm all over the place in my posts, everything just hits me at once when I start typing! Baha!
Thank you guys for replying, btw.

[greech]

So tapwater is one concern but would not think a 10% WC using tap would take a fish down that quick. I assume you added salt to the tap water? Did you mix it well? How long, etc? Did you make sure the SG of the new water matched that of the tank?

It sounds like the tail damage showed up right away which makes me think the fish was sick/damged/stressed to start with or there may be some kind of predator in the tank you are not aware of. Do you hear any popping sounds coming from the tank (especially when the lights are out)? If so you could have a mantis shrimp but I would think the LFS would have known it was there since this was one of there displays.

The tail damage does not sound like a disease that will persist in your tank like ich. In any case, even though the tank was "established" you should give it a little time to settle after the move. If you find the damsel, try and take a close up pic of the fin.

BTW, do you know what you want to do with the tank? Know that damsels can be very territorial and in a 20 gallon tank, it will not be very compasionate to new arrivals (especially when it is the first fish in the tank and marks its territory).

[sacrificetheory]

I know for sure I want a clown and firefish. Maybe some easy corals such as mushrooms. The damsel was honestly a test fish, I wasn't by any means attached to it. I just wanted to make sure fish would survive, but obviously I got my answer. :P
The salinity of the tank was a little high so on the wc I only added a very small amount and waited about 10 minutes before adding it to the tank. I use Instant Ocean, if that makes any difference.
Also, the tap water comes from a tap that is filtered, would that make any difference? Should I use distilled water? As I previously mentioned, my LFS closed and the closest one is about 2 hours away. :(
No popping sounds, my only hitchhikers are some bristle worms and some other kind of transparent worm. The damage tail almost looked like a rash, this morning it was completely pale and had a red tint.
I plan on making a trip tomorrow or the next day, should I get some more live rock? I was thinking about maybe a cleaner shrimp, also. What about chemicals? Is there anything that can make tap water safe?

[greech]

There really isn'y anything you can add to tap water to make it safer with the exception of a dechlorinator. If you cannot use RO I would used distilled water for mixing water and for top offs. If you want to stick with the hobby I would highly recommend that you find a source of RO/DI water or buy a RO/DI filter. www.bulkreefsupply.com (http://www.bulkreefsupply.com) is a great source for those IMO but there are mant places online to buy them. You may also find a used system somewhere like craigslist or on the for sale forums at sites like this.

Instant Ocean is a perfectly fine salt. You should try to let you new SW mix for a few hours before using it (overnight even better). If you have an old pump or powerhead you can use to mix with it will help and also heat up the water. On your tank I would recommend weekly WC's of 10 to 20%. Get your DT's SG to where you want it (since you mentioned corals down the road you should set it somewhere in the neighborhood of 1.024 to 1.026. Match up your SG of the new water to the DT's SG and top off the tank in between WC's using fresh water (salt does not evaporate).

Honestly, I would not add anything to the tank until you have a better handle on the tank and those nitrates lower. A cleaner shrimp will be a great addition but your tank may not be ready yet. If all that rock is mature, you should not see much of a cycle and those nitrates should dissipate fairly quickly on their own and/or by doing WC's. If you are going to a LFS tomorrow, take a water sample with you and have them confirm your results (can't hurt). Also, if the LFS you go to has a refractometer, they can confirm that your hydrometer is accurate (many are not). Just check your SG before you head out and see what their measuremnt is. They only need a couple of drops for a refarctometer.

It looks like you have enough rock to me but more is generally better. Keep in mind that if the rock you get is uncured or it will be out of water for a while while you travel, you will have some dies off and that can throw your water off until it recures. You can also add CLEAN dry rock which will become live in a couple of months of being in your tank. You want porous rock but not something like lava rock.

Hope I did not confuse you more and this helps somehow.

EDIT: Also, you mentioned having a HOB filter. If it has a biowheel you may want to remove it. All of the biological filtration you need is in your rock and sand. You can leave it on for a while but eventually it will become a nitrate trap. Any mechanical filtration you use in a marine tank should be kept clean and/or replaced often so if you have a sponge in the filter you will want to rinse it out and or replace it. One media I might recomend to go in the filter would be Chemipure Elite.

Another thing I just thought of is you don't have much flow in the tank. This is very important for several reasons even if you don't have corals. You need water to flow through your rock so your bacteria can "filter" it. Having one or two powerheads will also create surface agitation increasing dissolved oxygen and helping to keep pH balanced. The surface agitation will also break up the surface scum. Come to think of it, this may have had something to do with the damsel (lack of O2).

Ok, I'm done rambling now...

[sacrificetheory]

Rambling is fine with me! Any kind of knowledge to be passed on is very very welcome. So, add powerheads to my list. What kind do you think I need? As far as gph goes.
Also, I have a HOB on one of my freshwater tanks that has higher gph, do you think it would be safe to swap them?
I apologize if some of my questions sound redundant, I just want to have enough information as I can.

[Cerianthus]

Since 20L is 30" long, I do agree with extra PH. I even had 2-3 PH with 1 x HOB FOWLR set up filled way overstocked than normal with locally caught tropicals; filefish, butterfly, dottyback/wrasse, lawn mower, flying gurnard, juvie grouper, flounders, puffers, clams, mussels, etc, etc, etc. Ran PS part time only.

I would not swap the filter at this point.

[greech]

A good PH for the money are Koralia Evolutions. . One 750 would do fine for now but 2 (or maybe 1 750 and a nano version) would give you more random flow. Two 750s might be too much but I doubt it. Later down the road these can be hooked up to a wave timer if you like. If money is no object go with tunze nanostream (6025) or a Vortech MP-10.

[sacrificetheory]

Sounds good! I'm searching around right now for the best deals. What do you guys think of these? You can't beat the price! http://stores.ebay.com/purewaterclub/_i.html?_fsub=318384010&_sc=1&_sop=1

[greech]

I don't know anything about those. Never heard of them. Yes the price is good but I might be concerned about the quality of the filters and how the whole thing will hold up. Google them and see if you can find any feedback. Not trying to sell you on BRS units but they are very well made and they use high quality filters. Their customer service is very good as well. Kent also make some good units.

You don't need a big filter. A 25 to 50 gpd will work for your size tank.

[sacrificetheory]

There's a Kent unit up for auction, starting bid is 9 bucks. It's about 8 years old, though. I'll link you to the auction.
Quick question, can I hook up any unit to the faucet or do certain ones require there own dedicated plumbing? Probably a dumb question. Sorry. :(

[sacrificetheory]

http://cgi.ebay.com/Kent-Marine-Deluxe-Maxxima-Hi-S-Reverse-Osmosis-/110606329636?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item19c0a6a724

Sorry about that! I forgot the link. :)

[greech]

Those are fairly popular and still made today so finding parts (if you were to need them) should not be a problem. At 8 years, that membarance is probably dried out so you may need a new one and that will run you about $100 if you buy the Kent membrane. You will also need the other cartridges that will set you back $25 to $40 each. Not sure how many gpd that unit does. Brand new those units are around $250+.

[sacrificetheory]

Hmmm. I googled the ones on ebay. I haven't found a bad word yet. But of course, nobody has really had them any length of time.
I really really appreciate the help from you guys. Any more recommendations or advice would be very welcome. :D