New Tank, Water Changes, Fin Rot??

[rsw686]

My 56 gallon tank is 4 weeks old. I cycled it with live rock, live sand, and ammonia which took 3 weeks. I added 2 sergeant major and a blue devil damsel. All seemed to be well so at the end of the week I added a false peculiar clownfish and purple pseudochromis.

Ammonia and nitrite read 0, however the nitrate has been up around 40ppm. I've done two water changes of 20 gallons to try and get it down but it hasn't helped at all. I just added nitratelock, it comes in a media bag to place in the filter, which absorbs only nitrate so that will bring it down. It says it reduces it by half after 24 hours, which then you regenerate it by soaking it in table salt water.

Long story short, the fish have been eating fine, but I've noticed what looks like fin rot on the damsels and pseudochromis. I never noticed it before but might of overlooked it. I'm wondering if this is from the water changes being done back to back and the nitrate level. I am assuming once the nitrate goes down and the fish settle in their environment this will go away on its own, but I could be wrong.
Any suggestions would be helpful.

Water conditions are as follows
temp: 78F
ammonia: 0ppm
nitrite: 0ppm
nitrate: 40ppm
ph: 8.0-8.2 hard to tell on the test kit
alkalinity: 5meq/l which is 14dKh
phosphate: 0ppm
specific gravity: 1.023-1.024

 

[Germanman]

cold be nipping can u post a pic of the "fin rot"?

 

[rsw686]

cold be nipping can u post a pic of the "fin rot"?

Here are a few pictures.

 

[Germanman]

i dont really see any fungus on there i think its prolly nipping...what do you feed them and how often? also do they chase one another.

 

[rsw686]

i dont really see any fungus on there i think its prolly nipping...what do you feed them and how often? also do they chase one another.

I've seen them chase each other, but I wasn't sure if that was what it was from. This is my first fish tank. I've done a ton of research, but I'm lacking from the experience part. I'm trying not to kill any fish and wanted another opinion.

I have brine shrimp, mini krill, saltwater flakes, and marine pellets. I feed them a small amount twice a day alternating the food variety. The amount I drop is only takes them a minute or two to eat.

 

[Germanman]

yea its probably aggression damsels arent good tank mates..they need large territory to themselves and will kill to defend it.

 

[rsw686]

yea its probably aggression damsels arent good tank mates..they need large territory to themselves and will kill to defend it.

Yeah I thought damsels would be good to start with, I didn't want to spend a fortune on fish until I got the hang of it. The sergeant majors chase each other around. I think they both the other fish as the clownfish has gone after them a few times. I probably will sell them or give them back to the fishstore and just spend the money on fish that are less aggressive and get along better.

 

[Germanman]

good. at my old work we had a sergeant in the coral units that would bite everyone but me when they tried to bag up corals lol it was funny.

 

[rsw686]

good. at my old work we had a sergeant in the coral units that would bite everyone but me when they tried to bag up corals lol it was funny.

Aftering having a war with the fish, basically had to pull out all the live rock, I got the sergeant majors and the purple pseudochromis out of the tank. I had another 10 gallon tank and a small pump so I rigged it up next to the main tank as a refuge using a U shaped tube as a siphon between the two. It works quite nice until I can figure out who to give the fish.

The pseudochromis kept trying to eat my cleaner shrimp. The guy at the store said it should get along, but now that I've read more that doesn't look to be the case.

So that leaves me with a blue devil damsel, a clownfish, a cleaner shrimp, snails, crabs.

Any recommendations on what fish to get so I don't have issues with them? I was thinking another false peculiar clown, and a yellow tang? I'm thinking the tang would be okay in the 56 gal tank. Any others you can think of that won't eat the cleaner shrimp. I'm looking to have 5-6 fish.

 

[rsw686]

I was also looking at a neon goby. I've read they get along with cleaner shrimp. Maybe even an angel fish when the tank matures and there is more algae for it to consume.

These are just ideas. Whatever I get I don't want to have to deal with compatibility issues.