A Couple of Quick Question

J

justin42279

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Sep 6, 2004
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Hey everyone.

I just got started in the saltwater world of fish tanks. Its a fish only setup with no live rock. I set it up in the first week of Semptember. It has an Emperor 350 and 2 aquaclear 20 powerheads at each end of the tank. I went through and did a fishless cycle with a shrimp. My ammonia and nitrites are at 0. My Nitrates are at 10ppm and have been holding for about 3 weeks at that point. Now I am having a huge Diatom problem and it's covering all of my sand bed and rock. I also made sure to only use RO water from my LFS.

Someone that I talked to said that because my emporer 350 has a biowheel, my nitrate levels will never go down to 0. I've never heard of that before. Can anyone comment on this?

Second question, I recently bought 3 turbo snails last week. A couple of days ago, 2 of these snails have went into their shells and have not moved or come out. Is that normal?

Thanks for the help and this boards has a wealth of information.

Justin

Tank Setup:

55 gal
350 Emporer Filter
2 x Aquaclear 20 Powerhead
30 lbs Regular Lace Rock

1 Yellow Tail Blue Damsel
1 Yellow Damsel

2 Turbo Snails
7 Blue Legged Crabs

Ammonia: 0
Nitrites: 0
Nitrates: 10ppm
 
justin42279 said:
Hey everyone.

I just got started in the saltwater world of fish tanks. Its a fish only setup with no live rock. I set it up in the first week of Semptember. It has an Emperor 350 and 2 aquaclear 20 powerheads at each end of the tank. I went through and did a fishless cycle with a shrimp. My ammonia and nitrites are at 0. My Nitrates are at 10ppm and have been holding for about 3 weeks at that point. Now I am having a huge Diatom problem and it's covering all of my sand bed and rock. I also made sure to only use RO water from my LFS.

Someone that I talked to said that because my emporer 350 has a biowheel, my nitrate levels will never go down to 0. I've never heard of that before. Can anyone comment on this?
Click to expand...

I've heard of it before, and I'm not sure it's 100percent, but The logic is good. If you run the biowheel then nitrates get into the filters and stay in the water. leaking into you tank...

As far as the diatoms, I have read many posts and experienced it myself. This will go away after time. If you want you can clean your filters and vacum your rock. It should go away pretty easy... it'll just take time and maintaince...
 
Biowheel or no, if you are not using live rock or a deep sand bed, your nitrate can't decrease without large water changes. Conversion of nitrate to N2 or NO, which can leave the tank, can't occur under aerobic conditions. Live rock and the DSB provide these conditions, but the biowheel does not.

Mysterious snail deaths are a routine question on these boards. It may be that they were not acclimated properly, because large snails supposedly need 5-6 hours of acclimation to avoid tissue damage. Could be you have a bloom of some toxic algae like dinoflagellates, and they got poisoned. Could be some stress that they suffered before you got them. It's hard to know.
 
Thanks for the info everyone.

I do have a DSB in my tank. Am I correct in assuming that 10 ppm for Nitrate is not a bad thing? If the only problem is the growth of algea, what are some great cleaners that I can add that will take care of a huge chunk. I'm not really worried about the rock but more with the sand. I'm looking for a few somethings that will really give a good cleaning and will work with my tanks.

Justin
 
10 ppm nitrate is quite livable. For the sand, cerith snails will graze the sandbed and nassarius will stir it up. The hermits should help as well.

Just giving the algae time to die down will help as well.
 
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