Newbie

[fragit]

hello everyone,
I found your site while searching around the internet. I have had 2 nano-reefs for about a year and I am loving every minute of it. I have had salt fish-only tanks, but that was about 10yrs ago. Needless to say the reef portion of this hobby has come a long way. Anyway, after having some SPS for about 6mths now, I accidentally broke off a peice (oops). Well I decided to glue it down in another spot just to see what happened. The peice took off
! I now have another beautiful peice of SPS in my show tank, and a big interest in farming coral...

Since i am new to this any reco's are welcome. Here is what I have set up so far:

1 - 5gal AGA
1 - 10gal AGA
1 - 400w MH - Suspended 2' above both tanks
2-3 inch Sand bed in each
Heaters and Powerheads in both.
Small Peices of (.5lbs) of Live Rock in each.
Small whisper filters in each.

here are some of my questions:
1.Should I put a clean-up crew in each off these tanks?
2.Should I run carbon in these tanks?
3. Is 400w MH too much (Will it burn out any softies)? Should I downgrade the bulb to 200W?
4. Should I run actinics?
5. Whats the best light cycle?


Thanks

[FragOutpost]

Hello fragit and welcome to FragOutpost.com. Glad to have you aboard!
That is great to hear about your success in fragging SPS.

1.Should I put a clean-up crew in each off these tanks?

I would start by adding a few snails and maybe a hermit in each tank. You might also want to try some mini-stars. Since your tanks are small you might want to limit them to only one hermit in each.

2.Should I run carbon in these tanks?

It is not necessary to run carbon all of the time. It is a good idea to keep some on hand though for when needed. For example, if you happen to have any die off, or are experiencing an algae or cyno bloom. Or if you happen to notice that your water is becoming a little yellow, running some carbon will help bring it back to crystal clear again.
Beware with carbon as once it becomes exhausted and has absorbed all that it can, it can eventually leach dissolved organics back into the water column. So if you do decide to run carbon just be sure to change it periodically.

3. Is 400w MH too much (Will it burn out any softies)? Should I downgrade the bulb to 200W?

400 watts of MH is a lot of light, but only a drop in the bucket when compared to natural sunlight. If you are having success with the 400 watter then keep it. As far as burning softies are concerned, just be sure to slowly acclimate any new specimens slowly to the light. You can do so by either raising your light and slowly lowering it back or by placing a few layers of window screen on top of the tank and slowly removing a layer every few days or so. Once the softies are acclimated to the light they should thrive. As far as downgrading is concerned, I say if you already have the 400 then stick with it. You will experience much better growth rates than if you downgraded to a 250 or 175 watt MH. (Keep in mind that you can only run a 400 watt bulb in a 400 watt ballast.) A better idea might be to upgrade your tanks to one 20 or 30 gallon tank to make more efficient use of your light.

4. Should I run actinics?

Actinics are not necessary and are mostly for asthetic purposes. It is mostly personal prefence. Running actinics will help to make your corals fluoresce more and improve coloration.

5. Whats the best light cycle?

You should run your lights between 10 and 12 hours a day. If you decide to run actinics then you can simulate dawn and dusk by having the actinics turn on 1-2 hours before the MH and shut off 1-2 hours after the MH. If you are only going to run the metal halide then I would suggest a 10 - 12 hour photoperiod.


Hope this helps!

[fragit]

Awsome thanks!!!

I keep you posted on my progress.

[D12monkey]

Any update on progress?