Mushroom Corals

[Melz]

hi guys, im looking for some advice, my tank has been set up now for around a month. I did a water test at local marine store and it came out as follows

ph 8.2
nitritre 0ppm
nitrate 0ppm
ammonia 0ppm
kh 5
gh 20+

Am i right in saying there is a problem with the GH??? is there any other tests i need to do and how do i resolve this?.

I bought some blue legs yesterday and some live rock with mushroom corals (also coral food). The mushrooms have shrunk tremendously they were in the region of 5-6 inches across and now they are about 1 cm:shock: , Have i done anything wrong or will they take time to adjust?????. I dont want to loose em, oh and in the live rock i got some baby brittle stars:^: :^:. an added bonus, but what do i feed them?

All help appreciated, melz x

 

[jhnrb]

welcome Melz to the site. well unfortunately your system is only a month old and has not matured enough to support corals at this time, so maybe you will get lucky and most likely not. at this point I would recommend you go to the helpful articles and read the articles on the 1st page for beginners, etc. most of your questions will be answered there. at this point do not add anything else to the system until the system matures at least 3 months. you can feed your crabs some small pieces of fish, shrimp, and other marine cusine. just make sure it is very small amounts every couple days. you will need extra shells for the crabs as they grow. You will find articles on testing, what to test for and what the parameters should be. hope this helps. in order to be successful long term you really need to understand some of the basics, hence, the articles. once done there you can come back and post any lingering questions or concerns. just let your system mature and watch your water parameters as described in the helpful articles. keep us posted here . good luck, let us know if you need further help now. i feel what will happen will happen at this point. so if you loose a couple crabs or mushrooms at this point dont get too worried. just let the system balance out. happy fishin.

 

[Melz]

Thanks jhrnb for the info. I will have a look at the pages you have suggested..probably even print them out so i can re read. Yeah i realise now i have been stupid in adding things to the tank so early, ill just have to contain my excitment and watch my trop's for the nest few months and look after what i have got in the saltwater. With a bit of luck maybe they will survive, as you say it's not alot to loose at the moment and better that than something more costly.

thanks for taking the time to reply and heres hoping this is the start of a beautifull long lazsting relationship between, tank, and owner

 

[minireefer]

I would agree to hold off on any coral for now.Mushrooms are pretty hardy though.Sometimes they take several days to adjust to there new environment.
Lighting can cause the shrinkage if ther were in high lit high tank and moved less light they will slowly adjust to it.That being said what size tank do you have what kind of lighting is on it?The brittles should be ok just scavaging for their food

 

[Melz]

hi minireefer my tank is 36 x 18 x 18. The lights are 2 marine white tubes 30w each and a new bulb out the marine blue artinic t5. I have the white light on mopst of the day and switch to the moonlight one from 8 at night to about the same next morning. I now have a rust brown covering of algae over the coral sand...i have been told this will dissapear as the tank matures. I'm going to take a sample into my work to get tested for quality. Hopefully it will come out ok.

with thanks melz

 

[minireefer]

sounds like 50 us gallons.120 watts is really on the low end,but mushrooms and zoanthids should be ok.Is the stuff dark red and slime or just a brown dusty texture.Red slimey is a type of bacteria called cyno not good.The dusty brown is a ditom and will lessen as your tank matures.Also you can get some snails that will eat the stuff as well.

 

[Bifferwine]

Ideally for corals you want at least 3 to 5 watts per gallon, so if you want to get more stuff, you'll have to get more lights.