I haven't had an aquarium for a few years. I have never had a saltwater water aquarium. I have always wanted one though. I finally bit the bullet and started reading about setting one up. Probably should have read a lot more before buying anything.
I bought a 75 gallon tank, should have stuck to original plan and gone 40. I started with 80 lbs. Of dry rock, 15 cured live rock, I think I have 25 lbs of live sand and 10 dry aragonite. I set it up and let it cycle, or I thought it did. I got a small spike and everything went to zero.
I thought I will start with just a few hermit crabs and snails. So I got like 5 margarita snails and 2 small astrea snails(sp), 4 small blue hermit crabs. They had 2 very lively red scarlet skunk Shrimp, so I thought hey they should be alright. At this point the tank had been running for 3 and half weeks, all levels returned to zero.
I let about 2 weeks go by, feeding the shrimp a little since the tank had nothing for them. Very fun to watch them interact and eat. All levels were still good. So I go to the store and buy a lawnmower blenny, I didn't quarantine it, should have but didn't. For next week I check for spikes. Had a small ammonia spike, under. 25. Nothing else spiked.
So now the tank has been running for roughly 5 1/2- 6 weeks. I got a wild hair to add a hob refugium. So I ordered one. Another week goes by, everything is great. Snails, crabs, shrimp, blenny all seem to be doing great.
That brings us into December. Around the 5th I put the refugium on and added some live sand, 10#s, chaeto to refugium and a few burrowing snails and about 15 small cerith snails to get were the bigger snails couldn't get into.
Another week goes by and everything is going great. I am stoked about it.
Not sure what happened but I started to get an ammonia spike again, like under. 25. I do about a 10 percent water change, it comes down. I order a few fish online, since locally all I have is. Petco and their selection was looking poor and sick.
I have a royal gamma and clown Goby in quarantine now.
I did a water change, about 8 gallons, the next morning one of my shrimp was dead :(. Check levels had a slight ammonia reading under. 25. Read online that it might have mottled recently and the water change could have shocked it. Well I searched the tank and sure enough there was a molt, plus the strictest died had eggs. Not sure that mattered.
So present day tank has been running for around 2 1/2 months. 1 shrimp died a week ago,. And now my other died tonight. Ammonia was under. 25, nitrite 0, nitrate under 5. Salinity 1.025, pH 8.0, the highest my nitrates have ever tested were 10. Pulled chaeto out this morning because I feel it was dying and contributing to my ammonia issues. Besides the shrimp dying, maybe one of my astrea snails died,nothing else.
I am a bit bothered by this set back. I don't like killing my pets one bit. So now I have 2 fish in a quarantine tank, something killing my display tank, and can't catch my blenny.
I am open to tips, criticism, anything to help eliminate any further casualties. I know the happen, but those shrimp seemed to be thriving until this past 7 days.
Thank you for reading
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