I Think I Did Something Wrong?

[omega59]

Today i setup my aquarium for saltwater fish YAY. I got two pieces of LR and i placed in a bucket which my LFS added water from there which is good. Anyhow, My Aquarium is setup i'm adding salt slowly from what i understand it may tak up to 12 1 cups of salt to get a perfect result. I did not add the LR just yet as I think there is a problem......

After adding the sand my tank is ALL cloudy and debre is all over! i got both powerheads going to disolve the salt quickly in the tank. Filter is off i don't want it to get cloged and break. Please what do i do, do i do a water change??

 

[Truck]

let it settle

 

[omega59]

okay. is 12 cups sound right for a 30gal tank, cus i can't get the levels up and i just did 3 cups.

 

[Truck]

giv it time to disolve, did you put the sand in first?

 

[omega59]

i placed the pumps in one on back other on side. then washed the sand quickly rinse, then added it to the tank. waited 10mins or so and started adding salt. atm it reads 1.008

 

[Truck]

you shouldnt add the sand until the rock is in place, other wise it could fall

 

[omega59]

what do you mean fall?

 

[Truck]

if a mantis shrimp, or a goby or something that can burrow, decides to burrow, it could cause the rock to fall and could crush inverts

 

[omega59]

i will move the sand make a small ditch, then add the rock. but i don't want to add it yet if the salt is not right. can you tell me how many cups for a 30gal?

 

[Truck]

i dont know, ive not had a marine tank going for a while

 

[andywg]

you shouldnt add the sand until the rock is in place, other wise it will fall

It isn't quite as simple as that. There is a risk that burrowing creatures may undermine the rock sculptures. In practice the risk of a rock fall (without something like a dragon wrasse in the tank) is very low and it is nowhere near certain.

 

[Truck]

you shouldnt add the sand until the rock is in place, other wise it will fall

It isn't quite as simple as that. There is a risk that burrowing creatures may undermine the rock sculptures. In practice the risk of a rock fall (without something like a dragon wrasse in the tank) is very low and it is nowhere near certain.

and also any hitch-hikers which are not spotted, could cause problems, if they are not nipped in the bud

 

[jeasko]

to the salty side

iregardless of the sand issue you should alow the water to settle (may take a few hours! wouldnt be surprised with anywhere from 3-12hours) then id be taking a few gallons out of the tank at a time and adding salt to it making sure its at a high sg somewhere around 1.030 and then re add it to the aqaurium, this way it ensures the salt is disolved and not just sitting in the bottom of the tank, after doing this a few times take a reading in the tank and see where it is, if it needs more salt repeat this if its way over take some out and add just R/O water until iuts right.

What are you using to measure your SG? hydrometer or refractometer.

Dont worry to much if you think your going over board with the salt it does seem like an incredible amount you add when setting up!

also there is no real measure of cups per gallon its just something you have to keep adding until iuts right, unfortunately you should have just put water in tank and mixed in the salt to the right SG then added sand and left to settle, but hey there are always ways round things and its no great problem.

 

[andywg]

and also any hitch-hikers which are not spotted, could cause problems, if they are not nipped in the bud

And there are millions of problems that could affect the tank. The simple fact is that you indicated it was certain that putting LR on top of sand would cause a rock fall. My tanks are evidence that this is not always the case.

 

[Truck]

i then later added why