new set up questions

[canania]

Thanks to all for supporting this site, I've learned alot. I have two questions. I just set up a 72 gallon 1/1/2 weeks ago, we just added 60 lbs of fiji cured LR. I have a 20 gallon sump with a euro-reef skimmer. Just after placing the LR I noticed alot of wet brown foam started to collect in the cup for a couple of hours then stop. I was wondering, since we had to place and position the LR, was placing our arms in the tank, then adjusting the riser the problem, if so how long will it take to recover.
Secondly, I have a 4" DSB consisting of aragonite. Would the addition of a small amt of live sand be necessary? or beneficial?
Thanks in advance!

 

[ChrisRD]

Hi and welcome to Reefs.Org...

Having your hands/arms in the tank can definitely distrupt the skimmer for a while, but it will kick-in again on it's own. Also, it can take a few weeks for a skimmer to start performing consistently, although IME the Euro-Reefs are not very finicky at all.

Adding some live sand to seed your aragonite bed can definitely be beneficial - it's a common practice.

HTH

 

[fredso2003]

Live sand addition to yor c/c bed is good however the mjority of the snad wil shift itself to the very bottom of the bed over time because the sand matter is finer than the aragonite,you can also clear one small are till bare bottom then add the sand ther this will give your tank small "sand beds" and will also help keep it from disappearing into the mix.I hope this helps!

 

[canania]

Thank you for the feedback I was very helpful.
Regarding the live sand,should I add it now or wait for the tank to settle down from the new LR addition.
How much live sand would you recommend?
Thanks again.

 

[SaltyMist]

IMHO, Add it now, because:
1. Your tank is cycling, so adding the livesand now will prevent it from going through another cycle if you add the livesand later.

2. Adding it later could cloud the water (and cause another cycle, could be small, could be large), so better to get it out of the way now.

Im in the process of wanting to add more livesand to my aggressive tank, but people have said to add it slowly to an established tank, so I think it's better to add it now with no inhabitants of the tank so the cycle wont matter as much.

In the old school days live sand was never heard of, so we either used the CC bottom or a bare bottom tank. Today, knowing what I have read about livesand bottoms I'd never go with another CC bottom again.

Ive found adding anything to my tank will disrupt my Lee's skimmer, but I just upgraded to a different powered skimmer so I dont know how it will react yet. It's nothing fancy, just a cheapy $49.00 (closeout sale at my LFS) Via Aqua skimmer, so far without my hands going into the tank (and I dont relish the idea of putting my hands into the tank with a dwarf lion fish in there), its already started to bubble up nicely. But the old Lee's skimmer use to stop bubbling if I put my hands and arms into the tank, and would overbubble if I put something like stress coat into the tank, and produce plenty of clear water.

Goodluck, hope you enjoy the wallet draining hobby like I do.

 

[J.Howard]

Definitely seed that sand bed! You can get live sand from the LFS in bags, or they may sell their own. Places like IPSF http://www.ipsf.com where I got my stuff from have some great "kits" that come with nice additions like bristle worms, amphipods, brittle stars, hermits, and snails. These will speed things up quite nicely while adding diversity IMO. I feel that this was a contributing factor to the rapid cycle of my last couple of set-ups. At least get some live sand in there.

I don't know if a tank will re-cycle every time sand is added. It's a fairly common practice to trade sand with fellow reefers to maintain SB diversity. If you added a lot, I could see the possibility but small amounts to seed or swap shouldn't cause a cycle down the road IMHO.

 

[J.Howard]

Sorry about the bad link, just couldn't get it to work
Try this.

http://www.ipsf.com