eden Posted April 11, 2002 Report Share Posted April 11, 2002 Hi recntly I have just set up a salt water tank in my bedroom. I saved half the water when we moved the tank and now is set up with nothing but coral rock in it. I did some water tests once it had been running a while and found a high pH so i purcased some pH down and also some cycle, a couple of days after adding some of each a brownish philm started to build up on everything (is this normal?) and secondly the over flow in the back of the tank consists of 3 rows of Horozontal lines of holes but the water level sits between the bottem and middle row there for not letting the surface of the water drain off resulting in a philm of sorts building up on the surface, I can tun the pump up to raise the tank water level to the next set of holes but the the over flow of water is very loud. Any hints, tips, or ideas would be much appreceated thanks..... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rob Posted April 11, 2002 Report Share Posted April 11, 2002 Hi there Eden - is this your first marine tank? If it is then my comments on pH and cycling may be helpful, otherwise I may be telling you stuff that you already know. The pH for a saltwater tank should be around 8, you will need to get a wide range test kit to measure up this high as the standard test kit (used by freshwater aquarists) max's out below these values. Have you also been testing ammonia, nitrite and nitrate. While I haven't set up a marine tank myself a couple of members of the local club have and I've paid careful attention to their trials and tribulations (as sometime in the future I'd like to set up a mini-reef tank). The thing that has been drummed into them by they're supplier is careful monitoring of the cycling process. They were doing this by a 'fish free' method. They put a fresh mussel (that had had a knife put through it so that it was dead) into the tank to decay and then proceeded to take regularly (daily/every two days?) measurements of ammonia, nitrite and ammonia (and kept records of the measurements so that they could see the changes in the different things as time progressed). Once ammonia and nitrite are zero then the tank will have cycled, you'd probably have to do a water change to get the nitrate level down though. They also found the intial filter system they'd got with the tank was inadeqate as the tank never completed cycling (even after a couple of months). Having just re-read your initial post this cycling process may not apply as it sounds you've got your hands on an already cycled system - I would still be inclined to test the ammonia, nitrite and nitrate levels - with the price of marine fish you don't want to be putting them into a toxic tank. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
eden Posted April 13, 2002 Author Report Share Posted April 13, 2002 Hi there Rob...Yes this this is my first salt water tank. I had spoken to my supplier and he mentioned the cycling process that you were talking about and said that if I had saved enough of the old water and keeped as much of the denitrafing bacteria alive as possible I might not have to go through this process, just wait and see really. Since set up ihave been monitoring pH, ammonia and nitrite and all bar the pH was above normal so I remmadied that and carried on with the monitoring. After a couple more days of testing I went and bought a Molly (brackish fish) and have only just put him in there to see if my tessting has been correct (so far so good). I seem to have the waters chemical make up correct but am still unsure about these two types of ?????(stuff). I think the philm on the water appears because the water surface is not being disturbed by either over flow or return hose water (this also happens on my freash water tank unless I have the spray bar above water level to disturb and circulate the water but I do not have covers over this tank so it could just be scunge out of the air settling on the surface)>My COVERED salt water tank seems to be a different story though I still can'nt figure out either of these build ups. Thanks 4 your imput Robany more Ideas would be grate!!!... :-D P.S. the Molly is now LIVING happily in his new home. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Warren Posted April 14, 2002 Report Share Posted April 14, 2002 The brown algae is normal. It is usually present after setting up a new tank. If it continues you may not have enough lighting. After the tank has settled 2-3 months the algae should go away. It may even go away quicker. Once the filters get fully established and a general balance is acheived it should all settle down. Freshwater systems usually go through a similar algae cycle. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dan_from_nz Posted October 16, 2004 Report Share Posted October 16, 2004 just thought I would re-fresh this thread it is that oldest 'replied to' thread on here Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cees Posted October 16, 2004 Report Share Posted October 16, 2004 just thought I would re-fresh this thread it is that oldest 'replied to' thread on here But why? never mind, I bumped it again and didn't contribute anything useful either... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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