First Inhabitants

The next task was to create mountains and valleys in the tank. Scraping the tank took quite a bit of effort because of the height and the long forgotten ladder we bought finally found its use. Bigger sized rocks were introduced first and gradually stacked to create as many cleverages and shelter for the fishes. The rocks were arranged such that chances of collapsing were minimal. More rocks were placed in the sump for biological filter where the bacterial could colonize. After an hour spent just to scrape the rockwork, the mini mountains finally took shape.... Good enough for a start for now and a fish only with live rocks aka FOWLR.

In the evening, we picked up 1 fresh prawn from Giant during our weekly grocery shopping. The prawn was thrown into the tank and left to rot to jumpstart the biological cycle required to sustain life inside the tank. The bacterial will help to breakdown the harmful ammonia toxic to any life fishes into nitrite and then finally to nitrate which fishes can tolerate. The prawn turned red overnight as if it was cooked and could fool everyone to eat it if I placed it onto a plate. Tested the water for ammonia using a test kit and indeed it showed some reading. The prawn slowly started to disintegrate and I think it would be better to remove it before the smell becomes unbearable. Waited for 2 more days and tested the water again. NH4- undetectable, NO2- undetectable, NO3- trace amount. Seems like the cycle is completed and the bacterial were ready for fish loading. Forums usually recommends cycle duration of 2-3 months for the bacterial to establish themselves, but I suppose since I am re-using the rocks from the old tank setup, these rocks are matured enough with sufficient bacterial and hence my short cycle time.

Hippy! Time to introduce the very first inhabitants. They should be hardy enough considering they survived the grilling car temperature under the afternoon sun and dying for a decent environment than the miserable red pail.

So let me introduce the pioneers fishes were the Twin Tigers...

They started darting around upon realized into the tank. The remaining fishes followed the next day, little blue damsel, green chromis, cleaner shrimps, sand shifter to gradually load the tank. These inhabitants were left in the tank for another week to allow the bacterial to further multiply and cope with the increasing fish waste and ammonia produced. The week was especially long before the weekend and then the fun begins again! We went down to a fish shop in Bedok and came back with a pair of Nemo, black/white damsel, yellow tail damsel, bicolor dottyback. All supposing small hardy fishes and cheap to start off.

The tank still looks pretty empty and dull. But few months down the road, it is going to transform from this lifeless rock scapping into a reef tank, with corals swaying in motion with the wave and more exotic fishes happily swimming around. But this requires the tank to mature to a certain level so have to be very patient.

Setting up

After a day wait for the silicon gel to dry, it is time to do a leak test! I was praying very hard the nite before that the the return pipes were well sealed as any leakage will be disastrous. The aftermath to this will ultimately incurred von's wrath and likely lead to a premature death to the new hobby.

We do not have a long hose, so filling up the tank was done in bucket and pails. So 'let there be water'.....

Filling up.... and more to go...

Half-way mark, everything still holding up....

Almost there.... keep the water coming....

And finally... the first drop of water overflowing into the sump... No leakage so far. Continue the topping up to flood the sump tank.

Holding our breath for any signs of water leakage.... Phew... and then we pause for a moment to savour a job well done. 400+ litres of water.... not sure von wants to know how much is the utilities bill this time.

We poured some chemicals to de-chlorinate the water and powered up the skimmer and pump for circulation and then wait for a couple of hours for it to settle. The amount of salt mix was calculated to achieve the desired salinity of 1.023 and we quickly drove to the fishfarm to get the salt pack. (not sure of amount now as the excel spreadsheet was accidentally deleted by von... Doh!!)

Came back with a carton of salt and we discovered that the salt was caked-solid. 'Gosh... we gonna have to scrap the block to disintegrate it into its original form so the salt can be readily dissolved in the tank', I commanded. The first few scrapes were easy, but as it goes, the salt block got tougher and our skin started to have this burning sensation. Poor von... diligently scrapping away with a despondent look. 'We got to put on gloves!', exclaimed von. 'Okok before it gets any worse', I quickly responded to quench out further protest... hehe

The water slowly turned cloudy as more salt were poured in and the required salinity was reached with about 10% of leftover salt to spare. Water started to become clear again in about 2hrs, only to become cloudy again when the sand was introduced the next day.

After salt mix:

Almost clear after 2hrs

The sand dumping was fairly quick and the sand was lowered down to the bottom using bucket to reduce the debris storm.

And finally, tara!!

Pearly white sandbed: