[Mare100]

Hi everybody!

Have a question about the rock in our tank. We just set up our 120 gallon and have all 130 lbs. of rock in since last week. Half of the rock was fully cured at the store where we got it.....the rest was just brought in from the owner from a show. He said it was much cleaner than he thought it would be. It seems like the tank is cycling like crazy. Ammonia levels are down to 0, but nitrite was WAY up for the past several days. Looks like it came down to 1.6 as of today.....but brown algae has been growing like crazy since 2 days ago. I know that is part of the cycle, as that's what happened in the other tank. My question is....the algae is VERY plentiful. Should we brush it off of the rock or just let it be.....as ugly as it looks.....for now?

Also...I THINK I just noticed our first "critters" in there! On two of the rocks...there are little worms coming out of holes. The worms are sort of flat looking.....their color is dark pink to red. Looks like they have tiny legs all up and down their bodies. Anybody have any idea what these guys are?

Thanks in advance!
Mare

[RyanG]

Mare, welcome to RB!

You can brush off the algae if you want, you might want to try to get your phosphates down early to aid in algae control too.

Also I'm not sure what type of critters you have, do you have any pictures?

[volitan_fa]

I would personally wait until your tank cycles, then just before doing your first major water change brush as much algae off as possible and vacuum it up.

And most likely, those are bristleworms.

[Mare100]

Hi again and thanks for the suggestions!!

I think we will just let the algae be for right now. It looks like the Nitrite level has peaked and is finally starting to come down a bit. So let me see if I got this straight.....wait till the cycle is finished....then go in there and "pretty up" things by brushing off the algae....then go ahead and do a water change? How much change do you recommend? About 20%?

Then after that, should we put the cleaner crew in?

Does anyone have any suggestions for good "clean-up" invertibrates that have a good chance of NOT being eaten by our Wrasse and Snowflake Eel?

Ohhh....and I found out that those critters ARE bristleworms. I saw a picture of them on-line somewhere. Someone said not to touch them with your hand....are they dangerous?

Thanks for the info so far and for being so patient with all the questions! I'll try to figure out how to get some photos on here.

Mare

[volitan_fa]

Bristleworms can sting you, that's why you shouldn't touch them. Change about 20% of your water when you're ready. For the cleaner crew, large mexican turbo snails do a FANTASTIC job of keeping algae down and may be too big for your eel to try and eat....hopefully.