help please.....cloudy water

izzyiracheta

so i just started the whole saltwater thing....i bought a new 55 gal tank....the ladie at the lfs said i could put all my sand in the tank and fill it up with water and then add my salt...it has been 3 days and the water still looks cloudy in my opinion...my FW tank's water is alot clearer...anyways is this just normal or what????

izzyiracheta

oh and i plan on only doing a FOWLR for this tank

Reefing Madness

Gonna need a few things form you before being able to answer>
Do you have any powerheads in the tank, anything for water movement?
Are you running a skimmer? What kind, and what is it rated at?
Do you have any Live Rock or Dry Rock in the tank? How much?
With these things in place, your tank would have cleared up in a few days.
Dry Rock, there are a few hitchhickers onLive Rock that people want to stay away from, so they opt for using Dry Rock, or Dead Rock. Macro Rock is a good place to start looking for that. Either way you go you will need a minimum of 1lb per gallon
.Replacement filter media like filter floss and activated carbon (if you get a filter)
Multiple Powerheads (2 or 3) 10x your water volume for just a Fish Only With Live Rock, and at least 20x your water volume for a Reef Tank. So lets say your going reef, and you have a 100g tank, you would need flow in that tank at minimum of 2000gph, or 2 1000gph powerheads.
Protein Skimmer, rated at 2 times your water volume
Saltwater Test Kits. Reef Test Kit. Tets for Ammonia, Nitrites, Nitrates, PH, Phosphates, Calcium, ALK and Magnesium.
Saltwater fish food. Mysis Shrimp, Squid, Cyclopease, Algae Sheets, Romaine . Flake food is not really a good food to feed your marine fish.
Aquarium vacuum. This one is iffy. Most don't use one, if you have enough flow in the tank you won’t need one
Rubber kitchen gloves
Fish net
Two, clean, never used before, 5-gallon buckets
Aquarium thermometer, digital being the best
Brush with plastic bristles (old tooth brush) - needed for cleaning the live rock if you don't get Fully Cured Live Rock.
Power Strip, possibly GFCI outlets by the tank.
Optional but definitely recommend getting a Reverse Osmosis or RO/Deionization filter for the make-up water, and a barrel for storing the water.
Possibly a Quarantine Tank for your new fish. They sit in here for a few weeks to kill off parasites and bacteria, to keep it from getting in your main tank
Heater rated for your size tank.
Saltwater Mix.
Marine SaltSaltwater Hydrometer or even better a Refractometer, which is more accurate
Aquarium filter (not absolutely necessary if running with adequate amounts of live rock, but nice to have if you need to use a mechanical filter or activated carbon, etc.)
Aquarium substrate such as live sand or crushed coral. Some go bare Bottom, others choose the 2-3" bottom, others, more advanced will try the Deep Sand Bed, which is over 6" deep.

izzyiracheta

Yeah sorry bout that just getting the hang of things on this site.....ok so I have a 55 gal tank with artificial sand I guess they call it.....a HOB filter rated for 60 gal and I'm waiting for the two power heads I ordered to arrive....each power head can move 400 gph ....I heard that you could get by without a protein Skimmer if it was a FOWLR setup .....but I really didn't know when to add the rock or what kind,live, dead or some other kind ....anyway I do plan on getting live rock enough for 1.5 per gal...

Reefing Madness

You need the Live Rock to cure or cycle inthe tank now, as this is your actual biological filter. Your hang on back filter will just retain detrious and cause you Nitrate issues inthe long run. The rock will also help settle down the debre floating in there, along wih the powerheads keeping the debre from settling. And in a 55g tank, even in a FOWLR you should run a skimmer. These revmove organic debre that you can't see from the water column before they can cause you issues.
What Is Protein Skimming, and How Does It Work
What Is Live Rock - Why Is It Used In Saltwater Aquariums?

onefish2fish

if i read that right, you made a mistake.

you put the sand in, then the water, then the salt?
you can only put salt in a tank that has just water in it ( along with a heater and powerhead ) and you can only do this the first time setting it up. once any sand, rock, fish, coral, invert, anything is in there your saltwater needs to be pre-mixed atleast 24 hours in advance in a seperate food safe drum, container or bucket.

izzyiracheta

Thanks a lot for the info......I'm gonna see about ordering a Skimmer and begin to introduce some rock in the tank.....

izzyiracheta

And yeah that's what I did I put the sand in then the water and finally the salt.....its a new setup(no fishes or anything in there yet)

onefish2fish

yea, but you put the water in, then the salt, let that mix 24 hours with your powerhead then turn the powerhead off and add your sand. the salt may have got mixed into the sand and not fully be disolved. i would stir that sand up personally, which is going to cloud the tank all over again but i think thats the safest way personally.

Reefing Madness

Id' leave it. If you have a powerhead running inthe tank, that will make sure it stirs up the water enough that you should not have any salt clumped and not disolving.