Help me with my ceph. tank

[Tommyflashlight]

My cephalopod tank is nearing the time when it will be ready for a bimaculoides.
It has been cycling for about 5 months.
55 gallon main tank
110 w PC lighting
80w NO Actintic (too much light?)
15 gallon sump/refugium.(on reverse light cycle)
Prizm protien skimmer(hopefully will upgrade soon)
65 lbs live rock (coraline is growing good)
Lots of pods/bristle worms/featherdusters
a few little hermit crabs
1 serpent star (doing very well)
about 3-4 inches of fine white sand in main tank
4-5 inches in sump/refugium
The rockwork has some nice caves, and i plan on adding a pvc elbow soon
Nitrates- 0
Nitrites- 0
Ph- 8.4
ammonia - 0
alk- ?
calcium- ?
i have the two above test kits but havnt used them yet
I do between 1 and 2 water changes per month with Reef Crystals
And i just started using RO/DI water (0 ppm on the TDS meter)
I want to wait a month or two to make sure the water is all RO/DI
but then i think it should be about ready?
any suggestions to improve my chances of having a healthy/happy octo?

Also i want to add some other tank mates besides the serpent star
maybe a bristle star...... to help with the cleaning
or a sea urchin of some sort
maybe a sand sifting cucumber?
featherdusters?
Would an octo eat nassarisus(sp?) snails or are they too small?
im also thinking of adding some mushrooms, polyps, leathers, etc. is this a bad idea?

Last question- What do you guys feed your bimac. i want to feed hermits and such but wont be able to afford it all the time. Are there any good frozen foods? and will competition for food between the stars and octo be a problem?
Any help is really appreciated...... I have put so much time and effort into this project i want to do everything i can to make it a success. I included all the info i could think of but if you need anymore just let me know. Thanks.

[cephalopoder]

Sounds like you did a excellent job setting up!
There are only a few things you need to change.
PH should be around 7.9-8.2 so try and bring it down a little. Make sure salinity is at 1.025.Get a good copper test kit and make sure there is no copper in the water!
Temp should be around 65-75F. I don't reccomend going over 75 and I try and shoot for 70F.
Your 80 watts of NO atinic shold be plenty. The 110 pc might be too bright but you can try it. If octo hides alot its too bright.
Bimacs will prefer eat different things from one bimac to another. But snails are at risk with a bimac. My last bimac loved any snail that moved.
Cucumbers , brittle stars..are ok. Corals will be fine but need a lot of light. You can feed your octo thawed raw frozen shrimp. I feed all my octos that and they do great. You can also feed them crayfish and fiddler crabs. Petco has them both cheep. Or if you want you can order 10 lbs of live crayfish from a crayfish farm for about 50 dollars. You will end up with about 200 crayfish. That should last a long time. If housing them is a problem then keep 50 in a rubbermaid container and cook the rest for a cajun dinner:smokin:

[Tommyflashlight]

thanks for the quick reply!
ill work on the ph, and it sounds as if i need to turn down the temp a bit. im running it around 78 right now.
ill adjust my salinity a bit too and get it to 1.025. and i will test for copper. Im not sure what im going to do about lighting yet, i may just try it and see, or i might change some things around a bit.
Also, when you talk about frozen shrimp, do you mean what you would buy at a grocery store? or the small frozen shrimps you get through pet stores? I would like to feed live foods whenever possible, i might try the crayfish. by the way, I hear about overfeeding a lot. How often do you feed or does it vary from one to another?
thanks again!

[OctoMonkey]

Hi Tommy
Are you using the sump/refugium as an algae filter? If you are using caulerpa algae for this you can light it 24 hours a day as caulerpa is one of the only plants that can live properly without a dark stage in photosynthesis.

Benefits are that it help prevent pH changes throughout the day and with regular harvesting of the caulerpa algae you can aid in the removal of nitrates.

So far I have kept, britle stars, blue linckia, diadem urchins and sea cucumbers with cephs with no problems.

Colin

[Tommyflashlight]

Thanks octomonkey, i do have caleurpa, and plan to keep using it, i just hope i keep up with the pruning so it does not go sexual. The resulting burst of nutrients would probably not be good.

cephalopoder- i just noticed you signature
"Some day Architeuthis, some day...."
Architeuthis was in the running for the octos name.
Im still not sure if i will use it, though.

thanks guys