What Should Come First?

[BMW545]

I am in the process of setting up my new 90 gal. 100 lbs. of live rock will go in tonight. When should I start to add other things? Should I add some coral first, or is a clean up crew a good idea for the first thing? Any suggestions would be helpful.

[AJP]

After the cycle I would get a small clean up crew and slowly add what you need as you need them to the crew.
Coral I would wait a few months till the numbers stabalize, then add a few easy ones.

Oh and lets not forget the fish.

[Avi]

I agree with AJP...just let the water circulate with the live rock in the tank...Some people do, and some don't but I left the lights on for 8 hours while I did that and never got any algae outbreaks beyond some insignificant cyanobacteria on the substrate. I also kept my skimmer working during the whole time.

After the water numbers stabalized, which in my case (120-gallon tank with a start off of 120 pounds of rock) took 6 weeks, I added some cleanup stuff like turbo snails, hermits (Blue Legs, and Reds and some other things like Astria Snails soon after that) and then after another four weeks, added some coral...My first were open brains and they're bigger and better now after just about a year. I also added some fish too, but I added the coral and the fish very slowly. I can recommend doing the same because I didn't hit any serious snags.