[sgallagher7]

Well its been almost a week, so here is an update. The tank has been curing very nicely. Less and less dieoff after one final light scrubbing. Nitrates were still driving me crazy. Purchased some chaeto and got it last wed. By saturday my nitrates went from 100 to 30. Ammonia and phosphate at 0. What an eating machine.

I found 2 very cool looking critters that I found out later where very toxic to a tank. They were sea slugs. Black with neon pink and green spots. I was able to pick them out with ease. I have also found one tiny crab, and some small snails. Since these things have been doing well, I decided to get a few snails and crabs to start with the clean up. I purchased 10 blue legged hermits (small) and 10 Astreas. They have been doing ok, but prefered the waterline more than the rock. I decided this weekend to get 3 Mexican Turbos. Man can these things eat. They are cleaning up the tank in no time (although the algae hasnt been overwhelming). Also picked up 10 nassarius snails for the sand. I wanted to keep things in check. No more cleanup crew for a while. I want to make sure they dont starve.
One final thing. I wanted to get the hang of doing Kalk as a topoff water. I messed up my parameters a bit, driving the alk up to 4.5. Went to the chemistry porton of RC for help. Seems that I went a little high hith 2 tsp per gallon. There hasnt been any effect on the tank critters or rock.