questions about filtration and such (moved from introduce yourself)

[Bigpapa]

Hello,, I am new here too!! Just set up my tank this past week and am going through the cycling process now. I have a 60g long tank. Right now I have different kinds of damsels in the tank just waiting for my 3 months to pass. I did have a question though, since I am looking to put a bimac in this tank I have read that you should keep the tank at room temp. As of right now I do not have any live rock in there but I did use live sand and all my readings have been coming out good(except I just had my first ammonia spike) The numbers were: PH 8.0, salinity 1.026, Alk 4meq and now I getting the ammonia spike down. Soo, do I really need the live rock? LOL, if I could figure out how to attach a photo to this I would add my tank shot too..

 

[Animal Mother]

Hello,, I am new here too!! Just set up my tank this past week and am going through the cycling process now. I have a 60g long tank. Right now I have different kinds of damsels in the tank just waiting for my 3 months to pass. I did have a question though, since I am looking to put a bimac in this tank I have read that you should keep the tank at room temp. As of right now I do not have any live rock in there but I did use live sand and all my readings have been coming out good(except I just had my first ammonia spike) The numbers were: PH 8.0, salinity 1.026, Alk 4meq and now I getting the ammonia spike down. Soo, do I really need the live rock? LOL, if I could figure out how to attach a photo to this I would add my tank shot too..

Hello and welcome to TONMO.

This is really discussion for another thread in a different section of the forum. Live rock is pretty much the foundation of your filtration, so yes, it would be wise to add some for the long term. It isn't impossible to run a saltwater tank without it, but it sure is a lot tougher, and with the bio-load an octopus is going to create, it shouldn't be risked in that size of a tank.
What kind of filtration do you have running on the tank?

Also, what is room temperature in your house? A Bimac is a cold-water species, and ideally should be kept below 72 degrees. Some keep them at warmer temperatures, but their lifespan is significantly decreased.

You may wish to start your own thread in the "Octopus Care" section so that your questions will be answered by more people, since this is the "Introduce Yourself" thread and people don't look here for this type of discussion.

 

[monty]

Bigpapa from me as well. Almost everybody here uses a lot of live rock, but I think some of the researcher-types who keep a lot of octos use other types of filtration (canister and possibly other things), although they tend to have lots of tanks and (poorly) paid staff or volunteers to check up on them. So it can be done, but few people here do it... everyone seems to agree that for home use live rock had a lot of benefits and few drawbacks.

In case you haven't run into it yet, you should also be aware that damsels have caused problems for octos quite often, so it would be a very good idea to find the damsels another home before getting an octo.

 

[Animal Mother]

Yes, get the Damsels out before you add rock... or you'll just have to take the rock out again to catch them.

 

[Bigpapa]

Thank you very much Animal Mother and Monty for the info. I apologize for posting in this stream-I was having alot of problems with starting a new one and had not recieved any more info from the site on how to fix them so I used this "new" one to help since I am new here anyway. As far as filtration- I have an under gravel, a Jebo Protein Skimmer 180 with Power Head, and a Fluval 450. The temp I thought I had read on posts in here said the Bimac is the octo to go with for room temp about 72-74 but I could very easily be wrong. If that is the case what range should I go with? PS. Is there a way for me to move this to the other forum you had mentioned?
Oh, and as for the fish,, the are there any compatible fish that I could keep with the octo or does it mean that I either get a few edible ones prior to him or none at all?

 

[Animal Mother]

People have mixed results with fish as tankmates. If you get something small and peaceful they will end up food. If you get something larger it will likely pick on the Octopus.
You're probably going to run into problems with an under-gravel filter and live sand.
You can keep a Bimac at room temperature, but its lifespan is going to be shorter than the already short year or so.

 

[monty]

PS. Is there a way for me to move this to the other forum you had mentioned?

I moved it to "tank talk," but I don't think non-staff folks can move threads (although I don't know how to turn off my staff superpowers to find out.) "octopus care" is also a useful forum for octopus-specific questions, but I figured this is mostly about filtration, and anyway, most folks who read one read both.

To post a new thread when looking at the thread list, there's a big blue "new thread" button at the top and the bottom. To get to the thread list, click on the forums button at the top of the page, and then the name of the forum where you want to see all the threads or make a new one. Or, you could find an existing thread in the appropriate forum to "bump" with a new question on the same basic topic, that's fine, too.

 

[Bigpapa]

Thank you Monty!!