Starting the cycle, need Fish

[mellowyellow4lyf]

Wanting to start the cycle of my 75g tank, already have 80lbs of live sand and 20lbs of LR(will be buy another 50lbs along with the fish) and was wondering what fish to buy if I want to start a Reef tank with peaceful fish mates. I was told Damsels are very good but heard can be aggressive towards fish, but if not i was looking at yellow tailed blue damsels, Javanese Damsel or green chromis but dont really like the look of the green chromis. Any other cool looking fish that are decently cheap and are very hardy?

 

[JohnS_323]

To be honest, I don't think you're going to find too many people here that will advocate the use of live fish for cycling. It's really not a fair thing to do to the fish, no matter how hardy they are. You can have just as much success (perhaps even more) using a cocktail shrimp or feeding lightly on a regular basis. If you do chose to use live fish, my recommendation would be to stay away from damsels. Typically they start out attractive and relatively peaceful but lose that appearance and become down right mean over time.

Also, I would suggest you put in all of your rock first and give it time to cure before adding any fish.

 

[mott768]

Definitely get the rest of your rock first, also get the basic test kits like ammo, nitrite and nitrate and test the water before adding any fish. If you want to speed up the cycle get a couple bags of bio spira saltwater add it to your tank wait 24 hours test you levels if everything reads 0 you can slowly start to add fish, just keep a extra bag of it and test daily for the first week, if you get any reading on the tests add a bag. I've used it will all my tanks and never had any problems.

 

[mellowyellow4lyf]

def gonna look into bio spira saltwater and yea i guess your right when you say it is mean to cycle with fish