"Critters" and worms and junk in the tank..

[Tommy Gether]

I have seen tanks with lost of "life" in them, with tons of "critters" on the live rock and stuff. I want my tank like that, do I walk into Aquarium world and say "Yes I would like to buy some Critters"??,, Trying to not look like an idiot here.

[myjohnson]

How old is your current tank?

Did you use live rock or live sand?

[Tommy Gether]

i have over 100 pounds of live rock,, and I use sand. I bought 2 kinds of sand from petco when I started

this one for the base http://www.petco.com/product/112009/Natures-Ocean-Aragonite-Sand.aspx?CoreCat=certona-_-ProductListTopRated_Fish_2-_-Nature%27s%20Ocean%20Aragonite%20Sand-112009

and this one for the top http://www.petco.com/product/7534/Na...hite-Sand.aspx

[eklikewhoa]

Hopefully those LR tanks are ran on separate systems cause I'd be worried about Petco/petsmart running copper through their system.

Buy a few lbs of LR from city pets or the like and you'll have plenty of critters. They also sell pods and stuff in a bottle and that'll jump start the live food part.

[Tommy Gether]

i bought the live rock from an individual and some from fjw.. i didnt buy any rock from petco, only the sand new in the bag.

[myjohnson]

It takes a while for them to really colonize.

Look at the tank at night with a flash light.

Should be able to see some.

[TiAg]

You're looking for a "CUC" (clean up crew) and Pods. You can buy live pods online from most mail order places. Many LFS stock them as well.

CUC is snails, starfish, shrimp etc
Pods are tiny bugs that many fish eat (wrasses and mandarins to name a couple).

Your CUC goes in the main tank, PODS need to be put in the sump and seed the main tank so that they can reproduce. Once established they should keep re-seeding the tank as the fish eat them.