As per title, first ever mead under way. I'm trying to not screw it up, so I figured I'd double check what I've done so far-figure it's easier to correct mistakes sooner rather than later, and I also am uncertain of my next steps.

Anyways, relevant information:

Ingredients: 30lbs wildflower honey, 2 sticks cinnamon (cassia), 8 cloves (whole) 15 allspice (cracked) 2 oranges (peel and juice only).

Honey was mostly crystallized, so I heated a couple liters water to not quite boiling and added the honey to that, in order to make it dissolve better. It cooled down pretty quick, but the first bit of honey in would have gotten fairly heated. Divvied up into two batches (in 6 gallon wide mouth carboys) and topped off with water, until both were 5 gallons and added the spices/orange. All water was tap water-it's fairly hard, but tastes good.

Initial measurements (probably wrong, but I tried) were 1.103 and 1.104.

Added 1 pack Go-Ferm to each, and about an hour later added yeast-1 packet each. Yeast was WLP720, warmed up to 70^o over a couple hours. Water/honey solution was about 78^o when yeast was added. Mixed for a minute with a large whisk (it reaches the bottom of the carboy, with the handle still out the top). House is kept at 72^o.

This morning bubbles were visible, and a nice yeasty smell present. About 18 hours after the yeast was added I added 1 pack Fermaid-K (hydrated) to each, after a brief whisking, and followed by a more thorough one.

So, questions:

1. Degassing-does my whisking it do that properly? Is once a day going to be good enough?
2. I know it needs to get more nutrients-but I'm unsure how/when. I can get more nutrients from my local shop tomorrow, it looks like the recommendation is to hit it again at 48 and 72 hours, and then again at 7 days or 1/3 sugar break... Should it be a packet per container again? Or a different amount? Or a different nutrient?
3. How soon do I need to start using the hydrometer again? Is it something I should do daily or can I wait a few days?
4. For 'racking' am I right in assuming I'll have 8-9 gallons of mead, or will it be closer to 10? I'm trying to figure out what I need to buy to hold it for that stage...
5. I know these will eventually want to be maintained in an anaerobic environment-I presume that's after the transfer to secondary or does that need to be sooner?
6. I have a CO2 tank that I use for tire inflation-what attachments do I need in order to use it to do a CO2 flush of the tops of whatever these will age in?
7. Anything else I should do or not do based on the above?

Thanks.