100 Gallon Lagoon-style acrylic AIO

[tharbin]

Love your pigface! Nice yellow pig wrasse too!

Oh, you mean the 'I'm already dead so leave me alone' Foxface and the 'reason I need to buy more Dwarf Ceriths' Wrasse? I think the folks at Biota and ORA need to start hybrids of Hector's Goby in different colors and sizes. I'd buy one of each. Great tank inhabitant it doesn't care what the other fish are doing, it doesn't care what I'm doing, it is always out and working the tank 24/7/365.25.

On top of everything else my Foxface has narcolepsy. A day or two after I put him in the tank I woke up in the middle of the night because I heard the ATO running, and running, and running. When I checked the tank the overflow inlet was plugged. I grabbed a flashlight and saw a dead baby Foxface stuck against the slots. I grabbed a pair of tweezers to pull him out and after I tried for the second or third time to grab it, it woke up enough to swim down to the bottom of the tank. For weeks I had to move things around to keep it out of trouble. If I looked in the tank in the middle of the night it would just be floating around in the tank asleep. Its big enough now that it doesn't float out of its cave but it does like to come out before lights on and sleep plastered against the ledge in front of his cave. It spends half its awake time playing dead or hiding behind a rock and the other half begging under the feed cup. If I ignore it long enough it will go around and pretend to eat some tank algae but I know its just pretending, it wants mysis, or TDO, or seaweed sheets it likes to be catered to. But I still really like the silly fish. It has real personality and now that I've changed the feeding regimen he seems pretty chill again but still runs for cover at the least provocation.

One of the things I like with aquariums, especially saltwater aquariums, is the diversity of personalities among its inhabitants. The Foxface is a gigantic, scaredy-cat eating machine; the Yellow Coris Wrasse is a lazy teenager, last one up and first one to bed every day but while its up it never stops moving; the Firefish is the old man of the tank and is out from lights on to lights off just hanging near the middle of the tank waiting for food, and avoiding the Foxface when it goes on one of its tears across the tank; the Black Ray pops out at feeding time and then goes back in his hole but he adds a little 'surprise' to the tank when he shows up and the Hector's just swims endlessly eating this or that and coming over to the glass occasionally to see what the big ugly guy is doing now.

 

[tharbin]

CuC 2.0

 

[tharbin]

It may be time to look for an alternative algae grazer. On Sunday I was doing a little tank maintenance. While I was at it I did my usual pick some of the GHA routine. Anyway, a small piece of the dislodged GHA floated in front of the Foxface's cave. He saw it, stuck his snoot out and sucked it in; and then he spit it out. Jerk.

Pro tip: if you wear glasses make sure they are clean before doing remedial maintenance on your tank. Yesterday I though I was having a bacterial bloom and started thinking about the remedy. Then I noticed that when I looked at a few of the coral the tank looked clear. It finally dawned on my that the 'bacterial bloom' was massive smudging on my reading glasses.

 

[tharbin]

A couple of updates to the tank.

I moved the fuge from chamber 2 to chamber 3 and added a Sicce Syncra Nano pump to the chamber set very low and angled to 'spin' the gracilaria. I was happy with the state of the fuge as when I moved the macro it looked healthy and slightly larger than when I put it in. The reason for the move was to free up chamber 2 for a skimmer. The Tunze eco chic light fits chamber 3 like it was made for it as well. I may end up adding a second eco chic if I feel I need to kick-start the fuge. We'll see after things stabilize.

Then I added a Tunze 9004 DC skimmer to chamber 2. It is a little undersize for the tank but since I run a light-medium bio-load and I prefer to go a little too small than too large with skimmers, the 9004 was about the size I wanted. Since it is a surface skimmer I could also install it in the 2nd chamber and still use the sump covers. Since the foyer of our home is also the waiting room for when my wife gives violin lessons, I prefer to cover as much of the tank as I can.

The skimmer is one of those nice-to-have-around-for-when-you-need-it pieces for the tank, like a UV. For now I want to run it in and get it tuned then decide how much I will run it. I'm also looking at modifying the Green Killing Machine to possibly also fit in chamber 2 and mount it. All of the gear is on switches so I can turn pieces like the skimmer and UV on/off as needed without trying to remember where I stored the things.

I also added a second ADJ PC100a power center but I still have to print some brackets to mount it.

The last thing is that I bought another 5 lbs. of Stax rock as I need a few medium size pieces to mount a couple of corals and maybe modify the center island. I didn't do anything with it yet though as I ran out of steam. I didn't take an FTS because I didn't scrape the acrylic yet and there is 'stuff' floating around from messing with the sump.

Bad news: I found another aiptasia but it is in an easy to reach spot so I pull it tomorrow or Wednesday when I shuffle some of the rocks around.

Good news: The only sound I can hear from the tank is still the AI Nero 3s or the Prime 16HDs when the fans kick in. I am going to stop by one of the LFSs soon and take another look at the Tunze flow pumps. I used them on tanks in the past and really liked them. The Neros are okay but...

 

[BubblesandSqueak]

were you doing a chiller or just kicking up the AC this summer?

 

[tharbin]

were you doing a chiller or just kicking up the AC this summer?

In AZ we have the AC on most of the year. It's on now in fact. We just set it higher in the summer (around 77--always at least one degree cooler that the tank set temp) and cooler in the spring/fall/half of winter, and just use the heater for a few weeks here and there. Sometimes the tank will drift up midday a little but usually not more than a degree or so.

With LED lights it works out fine. When I was running MH/T12s, not so much. I usually ran fans on the tanks and floated ice as needed. I almost bought a chiller a half-dozen times but always cheaped out.

 

[tharbin]

It works:

Nice skimmer it already feels dialed in.

 

[tharbin]

This morning when I looked at the tank I realized my controller was not working correctly. Luckily, there doesn't seem to be any lasting impact from the failure. I told my wife I may need to invest in a new controller if I cannot determine why the controller failed. Mine only controls the fuge light so not too bad. Time to start doing research for a suitable and more resilient or redundant replacement.

Actually my tank has five controllers, the Inkbird heater controller (not connected to WiFi), the Sicce SDC controller (also not connected to WiFi), the Intermatic timer above for the fuge light (doesn't even know what WiFi is), the Tunze 9004 DC controller (also no idea what WiFi is) and the main one MyAi that controls the lights and flow pumps (Bluetooth). I just thought it was funny this morning when I said my controller was down to my wife and decided to turn it into a post. It was a slow morning...

 

[TheWB]

A couple of updates to the tank.

I moved the fuge from chamber 2 to chamber 3 and added a Sicce Syncra Nano pump to the chamber set very low and angled to 'spin' the gracilaria. I was happy with the state of the fuge as when I moved the macro it looked healthy and slightly larger than when I put it in. The reason for the move was to free up chamber 2 for a skimmer. The Tunze eco chic light fits chamber 3 like it was made for it as well. I may end up adding a second eco chic if I feel I need to kick-start the fuge. We'll see after things stabilize.

Then I added a Tunze 9004 DC skimmer to chamber 2. It is a little undersize for the tank but since I run a light-medium bio-load and I prefer to go a little too small than too large with skimmers, the 9004 was about the size I wanted. Since it is a surface skimmer I could also install it in the 2nd chamber and still use the sump covers. Since the foyer of our home is also the waiting room for when my wife gives violin lessons, I prefer to cover as much of the tank as I can.

The skimmer is one of those nice-to-have-around-for-when-you-need-it pieces for the tank, like a UV. For now I want to run it in and get it tuned then decide how much I will run it. I'm also looking at modifying the Green Killing Machine to possibly also fit in chamber 2 and mount it. All of the gear is on switches so I can turn pieces like the skimmer and UV on/off as needed without trying to remember where I stored the things.

I also added a second ADJ PC100a power center but I still have to print some brackets to mount it.

The last thing is that I bought another 5 lbs. of Stax rock as I need a few medium size pieces to mount a couple of corals and maybe modify the center island. I didn't do anything with it yet though as I ran out of steam. I didn't take an FTS because I didn't scrape the acrylic yet and there is 'stuff' floating around from messing with the sump.

Bad news: I found another aiptasia but it is in an easy to reach spot so I pull it tomorrow or Wednesday when I shuffle some of the rocks around.

Good news: The only sound I can hear from the tank is still the AI Nero 3s or the Prime 16HDs when the fans kick in. I am going to stop by one of the LFSs soon and take another look at the Tunze flow pumps. I used them on tanks in the past and really liked them. The Neros are okay but...

I like that Fuge light. I may have to get one for mine if it will fit and I think it will. I have the IM Cheatomax light but it's been decommissioned for a long time now. It worked ok but there's no way to tumble the cheato in the back of an IM Lagoon 50 so one side always got blasted and grew hair algae which turned pink. I like the idea of the submerged light rather than attaching to the back of the tank and using the small pump to tumble it. This is exactly why I wanted these big wide rear chambers in these tanks. Lot's of room just like a regular sump. I am doing the opposite of you on the skimmer though. We've got the room for full sized equipment and I'm going to run a Simplicity 120DC in mine. Might just be using it mostly for aeration depending on how well the Klir-7 performs but it will be there and ready to be used however much it's needed.

 

[tharbin]

I like that Fuge light. I may have to get one for mine if it will fit and I think it will. I have the IM Cheatomax light but it's been decommissioned for a long time now. It worked ok but there's no way to tumble the cheato in the back of an IM Lagoon 50 so one side always got blasted and grew hair algae which turned pink. I like the idea of the submerged light rather than attaching to the back of the tank and using the small pump to tumble it. This is exactly why I wanted these big wide rear chambers in these tanks. Lot's of room just like a regular sump. I am doing the opposite of you on the skimmer though. We've got the room for full sized equipment and I'm going to run a Simplicity 120DC in mine. Might just be using it mostly for aeration depending on how well the Klir-7 performs but it will be there and ready to be used however much it's needed.

I thought about going full size on the skimmer but I'm running a fairly light bio-load and I've got a bee in my bonnet about leaving the sump covers on. I'm sure a regular skimmer would be more efficient and the surface skimming is really of little value since the second chamber is bottom fed anyway but I also liked the idea of having a kind of smallish general purpose skimmer around anyway.

I'm really looking forward to see how your tank comes together. I'm not currently running the light submerged but it is near the water surface and I like that if it falls in no big deal. So far the fuge is working okay but the growth is kind of slow. That's partly because I chose to go with gracilaria instead of cheato, partly because I have established nuisance algae in the display that came from the old Waterbox and possibly because I only have 9 watts over the fuge. I may add a second light if I don't see more growth soon but so far I'm happy. The way I have the pump in the chamber I didn't end up needing to put slots or eggcrate over the outflow from the fuge. The pump keeps the algae balls away from the outlet while slowly spinning them. When they get bigger I may need to make some kind of a trap to keep the balls out of the fourth chamber.

The pH help has been minimal so far. My daytime is still around 8.1-8.2 but my nighttime has gone from 7.8-7.9 to 7.9-8.0 so a little better. Mainly it just seems a little more stable.

 

[TheWB]

I thought about going full size on the skimmer but I'm running a fairly light bio-load and I've got a bee in my bonnet about leaving the sump covers on. I'm sure a regular skimmer would be more efficient and the surface skimming is really of little value since the second chamber is bottom fed anyway but I also liked the idea of having a kind of smallish general purpose skimmer around anyway.

I'm really looking forward to see how your tank comes together. I'm not currently running the light submerged but it is near the water surface and I like that if it falls in no big deal. So far the fuge is working okay but the growth is kind of slow. That's partly because I chose to go with gracilaria instead of cheato, partly because I have established nuisance algae in the display that came from the old Waterbox and possibly because I only have 9 watts over the fuge. I may add a second light if I don't see more growth soon but so far I'm happy. The way I have the pump in the chamber I didn't end up needing to put slots or eggcrate over the outflow from the fuge. The pump keeps the algae balls away from the outlet while slowly spinning them. When they get bigger I may need to make some kind of a trap to keep the balls out of the fourth chamber.

The pH help has been minimal so far. My daytime is still around 8.1-8.2 but my nighttime has gone from 7.8-7.9 to 7.9-8.0 so a little better. Mainly it just seems a little more stable.

Makes sense on the smaller skimmer based on your needs. especially if you are trying to use the covers.

I also am thinking about how to get the Green Killing Machine into the sump area somewhere. It will probably fit if I put it under the Klir7 and then stick out into the skimmer chamber. There should be room. It will depend on how easily I can remove it from that spot once everything is up and running. Might be a little crowded.

My tank should get into the room and on the stand this weekend. I've got someone to help me with it. Hoping to have it wet very soon.

I'm mostly going to use the fuge area to cultivate Pods. Any ph benefits will be a nice bonus. I'm thinking live rock rubble and live sand from TBS in containers and then some Macro, probably just chaeto.

 

[tharbin]

Makes sense on the smaller skimmer based on your needs. especially if you are trying to use the covers.

I also am thinking about how to get the Green Killing Machine into the sump area somewhere. It will probably fit if I put it under the Klir7 and then stick out into the skimmer chamber. There should be room. It will depend on how easily I can remove it from that spot once everything is up and running. Might be a little crowded.

My tank should get into the room and on the stand this weekend. I've got someone to help me with it. Hoping to have it wet very soon.

I'm mostly going to use the fuge area to cultivate Pods. Any ph benefits will be a nice bonus. I'm thinking live rock rubble and live sand from TBS in containers and then some Macro, probably just chaeto.

I've got my GKM off line for now but I want to get it plumbed in so that I just flip a switch if I need it. I haven't gotten around to measuring things yet though. Right now I'm busy trying to convert the display from a nuisance algae display into a coral/fish display and mounting a few of the frags that have overgrown their plugs.

The tank is just waking up so it is very blue. Not the best photos but...

The good news is the Purple Rim Trumpet is still doing well but the slowest splitting trumpet I've ever seen. It is almost done splitting from two heads to four or five (it looks like one of the new heads is already splitting again). If you look at the sand you can see one of the three stains, at least, of algae I'm dealing with. Little tufts on the sand bed. Easy to remove but prolific. I'm now using a rake-shaped back scratcher we picked up at ACE Hardware to rake the sand Japanese-Garden style. It is now my Zen Display.

The 'rake' telescopes so very handy.

The Purple Rim still splitting

The Tubbs now has its own Stax rock (that's the Tropicana next to it).

The biggest change is that I have, at least temporarily, pulled most of the Stax. I replaced the center island with another of my old base rocks. It fits better with my current flow patterns.

I'll try to get some better shots after I clean the panes and the tank is whiter.

I think I will be mounting the gold hammer on a Little Rox in the next few days and I'm deciding on where the Purple Stylo will go. We've decided to keep it as it is actually quite pretty with the deep purple polyps and mint green branch tips. Both of the Beach Bum frags are finally starting to grow so I'll need to decide on their placement soon.

In less good news the Pink Fiji Birdnest has finally started to change but not for the better. I'm losing it and the Green Fiji has decided to follow suit. If past experience is any indication I'll lose both of them as I've never had a birdnest recover once it decides to die. I think the pink had something wrong from the beginning as it never settled in and whatever it is seems to have spread to the green. Basically they are both STNing.

Pods is also one of the ideas behind my fuge. I just got another order of pods/phyto from @Eldredge and half went in the display and half in the fuge. I'm still considering what to put as substrate in the fuge. I've been considering some rubble or maybe a tub of Miracle Mud.

Edit: added photo of the 'rake'.

 

[tharbin]

I decided to frag the Green Fiji Birdnest to see if I can save some of it. We'll see.

What's left of the mother colony. I can still frag a few pieces off of it. I went to pull it off of the rock but one of the branches had fused to the rock and still looked healthy. I'll monitor it and the frags to see whether to frag more, forget it or just prune what is left to any healthy tissue that may be left.

While I was working in the tank I spotted a little splash of color on the sand near the Tubbs. There's Junior on its very own frag plug. It must have fragged off when I mounted the Tubbs.

Since I haven't taken a shot of it in a while, here is a shot of the Mystic Sunset along with a healthy dose of Green Nuisance Algae (GNA) number 2.

The Beach Bums are temporarily on the centerpiece flat rock so I got a shot of them. Still small but I only paid $25.00 for the pair a year and a half ago. They are finally starting to grow. That's the WWC Grafted Monti to the right. At least it is starting to turn greenish again.

Since I shot momma WWC, here's Pinhead, along with more GNA#2. I'm kind of proud of keeping Pinhead alive as it kept floating into crevices when it was pinhead-size.

Now if I can just talk myself into scrapping the acrylic panes...

 

[tharbin]

I finally cleaned the acrylic so here are some tank shots. Only thing new is that the loss on the green birds nest has slowed down. Two of the frags from it look okay so far but the third one is losing tissue just like the main colony.

 

[TheWB]

I finally cleaned the acrylic so here are some tank shots. Only thing new is that the loss on the green birds nest has slowed down. Two of the frags from it look okay so far but the third one is losing tissue just like the main colony.

Everything is looking really good. I like that little channel there on the right side you created.

 

[tharbin]

On Monday I received a Maxspect Jump Gyre 2k I bought from the BRS sale and installed it. Since all three of the Neros were also overdue for maintenance I went ahead and pulled them for now. I will probably reinstall one or two of them after I figure out where they are needed. If they still had the 4k version when I ordered I don't think I would need the Neros at all.

When I went to pull the Neros, the one at the right end popped off and fell into the rock knocking the pink Fiji birds nest off the rock and I didn't notice it. Since it was basically, if not totally dead anyway I figured I pull it next time I was in the tank but my wife said leave it, it just looks like more reef rubble anyway so it stays.

Right now I'm trying to figure out a change to the scape to make one more largish cave toward the right as I still want to try to add a Tomini Tang and all of the caves are in use.

Two of the three green Fiji birds nests frags are peeling so it doesn't look good.

 

[Gumbies R Us]

On Monday I received a Maxspect Jump Gyre 2k I bought from the BRS sale and installed it. Since all three of the Neros were also overdue for maintenance I went ahead and pulled them for now. I will probably reinstall one or two of them after I figure out where they are needed. If they still had the 4k version when I ordered I don't think I would need the Neros at all.

When I went to pull the Neros, the one at the right end popped off and fell into the rock knocking the pink Fiji birds nest off the rock and I didn't notice it. Since it was basically, if not totally dead anyway I figured I pull it next time I was in the tank but my wife said leave it, it just looks like more reef rubble anyway so it stays.

Right now I'm trying to figure out a change to the scape to make one more largish cave toward the right as I still want to try to add a Tomini Tang and all of the caves are in use.

Two of the three green Fiji birds nests frags are peeling so it doesn't look good.

Tank is looking really nice!

 

[tharbin]

Tank is looking really nice!

Thanks, it is going through a bit of the uglies right now. I will probably need to reinstall one or two of the Neros as the 2k gyre is just not quite enough for the full tank but I do like the flow pattern from it.

 

[tharbin]

Tank update. Not much really new; yet.

The gyre is really nice, I just wish I had the 4k instead of the 2k as I feel it would be all the tank needs. I'm running the 2k on random at 90% and it is almost enough. I've cleaned the Neros to reinstall one or two but I may just spring for a 4k gyre or add a Tunze 6040. I'm not sure yet.

Tank status: I'm losing the war against aiptasia and algae, but slowly.

I keep finding lone aiptasia here or there and dispatching them with extreme prejudice. One time there was one on the ball valve of the Loc-line return. I pulled the return and scrapped and peroxided the unit and replaced it. A few days ago I noticed four very small aiptasia on the ball valve so I didn't clean it well enough before. I pulled it again and cleaned them off on Monday. On Monday night I saw aiptasia tenacles sticking out of the crack between the ball valve body and lever. I decided to soak the valve in citric acid for a week or so and then dry it and re-peroxide it before returning it to the tank therefore I needed a substitute return. I remembered that I had a 3/4" bulkhead ball end, the unused loc line flare nozzle from the Tenecor and three sections of used loc-line I had picked up 'just in case'. Anyway, I built a replacement return with the intention of pulling the existing return and soaking it and use the substitute for a week or so. Turns out the used loc-line are all cracked but I may try it anyway. Worst case is I pull the valve off of the sections and put the ball on but I hate working with loc-line so I'm trying to avoid that. While I was building the new return section my wife said "I hate to give you bad news but I found another aiptasia..." Ouch. This one is big. It is in the crack between two of the rocks in the left hand island. Luckily I can easily remove the top rock and I think I can get at it but the Foxface will not be happy as it is the roof to his cave. I may try F-Aiptasia on this one as I received a free sample of their new coralline-colored product. I usually just epoxy over them if I can't pull and scrap and peroxide the area easily. Edit: I just went through the tank with a flashlight and found two more good-sized ones, another in the same crack with the other big one and one in the flat rock near center of the tank. I may need to consider biological control before it gets out of hand.

Other than a little hair algae here and there that is easy to maintain I have two types of turf algae and bubble algae. One of the turf algae is low growing and soft that grows in mats on the rocks. It is slowly winning. I do pull some every day but it is hard to get all of it in an area. The Foxface and Hector ignore it and the snails will only eat the parts I've plucked down. It is causing me some trouble as it is choking the Kryptonite Trumpet and I can't remove enough of it without damaging the coral to help it much. I may need to pull the trumpet and really get in there to get most of it off. The other algae is a tough bunch algae that grows mainly on the substrate but does encroach the bottom of the rocks here and there. It is prolific and green-tints the sand as well. The Foxface does 'nibble' on this from time to time but mainly I rake it up. It just grows very quickly. The good news is the bubble algae. The Foxface does eat it and there is none in the open in the tank. There is some in the tank but it is down in cracks and crevices where the Foxface can't or at least doesn't go. I'm going to talk to my favorite LFS about finding me a smallish Tomini Tang and if they can't there is another LFS that has five or six Blue-Eye Kole Tangs but I had bad experiences with that LFS many (17 or 18) years ago. It does look like they've really cleaned up their act though. I figure a Tomini or a Kole will help some with the algae and get the Foxface more serious about doing its part as it always follows the other fish around to see what they're eating.

The corals, in general, are doing well; the green birds nest has slowed down on the STN and one of the frags never STN'd and is very slowly starting to grow. The purple-rim trumpet is still splitting, it is now five heads, both the WWC grafted-monti and its bailout baby have turned mainly green with the beginnings of some orange streaking, the Tropicana anacapora is slowly growing, the acans and goni seem fine and the big news is that both Beach Bums have started to encrust their plugs.

 

[JoJosReef]

Uff, Aiptasia is the worst. I have 2 that I've located in very hard to reach places, one upside down, so F-aiptasia's not going to work on that. Just keep at it! The worst thing is saying "I'll get to that tomorrow". Ugg, and as I'm sitting here typing I just found a baby aip staring at me from my 10gal...