120 peninsula build

[USMC4Life]

74F. Whenever I go above 76 or so I start having problems.

 

[fragit]

74F. Whenever I go above 76 or so I start having problems.

That's interesting must be a chemical or O2 thing.

 

[fragit]

In an effort to drive up nutrients I decided to pull the Chaeto from my refugium. All I have in there now is feather Caulerpa. I've been feeding really heavy and removed my filter socks and still getting 0.0 nitrates with a Red Sea kit. I also ran my skimmers air intake into the garage. I have a sneaking suspicion that my PH is off. With winter all but here, and the house being buttoned up and a basement sump with the furnace running more frequently I'm sure it's being effected. I usually don't test PH, but ordered a Salifert PH kit so that I can at least check at different times of the day. I may have to hook up a CO2 scrubber but we'll see. My birdsnest is pretty much dead. There are a few polyps still clinging to life, but the colony is all but gone. My stylophora has had some major tissue necrosis and sloughing again some small sections cling to life. One of my Acros is in the same state as the birds nest, just a couple small areas cling to life. I spoke with @twilliard last night about this strange algae I have growing. He was unable to identify it, but did confirm it is an algae. He recommended that I try changing my lighting spectrum to see what happens. He thinks that will really effect it. He did say that he has never seen it before. In 15 years in the hobby I've never seen this stuff either. So I dropped all my whites in both the DT and fuge to see what happens. My parameters remain stable, Alk has consistently been 7.0 for about a week now. Calc at 420-440 and Mag at 1360 or so, SG 1.026, and temp 78. Fish remain active and healthy. My scarlet hermits are doing a pretty good job of clearing this weird algae in the DT. Hopefully I get things squared away before Christmas as I would like some gift cards to BattleCorals and CultivatedReef. My new GHL doser is going to arrive today. I can't wait to stop manually dosing. That's all for now. Time to test my water parameters.

 

[USMC4Life]

I would say lower the temp by several degrees and see if that helps.

 

[fragit]

Doser is online! That should help with stability a ton. More importantly I don't need to go up and down the basement stairs a minimum of 6 times a day to dose manually.

 

[fragit]

Yesterday my wife literally told me to go the the LFS and pick up a couple fish. They had 3 lyertail anthias that had been there for a few weeks. So I picked them up, and into the DT after a 4 hour temp and drip acclimation. Miss Piggy the Kole Tang is being a little territorial and one of the Anthias is camped out in the rocks. Everyone will get settled in nicely I suspect.

 

[fragit]

The one Anthia that was hiding in the rocks is out now. She's a bit beat up. Has some torn pectoral and dorsal fins and one of its sides looks a little scraped up. I may move her down to the QT system so that she can heal an regain he strength.

 

[fragit]

The one Anthia that got its but kicked passed today.[emoji24][emoji35]. I went to petco and picked up a critter box to make a social acclimation box. She swam in there after an hour or so trying to evade one of the other Anthias and the Kole Tang. She died a few hours later. She was really beaten up, both flanks looked all scraped up and bloodied fins tattered. She will be buried in my flower garden tomorrow. She was my first fish loss in this new tank. It really sucks.

 

[Jackcarp]

Here he is the latest addition to my family. And hopefully a new and brilliant reefer. This is Enzo our very healthy and happy little boy. Born 11/23 at 9:17am, 7lbs 4oz, 19 5/8" long. Mama is doing great! Hopefully we can go home today! So without further ado......

Congrats!!

 

[fragit]

Today's parameters
Temp 77-78
Salinity 1.025
PH 8.1
Phosphate 0.012
Nitrate 0.0 (undetectable with RedSea)
Alkalinity 7.1
Calcium 440
Magnesium 1340

My numbers look good, I still wish my nitrates would increase. Glad phosphates continue to drop a little and get in line. Alkalinity is right where I want it now that the doser is online. I will check again tomorrow for the 47hr mark. Birds nest gone, stylophora gone, one Acro gone (except for one tiny spot), stag, and other Acro still can't tell. Hammer doing just fine, Heliopora doing well. Fish all good. Have some diatoms blooming for some reason. Probably because I feed the crap out of the tank the last couple days, especially yesterday. In an effort to get that one Anthia that died to eat I fed probably 5 cubes of Hikari frozen brine and mysis. I usually only feed maybe one cube a day. I probably won't add any corals until after Christmas. I may ask the LFS, for another cheap frag pack but think I will monitor for a while.

 

[fragit]

Parameters today
Temp 79
Salinity 1.025
PH 8.2
Nitrate 0.6
Phosphate 0.037
Alk 7.1
Calc 430
Mag 1320

Been dosing 1 drop PRObio and NP Pro in the morning. And 4 drops build, energy, vitality and aminos every other night as directed. Feeding a little less as I'm back to work. Not much macro in the fuge which I think is why my nitrates are finally starting to show. Also dosing less bacteria is helping. No other changes to the system. Waiting until after Christmas to add any more livestock.

 

[fragit]

It's been a little while since I updated... Not much has changed. For some reason all of my macro algae died off, probably due to lack of nutrients. Last checked all parameters on Tuesday and phosphates still dropping, nitrates still detectable at 0.35 which is down just a bit. I think I need to start dosing spectraside. Still continue to feed heavy. I got some nice gifts for Christmas. My brother picked out some nice sps from Cultivated Reef here in Maine, and I got a gift card to Battle Corals and some cash from my folks and inlaws. So I should be stocking up the sps again with about a dozen corals next week. We are getting a snow storm here today so not going to risk having stuff shipped until next week. I also sold the Stream3 I won and ordered up a Gyre X250 which should be getting delivered tomorrow weather permitting. I am debating whether or not to keep the refugium macro free and shut the lights, add a little more rock I have laying around and just let it be a cryptic zone. Any suggestions?

 

[revhtree]

Thanks for the update!

 

[fragit]

Got the Gyre XF250 installed yesterday and I gotta say I really like it. I'm bummed that the Stream3 didn't work for my system but I found it a good home. The directions for the Gyre stink! First I had a heck of a time getting the power cable from the pump to the controller together. The connection is so tight I thought they were sized incorrectly. It took a lot of muscle to get it together. Then the manual for the controller need a lot of work. I turned the thing on and it was running backwards. I couldn't for the life of me figure out why. After an hour of playing with the settings I realized that the flow setting has positive and negative. The flow needed to be set in negative, which is so dumb IMO. Well the thing is set, works awesome looks good, is silent, and moves a ton of water. Big update coming next week! I have a Battle Bag coming from Battle Corals, and 5 frags coming from Cultivated Reef. Christmas was good for the tank this year.

 

[USMC4Life]

Pictures!

Oh and happy new year!

 

[fragit]

Pictures!

Oh and happy new year!

Happy New Year to you too. Pics will come next week when I get my sticks. Sorry @USMC4Life your just gonna have to wait.

 

[USMC4Life]

But, but I wanna seeeeeeeeee lol.

 

[fragit]

But, but I wanna seeeeeeeeee lol.

Geesh your worse than my 1 month old son. I wanna, I wanna [emoji24] lol. I deleted my past photos from my phone to free up space so your going to have to go back in the thread for comparing. I set the thing on random flow peaking at 70%. I love this pump!

 

[Fudsey]

Looking great @fragit

 

[fragit]

Frags came in today all from Christmas gifts. Got 5 pieces from Cultivated Reef here in Maine, and a Battle Bag from Battle Corals.

Cultivated Reef

Back row left to right- Seasons Greetings Monti Cap, No name Pink Milli
Front row left to right- Strawberry Fields Acro, Red Planet Acro
Middle- Orange Monti Cap

Battle Corals

Left- Reef Ready Grape Juice Acro
Back Row left to right- Sniper Blue Acro, BC Secale, Reef Raft Excalibur Mille
Front Row left to right- Palleti Yellow Tip, Forest Fire Digi, Jedi Mind Trick