20g Macro Algae/Seagrass build

nawilson89 · Oct 29, 2015

Hey Reef2Reef. It's been some time since I've been an active member. (Almost exactly one year). I had taken down my build due to well, my girlfriend being pregnant. Since then we've had a gorgeous daughter! My girlfriend has returned to the workforce and it's given us an opportunity to start up a new tank.

Unfortunately no pictures yes, but it's been up for a week. It's a standard 20g with a Reef Radiance DM 12-e over head LED bulb. i have an old circ pump (no idea what the gph is). but lets move on:

Substrate:
20lbs of carib-sea live aragonite sand
Cup of live mud from floridapets

About 3lbs of base rock
10lbs of live rock pulled from a local member's tank

Flora:
Shoal grass
caulerpa prolifera
dragon's breath algae

CuC:
6 Cerith snails

So the diatom is in full bloom, it started a few days ago. The tank itself is looking great.
I haven't seen any hitch hikers as of yet, or a single pod. I purchased some "algaegen" i think that's what it was called, with some phytoplankton and (not really thinking when i did this) put BOTH in the fridge. It's safe to say I killed off my pods before I even had them. Nonetheless I dumped both in the tank anyway (saved a bit of phyto for later).

Coming in the mail i have:
Chaeto
Caulerpa Prolifera
Codium
Dragon's Breath

Digital thermometer
Kent's Lugols Solution
Kent's Iron and Manganese

Planned Stock:

I plan on having a heavier bioload to give my macro something to do.

My girlfriend gave me two ultimatums for this tank. A pair of clownfish or a pair of sea horses.
Honestly I'd rather have seahorses than clowns, but clowns are more readily available and easier to take care of.

Basslet: Royal Gramma or Swissguard (Right now i'm leaning more toward the Royal Gramma because of being readily available and the price, I do have experience with both fish though)

Goby: If you've seen my signature you would see this coming.
I want either Greenbanded Goby or Neon Goby, both in pairs (quite honestly I don't want to say EITHER, I want to say BOTH)

Tiger Pistol Shrimp and cohabitant Goby. (Haven't decided on a specific breed of Goby yet)

Peppermint Shrimp
Harlequin Shrimp (this is definitely a "I really wish i could have this" moment. I probably will never own one)
Mandarin Dragonette (Same as the Harley)
Most like one or two types of hermit crab (just one of each)

So... here's where I say. Read this. Provide advice, criticism, or opinions.

Also... notice me @Reefing Madness

Reefing Madness · Oct 29, 2015

nawilson89 · Oct 31, 2015

Pics are up. Here's from today. Sorry they are still pretty purple even after messing with the settings and getting help from the forum.

Reefing Madness · Oct 31, 2015

Right on man!!

powers2001 · Nov 2, 2015

This is a great plan for an already great tank! It is a gentle tank inspired by your girlfriend. I would go with the seahorses.

nawilson89 · Nov 2, 2015

powers2001 said:
This is a great plan for an already great tank! It is a gentle tank inspired by your girlfriend. I would go with the seahorses.

Honestly. I really really want to go with sea horse, you have no idea. I just don't know where I could get them locally and which species would fit as a pair in my 20g. From what I do know about sea horses is that they would flourish in this macro algae set up and them being messy eaters would be helpful to the lives of my macros. I wouldn't mind the multiple feeding at all.

powers2001 · Nov 3, 2015

There is nothing wrong with getting livestock online.
To deal with the messy eating I would get a pretty big clean-up-crew. I would go with about 5-10 scarlet hermits. If they don't get enough to eat from uneaten food, they will nibble a little macro but not enough macro that they would keep ahead of the growth.
Uneaten food won't help macro algae but won't necessarily hurt it as well. Algae only eats the dissolved stuff in the water that you can't see.

nawilson89 · Nov 3, 2015

powers2001 said:
There is nothing wrong with getting livestock online.

To deal with the messy eating I would get a pretty big clean-up-crew. I would go with about 5-10 scarlet hermits. If they don't get enough to eat from uneaten food, they will nibble a little macro but not enough macro that they would keep ahead of the growth.

Uneaten food won't help macro algae but won't necessarily hurt it as well. Algae only eats the dissolved stuff in the water that you can't see.

Very true. I just don't order much live stock online. Only really have gotten fish on the freshwater side.

As much as i love hermit crabs (literally I could fill a tank with them and gobies and be happy). I'm not sure of having them with sea horses.

I meant uneaten food dissolving into ammonia and phosphates to help the growth of macros.

So now I'm going to go research what sea horses I can keep in a 20g (with a royal gramma and some gobies of course) and look for an online retailer. This weekend I'll purchase alot of pods for my tank and start having them multiply.

Wiz · Nov 3, 2015

Curious about florida pets mud. What did you think? I've gotten pods from them. I was very happy with that.

I love the set up.

nawilson89 · Nov 3, 2015

Wiz said:
Curious about florida pets mud. What did you think? I've gotten pods from them. I was very happy with that. I love the set up.

Initially I purchased a cup of mud and my shoal grass. When I set it up I wasn't too impressed with what I had ordered, but alas I was impatient. I'm not sure what effect the mud has had on my live sand, but my shoal grass is looking very well after only a few weeks.

nawilson89 · Nov 3, 2015

So I'm back on Seahorse research and I think it's plausible. I MAY be able to handle it. So I searched around and I found someone selling seahorses on ebay. Dwarf Sea Horses. I don't think dwarves will bode well in my current set up as it's 20g. I plan to keep a royal gramma, a blenny and also some gobies in that tank and I don't know for sure if they would be able to co-exist. I wouldn't want a goby to attack a dwarf or the gramma to just swallow it.

So of course I sent the info to my gf who of course is 100% on getting dwarfs. And we spoke a bit about it and what we can and want to do. I have a 10g tank that her brother is holding on to for me. Once I get that back and my 20g has grown out a bit I'll get some refugium mud for a substrate, throw in some reef rubble and macros. Grow the 10g out a bit and then order some dwarfs for a species only tank.

nawilson89 · Nov 3, 2015

So I've had hours to think about dwarfs (I'm quite literally high jacking my own thread) and I've pretty much came up with a plan for them.

I plan on buying a gallon of mineral mud to serve as my substrate and a few lbs of rubble rock. As my 20g matures and my macros are able to be propagated I'll use them as the basis of my tank.

Planted Caulerpa Prolifera with rubble holding dragon's breath, gracilaria, halimeda and chaeto. I want the copepods to have somewhere to flourish and a hitching post.
I already have lighting down for and plans for a new sponge filter.

So that's my plan for a few months from now.

nawilson89 · Nov 4, 2015

So growth update.

Haven't got to see much of my tank in the last two days. My girlfriend works at home and sets up in the bedroom where my tank is, plus I have a noisy seven month old so I can't just sneak in the room while she's taking calls. From what I have seen last night and this morning is my glass covered in diatoms (ew, but good. I'm happy) and caulerpa growth (not alot, but I see it). I see a bit of growth in the smaller dragons breath and havent seen anything happening in the larger dragons breath. Chaeto seems to be a bit bigger as is the halimeda branching out further. Gracilaria hasn't changed? Not really sure.

Copepods are EVERYWHERE when I look and I kind of regret ordering 250 pods from reefs2go now.

nawilson89 · Nov 9, 2015

So got some fish!

Stock list:

Royal Gramma
Tail Spot Blenny
Neon Goby x2

My Pod order came in. Everyone went crazy for a bit. Not sure where all the pods are or if any are left (Actually fed some Mysis shrimp and pods came out to collect).

nawilson89 · Nov 10, 2015

My copy and paste from another site.
Flora:
I'm still not seeing much (if any) chaeto growth. It may be because they aren't free floating, but I'm not concerned. I've decided to pull the few pieces I have save for a bunch i have tucked into the entrance of a cave. That piece is used as security for a neon goby who has taken refuge in the rock.

The Dragon's Breath seems to be taking off, but I am waiting for more growth before sectioning it out.

Of course the caulerpa seems to be doing the best as expected. A few of it's leaves have grown larger and broader on some of the shoots.

Codium is being pushed down by the current, I plan on getting a weaker powerhead as I think my tank has TOO much current. I can't remember the rating of this circulation, but my fish haven't taken to a portion of the tank, probably because of the amount of current it's getting.

Gracilaria. I'm not sure on where it's gotten. Neither I nor my girlfriend have seen much change in it.

Halimeda is about the same as the graci. No note worthy changes.

As I said in a previous post, sea grass is throwing up new shoots. It's looking really good and seems to be doing much better than i expected.

Fauna:
All fish are eating well and looking healthy at this point. I've been monitoring them for a few days.

My neon goby "pair" are looking alright to say the least. One is slightly larger than the other and the bigger one does chase it a bit. At first I was a bit worried about that, but from my experience with gobies it's ok. My last pair of gobies (they were a different species though) did alot chasing and after a month started to spawn and did alot of the same activities these two are doing. The non dominant one is hiding out in a cave and comes out to explore and eat then goes back to the cave on it's own for the most part. My old pair of greenbanded did the same thing, both are looking very fat.

Two spot blenny was hiding out under the halimeda but has found a new cave dwelling in my largest rock. It technically has an apartment above my neon gobies. It's been out and about among the rock work picking up pods.

Royal Gramma says near the back of the tank for now in the rock work and is eating well. It's a bit skiddish which is weird for me as I've never had nor seen a Royal Gramma that was so reclusive.

I haven't established what I want as my remaining inhabitants. I want to add a few more different species of macro algae and a few fish.

Whether I do a few cardinal fish or a pair of sea horses is to be debated.

nawilson89 · Nov 11, 2015

Shoal Grass growing in nicely

The only fish who will let me take it's picture. my two spot blenny

Dragon's breath

FTS

I added a few inverts.

3 astrea snails and 3 nassarius snails

one tiny blue leg hermit
one red leg hermit

nawilson89 · Nov 17, 2015

Spent the last few days battling a bacterial bloom. Looks like you can see the early stages above.

Stopped feeding the tank Thursday, switched out my circ pump with a lower power head. The new flow (the powerhead is on the other side of the tank, so now current is backwards) thew everything around.

Tank is pretty much clear today and looking REALLY good. Detritus is down.

This weekend I may add a few more bits to my CuC. Not sure what yet.

nawilson89 · Nov 30, 2015

Well, holiday's over. Time to get up to date.

Had about 3 days of no lights and a 10g filter running on the back.

Clear tank.

Just, wow... Clear.

Caulerpa is fine. It's getting really tall. Gracilaria seems to have grown as have the dragons breath. Codium is being codium and Halimeda hasn't really done anything. Really thinking about taking it out and trying something else (What I really want is grape caulerpa).

Probably going to order a few things from another reefer this week. Over all, things are looking great.

After the 3 days of darkness and turning the lights back on, I've seen more of my Royal Gramma than I ever have. He's grown a bit too.

Haven't seen my hermits at all. I think the rogue hermit has killed them. So I never mentioned it before as I was planning on taking it out. I purchased a "blue legged hermit" and I say that in quotations because when i got home I had a good look at it and it's no blue legged hermit; from an LFS. Once I had a closer look I realized it was a thin stripe hermit. If you guys know anything about hermits, a thin stripe is a no go for this tank. They're a pretty big, brutal species, they kill and eat anything. Like i said I planned on removing him, but I threw him in the tank for a few days and he did ALOT of work with detritus and leftover foods. He also munched on caulerpa, now I think he's taken out the other two hermits so it may be time to go. I've taken a liking to him though. Heck, I may add him to my 2.5g when I get it running and then move him elsewhere when I decide to stock it.

Back to my 20g though. Still don't know what else to put in here. I'm about to breakdown and just get a pair of clowns... I like Gobies, basslets, and blennies but my tank can't support many of them without constant infighting and leading to illness.

Pics to come soon, this afternoon most likely.

nawilson89 · Nov 30, 2015

I keep telling myself. "There's been no growth. Am I doing this right?" Then I looked at an old picture from Nov 11th...

Then I looked at this picture of last week.