30G Mixed Reef Cube

[Rjukan]

Aww yeah, looking good! I love the 2nd to last one, what is that?

The first and 2nd pic, looks like a stylo? I would probably frag it down in case that bleached part is stn or rtn.

 

[Sumo Reef]

Aww yeah, looking good! I love the 2nd to last one, what is that?

The first and 2nd pic, looks like a stylo? I would probably frag it down in case that bleached part is stn or rtn.

Thanks! The second to last one are two frags that were the same one before it broke: Tubbs Stellata Montipora :)

You are correct on the stylo but there is no STN or RTN going on anymore. This thing is making a comeback from the RO mishap and has recovered a great deal. It has almost filled in the missing flesh at the top again!

 

[Sumo Reef]

Bought some new corals and picked this guy up last week. One of our Chromis went haywire and started bullying everyone in the tank so he was removed lol... never again with Chromis.

Say "hi" to Gwendoline!

 

[Sumo Reef]

So tank is doing great! Wanted to share some healing/growth pics with yall. This is over the course of a month.

Also these are with my phone, but I did get a Canon M50 for my bday [emoji16] just gotta get a macro lense and also figure out the best solution to post photos. I took a few o.o.t.b. pics but they were too large to upload to r2r. Any recommendations? Should I resize or host externally?

 

[count krunk]

I use imgur for all my hosting. I separate by albums when I upload. You can choose a size when you upload. I chose their 17" monitor setting.

I just copy paste the BBC code from imgur and that will show the picture

 

[Sumo Reef]

Tank was getting too green so brought in a couple blue bois from Boom Corals. These are on sale right now for a good price!

 

[Sumo Reef]

Hey everyone!

So I'm back on R2R after a hiatus of a few years. The tank is still up and running. Whew, almost four years now it's been. My tank is not where I would like it to be, and I recently made many moves to rekindle my interest in it. So this will be a long-winded update. Here it goes!

Last few years Summary
I learned a lot over the years, but because of work, COVID, and personal life taking all my time then, I didn't get dialed in on the tank or give it the attention it needed. Many equipment changes have been made with success, and I've gotten better at stability and general husbandry.

Moving
The tank has moved apartments with me twice in the last three years - In June 2021, it moved to a new location and will be moving again near the end of the year o_O. I lost Fernando the 12-line wrasse, Penelope the Helfrichi Firefish, and several SPS colonies. RIP.

Currently have the upgrade itch too, but if I cannot do a 30gal, why would I be able to maintain a larger tank? Plus, I plan on moving in 6 months again and don't want to do that in the middle of a new tank maturing. This hobby really does require us to live in one place.

Equipment
The tank was never doing very well, and I despised manually testing alk, calcium, pH, salinity, etc. So I bought an Apex, Trident, and a Dos and never looked back! Logging in and checking numbers while drinking my morning coffee is more manageable than taking out test kits galore every day.

Another thing I changed was my LED from an AI Hydra 26 HD, set with the mimic AB+ schedule, to a Radion XR15 G5 Blue. The difference at the time of switching was night and day. Corals perked up right away and started growing a LOT. I'm not a pro and don't want to tinker with light settings, so I decided to switch to EcoTech since they are the OG LED.

Also, I have added an EcoTech Vortech MP40 as I wasn't happy with the look of two big Icecap Gyres. An MP40 is oversized for a 30 gal, but the glass on this tank is 1/2 inch and too thick for the MP10. Plus, the MP40 can go on my next tank!

Stability
The beginning quarter of this year was challenging for me personally while I looked for a new job as I was not happy where I was. During this period, the Trident failed to test Alk even though the solution was brand new. After a few days, I gave up and let it sit broken until about April. After working with Neptune Customer Service to clear the input tube and run a few diagnostics, I bought a replacement one for ~$200 from Neptune as per their program.

Additionally, since owning the Apex, I have just trusted the numbers. However, in the last few months, I have bought several testing kits to triple-check any parameter. I now have 3 different kits of every test. Using multiple test kits for verification has revealed that my Apex+Trident has been incorrect on salinity, pH, Alk, Calc, and Mag for the last year. It has since been dialed in, and all tests match. Corals are looking better than ever! I'm still adjusting my Alk dose to get the Trident to be more accurate and fluctuate less.

Going Bare Bottom
My weekly water change routine always involved vacuuming my substrate and would always cloud the tank, and I kept getting algae and cyano. I got tired of this, so after the move in 2021, I removed the substrate and moved to a bare bottom. This change coincided with the MP40 since I wanted to crank up the flow a little but could never because it would kick up the substrate in this tiny little tank. OMG, why didn't I do this sooner???? Bare bottom for life.

Excuse the scratched glass. I had a nicked blade on my scraper. Always check your scraper.

Aquascape
I have never really been happy with my Aquascape. Using STAX seemed great initially, but over the years, it came unglued/un-epoxied and is no longer stable. This finally got on my nerves, so I purchased the CaribSea Reef Tree kit. This kit comes with 1 base rock and 3 arches with pre-drilled holes, all of which are painted purple. So excited about this!

The Reef Tree kit has been soaking in a brute trash bin (heater and pump included) with some rock and water from the current tank for a month. Today, I also added some eco pods from AlgaeBarn. I plan to make the switch in a few weeks, and I will keep you all posted!

New Residents
I have had two of my fish for almost 3-4 years. Squirt the Blue-green Chromis and Gwendoline the Royal Gramma Basslet. They are little CHONKs, and I got them some new roomies.



... Before I go further, at this point, I want to acknowledge the violation of rule #1 in our hobby:

Don't change too much too fast.
or
Nothing good happens quickly.​

More fish + new rocks + more feeding = crash. I am keeping a close eye on everything, dosing 1ml of NOPOX daily, 25% water changes every week, and adding a cap of Microbacter after every WC. It's been two weeks now, and so far, so good.

Say hello to Brutus the Falco Hawkfish, Lenore the Firefish, and Tsu'tey the Cardinal fish. I must say I LOVE Brutus' personality and highly, HIGHLY recommend a Hawkfish to those who have never owned one. He is curious and will come perch right next to me every time I say hi.

Corals That Survived
Quite a few of my corals have been sticking it out and are ready for the coming glow-up!

Next Steps
In the coming weeks, I will be switching to the new aquascape, and after a month of that settling, I will look to add a bunch of new coral! Stay tuned!

Gwendoline sees all.

 

[DarkReefer]

Great write up and welcome back ! Keen to see how it all goes and look forward to seeing more updates

 

[Sumo Reef]

Thank you! For sure!

I am going on vacation this weekend but the weekend after is when I plan on swapping the aquascape :grinning-face-with-smiling-eyes:

 

[DarkReefer]

Thank you! For sure!

I am going on vacation this weekend but the weekend after is when I plan on swapping the aquascape :grinning-face-with-smiling-eyes:

Nice, enjoy the vacation and look forward to the update!

 

[Sumo Reef]

Back from vacation, and all is well. I have been tweaking the Alk dose daily to keep it around 8. I think the sweet spot is somewhere around 9mL a day.

Also, I use this small cabinet next to the tank to house my Neptune Dos and the Alk and NOPOX containers.

 

[DarkReefer]

Back from vacation, and all is well. I have been tweaking the Alk dose daily to keep it around 8. I think the sweet spot is somewhere around 9mL a day.

Also, I use this small cabinet next to the tank to house my Neptune Dos and the Alk and NOPOX containers.

Nice!
I'm aiming for around 9 I think with my Alk. Probably need to make time to test again tonight.
My alk's been climbing slowly with my dosing, but only slowly, keep winding it back slightly each time until I find the sweet spot!

I've also done a similar setup to yours with a cabinet next to the tank with all my dosing gear and other bits and pieces. Pretty handy!

 

[Sumo Reef]

Yeah, at this point a constant slide of ~.1 will be manageable for me it seems. I read somewhere that 7.8-8 is ideal for SPS so that spot has been my goal for a while now.

 

[DarkReefer]

Yeah, at this point a constant slide of ~.1 will be manageable for me it seems. I read somewhere that 7.8-8 is ideal for SPS so that spot has been my goal for a while now.

Yeah nice. I think I used to try hover 7.5, but that was a bit low and with the fluctuations I was getting at the time it didn't take long before corals were looking upset with me. Recently been thinking 9 just so it's in that area that everyone likes which I think was something like 8-11 ish? and give a little play on either side, not that I should need it with the dosing set up (once it's dialled in).
My Alk last test was about 10.1 so creeping up a little but not a danger yet.

I'm testing twice a week until I get things dialled in on the doser.

 

[Sumo Reef]

Yeah nice. I think I used to try hover 7.5, but that was a bit low and with the fluctuations I was getting at the time it didn't take long before corals were looking upset with me. Recently been thinking 9 just so it's in that area that everyone likes which I think was something like 8-11 ish? and give a little play on either side, not that I should need it with the dosing set up (once it's dialled in).
My Alk last test was about 10.1 so creeping up a little but not a danger yet.

I'm testing twice a week until I get things dialled in on the doser.

I watched a bunch of interviews on YouTube with successful tank owners and talked to some long-running LFS and they all say the same thing:

Find what levels work for you and then keep it stable.

 

[DarkReefer]

I watched a bunch of interviews on YouTube with successful tank owners and talked to some long-running LFS and they all say the same thing:

Find what levels work for you and then keep it stable.

Yep exactly. Once we've got it tuned in, fingers crossed we can keep eeeeverything happy :)

 

[Sumo Reef]

The swapping of the rocks is complete! OMG, I am so happy with this. I should have done this sooner! In my next tank, I am starting my rockwork with these. This is hands-down the best aquascape product for simplicity and looks!

Process wise I just used two buckets filled with some saltwater, one to put coral frags into and another to put old rocks in. After getting all the old rocks out I put the new rocks in and re-glued corals into their new spots. I will need to keep an eye on the corals to make sure they are happy with their placement. This process was followed up with a 50% water change and siphoning off the bottom of all the detritus leftover from moving old rock.

Found these little zoa frags when moving the rocks - Rastas, and JF Daisy Cutter. The Daisy Cutters were lost about a year ago. Apparently, they were hanging on for a long time in complete darkness under the old rocks. They now have some light and have already started to perk up! Hopefully, we can get these dudes to populate the bottom!

I'm very excited about the new layout and look of the tree! I'm thinking softies and LPS for the bottom, SPS up top, and some monti's in the middle. It will be tough to ensure the bottom corals don't get blacked out from branching or plating corals though :confounded-face:.

What kind of corals and positions do you guys think I should get with this new tree?

By the end of this week, if everything looks happy, I may buy a couple of frag packs from various stores!

https://www.bulkreefsupply.com/liferock-reef-tree-aquascape-kit-caribsea.html

 

[Sumo Reef]

Since adding the rocks I have had to decrease my Alk dose. Down to 7.5 from 9ml a day and still adjusting. The rocks were actually added on the 10th.

Alk measured below:

 

[DarkReefer]

Nice man, the rock scape looks good!
That's pretty awesome about the zoas you came across too.
Just goes to show life can find away and even if you think it's all over, there's every chance it may come back!

 

[Sumo Reef]

Nice man, the rock scape looks good!
That's pretty awesome about the zoas you came across too.
Just goes to show life can find away and even if you think it's all over, there's every chance it may come back!

Thanks! Yeah, I'm impressed with their resilience :D