A good little tank (IM Nuvo 10 gallon)

[Aeb1419]

Wow amazing tank. Quick question. How much flow are you looking to get in a 10 gal tank? Is more flow better for corals and algae growth? How much flow do you get from the return pump?

I am looking at lighting and I like the kessils. Im okay with just using an outlet controller but does it have a seperate outlet it turn it on for a moon light setting?

 

[Pbh-reef]

Wow amazing tank. Quick question. How much flow are you looking to get in a 10 gal tank? Is more flow better for corals and algae growth? How much flow do you get from the return pump?

I am looking at lighting and I like the kessils. Im okay with just using an outlet controller but does it have a seperate outlet it turn it on for a moon light setting?

Thanks for the compliment, I love my tank and think it is amazing to watch but I definitely don't think it is amazing in comparison to other tanks, it is very much a beginner tank and I am in many ways a beginner (esp with coral). To answer your questions to the best of my ability:

-I use a jebao wave maker at the lowest setting with a power dimmer wheel attachment on the plug so that it is at the weakest it can be (otherwise sand starts to get kicked up) and a sicce 0.5 pump (185 mph but in reality less because of the resistance it encounters in return tube).

-Some coral need more flow (like birdnest) others would do just fine with much less flow (like my soft corals). Others need medium flow and others are fine in a variety of flows. Some corals do badly with too much direct flow (like acans).

My general advice if you're starting a nano reef is to go on nano-reef.com and read through a bunch of the tank of the month's, there you will see a variety of successful tanks you can emulate/base your own off of.

 

[Pbh-reef]

My husband and I are off for a three week vacation to Japan, leaving our tank for the longest time since we got it almost a year ago. A good friend who’s fish sat in the past is helping us out, so I have hope that all will be well baring a power outage or other disaster. Here’s a photo of the tank from yesterday morning in just natural light. I treated the gramma for internal parasites with GC/focus bound food a couple of weeks ago, since then it’s gained a ton of weight back and become so so so much more active!


The gsp on the back wall is also bouncing back. For the most part all seems well, corals are growing nicely.


My single nassarius snail was upside down and immobile this morning, close to the pistol
Shrimp’s cave. Lately Toby (the snail) has seemed slower than usual, with less slide in his step. I hope he stays with us for a long time, he’s a wonderful animal that brings a lot of joy to watch. My husband (who loves Toby) righted him and pushed him away from the shrimp, and he buried himself in the sand and eventually came out to eat a bit when I fed the tank. So there’s some hope.

 

[Pbh-reef]

I need to do a proper update since I got back from my vacation in late July, but here’s the short version - most of the corals have started growing significantly faster in the last two months, which is awesome! I also successfully got a new fish through qt (a hifin goby). On the down side, cyano took hold in the sand bed during the vacation, but I’m not super worried, I assume it will go away through regular maintenance. Here’s a pic of the new goby, I’ll post a longer update with a FTS in the next few days!

 

[Pbh-reef]

Not a full update but a pic of the Goni I got from a local reefer in early June that I’m proud of. It lost color while I was in Japan (too much sunlight getting to the tank) but has since colored up beautifully. When I got it it was a dark red color but also quite translucent (if that makes sense). It has since become a pinkish orange and grown a bit (I think, it’s hard to tell). It’s such a beautiful coral and one I really hope continues to do well. I’ve noticed it really puffs up and looks happy after I dose phyto so I’ve started to do that more regularly.

 

[Pbh-reef]

Finally finished QTing the last fish - a pink streaked wrasse! Not the best pics but wanted to celebrate and share the new addition with you all!

 

[Pbh-reef]

photo dump time! I keep promising a narrative update, and I will do that eventually, but obviously pictures are what bring folks to a build thread, so here's my very blue iPhone pics :

After we returned from our vacation, I realized the tank was suffering from being in so much direct sunlight, so my husband and I moved the tank. Its helped improve coral color, decrease algae growth, and its much better for viewing so win-win-win! We bought a bedside table from a thrift store, sanded and re-finished it with marine layer varnish:

Here's two FTS, front and side views, in the front view you can see all 3 fish that are now in the tank:

And finally, a couple cool shots of the hifin goby, one including his buddy the pistol shrimp

 

[Pbh-reef]

I've now had the tank for a little over a year. In that time the biggest difficulty has been fish disease and QT. Nothing else has been as much of a challenge. I lost a single coral, and have had some coral set backs, but besides the goni that came with the tank, every coral has recovered by some combination of giving it more or less light (re-placing it on the rock work), and increasing water changes. I've started to experiment with not running filter floss except right after I do a water change or scrap the glass to pick up algae/detritus. The water has more particles in it but if there's no big impact on coral health I may continue to go without regular floss, we'll see.

In terms of pests, the cyano that was getting bad after the 3 week vacation in July is going away. There is also some hair algae on the hammer coral, I scrape it with a tooth brush during water changes, but my hope is it will also go away on its own.

I don't think I will add any more fish to the tank, although I'm sorely tempted to try another pygmy geometric perchlet or rainford goby (perchlet for the personality and coloration, rainford goby for the colors and hair algae eating/sand sifting utility). But if I add another fish it won't be for a good amount of time.

I do plan to add more corals, mostly from frag swaps my local club does, but need to figure out if i will be doing a coral QT to stop pests and fish diseases from getting into the tank. I have a 12 gallon bio cube with the led light it comes with, do people think that could keep most corals alive for 76 days (ich fallow period)? They don't need to grow or even keep their best color, just be 'fine' if that makes sense.

 

[Pbh-reef]

Played around with my new iPhone’s camera trying to get a decent pic of the wrasse, which is super hard- heres two I think are ok, I messed around with the brightness of the second one to try to represent his real coloration. Love him and the goby sorta looking at each other in the first pic.

 

[Pbh-reef]

Still trying for a decent pic of the wrasse but in the mean time here’s my gramma looking like a mean little fish in dramatic eye shadow! I’m loving the tank these days, the 3 fish are awesome and the corals are growing beautifully!

 

[Pbh-reef]

Recently the birdsnest and setsosa have started to grow more rapidly. I took a pic of the tank tonight to compare with in the future. Occasionally (it seems to be after water changes) the hammer loses a few polyps. Twice now i found them attached to my goni, burning holes in it! The goni recovered both times (I actually think the goni is also starting to grow a bit faster, but its hard to tell). I'm not sure what's up with the hammer, but I think it doesn't like me scraping algae so close to it (it right against the glass). I'm not sure what I can do about it!

 

[Hermie]

I do plan to add more corals, mostly from frag swaps my local club does, but need to figure out if i will be doing a coral QT to stop pests and fish diseases from getting into the tank. I have a 12 gallon bio cube with the led light it comes with, do people think that could keep most corals alive for 76 days (ich fallow period)? They don't need to grow or even keep their best color, just be 'fine' if that makes sense.

based on my experience, yes definitely, I was using extremely low light bulbs for all of my corals and none of them died in my 2.5 gallon QT. basically if they made it past the dip, they survived in QT under low light for 2 and half months. good luck with whatever you choose. I also QT inverts to keep out fish disease.

 

[Pbh-reef]

based on my experience, yes definitely, I was using extremely low light bulbs for all of my corals and none of them died in my 2.5 gallon QT. basically if they made it past the dip, they survived in QT under low light for 2 and half months. good luck with whatever you choose. I also QT inverts to keep out fish disease.

Thank you! I appreciate knowing that!

 

[Pbh-reef]

Going through my own thread I noticed the goni I got from a local reefer has actually grown a ton since June, as has the lithophyllon. It makes me so happy to know the corals are actually growing pretty fast and well! The blasto he gave me has four beautiful heads now and has colored up beautifully since I put it where less light and flow reach it. I took the pic below with aquarium cam ap. Some of the corals are too bright/pink (the goni is much darker red now) but the blasto looks much more like itself (actually a little washed out) in comparison to a pic w/no filters

 

[Angel_Anthias lover]

Really cool tank, very pretty.
Love the red goniopora and the pink streaked wrasse,.one of.my fav fish.

 

[Pbh-reef]

Really cool tank, very pretty.
Love the red goniopora and the pink streaked wrasse,.one of.my fav fish.

Thanks! I love both the Goni and wrasse too! Haven't updated this thread in awhile, I had to give the gramma away to a local reefer because it was getting too aggressive with the wrasse. I also got a tuxedo urchin, which is an awesome addition in terms of how interesting it is, but it sadly doesn't seem to eat the longer threads of hair algae that have grown in some places, most annoyingly between my zoos....

 

[Sinibotia]

I love all the different zoas, they are beautiful! And clearly you've had more luck with the birdsnest than me! How do you like the Kessil? I went with a black box (luminie pixie) and I've been wondering about upgrading.

Oh, and the goby looks great! Such a perfect fish for a 10!

 

[Pbh-reef]

I like the kessil - i have it around 75% power and 70% blues, thinking fo slowly raising the power. The birdsnest is growing well, but it only started really keeping its color a month or so after I started dosing, it still has a ways to go before its at its full potential.

I do love the zoas for color, but I will say the fact that hair algae grows between them is annoying! Other than between my zoas I don’t really have to worry about hair algae, but I think my CuC can’t get between them. A rainford goby would probably help but I’m done adding new fish to this tank.

 

[Angel_Anthias lover]

Are those vampire in drag zoanthids in your tank?. I just noticed your beautiful zoa garden, i dont know how i missed that lol.

 

[Pbh-reef]

Are those vampire in drag zoanthids in your tank?. I just noticed your beautiful zoa garden, i dont know how i missed that lol.

Yes they are - I've since remove them all from the frag plug and pasted them to the branch rock in the front and another small rock in the back with other zoas. They have a beautiful blue and yellow color and they seem to respond very aggressively to food. I think I will also attach the last frag plug I have in the tank, of gatorade zoas, to the branch rock and have no more plugs on the sand.

Here's a gif I made this morning of my pink streaked wrasse, I wonder if it will work on r2r?