Abby's 260

[Timfish]

Week 7

 

[Timfish]

Week 8, Just letting things grow and mature. Got some Cyphastria from the side of a frag tank and stuck it on the back and a couple other places. Added some feather dusters and some Nasarious snails and blue knee hermits.

 

[revhtree]

Week 8, Just letting things grow and mature. Got some Cyphastria from the side of a frag tank and stuck it on the back and a couple other places. Added some feather dusters and some Nasarious snails and blue knee hermits.

Congrats on the new tank! Looking good!

 

[Tahoe61]

Oh my goodness the tank looks so big!

Little tiny Tangs. The rock scape is amazing, it looks so natural.

 

[Timfish]

Week 9

Did some testing.

Alk 9 dKH (API)
PO4 ~.5 mg/l (Salifert)
Nitrate undetectable (Salifert)


Just FYI, when the system was first alkalinity was tested a couple times. Initial results when water was first added was 15 dKH and on day three it was 9.

 

[Timfish]

Well, this is a first. Had a problem with the green polyp toadstool. It stopped opening up and something was clearly irritating it along one side. At first I thought it was the BTA that had moved to a spot behind it. Turned out a mithrax crab that came in on the live rock was pinching or scrapping off tissue. It's been a month now since I removed the green polyp toadstool and the mithrax still has yet bothered the lime green toadstool. Kinda suggests to me the possubility the green polyp toadstool might have had a problem.

 

[Timfish]

Week 11 update. Red cyano has pretty much disappeared and system is shifting to more true alga. There are now 4 urchins, I think. A small long spine hasn't been seen since it was added but it's spines haven't been seen either so I'm assuming it's still munching away somewhere.

 

[Timfish]

Week 12

End of the third month and lots of true algae now with notes of other nuisance "alga". Red cyano from a few weeks ago is almost completely gone. Still thinking there's 4 urchins, or at least haven't seen signs of a dead one like a pile of spines somewhere. Using steel straws to help remove algae with weekly water changes (See more about this here: https://www.austinreefclub.com/topic/46724-260-w-bta-island/#findComment-358423 ). Some of the anemones have gone for a walkabout, so annoying and so typical (what's that adage about expecting different results? :D )

 

[Timfish]

Week 13 full tank shot.

 

[Timfish]

Sorry! Have been busy and fell behind with weekly status updates. Here's stuff from week 14:

Week 14



Just a bunch of individual pics of some of the animals.

Thin Strip Hermit, love these critters. They're great herbivores and quite comical. Their claws have flat edges for scraping algae off rocks.

















"Did you authorize him to take pictures of us?!"





Rock boring urchin, Echinometra sp. These are better than the short spine urchins for scouring algae off rocks and easier to handle than the long spined Diadema sp.







































Captive raised Tiger Tail Cucumber.

 

[Anna K]

I am loving the week by week updates! It's amazing to see even the small changes every week in your tank!

 

[Timfish]

@Anna K Thank you! I've been busy and hope to catch up soon. I will still be posting the weekly pics and videos I've taken. Here's week 15:

 

[Timfish]

Week 16

Love these rock urchins! They're really good at chewing algae and stuff off rocks, they're spines aren't nearly as sharp as Diadem urchins and they don't pick up and carry off stuff they're not supposed too.





Some random pics of some of the fish and a full tank shot.

 

[Timfish]

Week 17

 

[Timfish]

Week 18



Found a fresh molt from a Thin Stripe Hermit. These are probably the most robust molts I find in my systems. Thin Stripe Hermits are found along the Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi and Florida coasts. They're great scavengers and due to their size much better for helping control nuisance algae. (One mistake I've made is drying the molt then placing it on top of a monitor so it looks like it's crawling over the top, payback has seemed to me to be excessively disproportionate from those individuals with spider phobias. )





For as frequently as it happens, it's not often I see a BTA with disproportionate tentacles from a split.

 

[That Crusso Kid]

Exactly 6 months, today, since an update.

How are things going?

 

[Timfish]

Exactly 6 months, today, since an update.

How are things going?

Pretty good! :)

 

[Timfish]

Here's the system at 1 year old. Haven't been able to count all 14 damsels I added initially but I am consistantly counting 10 - 12. Haven't lost any other fish.

 

[That Crusso Kid]

Here's the system at 1 year old. Haven't been able to count all 14 damsels I added initially but I am consistantly counting 10 - 12. Haven't lost any other fish.

Looking nice!

Hey, the flow in your tank looks a little bit light. Something you might want to look into. Just a suggestion. LOL!

 

[Timfish]

Interesting! This mantis showed up after a year. So far it's only been seen this one time. One curious thing is there's a coral banded shrimp that's been cohabiting for about a year now. I'm guessing it's a Neogonodactylus wennerae mantis shrimp. Funny that a big mithrax crab has caused issues when this this mantis hasn't.