About to Quit

[Alvaro_Spain]

For maturing it has worked for me to convert freshwater mollies to saltwater (they are brackish fish so they live fine in saltwater).

I find that these fish are excellent not only because they are hardy but also because they are great clean up crew. They are munching on algae all day.

Keep on!, you are hardly starting. Lights higher and more nutrients in the system. You´ll be doing it right when those rocks start being greener

 

[ggNoRe]

Personally, I don't get all the comments saying it's just 3 months... Be patient!

3 months is more than enough time IMO. I remember Jake Adams from Reefbuilders saying he likes to add a coral or 2 before the tank is even cycled. For trade shows there are countless vendors with high dollar corals in new systems. Also, below is a video of a BRS system at 4 months almost fully stocked and thriving. As well as my new tank at only 3 months with plenty of corals and thus far not one coral casualty. Given my system has been far from perfect with plenty of fish casualties and a battle with dinos but that's besides the point.

That being said your rocks do look really clean. Have your lights been on the whole 3 months? Always at 15%? If I was you this is what I would do. Run lights at 70%+. Stop dosing bottle bac or anything else. Stick to only your 10% water changes. Throw in one cheap coral and just let things be.

Best of luck!

3 weeks of Dinoflagellates battling

youtube.com

 

[skinnywater66]

Don't quit! Just think of all the knowledge your gaining by figuring this out and when you do you can handle anything that happens.

 

[Apollo7235]

I can promise you all, I 100% did not expect to have a killer reef at 3 months. My frustration 100% stems from the fact that I have a QT 10-gallon tank that uses the exact same water, salt mix, maintenance, EVERYTHING as my 38-gallon, it is literally less than half the age of my DT, and I started the QT using water, biomedia, and rock from the DT that is incapable of supporting coral, yet, my coral do amazing in my QT and die in the display that seeded it.

That is why I am so frustrated. I am a very patient person and I entered this hobby knowing it was going to be a long journey. My husband actually gave me this gift fro Christmas knowing that I needed something I could continually add to and nurture...

Anyway, I sincerely appreciate all of the support and the insight. Thank you all for taking the time to comment and share your thoughts.

I turned my lights back up to 100% (they were only at 15% while the corals were in there), and my corals are back in the magic 10-gallon QT. I also added 6 pounds of cured live rock over the weekend, so hopefully that helps with the kickstart. I'm trying to make a trip to a LFS today, so hopefully they have a few more fish that I would like to add ti my tank so I can get them rolling in QT.

Still trying to get my NPS to open back up, but I'm sure I'll get them there in the next couple of days after a few 'tupperware' treatments.

 

[Alvaro_Spain]

Personally, I don't get all the comments saying it's just 3 months... Be patient!

3 months is more than enough time IMO. I remember Jake Adams from Reefbuilders saying he likes to add a coral or 2 before the tank is even cycled. For trade shows there are countless vendors with high dollar corals in new systems. Also, below is a video of a BRS system at 4 months almost fully stocked and thriving. As well as my new tank at only 3 months with plenty of corals and thus far not one coral casualty. Given my system has been far from perfect with plenty of fish casualties and a battle with dinos but that's besides the point.

That being said your ocks do look really clean. Have your lights been on the whole 3 months? Always at 15%? If I was you this is what I would do. Run lights at 70%+. Stop dosing bottle bac or anything else. Stick to only your 10% water changes. Throw in one cheap coral and just let things be.

Best of luck!

3 weeks of Dinoflagellates battling

youtube.com

3 months is perfect if you start with live rock, but starting with dead rock is very little time. IMO

 

[Alvaro_Spain]

I can promise you all, I 100% did not expect to have a killer reef at 3 months. My frustration 100% stems from the fact that I have a QT 10-gallon tank that uses the exact same water, salt mix, maintenance, EVERYTHING as my 38-gallon, it is literally less than half the age of my DT, and I started the QT using water, biomedia, and rock from the DT that is incapable of supporting coral, yet, my coral do amazing in my QT and die in the display that seeded it.

That is why I am so frustrated. I am a very patient person and I entered this hobby knowing it was going to be a long journey. My husband actually gave me this gift fro Christmas knowing that I needed something I could continually add to and nurture...

Anyway, I sincerely appreciate all of the support and the insight. Thank you all for taking the time to comment and share your thoughts.

I turned my lights back up to 100% (they were only at 15% while the corals were in there), and my corals are back in the magic 10-gallon QT. I also added 6 pounds of cured live rock over the weekend, so hopefully that helps with the kickstart. I'm trying to make a trip to a LFS today, so hopefully they have a few more fish that I would like to add ti my tank so I can get them rolling in QT.

Still trying to get my NPS to open back up, but I'm sure I'll get them there in the next couple of days after a few 'tupperware' treatments.

Glad to hear you don´t give up. Keep us posted.

 

[Rjmul]

Yeah, I have a little cheap Coralife light in my DT and two AI Prime 16HD's in my display. I turned them down to 15% when I added the corals and put them on acclimation for 30 days to try and keep them from burning.

Hard to say without a par meter, but I wonder if they're getting enough light. You'd be surprised what little par primes put out. I'll say this... I have a regular ai prime HD running as a fuge light all channels at 60% about 5 inch off the surface of the water. Par is only 130-220 at the surface. Long story short I struggled for a long time running led. I'm not rich so I can't just blanket my tank with half a dozen radions. I ended up setting my new tank up with an aquatic life hybrid.

Fuge is only 9.5 by 11.5 inches

 

[Brady4000]

3 months is perfect if you start with live rock, but starting with dead rock is very little time. IMO

.... I started with dry rock I bleached myself. I started adding coral less then a month in.

 

[Brady4000]

I can promise you all, I 100% did not expect to have a killer reef at 3 months. My frustration 100% stems from the fact that I have a QT 10-gallon tank that uses the exact same water, salt mix, maintenance, EVERYTHING as my 38-gallon, it is literally less than half the age of my DT,

Then it’s light, it has to be. It’s the only difference. If your using all the same stuff, and your coral is doing good in your 1.5 month QT (which makes sense).

Hard to say without a par meter

+1 This would help a whole lot. Renting a par meter would be my next step.

 

[Rjmul]

But welcome to the rabbit hole, never stop learning. Never quit. My wife calls this hobby "an unhealthy relationship"

 

[zalick]

Then it’s light, it has to be. It’s the only difference. If your using all the same stuff, and your coral is doing good in your 1.5 month QT (which makes sense).

@Apollo7235 - what is the coralife light? LED or fluorescent?

I 100% agree with Brady. The only real variable is the light.

 

[Rmckoy]

Simplify it as much as possible .
10% water changes weekly .
Saturday being testing day
Sunday is water change day . Set a schedule and stick to it .

add a few fish and feed them .
corals are very sensitive to the slightest swings in any parameter which will stabilize as the system matures .

no system is perfect or never goes through trouble .

 

[Apollo7235]

@Apollo7235 - what is the coralife light? LED or fluorescent?

I 100% agree with Brady. The only real variable is the light.

It's LED with whites and blues. I leave it on the whites and blues setting, on a timer from 10AM to 10PM, same photoperiod as my AI Primes.

https://www.petco.com/shop/en/petcostore/product/coralife-marine-aquarium-clip-on-led-fixture

 

[Rmckoy]

For the sun coral .
they can be trained to open at which ever time you want to feed them .
Feed at the same time every day ,
They do prefer darker caves or over hangs .

cut a 2L soda bottle to fit over it as a feeding funnel .
eventually they will start opening just before feeding time .
They do not like bright lighting ...

 

[Apollo7235]

For the sun coral .
they can be trained to open at which ever time you want to feed them .
Feed at the same time every day ,
They do prefer darker caves or over hangs .

cut a 2L soda bottle to fit over it as a feeding funnel .
eventually they will start opening just before feeding time .
They do not like bright lighting ...

I had them open all day, along with my dendro before all of this. It's just a matter of trying to help them recover now, unfortunately.

Sorry for the shakey video. I was holding my 6-month old in my other hand and she's a wriggly one.

 

[Apollo7235]

Good news:

Coral are looking better since I moved them back to my magical QT tank. Dendro is peaking its tentacles out for the first time in days and the tubastrea is starting to puff back up again. Not sure if the rear large heads are going to come back, but we’ll see.

I bought the black tubastrea a few days ago and it was about 75% dead. I’ve been able to bring it back quite a bit since I brought it home, so hopefully I can do the same for its poor cousin.

 

[zalick]

It's LED with whites and blues. I leave it on the whites and blues setting, on a timer from 10AM to 10PM, same photoperiod as my AI Primes.

https://www.petco.com/shop/en/petcostore/product/coralife-marine-aquarium-clip-on-led-fixture

That light has extremely low PAR numbers. Here is the par graph. It peaks at 50 PAR 12” below. My guess is that your DT LEDs even at 15% are zapping the coral. Clearly they prefer the low par coralife. They might only be getting 20 par from the coralife right now.
If you move them back to the DT, I’d start them in a corner as far away from the center of the lights as possible.

 

[Tamberav]

15 percent is too low but I just want to point out that people are solely blaming the light whe the OP has several angry NPS corals that need no light at all. You also do not need light for a mature bacterial colony.

 

[zalick]

15 percent is too low but I just want to point out that people are solely blaming the light whe the OP has several angry NPS corals that need no light at all. You also do not need light for a mature bacterial colony.

They need no light and don’t like light. In the wild sun corals are closed during the day and open at night. Thus they are doing better in OPs QT tank with < 50 par

 

[Ghost25]

I'm probably just repeating what everyone else has said but.

1. Not enough nutrients, 2 gobies is nothing. You should probably feed way more, and remove the marine pure and substrates other than rock. Maybe turn off your skimmer.

2. More diversity, as many have said get a piece of live rock from a healthy established tank, you want more bacteria, copepods, and algae.

3. Light acclimation is overrated. Yes your NPS don't need it and your QT has low par but your corals can take way more than what you're giving them.