Alice L's 180 g Mixed Reef

[ReeferMo]

Stunning tank!

I’m going to try and copy your rockscape when I redo mine in a few weeks

 

[GoAskAlice]

Stunning tank!

I’m going to try and copy your rockscape when I redo mine in a few weeks

Thank you! I used a lot of Marco shelf rock. At first it looks kind of flat and uninteresting, but later you'll have lots of real estate for mounting corals! Although I made quite a few changes after this photo, this is what it looked like when I first filled the tank--

 

[ReeferMo]

Stunning tank!

I’m going to try and copy your rockscape when I redo mine in a few weeks

Thank you! I used a lot of Marco shelf rock. At first it looks kind of flat and uninteresting, but later you'll have lots of real estate for mounting corals! Although I made quite a few changes after this photo, this is what it looked like when I first filled the tank--

Thank you. This picture will help me a lot

By the palooza show in NJ this past summer, I bought a huge stack of Coralline shelf rock from Marco when the show was over. Those rocks were used for the competition over there. Every month or so I add one to my tank not to bomb my tank. I should be done in a few weeks

I just dump it in the tank (neatly)
When done I’ll take them all out and rockscape it

 

[GoAskAlice]

Thank you. This picture will help me a lot

By the palooza show in NJ this past summer, I bought a huge stack of Coralline shelf rock from Marco when the show was over. Those rocks were used for the competition over there. Every month or so I add one to my tank not to bomb my tank. I should be done in a few weeks

I just dump it in the tank (neatly)
When done I’ll take them all out and rockscape it

Oh wow! Be sure and post pics. I'd love to see it!

 

[Lisa Cain]

My display tank is a Red Sea Reefer S 850 G2. Here it is today, so obviously this is an “already built” build thread.

Equipment—ReefMat 1200, Red Sea skimmer, Vectra M2 return pump, 4-head dosing pump, Tunze ATO with an IM 15 gallon ATO reservoir, four MP40 pumps, and two BRS 600 watt heaters with an Inkbird controller. My opinion on most aquarium equipment is that if you look at it too long it stops working, usually the night before you’re leaving on vacation, so I don’t intend to add anything unless I absolutely have to.

The lights you see in the pic are 3 Radion XR 15 G6 blues and 2 Radion XR 30 G6 blues.

There is a refugium that holds reef rubble—no macroalgae. I started out growing chaeto there but after the third time I had to pull out the skimmer and take it apart to clean chaeto out of the pump, I drained the sump and got rid of the chaeto. That stuff is like pieces of a Brillo pad getting sucked into your pumps. Right now I’m trying to get a population of pods going in the refugium.

I don’t have many photos between when I filled the tank in April 2023 and now. None that I care to post anyway because the tank went through every nuisance algae blight known to man (or woman) for almost two years. At one point I had dinos growing on top of gha. Nice.

I won’t go into my algae battles here. Lots of good information on this site on that subject. I will say during the past two+ years Reef2Reef quickly became the second most visited site on my laptop, surpassed only by Amazon. I’ve always taken the approach of letting the tank reach a balance rather than experimenting with any algae reducing additives, even though at times that approach took more patience than I knew I had.

If someone starting a reef tank were to ask me for just one piece of advice it would be do not start a tank with 100% dry rock. Based on my experiences and the experiences others have posted on this forum, dry rock soaks up and in turn releases the nutrients algae love and use oh so efficiently for a very long time. I’m still battling this crazy situation of no detectable phosphates or nitrates…so dose aforementioned…get algae…get rid of algae…get dinos…get algae and dinos--and so on and so forth.

I also believe that while starting with dry rock and bacteria in a bottle allows us to add fish to our tanks quickly, it neglects other biological processes we may not fully understand but need.

A few months ago, I removed some of the Marco rock I started with and added about 60 pounds of live rock to the display and some live rock rubble to the refugium. The results weren’t miraculous, but I think I’m gaining ground in the algae battle. And the tank is maturing so I have that in my corner. The current challenge is maintaining levels of phosphates and nitrates that work for my tank.

Enough of the narrative. The “mostly pictures” I mentioned appear below. I’ve hit pause on adding any more fish or coral for now, focusing instead on stability. Currently I have 16 fish--
--7 Lyretail Anthias
--Yellow Tang
--Potters Angel
--Swissguard Basslet
--Fridmani Dottyback
--Leopard Wrasse
--Yellow Wrasse
--2 Marine Bettas (very camera shy)
--Goldheaded Goby (a mistake and the reason I keep a turkey baster next to the tank)

That’s it, for now anyway. Ask me any questions about the tank or its inhabitants. And, yes, I maintain it myself.
Happy Reefing!

Absolutely beautiful.

 

[Lisa Cain]

Absolutely beautiful.

Hello I am going to post an update on my new tank in a few minutes. When you get a chance please look over it. I have 1-2 questions. Thank you!

 

[Fish Styx]

 

[kingranch2003]

Hello my friend! I haven’t stopped by in a while. Hopefully you and your beautiful tank are thriving!

 

[Nano_Man]

Yep really nice Reef love all the fish.thank you for sharing

 

[GoAskAlice]

Hello my friend! I haven’t stopped by in a while. Hopefully you and your beautiful tank are thriving!

Good morning! What a lovely song to start my day! Thank you for that!

The tank (and me) are doing well, thanks. Coming up on the tank's 3rd year anniversary. Working on some pics to post an update for that. Hope all is well with you!

 

[GoAskAlice]

Yep really nice Reef love all the fish.thank you for sharing

Thank you!

 

[kingranch2003]

Good morning! What a lovely song to start my day! Thank you for that!

The tank (and me) are doing well, thanks. Coming up on the tank's 3rd year anniversary. Working on some pics to post an update for that. Hope all is well with you!

Glad you liked that one! Yes, everything is good over here. Ill be hitting the 2 year mark in May, and it would be great to see some 3rd year pics from you!

 

[That Crusso Kid]

Yeah, so what's going on over here? Making people wait this long for an update. Sheesh!

 

[GoAskAlice]

Yeah, so what's going on over here? Making people wait this long for an update. Sheesh!

Working on it.

 

[exnisstech]

Your experience with dry rock mirrors mine. I still can't believe people willingly choose to deal with all of the headaches that come with dry rock to avoid some hitchhikers which IMO can be very cool and interesting.

 

[GoAskAlice]

My tank has just passed the three year mark since I first filled it. Here's an update--

Biota Palauberry and PC Rainbow coexisting--

Biota Sprung Elegance--

Space Invader Pectinia. Appropriate that "invader" is included in its name. I have found it to be a very aggressive coral, but so pretty.--

BC Nero, a very fast growing tabling acro--

Myagi tort. Another fast grower--

New fish. Pyramid butterflyfish--

New frags from spsTank. TGC Tropicana, Vivid Insanity 2, BC Skinny Love, CB Tangerine Dream. Need to find spots for them.--

Some random pics--

 

[MegabiteOG]

My tank has just passed the three year mark since I first filled it. Here's an update--

Biota Palauberry and PC Rainbow coexisting--

Biota Sprung Elegance--

Space Invader Pectinia. Appropriate that "invader" is included in its name. I have found it to be a very aggressive coral, but so pretty.--

BC Nero, a very fast growing tabling acro--

Myagi tort. Another fast grower--

New fish. Pyramid butterflyfish--

New frags from spsTank. TGC Tropicana, Vivid Insanity 2, BC Skinny Love, CB Tangerine Dream. Need to find spots for them.--

Some random pics--

Your tank looks amazing! Corals, fish, and scape.

 

[GoAskAlice]

Thanks!

 

[JoJosReef]

Bump ;-)

 

[skey44]

Beautiful work