an unthinkable 120G Reef

[Unthinkable]

I’m also working on my fish room in the basement

I’ll have plenty of room on the left side for QT and hopefully a frag tank as things progress

 

[Unthinkable]

I also picked up a couple 55g barrels off craigslist.

They are in pretty good shape. They held soap which I’m concerned with, I plan on rinsing with a power washer and some vinegar, but should I just bite the bullet and buy new?

 

[Red_Beard]

I would. I used to build and maintain automatic car washes for a company that manufactured the soap. First hand experience with some of that stuff would definitely lead me to go new. There are a lot of surfactants and acids that could have been in that drum that are all but impossible to get clean. Up to you but i would totally not want to chance it.

I am lucky enough to have a plastics manufacturer not too far from my home town and picked up a couple snap top drums. Having worked on/around them for a while i thought it would be immensely easier to clean if the whole top came off. They also still have the bungs so you can run plumbing and stuff out of a prethreaded built hole in the top if you want or seal it up for evap purposes.

 

[Unthinkable]

My tank is filling slowly, just doing ro/di straight to the tank takes some time, but I expectt I’ll be done filling the DT tomorrow night!

 

[Unthinkable]

I’ve also decided to buy new drums. It’s silly to risk polluting animals to save $100

 

[Unthinkable]

Still murky, but the DT is filled! Just a tiny leak from a loose bulkhead and a loose union but I have everything under control. Now to fill the sump and add some filter socks/floss to clear up the water.



Aquascape is still a WIP but I think I’m close.

 

[Unthinkable]

Tank filled, leak tested and we’re salty!

Don’t mind the cables, I still need to do some wire management. I goofed up on painting the doors, They need a good sanding and touch up before installation.

 

[Unthinkable]

well I'm back from vacation and everything is going good with the tank, just a different outcome than expected leaving the tank for 9 days. My Tank has been cycling for 4 weeks now.

I turned on my light schedule a couple days before I left. I chose to start with coral labs LPS/Soft profile since I will start with softies/LPS . I figured the 2 weeks with a 12 hour schedule would start the uglies and potentially support some CUC after a massive water change, but there is hardly any sign of algae/diatoms. There are a few very faint rust colored spots on the sand but that's it! I'm surprised by this. Am I being too impatient? I assume I will soon regret wanting the ugly stuff sooner...

I didn't get my water parameters but they should be what instant ocean baseline is at 35ppt. I will take my water to the LFS tomorrow for testing.
the parameters I can test:
0 TDS from 4 stage RO/DI
temp: 78-79
PH: 7.96
ORP: 319
Salinity 35 ppt
Ammonia: 0
Nitrite: .5-1 I was surprised by this but probably residual from the ammonia being broken down
Nitrates: 20-50

 

[Unthinkable]

I performed a 75G water change, turned on the skimmer and added some Chaeto and pods. Nitrates are now below 10.

The 4 little brown spots turned into 8 spots, then 20... uglies are coming! I added 4 snails and 4 hermits for now. I have a fish in observation!

I picked up a solon wrasse that's been at the LFS for a while so i'm confident it's healthy, eating and relatively safe as a first fish. I do have a QT tank setup and I plan to use with new additions, but this one will just be observation, no meds.

 

[Unthinkable]

Tank is doing great, however I did lose a pink spotted goby to an infection.

Current fish (impossible to photo):

Royal gramma
Solon wrasse
Flame wrasse

Inverts:
1 fire shrimp
4 trochus snails
2 turbo snails
2 nassarius snails
1 fighting conch
2 red leg hermit crabs
2 blue leg hermit crabs
2 Scarlett hermit crabs

I’ve also added a couple of containers of pods and have been dosing phyto. my pod population seems to be thriving. I also have a pretty good clump of Chaeto in the sump. It started as 2 baseball size clumps and has grown at least double in size in just 1.5 weeks.

The one thing I am kind of struggling with is my varios regal 150int skimmer. It either runs with bubbles halfway up the neck not producing skimmate or fills up with very light skimmate in a day. The good news is my nitrates stay around 5 and the skimmer isn’t quite needed at the moment. Any suggestions are welcome.

 

[Unthinkable]

I officially have a reef tank! I added a small head of frog spawn and a plug filled with 12-14 Rasta zoas! I don’t have a good pic of the rastas yet but here’s a little shot of the frog spawn:

 

[Jon Fishman]

It’s coming along!

First post had a dog-cot. Waiting patiently for dog pics

 

[Unthinkable]

My pups name is Achilles he’s a 10 year old 90 lb Shepard/lab mix. He looks pretty good for an old man!

 

[TexAgReefer]

Looking good!

 

[Unthinkable]

Here are some pics under whites and more polyp extension:

 

[Unthinkable]

 

[Unthinkable]

 

[Unthinkable]

Here are some videos of my animals and life growing in the sump. Fish are healthy and getting along.
My orange spotted goby found a buddy this weekend which my wife and I are so excited about! The pistol shrimp has been MIA for the past 3 weeks.

current stock:
1. Royal gramma - graham aka grandma
2. Solon wrasse - Saul
3. 3 lyretail anthias -all named samanthias
4. Flame wrasse - Te fiti (will change to te ka if/when she changes to male)
5. Orange spotted goby - Goben and his tiger pistol shrimp - pistol Pete
6. Fire shrimp - Still working on a name. ofc the beautiful red shrimp hides in the back cave
7. Tiger conch - genghis conch
(10 shrute bucks if you get the naming ref of #4 and 5 )

various hermit and snails

 

[Unthinkable]

Well I asked for them! Uglies are here! Diatoms are in full swing. I just upped my CUC with some more turbo snails to clean up the rocks. My nitrates are still around 5 or so, even with feeding 3x a day.

I suspect my phosphates are on the high side, I’m waiting for a Hanna checker to do some testing.

I’m going to be doing a water change this weekend and will clean up my sand and maybe brush some of the diatoms off the rock. I’m also planning on lowering my feeding schedule to try and go to 1-2x a day for the anthias and wrasses.

 

[Unthinkable]

I also added my #1 fish on my wish list for this tank: