Brew's 187g slice of the ocean

Brew12 · Feb 11, 2019

Apologies for not being on much this weekend. One word explanation. Taxes.

A few quick updates. The algae battle continues. It's slowly making progress but the rate of that progress seems to have slowed. This algae is awful. Was hoping it would be cleaned up by now but it's not to be. My nitrates have been slowly climbing during the fight and are now at the point where I feel I need to start reducing them. I hate to introduce a new change to my system right now with this Vibrant/Algae battle going on but I think I am going to start vodka dosing tonight.

One of my cute little yellow tailed damsels has a bad case of popeye on one side. There is no way I can catch him so I'm hoping it resolves on it's own. I've had the fish for over 2 years so hoping he gets better.

And, I found out I made a programming mistake a few weeks ago. I had set up my Chroma by UWC on a doser so I wouldn't forget to add it every day. And... I failed miserably. Instead of 8ml at 8am every day it was only dosing on the days I had selected. Which were absolutely none. I thought some of my coral coloration was fading and was going to recalibrate the pump when I noticed the bottle was still full. Ooops.

Curious to see how things color back up now that it is set up correctly.

RichtheReefer21 · Feb 11, 2019

Brew12 said:
Apologies for not being on much this weekend. One word explanation. Taxes.

A few quick updates. The algae battle continues. It's slowly making progress but the rate of that progress seems to have slowed. This algae is awful. Was hoping it would be cleaned up by now but it's not to be. My nitrates have been slowly climbing during the fight and are now at the point where I feel I need to start reducing them. I hate to introduce a new change to my system right now with this Vibrant/Algae battle going on but I think I am going to start vodka dosing tonight.

One of my cute little yellow tailed damsels has a bad case of popeye on one side. There is no way I can catch him so I'm hoping it resolves on it's own. I've had the fish for over 2 years so hoping he gets better.

And, I found out I made a programming mistake a few weeks ago. I had set up my Chroma by UWC on a doser so I wouldn't forget to add it every day. And... I failed miserably. Instead of 8ml at 8am every day it was only dosing on the days I had selected. Which were absolutely none. I thought some of my coral coloration was fading and was going to recalibrate the pump when I noticed the bottle was still full. Ooops. Curious to see how things color back up once now that it is set up correctly.

Whooooooooops.

Why-Me · Feb 11, 2019

Great chance for before/after coloration pics to document in your thread.

Fudsey · Feb 11, 2019

Why-Me said:
Great chance for before/after coloration pics to document in your thread.

Good call

Brew12 · Feb 11, 2019

Why-Me said:
Great chance for before/after coloration pics to document in your thread.

I try to take and post a lot of pictures. The problem is that I have to edit them to get them to look right. Even though I try to reproduce the coral to look like what I see I don't know if I would be accurate enough to be confident documenting the impact of Chroma.

Victoria M · Feb 11, 2019

Oh crap!

Brew12 · Feb 12, 2019

Uh boy... my poor tank is going to get mad at me one of these days. ;Blackeye I was working in the sump last night trying to clean some things up. I knocked my GFO reactor off where it is mounted and put it back up. Not a big deal except that I must have opened the valve for it almost all of the way.

My PO4 in the tank went from 0.07ppm to 0.00ppm overnight.

I added some coral food this morning and got flow throttled way back through the reactor. I doubt it will cause any issues since PO4 should leach out of my substrate fairly quickly to get at least some detectable amount.
First time that my practice of putting a large amount of GFO in the reactor so I don't have to change it as often has come back to bite me. ;Meh

Victoria M · Feb 12, 2019

I hate it when that happens. My skimmer gate valve is easily bumped by my messing around with my reactor pump tubing. I am always nervous that I will mess it up and not notice.

Brew12 · Feb 12, 2019

One of our dogs, Brandy, is an escape artist. She will chew through 2x4's to get out of the back yard if you give her enough time. She can also squeeze through incredibly tight spaces. The last 9 years have been a challenge to keep her safe in the back yard as much as possible. Unfortunately, she got out again 2 days ago and it looks like it caused massive deterioration in her already bad hips. We've have her on pain meds and she doesn't appear to be suffering. Every day after work I walk both the girls for around a mile. I tried tonight to do a shorter walk hoping it would stretch out her muscles. It didn't help much at all. There just isn't normal stability with her back legs.
So, tomorrow morning we have a vet appointment. I'm dreading what the news will be. I think it is inevitable that we have just finished our last walk together tonight.

We were hoping for a few more months and at least one more chance for our son to see her before it was time. I just don't see that happening anymore.
Hope you guys will excuse me if I'm not my normal self for the next few days.

Brew12 · Feb 12, 2019

My baby girl.

UWC · Feb 12, 2019

Oh man, hoping the best for you guys!!

Why-Me · Feb 12, 2019

So sorry to hear this. Dogs are such great companions, I feel for you.

Why-Me · Feb 12, 2019

I had a yellow lab (Daisy) that was born with elbow dysplasia, the vet tried to get me to put her down as puppy and said she would never see 6. Well long story short she hopped like a rabbit her whole life and made it 12 years.
And had the coolest mohawk ever!
Her nickname became Last of the mohawkians

Brew12 · Feb 12, 2019

UWC said:
Oh man, hoping the best for you guys!!

Why-Me said:
So sorry to hear this. Dogs are such great companions, I feel for you.

Thank you guys. She is a member of the family.

Why-Me said:
I had a yellow lab (Daisy) that was born with elbow dysplasia, the vet tried to get me to put her down as puppy and said she would never see 6. Well long story short she hopped like a rabbit her whole life and made it 12 years.
And had the coolest mohawk ever!
Her nickname became Last of the mohawkians

We don't believe it is dysplasia but osteoarthritis. Our vet told us earlier in the year that a hip replacement would be the best solution but it is often unsuccessful on dogs over 50 pounds and she weighs 75. We have had her on joint supplements for quite awhile and that seemed to have been helping. We figured she still had another 6 months to a year before she would get this bad but she must have done some damage when she got free. We are hoping a cortisone shot may buy her at least a little more time.