d2mini's "Essential Focus" Mixed Reef Build

[d2mini]

He Dennis,
You going to go with life reef for the carx again, or you going to try something different?

For now I'm dosing. Don't know what i'll do about a CaRx.
Bill Wann was running a group buy on his 6" reactor. So tempting. lol

 

[msderganc]

For now I'm dosing. Don't know what i'll do about a CaRx.
Bill Wann was running a group buy on his 6" reactor. So tempting. lol

He's currently building me a dual chamber 4" reactor with as small of a footprint as possible. Should be ready any day. It wasn't cheap, but I'm sure it'll be awesome.

 

[d2mini]

Here's my Blenny hitchhiker.
He's a good 3.5" long if not more.

 

[Zaffor]

Look at that!! Thats great.
Dennis your thread is one of my most active subscriptions!!
Awesome

 

[mwilk19]

Here's my Blenny hitchhiker.
He's a good 3.5" long if not more.

I'll bet he's thinking, "what the heck happened?"

 

[ksed]

Dennis any thoughts on what causes the fuge to crash?

QUOTE="d2mini, post: 3629228, member: 31993"]@bowen1022 does this photo answer your question?

It did seem to bring some junk to the surface, but not enough.
Since my tank was "only" 9 months old and I didn't have a ton of coral yet, I decided to cut my losses now and start fresh.
Going back to what I know works for me. Standard Berlin style filtration, a nice ball of cheato (that gets trimmed!), and no more Triton dosing.
Triton was going ok for me in the beginning but once the fuge crashed, it's been all downhill.
I'll use ESV Bionic for now since I'm set up to dose, and once demand pics up and I have time to recover $$$ from this, I'll invest in a CaRx again.
New TBS rock and sand coming tomorrow night.

This pic is this morning.
Nona (our kitteh) is all "what the heck?" Can you find her?

NONE of my fish made it through the transfer to QT.
I set up a 50g QT with matched salinity and temp but there must have been an 02 drop because they were all dead within a couple hours.
So pretty bummed about that to say the least.

Most coral are packed in an 18" cube. I took a few lps to my office nano.
All coral were dipped and put into fresh SW.

The tank was drained, and then filled with tap water and bleach and run for 10 hours over night.
I drained it again this morning.
Filling with fresh SW commences later today.
Part 1 of the rock and all the sand goes in tomorrow night.[/QUOTE]

 

[d2mini]

Dennis any thoughts on what causes the fuge to crash?

Zero nitrates.

 

[bubbaque]

It has got to be more than zero nitrates. Your fuge was growing great with the amount of fish you had and your feeding routine. When the chaeto was dying it would would release nitrate and then it could reasorb it. I think the chaeto would stay the same size but not die since it would supply itself with the nitrate it needed as it died.

 

[d2mini]

It has got to be more than zero nitrates. Your fuge was growing great with the amount of fish you had and your feeding routine. When the chaeto was dying it would would release nitrate and then it could reasorb it. I think the chaeto would stay the same size but not die since it would supply itself with the nitrate it needed as it died.

I doesn't work that way.
I'm no scientist so my terminology may not be correct, but basically the macros take the macro nutrients (like nitrate) and convert them to micro nutrients like sugars. Same as what you put into your body comes out in a completely different form.
Every thing that is consumed gets broken down into a lesser matter.
The theory behind leaving the algae bed alone is that as some of it starts to die off, those sugars and whatever are released back into the tank to feed the coral, like a natural form of carbon dosing.
The problem was, I let the nitrates drop to nothing and was left with a gigantic, dense brick of cheato that had no food.
The second problem was that once it started dying, it wouldn't stop.

 

[HolisticBear]

The second problem was that once it started dying, it wouldn't stop.

If I've followed correctly, this part is the real mystery. Besides the actual problem itself, it robs confidence in the system. This is why rebooting feels logical.

 

[foxt]

Your "reeftastic" system had an auto water change system, small frequent changes, right? Will you be running something like that in this tank?

 

[d2mini]

Your "reeftastic" system had an auto water change system, small frequent changes, right? Will you be running something like that in this tank?

Yes, and yes.
All the water lines were already run when I set up this tank. Planning ahead!
It's just a matter of getting a couple pumps, and picking up an extra level sensor for my sump.

 

[Reefer525XL]

Dennis, I may have missed this but how are you topping off your tank? Are you using a pump to move water from the shed to the sump via one of the 3 lines behind the baseboard?

Edit: never mind, went back and found the answer

 

[hybridazn]

Dang Dennis, sorry to see all this but glad to see it back up and running again.

I'm currently going thru a diatom bloom in my tank which has been up for 6 years now. Some sps took and hit and others are fine, very strange. I think it was caused by a spike in silicates from my rodi filters needing replacing.

 

[d2mini]

Part 2 of "The Package" has been delivered!
I've got sponges out the ying-yang.
Flame Scallops
Starfish
Decorator Crabs
Emerald Crabs
Cucumbers
An army of Pep Shrimp
Another army of Urchins
A Royal Gramma
Ended up putting a lot of the rock in a holding tank until I can nail down a scape I like.

And I got this dude.... anyone have an I.D.?

 

[clownsrcool]

When you did your AWC setups where would you divert your waste water to? Did you tie into a drain in the house somewhere?

 

[foxt]

Moving right along with TBS! I had a great experience with Richard's stuff about 6 months ago, and will be using him again very soon for an upgrade. I'm still finding gorilla crabs that I have to catch, but I liked the other stuff that showed up with them so it's a tradeoff I can make. A couple of questions, if I may:

1. Did you reuse any of the contents of the last package (rock, cucumbers, starfish, etc), or was it all a total loss? I started a 55g with TBS, and will be upgrading to a 220G, and am thinking that I already will have three stars, 3 urchins, 2 cucumbers, lots of hermits, lots of rock, so I don't need a full 220g package, more like a 150g?

2. Last time, I obsessed over trying to get the rocks back in to the orientation they were in while in the Gulf. There was so much life on the rocks, it was difficult to tell which way was up. I noted that you are holding off with scaping, but when you get to it, what do you do: attempt to orient the rocks as they were, or let the scape dictate how they should be placed and let the life on them adjust? I am particularly thinking of the dusters, sponges, etc that might prefer one orientation over another.

3. You seem to have luck with the sponges; me, my orange ones are ok, but my red ones are shrinking. I see you use KZ sponge power, does that help the reds?

4. My barnacles all died off, and I've read about similar results from others. I do not know if they starved, or if something else did them in (crabs, pistol shrimp, etc). Seems like they can be fed just like other filter feeders, but that didn't work for me. What's your experience?

5. Last one! Between the urchins, the snails, the hermits, after 6 months now, my rocks are still devoid of any kind of algae. I think I got a mix of rock 2.0 and natural rock, so there is some purple, but mostly white rock in the tank. Those rocks look like a construction site most of the time, with the snails and the hermits actively moving around. Can rocks be "too clean"?

Thanks!

 

[d2mini]

Ok, apparently that is a toadfish that needs to go to the sump because his mouth is too big and hungry. lol

When you did your AWC setups where would you divert your waste water to? Did you tie into a drain in the house somewhere?

Right behind the tank is the sink in my powder room. BRS sells a saddle clamp with a 1/4" (or 3/8") quick fitting for your water line that you can attach to your drain plumbing.

Moving right along with TBS! I had a great experience with Richard's stuff about 6 months ago, and will be using him again very soon for an upgrade. I'm still finding gorilla crabs that I have to catch, but I liked the other stuff that showed up with them so it's a tradeoff I can make. A couple of questions, if I may:

1. Did you reuse any of the contents of the last package (rock, cucumbers, starfish, etc), or was it all a total loss? I started a 55g with TBS, and will be upgrading to a 220G, and am thinking that I already will have three stars, 3 urchins, 2 cucumbers, lots of hermits, lots of rock, so I don't need a full 220g package, more like a 150g?

2. Last time, I obsessed over trying to get the rocks back in to the orientation they were in while in the Gulf. There was so much life on the rocks, it was difficult to tell which way was up. I noted that you are holding off with scaping, but when you get to it, what do you do: attempt to orient the rocks as they were, or let the scape dictate how they should be placed and let the life on them adjust? I am particularly thinking of the dusters, sponges, etc that might prefer one orientation over another.

3. You seem to have luck with the sponges; me, my orange ones are ok, but my red ones are shrinking. I see you use KZ sponge power, does that help the reds?

4. My barnacles all died off, and I've read about similar results from others. I do not know if they starved, or if something else did them in (crabs, pistol shrimp, etc). Seems like they can be fed just like other filter feeders, but that didn't work for me. What's your experience?

5. Last one! Between the urchins, the snails, the hermits, after 6 months now, my rocks are still devoid of any kind of algae. I think I got a mix of rock 2.0 and natural rock, so there is some purple, but mostly white rock in the tank. Those rocks look like a construction site most of the time, with the snails and the hermits actively moving around. Can rocks be "too clean"?

Thanks!

1. Total loss. What was left I didn't want to chance moving over. Just coral was saved (and dipped).
2. I don't worry about it and scape for what I think looks/works good.
3. Yellow balls last the longest. The truly red stuff goes first. You can try dosing phyto, sponge power, etc but watch your p04... it can go up quick.
4. Again, hard to provide enough food for all the filter feeders in our closed systems. Enjoy them while you can.
5. The urchins are truly awesome. Great rock cleaners. And they don't mess with anything. Solution for you rock.... buy more coral.

 

[foxt]

Thanks for those answers!

 

[najer]

Great looking fish, shame it is a hungry hunter, love that you got that blenny, very cool.