DarkReefer's Waterbox 70.2 (My First Marine Tank!)

[CrimsonTide]

Well after less than a week it looks like I'll likely lose my Naoko's Wrasse
Last night it jumped when I was messing around in the sump and although it landed in the sump after bouncing off of me, it must've injured itself on the way down because it's not looking healthy at all. Sitting on it's side at the bottom of the tank, I doubt it'll make it through today... I really hope it does though it was an awesome fish.

Pretty annoyed at myself for allowing it to happen, should've been more prepared. I just bought the Red Sea DIY aquarium net cover to install yesterday after a few people on here had commented that it's a must to have a cover installed and it happened before I got a chance to set it up.

On a plus side, I installed an inkbird temperature controller, according to it even though my heater was set to around 25, water was at about 27.7 deg celcius, so now I've wound that back to 26.5 for the moment (will drop it further).

Really hope this fish pulls through...

Darn sorry about the wrasse it was a stunner. Maybe it will pull through. I made a DIY lid for my tank as well. You never know when someone will want to show off and jump out of the tank. Let me know how the inkbird does. I have a regular thermometer in my tank and its accurate but my heater definitely isn't. If I had it where it is supposed to be its actually too hot. So I installed the thermometer and adjusted it down to the right temp.

 

[DarkReefer]

Darn sorry about the wrasse it was a stunner. Maybe it will pull through. I made a DIY lid for my tank as well. You never know when someone will want to show off and jump out of the tank. Let me know how the inkbird does. I have a regular thermometer in my tank and its accurate but my heater definitely isn't. If I had it where it is supposed to be its actually too hot. So I installed the thermometer and adjusted it down to the right temp.

Cheers, would love for it to pull through. Really enjoyed that fish. Aside from the sand sifter it was one of the more interesting fish to watch as he swam around through the caves and rockwork and was quite active.
I've got the netting covering the tank at the moment but will likely try build the frame etc tonight to get it to sit properly (atm the frame is just sat on top holding it down).

So far it looks like the inkbird has a lot of potential, however the instructions are fairly rubbish to read and not very informative. Did find a video that was quite informative though on the different things it can do. I also really like there's an app you can get to use it with, has push notifications etc if it's over heating/underheating that you can set the temp for when the alarms/notification goes off or even if there's probe errors etc. I feel like the app could do a bit more though (ie. being able to adjust temp you want set remotely or set the day/night temps in the app instead of just physically). Might be that I just don't know quite where/how to do this but not sure...

Given it was half the price of the one I was looking at which looked a little sleeker pretty happy with it. Just need to get some double sided tape to make it all look nicer in the cabinet. Need to generally clean up the cabinet a lot to be honest.

 

[DarkReefer]

Yep, got home today and the poor guy was gone.
It even appears someone in the tank had a bit of a feed on him also. Not sure if it was snails, or the sand sifting goby or clowns that got to him.
Such a shame

Also seems like my last chromis has disappeared, after seeing the wrasse I wouldn't be surprised if he was munched off too.
Trying to decide if I should buy a few more wrasse and put a bunch in together so they dont have established territory etc. Idk, could potentially go a baby tang... who knows.

So disappointing to lose such a beautiful fish though. Can understand how the guys feel when they lose a bunch in a really nice tank.

 

[DarkReefer]

Finished making my cover today.
Pretty happy with how it turned out, no more issues with fish jumping (at least most of the time).

WC tomorrow morning then probably another visit to the LFS.
Probably should stop going there, keep spending money on things lol.

 

[DarkReefer]

Little update from the weekend.
Picked up a Blue Flasher Wrasse & a frogspawn coral.
Also moved my trachyphyllia after being told to be careful of it potentially bleaching in the spot I first had it in.


This is how the tank currently sits (until this weekend probably LOL)

Was hard to place the frogspawn as it had such a huge rock/skeleton to it. Had to put it on the sand to try and get it to blend a bit. (you can see it in the pic above)

Blue Flasher Wrasse, this guy was very quiet for the first day. Didn't want to eat and hid quite early for the night. By the next morning he was much more settled. Definitely not as active as the Naoko was initially, that guy was great with how he'd swim in and out of caves etc, but certainly moving around more and coming up to get food (be it pellet or mysis).

 

[DarkReefer]

Woke up this morning to find my big trochus doing something weird on the highest point in the tank. Wasn't sure if it was dying or not, but apparently it's spawning. Turned the lights on a little to try and see what was actually happening. Wonder if I'll get any babies.

 

[DarkReefer]

This weekend I did a 50L WC, however I changed up how I did it slightly and much happier doing it this way I think, will need to prep a little more next time as I had to rush when the tank was part empty, but I fixed up my salinity before adding the water to the tank, along with getting my Alk right beforehand also.
Not sure how or why though, I had to really pull out some SW and replace with RO yesterday once it was in the tank as my salinity crept to about 1.027-1.028. Took a couple litres or so out and tested and it seemed to be down to 1.025-1.026 again.

Another weekend, another batch of new additions.
Honestly, this is really addictive.. lol.

For Corals I picked up a Blasto Wellsi red frag, a purple torch and a pearl hammer. (nearly ended up with a different hammer as the guy went to grab it from the online section of the store where they don't like taking people, they've taken me out there a few times but they must get into trouble for it), he brought it back to show me but by the time it was back inside it was closed up, it was only after discussion he realised the one he grabbed might not be the one I wanted, and then took me out there just to be sure, ended up finding the one I wanted. There was some serious white slime on that one when I got it home, it was not happy.

Hasn't opened up fully yet, these are such weird looking things but will add some much needed colour.

Purple torch is loving life next to the green tip torch.

Pearl hammer seems to be settling in, think it's got some more opening up to do yet though. There was some damaged parts after I had cleaned it as gently as possible to get rid of the slime so some of those have been breaking off here or there. I'll likely have to reposition this one as the skeleton is quite tall and looks a bit weird on the rock work. Depends how much it opens up and hangs over itself.

Also picked up some fish!
I've been looking at a Banana (as the LFS calls it) Wrasse, which I believe is a Canary Wrasse everywhere else in the world, for a few weeks because I wanted to add some fish with bright colours. This little guy came home over the weekend. He's very shy though and buried himself immediately in the sand for the first day. It came out briefly the following day, when I grabbed this pic, and then proceeded to hide again not too long after.

I also got hold of a Two-spot Bristletooth tang.
I love, love, love tangs and have wanted to get one but with the size of my tank it's been difficult. I'd been toying with the idea of getting a blue tang or a purple or something, but they all require quite large tanks (I think the blue is like 120 gallon), so I thought it would likely outgrow my tank very quickly. At least the Bristletooth tang, according to liveaquaria, requires a 70 gal which is much closer to what I've got, so I figure I will get more time of having this little guy before having to upgrade into a new tank/move him on, especially with him being quite small at the moment too. I've eyed these tangs off on and off for a month now as well.
He seems to have settled in nicely.

 

[CrimsonTide]

This weekend I did a 50L WC, however I changed up how I did it slightly and much happier doing it this way I think, will need to prep a little more next time as I had to rush when the tank was part empty, but I fixed up my salinity before adding the water to the tank, along with getting my Alk right beforehand also.
Not sure how or why though, I had to really pull out some SW and replace with RO yesterday once it was in the tank as my salinity crept to about 1.027-1.028. Took a couple litres or so out and tested and it seemed to be down to 1.025-1.026 again.

Another weekend, another batch of new additions.
Honestly, this is really addictive.. lol.

For Corals I picked up a Blasto Wellsi red frag, a purple torch and a pearl hammer. (nearly ended up with a different hammer as the guy went to grab it from the online section of the store where they don't like taking people, they've taken me out there a few times but they must get into trouble for it), he brought it back to show me but by the time it was back inside it was closed up, it was only after discussion he realised the one he grabbed might not be the one I wanted, and then took me out there just to be sure, ended up finding the one I wanted. There was some serious white slime on that one when I got it home, it was not happy.

Hasn't opened up fully yet, these are such weird looking things but will add some much needed colour.

Purple torch is loving life next to the green tip torch.

Pearl hammer seems to be settling in, think it's got some more opening up to do yet though. There was some damaged parts after I had cleaned it as gently as possible to get rid of the slime so some of those have been breaking off here or there. I'll likely have to reposition this one as the skeleton is quite tall and looks a bit weird on the rock work. Depends how much it opens up and hangs over itself.

Also picked up some fish!
I've been looking at a Banana (as the LFS calls it) Wrasse, which I believe is a Canary Wrasse everywhere else in the world, for a few weeks because I wanted to add some fish with bright colours. This little guy came home over the weekend. He's very shy though and buried himself immediately in the sand for the first day. It came out briefly the following day, when I grabbed this pic, and then proceeded to hide again not too long after.

I also got hold of a Two-spot Bristletooth tang.
I love, love, love tangs and have wanted to get one but with the size of my tank it's been difficult. I'd been toying with the idea of getting a blue tang or a purple or something, but they all require quite large tanks (I think the blue is like 120 gallon), so I thought it would likely outgrow my tank very quickly. At least the Bristletooth tang, according to liveaquaria, requires a 70 gal which is much closer to what I've got, so I figure I will get more time of having this little guy before having to upgrade into a new tank/move him on, especially with him being quite small at the moment too. I've eyed these tangs off on and off for a month now as well.
He seems to have settled in nicely.

Nice additions to the tank! Welsi are supposedly harder to find in the states. I like the canary wrasse. He looks great even under blue lights. I wanted to buy a hammer but all the ones for sale the other day were wall hammers and not branching. The branching are much easier to thin back if they get too big.

 

[DarkReefer]

Nice additions to the tank! Welsi are supposedly harder to find in the states. I like the canary wrasse. He looks great even under blue lights. I wanted to buy a hammer but all the ones for sale the other day were wall hammers and not branching. The branching are much easier to thin back if they get too big.

Thanks! Still a long way to go until I get it where I'd like to, but it's a good start.
Yeah the Canary really pops!. The Tang is such an awesome looking fish too, looks great despite being brown/orange-ish mostly.
Not exactly sure what type of hammer mine is tbh. The new one certainly has a really thick base though (as you can see from the pic of the Canary).

 

[DarkReefer]

Another weekend gone by, another lack of self restraint at the LFS.
Started off by testing my parameters on Friday night. Whilst I'm still testing weekly I haven't gotten into a rhythm yet of how I'd like to monitor. Some weeks I'll test before the water change so I can see what's happened throughout the week, others I'll test after, so I can see what it's like after the change. On occasion I've even done both.
Sat morning was a 50L WC, whilst I was adjusting my parameters of the water going in, I managed to overdose alk in one of them. Thankfully my tank is always pretty low on that front so the 25L that was dosed at 13.5dKH wasn't a big team. The other 25L was around the 6 mark so with the adjustment and the tank being around 7-8 overall in the grand scheme of things it adjusted fine and totalled about 8.4 when I checked it later on. Oops.

Down to the first LFS later that day and grabbed myself an Eheim auto feeder. Really impressed with how simple but effective the set up is on it. Allows manual feeds, upto 2 rotations a minute between each feed and you can adjust how much to feed etc. Seems like a good bit of kit. Should be interesting to see how it holds up.
Also grabbed myself an Elegance Coral as I'd been considering one of these for a while in lieu of an anemone (at least for now). Looks to be settling in quite nicely.

Over to the 2nd LFS and took home a Flame Hawkfish. My gf and I had seen one of these previously and really wanted one but the one we saw wasn't for sale. Finally somewhere had some stock so we were straight in there to grab the little guy.

Unfortunately we had some complications. My wrasse decided it wanted to show the new guy who was boss and started to bully and harass it, chasing it around the tank.

So lights out on the tank for a day to ease the aggression until I could get back out to the shop again and pick up a separation box.
The following day back to the LFS and picked up a box, along with a couple more corals as I really wanted to start putting some corals on the top of the rockwork.
Picked up an awesome looking QLD Goni, and what I'm told is a Pink Lemonade Chalice. Pretty happy with both purchases, though the chalice I expected to be more red, in my tank it looks closer to orange.

Bit of a crappy pick of the goni unfortunately. Will need to work on getting a better one.

I also spent a lot of time trying to net the wrasse to put it in the box, baiting with pellets etc. Wasn't going to happen.
In the mean time I got the hawkfish as it was a lot easier to catch and put it in there to keep them separate whilst I worked on getting the wrasse.
I then tried the DIY fish trap using a plastic bottle and cutting off the top, inverting it inside the bottle with some mysis inside, this got the attention of him and others but none seemed to go through the hole itself after about an hour (might've happened eventually but I wanted him out sooner). I then managed to bait him into the separation box using a turkey baster and mysis. Closed the door behind him and then got the hawkfish out. Thank goodness that was over. Wrasse can stay in there until next weekend I think.

Got some more updated shots of the tank/corals also.

Had to reposition this guy slightly after knocking it with the net attempts and glued him down now.

Loving the colours of this peal hammer, really looks awesome in this pic.

This was before anything was added this weekend.

 

[Garf]

Looks like your LFS had some nice stuff, then you turned up

 

[DarkReefer]

Looks like your LFS had some nice stuff, then you turned up

Haha nah, there was plenty still left behind after I left. Didn't want to get TOO crazy.

 

[DarkReefer]

Over the weekend my tank hit 3 months old
Added about half a dozen corals to it also in celebration (well, mainly because they were 50% off!).

Here's a couple of shots from today.
Have plenty more but might post those another time!

 

[DarkReefer]

It's been a minute since I made an update as I've been a little busy. Unfortunately no pictures at the moment but here's the news. Will try and post some pictures tonight/tomorrow once I get some time.

Recent additions include only a cleaner wrasse in the fish department, but I managed to get a small gold torch last week also.

I've been having some issues with my water levels over the past month, most likely due to addition of so many new corals at once I guess. I think I managed to stabilise those over the past couple weeks, though the last few weeks I've been trying to get away with water changes bi-weekly. I don't think this has worked out too well though as the new torch doesn't appear overly happy as yet.
Last night I did a 50L waterchange, gave the glass a clean, sand a good vacuum and even carefully pulled out my chalice and scrubbed off the bubble algea it was growing in a separate bucket. Will likely check my nutrients tonight/tomorrow morning and top up as necessary.

Most of the LPS looks great, the Goni & alveopora are big and bushy and happy, the hammers are always open to their fullest and fluffy looking every day, as are the frogspawn. My 2 original torches a green tip and purple torch both have been looking good, though a day or so after adding the gold torch the purple is looking a little more stringy and sucked in a little compared to before. Hoping when I get home tonight and see the gold and purple torch out and more happy after the water change, but we'll see.

I've had my trachy receed and die on me, so pulled it out during last night's clean. It also seems my lobo isn't too happy either and seems to be following albeit much, much more slowly (I've started to notice some skeleton or spikey bits showing through the fleshy part and colouring seems a bit more whiter than the lush orange it was).

Everything else seems okay for memory.
Really got to do something about the water change side of it though, I'm really not enjoying it anymore like I first did and find it rather annoying, same with the constant testing. I don't mind testing once a week or maybe twice and I'm getting quicker at doing them, but it's just not that enjoyable. Has anyone else gotten to this point? What did you do to make it better and possibly start getting more enjoyment again? It might be that I feel a little defeated with the tank after having that coral recede and die.

Also doing tests that seem unreliable and to me look like they're just ok or borderline bad, then take some water to the LFS and they tell me the results are good and things are improving or that they appear in the right ranges etc it makes me question what I'm doing. So now even if my own kits are saying 1 thing I'm also telling myself they're probably fine based on the last test I did and when they were in similar ranges etc.

I know I've been fighting with my nitrates/phosphates also. I've been dosing Nitraphos I think it's called, only a couple times a week roughly, which has seemed to help but still here I am worried I'm potentially going to lose an expensive torch among other things if this keeps up.

Sorry for the long post, if anyone has some tips/advice would love to hear from you.
I'll try and get some current pics up soon too.

 

[CrimsonTide]

It's been a minute since I made an update as I've been a little busy. Unfortunately no pictures at the moment but here's the news. Will try and post some pictures tonight/tomorrow once I get some time.

Recent additions include only a cleaner wrasse in the fish department, but I managed to get a small gold torch last week also.

I've been having some issues with my water levels over the past month, most likely due to addition of so many new corals at once I guess. I think I managed to stabilise those over the past couple weeks, though the last few weeks I've been trying to get away with water changes bi-weekly. I don't think this has worked out too well though as the new torch doesn't appear overly happy as yet.
Last night I did a 50L waterchange, gave the glass a clean, sand a good vacuum and even carefully pulled out my chalice and scrubbed off the bubble algea it was growing in a separate bucket. Will likely check my nutrients tonight/tomorrow morning and top up as necessary.

Most of the LPS looks great, the Goni & alveopora are big and bushy and happy, the hammers are always open to their fullest and fluffy looking every day, as are the frogspawn. My 2 original torches a green tip and purple torch both have been looking good, though a day or so after adding the gold torch the purple is looking a little more stringy and sucked in a little compared to before. Hoping when I get home tonight and see the gold and purple torch out and more happy after the water change, but we'll see.

I've had my trachy receed and die on me, so pulled it out during last night's clean. It also seems my lobo isn't too happy either and seems to be following albeit much, much more slowly (I've started to notice some skeleton or spikey bits showing through the fleshy part and colouring seems a bit more whiter than the lush orange it was).

Everything else seems okay for memory.
Really got to do something about the water change side of it though, I'm really not enjoying it anymore like I first did and find it rather annoying, same with the constant testing. I don't mind testing once a week or maybe twice and I'm getting quicker at doing them, but it's just not that enjoyable. Has anyone else gotten to this point? What did you do to make it better and possibly start getting more enjoyment again? It might be that I feel a little defeated with the tank after having that coral recede and die.

Also doing tests that seem unreliable and to me look like they're just ok or borderline bad, then take some water to the LFS and they tell me the results are good and things are improving or that they appear in the right ranges etc it makes me question what I'm doing. So now even if my own kits are saying 1 thing I'm also telling myself they're probably fine based on the last test I did and when they were in similar ranges etc.

I know I've been fighting with my nitrates/phosphates also. I've been dosing Nitraphos I think it's called, only a couple times a week roughly, which has seemed to help but still here I am worried I'm potentially going to lose an expensive torch among other things if this keeps up.

Sorry for the long post, if anyone has some tips/advice would love to hear from you.
I'll try and get some current pics up soon too.

I think you can get burnt out with all the numbers and things and miss enjoying your tank. I would say try to find something to make your waterchanges easier or more enjoyable. If you're dosing to keep your nutrients up you might want to get a dosing pump if you don't have one to make it easier as well. Also I dont know what testing kits you have but the hanna checkers are really reliable if you don't have those maybe invest in them. Also maybe put some soft corals in your tank that don't use as much of your nutrients every week and less meaty corals. Theres also a lot of people who just let their tank do its thing and survival of the fittest. I know you have some expensive coral so you might not want to go that route but you have a nice tank so idk. I would say get back to what made you happy in the beginning. Stop burning yourself out on the other things.

 

[DarkReefer]

I think you can get burnt out with all the numbers and things and miss enjoying your tank. I would say try to find something to make your waterchanges easier or more enjoyable. If you're dosing to keep your nutrients up you might want to get a dosing pump if you don't have one to make it easier as well. Also I dont know what testing kits you have but the hanna checkers are really reliable if you don't have those maybe invest in them. Also maybe put some soft corals in your tank that don't use as much of your nutrients every week and less meaty corals. Theres also a lot of people who just let their tank do its thing and survival of the fittest. I know you have some expensive coral so you might not want to go that route but you have a nice tank so idk. I would say get back to what made you happy in the beginning. Stop burning yourself out on the other things.

Yeah I think you're right.
I still enjoy watching the tank but it has been a little less since having some troubles creep in.

Most of my test kits are Salifert & API. I do have a Hanna Alk kit which I quite like and it's nice having digital readout. I might have to invest for the Phosphate in particular as I find that one hard to read, the Mag/Cal tests from Salifert seem easy enough so I think they're ok.
There's still a little space I can use in the tank for corals so maybe some soft corals will be a better idea.
I'm not too much of a fan of survival of the fittest, it'd be nice to get everything looking nice and keeping it healthy.

It's been suggested to me on here that I should look to do an ICP, so I will probably look into that as it's probably the most accurate test I can do. Will also get the LFS to test again for me today/tomorrow.

I enjoyed building a reef to be honest. Was my favourite part, adding this or that, making it look nice adding in the fish with various colours and personalities. Definitely enjoyed that and then enjoyed watching everything thrive... for a time. If I can get everything happy and healthy again I'll be much happier with it.

 

[DarkReefer]

Guess I should update this since it's been 5 months!

Had some troubles prior to previous post as mentioned above, ended up losing my orange lobo and a fungia along with a pink lemonade chalice that just looked terrible. Unfortunately I also lost my Allen's sandsifter. The tang kept swooping or trying to attack it every time it came out and I didn't notice how skinny it was until it was too late.
I had a 24k gold torch that barely lasted a few days to a week. Managed to get a free replacement after the LFS confirmed the batch they received seemed to melt. It took 2 months to get the replacement but well worth it. The new one is looking great and seems pretty happy.
I ended up adding some activated carbon to remove any toxins etc that may have been in the water just in case.
This seems to have really helped stabilise everything in the tank.

I've added some new Zoas over the past couple months that are nice and colourful and also a Forest Fire Bubble Tip Anemone which really pops in the tank too. The first nem I got basically melted also, it was already stressed when I bought it and it never came good and died within 2-3 days. This one is much better though and has settled in by the looks of it.

I've also managed to work out my water changes to be less stressful with water spillages or the water glugging annoying me, I've just been siphoning for everything and it seems like a much pleasant experience, even if it does take slightly longer.

 

[DarkReefer]

My how things have changed from my last few posts!

Over recent months I've had some troubles keeping balance of nutrients etc in my tank unfortunately.
It's seen a number of deaths coral wise and corals retracting and a lot of colour loss throughout the tank.
It's been hard for me to stay motivated due to the losses and failure but hopefully that'll change soon.

I've been battling high phos for a while, which saw a lot of the changes initially with coral growth or lack there of and things starting to die off or suffer.
Still working on it to this day unfortunately.

Back in November I did my first ICP test - results here
Recommended action to correct some elevated levels I had were 6x 15% weekly water changes over 6 weeks which I've been doing.

I also went and got myself an aquaforest media reactor and started keeping some rowaphos (initially only 35ml based on some online calculator I found, but then upped to 50ml) but still experiencing elevated levels so have today begun carbon dosing again with Nitraphos minus (Nitrates were up to around 20 recently also after hovering around 10 for a couple months or so after previously dosing).
I'll also be changing out the activated carbon and likely change out and increase my rowaphos with tomorrow's water change.

I've also put my order in to finally get an automated dosing unit, a Kamoer X4 Pro, which I'm looking forward to getting.

Turns out I'd been dosing my mag + trace wrong (and possibly likely cause for some of my elevated levels in ICP test). Was raising my mag levels at times by dumping the whole amount in at once (ie. enough to bring it up 100ppm or so instantly) which worked out to be 2-3 litres worth in one hit.

Still a lot to be learning but hopefully I'll get over this road bump and can get back into enjoying the tank some more and start hopefully seeing some of my corals come back and thrive. Miss having my 2x goni and alveopora extended mostly. They were stunning.

There's still some things that seem to be doing well in the tank, primarily the gold tip elegance, the deshi my anemone and frog spawns. SPS took a massive hit with the fluctuations unfortunately so they're looking worse for wear.

I was also having a bubble algae outbreak and thankfully the foxface I got for it sorted it out very quickly within a week or two.
Here's some updated pics;

Daisy coral and zoas seem to be hanging in there, goni hasn't been out in months (extends very slightly early morning/late evening)

Poor SPS and Goni

Hammer's receding/dying off (this is also attributed to flatworm I've had to dip + brush eggs off these 3-4 times now).

What's left of my 24K gold torch and Alveopora

What's left of my purple torch after I relocated it to put the gold torch up front and centre.

 

[CrimsonTide]

I got a kamoer X1 in the mail today. Just set it up. Its set to dose tomorrow morning for me im very excited! I had a horrible algae outbreak as well and its finally gone for the most part. It was hair algae out my ears. Then bubble algae galore. I still have some bubble algae and my tank isn't big enough for a foxfire or I would use one. I'm trying to rely on picking it off scooping it out and stupid emerald crabs. Which I havent seen eat 1 bubble algae. I also tried Vibrant and that seemed to help. All in all I feel your pain and you should love the doser.

 

[DarkReefer]

I got a kamoer X1 in the mail today. Just set it up. Its set to dose tomorrow morning for me im very excited! I had a horrible algae outbreak as well and its finally gone for the most part. It was hair algae out my ears. Then bubble algae galore. I still have some bubble algae and my tank isn't big enough for a foxfire or I would use one. I'm trying to rely on picking it off scooping it out and stupid emerald crabs. Which I havent seen eat 1 bubble algae. I also tried Vibrant and that seemed to help. All in all I feel your pain and you should love the doser.

How'd your X1 go this morning?

Yeah my tank is small for a Foxface as well but I got a small one so it should be okay for a while (hopefully I'll have a bigger tank by the time I need to change it out! )
There's other breeds of rabbitfish that might be of interest/use to you and your tank though that still eat bubble algae.
There was a really derpy looking one that I wanted, very dull boring coloured fish but it still had character, but they didn't have one available so I got the foxface instead. The foxface was the one I was initially interested in but I was told it was hit and miss with eating the algae, thankfully this guy is amazing and picked every bit of it he can get to clean.

Whilst not entirely an 'impulse buy', I got a Klir Fleece Roller today. It seems to be a pretty cool bit of kit, I'll likely still run a single filter sock, but maybe just a mesh one. Will see how it travels. Not 100% sure I set it up entirely right, but I'm giving it a shot and hoping it works out.

My aim is to try and get the tank a little more automated, hence the roller and getting an X4 Pro in the coming weeks hopefully. I think making things like dosing/changing filter socks etc more automated will assist in future when the missus and I want to go on holidays somewhere, means I wont need to get someone around to do anything (or very little at least).