Dawn's 56 gallon natural nutrient garden

[vlangel]

75 gallon sumpless aquarium

AQUARIUM PROFILE & EQUIPMENT
1. What type of saltwater aquarium is this?: mixed reef
2. Total water volume: 75 gallons
3. When did you start this tank?: September 2025, but all the rock, sand and inhabitants were transferred from a 9 year old 56g aquarium
4. What is your aquarium made of?: glass Aqueon
5. Aquarium Stand: Aqueon 48" x 18"
6. Aquarium filtration: only a canister prefilter sponge from an Oase BioMaster 800 and natural biological from rock, sand, macroalgae. The canister filter is acting as a cryptic sump where pods, worms and other life can live and reproduce unmolested by fish. Hopefully this will provide a continuous supply of pods and worms for a natural food source for fish and coral.
7. Controller: Inkbird temperature
8. Protein skimmer: no
9. Reactor: no
10. Sump: no
11. Equipment for flow & circulation:
A. Oase BioMaster 800 canister filter,
with 36 watt UV sterilizer plumbed into output line.
B. Ecotech mp 40
C. Option in-tank filter for media
12. Aquarium Lighting: ReefBreeder
Photon V-24
13. ATO: no
14. Aquarium Heating: heater that is
made to be integrated in the
BioMaster 800 canister filter. The beauty of this is the heater is in the canister and not in the tank cluttering the display. Also none of the inhabitants can be injured by it.
PH: 8.0
Specific Gravity: 1.026
NO3: 15ppm
PO4: .7ppm
Alkalinity 8
Calcium,and Magnesium are not monitored as these are naturally regulated with water changes and AFR dosing
Salt Brand: Instant Ocean
Trace Element dosing: Cheatgro (1 capful weekly), AFR (20ML daily ), and 1 capful Seachem Stability weekly
Water Chemistry Details: 10% water change weekly
Aquarium Aquascape:
Substrate: shallow and deep sand
Live rock: 80lbs of Carribean
Nutrient export: Water changes, Macroalgae and coral

AQUARIUM INHABITANTS
Fish: Percula Clownfish, Yellow Watchman Goby, Firefish Goby, One Spot Foxface, Masked Goby, Longnose hawkfish, Solon fairy wrasse, Bridled goby, Neon cleaner goby and a Pajama Cardinalfish

2 Yellow tail damsels and Coral Beauty angel in QT to be added

Coral: SPS- Scroll corals, poccilipora, Monticaps, and Lepto.
LPS- Multiple colored Hammers, Aqua Trumpets, Neon Green Trumpets, war coral, sonic and Multiple colored Torches
SOFTIES- various Palys, various Zoas, Sinularia finger leather, kenya tree, Cabbage leather, Green Toadstool leather, xenia
SPONGES- Yellow Ball Sponge,

Inverts: Rock Flower Anemones, Black Tube Anemone, 6 Feather Dusters, Emerald crabs, Nassarius snails, Streaming snails, Fighting Conch and an Atlantic cucumber.


Macroalgae: (Green) Codium, Gracilaria Hayi,

2 Mangroves

Aquarium Nutrition:
Auto Feeder 1Xs daily veggie flakes
1 Frozen Cube daily of various foods
5 ML of live Phyto


Starting on page 27 is the build portion of this 75g aquarium. All the pages before that are the 56g column tank that I transferred into the 75g. I just want a shorter tank with a bigger footprint. Or you can check out my build thread in the member's tanks, Lurking Danger 75g Dragon Lair.

 

[acer]

very nice

 

[Hemmdog]

The members' tanks cycle through so fast that I need to look through a lot of pages to find my thread so I figured I would also journal it here. Here is my link:

https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/dawns-natural-nutrient-reef-garden.546312/

I took a video featuring a lot of the critters that reside in this tank: fish, shrimp, crabs, snails, asterina stars, micro starfish and even bristleworms! Once it is uploaded I will post it here.

Very cool! What’s that long blue fish you have, he’s sweet.

 

[vlangel]

very nice

Thanks Ted, I like this tank because it is so easy.

 

[vlangel]

Very cool! What’s that long blue fish you have, he’s sweet.

Thank you. The blue fish is a blue gudgeon dartfish. They were extremely shy for the first 2 weeks, so much so that I was afraid that they were going to perish from lack of food. Now however they come out into the water column frequently even when I am not feeding.

 

[Dr. Dendrostein]

The members' tanks cycle through so fast that I need to look through a lot of pages to find my thread so I figured I would also journal it here. Here is my link:

https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/dawns-natural-nutrient-reef-garden.546312/

I took a video featuring a lot of the critters that reside in this tank: fish, shrimp, crabs, snails, asterina stars, micro starfish and even bristleworms! Once it is uploaded I will post it here.

Thank you for sharing, comrade

 

[kevinl]

Beautiful Dawn!
The life you have in that tank is amazing!!

 

[vlangel]

Beautiful Dawn!
The life you have in that tank is amazing!!

Thanks Kevin, I appreciate the kind words. This tank is the most fun, vibrant, stable aquarium I have ever had.

 

[vlangel]

I call this tank a natural nutrient tank because I intentionally run the nutrients high. Since its an aio I do not have a skimmer on it. It gets fed heavily because of the blennies and gobies needing to eat 2-3 Xs a day. I rely on the ornamental macro algaes to utilize all the nutrients in the water. Last week even I was a bit taken back when my testing showed NO3 to be 50 ppm and PO4 to be between 1-2 ppm! The tank is very clean though, so I am getting away with it because of the macros. I am cutting back a bit on the food in hopes of getting it down closer to NO3 being 20 - 30 ppm and PO4 being .5 - 1 ppm for the sake of my inverts. Macro algaes will outcompete nuisance algaes as long as the ratio of nitrates to phosphates is in the 30:1 range and there is enough carbon available.

 

[vlangel]

Going to LEAR was amazing. We got there about 40 minutes to an hour after it started and there was still a huge long line to get in. Fortunately it went fast.

Seeing so many beautiful coral in 1 room was overwhelming. I was not sure whether to shop around or to just buy when I deemed a coral a good price. I ended doing the latter.

I went knowing that I was going to look for ricordia, and a long polyp toadstool. I also thought different color euphyllia would be nice. Beyond that, I wasn't sure.

Well I came home with 14 new coral! It was so much fun. I did not spend more than $35 on any coral. I have 5 new ricordia/yuma/shroom, 2 new acans, 1 new gorg. I saw a very pretty acid washed BTA, (of course he chose to attach to the back of my rock on the left). He's still viewable and feedable so it's ok. And he can't hurt anything else back there. Also I saw a beautiful yellow torch and I always wanted one. There was a green tipped hammer and mine is a purple tipped hammer. And there was green pipe organ, another coral that I always wanted but never tried. On my list was a duncan frag so I had to buy that and also my long polyp toadstool. Lastly I bought those large brownish tan and white palys which I can't recall the name atm. Anyway it was a great day. The coral are in the tank and I will get pics when I can.

 

[vlangel]

14 new coral and the FTS does not look that different but here goes:

2019-02-23_06-24-35 by Dawn Gilson, on Flickr
Yellow torch with green tipped hammer in the backround. by Dawn Gilson, on Flickr
Green pipe organ by Dawn Gilson, on Flickr
2 new acans by Dawn Gilson, on Flickr
Acid washed bta in foreground, the long polyp toadstool is in the background all closed up. by Dawn Gilson, on Flickr

 

[vlangel]

I moved the pipe organ and it is much happier, and the same goes for the hammer. I moved the toadstool leather and I am much happier, and the acid washed BTA moved itself and I hope it is finally happy! All the other coral I got are doing great except the non photosynthetic gorge which has yet to open it's polyps.

 

[vlangel]

Last night I came home to find the non photosynthetic gorg half open. I immediately added microvert and phytofeast to the fish food. This morning the whole gorg is open which is very exciting since gorgonians really help create that natural look I am going for.

 

[kevinl]

YA!

 

[vlangel]

Orange gorg with white polyps by Dawn Gilson, on Flickr
Orange non photosynthetic gorg with white polyps. Acid washed BTA in front of it.
2019-03-03_07-28-37 by Dawn Gilson, on Flickr
Grandis and yellow hammer.
2019-03-03_07-30-18 by Dawn Gilson, on Flickr
I moved the sun polyps, the yellow whip gorg and the pink tipped hammer to this area.
March FTS by Dawn Gilson, on Flickr
March 2019 FTS

 

[Misled]

Beautiful stuff Dawn!!!

 

[BIGGUN]

I KNEW you'd like it there.

Nice tank!

 

[vlangel]

Beautiful stuff Dawn!!!

Thanks Jesse! I got some really nice coral from the LEAR frag swap and they are filling in my reef nicely. Now, I need to concentrate on keeping them alive and getting them to grow. If I can do that then this tank should be looking pretty good in a year from now.

 

[vlangel]

I KNEW you'd like it there.

Nice tank!

Yes, it was so much fun! Now I am going to want to go every year, LOL! Thanks, I am enjoying it and the ease of care compared to my seahorse tank.

 

[vlangel]

Marmalade looking very cute as always! by Dawn Gilson, on Flickr
Marmalade is about as cute as they come!
Acans garden on retaining wall. by Dawn Gilson, on Flickr
The GCG is Jet. I have 2 of them but Piper and Jet must be feuding because they live on opposite ends of the tank!
Yellow torch, ricordia and BTA by Dawn Gilson, on Flickr
I am a sucker for any euphillia with waving tentacles in the flow! Torches have challenged me in the past but this one seems off to a good start.
Long polyp toadstool by Dawn Gilson, on Flickr
I know toadstools are a super common coral but I went to LEAR to specifically find one, particularly with long polyps.
Xenia by Dawn Gilson, on Flickr
Another super common coral but I love xenia. RIP Sebastion (Nick) gave this colony to me a year or so back and it has thrived in spite of being moved from tank to tank.
My dartfish are Spirit and Spectre but I can not tell them apart. by Dawn Gilson, on Flickr
Spirit and Spectre are such a pretty shade of blue and they add nice color to the reef.