Dawn's natural nutrient reef garden

[BaghdadBean]

Well I am sadly reporting that the canary blenny never did eat and has perished. That makes me so sad and it took him a month to waste away and die. Its hard to see that happen but I offered him a huge variety of food and nothing tempted him.

The watchman goby, Guardian is doing excellent however. It appears that he has grown some already and he eats any and everything. I still have him in the fuge and will not plan to move him to the display until he gets bigger and I can add him with another fish to spread out bullying. He seems to be large and in charge of the fuge though.

I went to our club's frag swap last weekend and it was a lot of fun. Usually I go to talk to club members more than to find deals and buy stuff. My aquarium is not one to have high end coral although I enjoy looking at them at swaps. I was kind of on the look out for FL ricordia and one vendor had a plug with 2 ricordia, each a different color. She sold it to me for $20 and I was a happy customer. I also got a fish handbook cheap, an oldie but goodie that the lfs I worked used in the 90s. My last exciting news is I won a seahorse plaque and a gift certificate for a gorgonian in a $20 investment raffle that gave away 2 containers of New Life Spectrum food for entering. Each container was probably a cost value of $10, so again I was pleased.


Here is a fairly current pic of my tank from the end. It is doing very well.

0 new items by Dawn Gilson

photos.app.goo.gl

Sorry to hear about your blenny loss, but oh my gosh your photos and your tanks are amazing. You might be reinspiring me to do something with my retired 58 gallon Oceanic. I used to have a mixed reef in it, but the dimensions were too tall and not quite deep enough for a really satisfactory SPS home. Looking at your tiered sand bed made me think that maybe I had it all wrong, and what if I made a tiered sand and rock bed featuring seagrasses and gorgonians, wouldn’t that be neat… not to mention pretty energy efficient in comparison to my big SPS system in the house…

 

[vlangel]

Sorry to hear about your blenny loss, but oh my gosh your photos and your tanks are amazing. You might be reinspiring me to do something with my retired 58 gallon Oceanic. I used to have a mixed reef in it, but the dimensions were too tall and not quite deep enough for a really satisfactory SPS home. Looking at your tiered sand bed made me think that maybe I had it all wrong, and what if I made a tiered sand and rock bed featuring seagrasses and gorgonians, wouldn’t that be neat… not to mention pretty energy efficient in comparison to my big SPS system in the house…

So sorry that I never replied to your post. Did you set up your 58 gallon Oceanic tank?

 

[InsaneClownFish]

Very cool system and concept. I love reefs that have a theme yet they serve to recreate a biotope. These tanks remind us that the ocean is so varied and diverse.

 

[vlangel]

Very cool system and concept. I love reefs that have a theme yet they serve to recreate a biotope. These tanks remind us that the ocean is so varied and diverse.

Thank you for the kind words. I think it's all the diversity that makes me live the ocean so much!

 

[NoahLikesFish]

i like it

 

[BaghdadBean]

So sorry that I never replied to your post. Did you set up your 58 gallon Oceanic tank?

The silicone on the 58 looks pretty hashed, but I traded a guy some organic lamb for a 72 gallon bowfront that I’m going to run the tiered planted marine view in. I’m still doing some pretty major work here putting in the water room, but I’m definitely looking forward to having a different sort of system to play with besides my SPS build!

 

[vlangel]

The silicone on the 58 looks pretty hashed, but I traded a guy some organic lamb for a 72 gallon bowfront that I’m going to run the tiered planted marine view in. I’m still doing some pretty major work here putting in the water room, but I’m definitely looking forward to having a different sort of system to play with besides my SPS build!

I love bowfront tanks! I used to maintain a 72 gallon bowfront for a lfs I worked for and I like those dimensions. Bristle tooth tangs have some swimming room but it's deeper in places than a standard 55 gallon.

I will look forward to see how your tank progresses. Have you started a build thread on it?

 

[vlangel]

I tested my nitrates (10 ppm) and phosphates (.1 - .25 ppm) so the additional water change a week definitely brought the nutrients down. I do not want them to go any lower so will go back to 5 gallon/week and see how that goes. I get a light rust color on the sand when I run my nutrients too low and I don't want that.

Everything else looks good. Also I brought up a sprig of codium from the sump to add to the display. It has lots of lush red gracilaria but no green macro algae. Hopefully the codium will flourish.

 

[BaghdadBean]

I love bowfront tanks! I used to maintain a 72 gallon bowfront for a lfs I worked for and I like those dimensions. Bristle tooth tangs have some swimming room but it's deeper in places than a standard 55 gallon.

I will look forward to see how your tank progresses. Have you started a build thread on it?

I’ve never been a big bowfront person because I liked deeper aquascapes, but I got this one specifically for the height and varying depth. I have a BEAUTIFUL ancient piece of live rock/old coral colony that I’ll use in it for the terrace part, which is just too big and trippy looking to lose under SPS in my main build. I haven’t started a build thread for the 72, just the 142, although I probably will when I’ve got more progress. I just love how much variety there is available to play with on biotope style aquariums!

 

[Subsea]

I tested my nitrates (10 ppm) and phosphates (.1 - .25 ppm) so the additional water change a week definitely brought the nutrients down. I do not want them to go any lower so will go back to 5 gallon/week and see how that goes. I get a light rust color on the sand when I run my nutrients too low and I don't want that.

Everything else looks good. Also I brought up a sprig of codium from the sump to add to the display. It has lots of lush red gracilaria but no green macro algae. Hopefully the codium will flourish.

I am with you on how unique Condium looks. I just got some from live plants. In the past it has not worked well for me. I have feather Caulerpa & Prolifera but Condium texture & color are differt from emerald green. I just did get photosynthetic blue sponge, I think it is ORA aquacultured.

 

[vlangel]

I am with you on how unique Condium looks. I just got some from live plants. In the past it has not worked well for me. I have feather Caulerpa & Prolifera but Condium texture & color are differt from emerald green. I just did get photosynthetic blue sponge, I think it is ORA aquacultured.

I think it's hard to keep codium when caulerpa is sucking up the nutrients first. My codium began to do better in the fuge when I pruned my caulerpa almost to extinction (which is impossible, ha ha!). I will let you know how it does in my display. Good luck with yours!

 

[vlangel]

I’ve never been a big bowfront person because I liked deeper aquascapes, but I got this one specifically for the height and varying depth. I have a BEAUTIFUL ancient piece of live rock/old coral colony that I’ll use in it for the terrace part, which is just too big and trippy looking to lose under SPS in my main build. I haven’t started a build thread for the 72, just the 142, although I probably will when I’ve got more progress. I just love how much variety there is available to play with on biotope style aquariums!

Biotopes are really cool and it's fun to think about mimicking nature.

In regards to using live rock as a retaining wall to create the tiers...it constantly leaks sand no matter how tight you think you have it built, ha ha! Like you, I used some large, dense live rock to hold back the sand. I placed the rock on the glass so that no digging fish/shrimp could undermine it. Generally it works well, but not perfectly.

 

[vlangel]

Hhm, my new LED seems to have developed a glitch in the last 3 days. It turns off, then flashes white light several times and then turns back on and resumes lighting. That does not seem normal and yesterday it did it 3 Xs, the most I have seen so it may be getting worse.
I contacted ReefBreeder and I will let you all know what they do.

 

[vlangel]

Well ReefBreeder's got back to me right away. They said it sounded like I had it in 'lightening' mode and they were correct. They told me how to turn it off so now I expect that it will be fine. I probably accidently turned on the lightening mode as I was tweaking the intensities.

 

[vlangel]

I was saddened to find that Jammies, one of my pajama cardinals died last night. He ate well yesterday but I have been noticing that his fins were getting ragged and I had treated him with antibiotics for pop eye about 2-3 months ago. I got him as a full grown fish in 2018 and so he probably lived out a pretty typical lifespan for a pajama cardinal. At least he lived a pretty happy easy life in my tank and I will miss him. Probably PJ, the younger, small pajama cardinal will miss him too.

 

[vlangel]

Not much to report in the natural nutrient tank system. That's a good thing as 'no news is good news'! The newer creatures in the display tank (the green BTA with the purple foot, and the green nephthea) have adjusted very well, I think. I love how both of them bring lots of gentle swaying motion into the tank in addition to adding splashes of green to the mix.

I also love the charm that my 3 most recently added fish add. I have never had a thriving yellow watchman goby before and Guardian is everything I had hoped for.
Charlie Brown, the Midas blenny is like a big playful puppy dog, who doesn'' t love that????
Finally Angelica, although no angel is the prettiest Coral Beauty that I have ever seen.

 

[vlangel]

Yesterday I went to a marine expo in our general area. My tank is nicely stocked right now so was not wanting to drop a lot of $ at the expo. I did see a nice purple plume gorg that was very reasonably priced and I do not see a lot of gorgs at our local lfs. I know some very nice ones can be gotten online but then there is the shipping cost, which is prohibitive for just one gorg. Anyway, it seems to be adjusting well and I am pleased with it.

 

[vlangel]

I had not given an update or posted since spring so here is a recent video. The high nutrient tank is in a sweet spot right now. The coral are flourishing as are the fish and invert life, (well except Monarch, the royal Gramma who hides a lot. He is fat and still eats well at least). I am satisfied with my choices of life in the tank as well as the aquascape. I am very happy with the stability of the tank. It basically survived all summer with only weekly water changes and using the mag cleaner on the glass. I was extremely pleased after I pruned and did a better job on the glass. I still want to syphon out excess detritus in both the display and the refugium just as a precaution. The tank is high nutrient but how much detritus is too much,,,,I don't know. I don't want coral to decline to find that out.

 

[vlangel]

Its really weird but October is always the time of year that I get the most excited about my aquarium. Maybe its the days getting colder and shorter that give me more time indoors to spend on the fish tank.

Anyway, I have been wanting to add some thing new to my tank and have been watching Gulf Coast Ecosystems. They had some macro algae and some gorgs I was thinking about. Well yesterday I peeked at the site and some new things were available so I decided to pull the trigger and ordered a few things. Here is the list:

Green macro algae; 1. caulerpa cupressoides, a stiff upright notched blade caulerpa that is less invasive. 2. halimeda opuntia, a hardy halimeda specie that will grow on sand or live rock and does well in reef aquaria.
Red macro algae; 3. Coraline fine, a branching coraline algae that varies from lavender to bright purple in coloration. This specie is soft and has fine branches.
Brown macro algae; 4. Lobophora, a slow growing macro with ruffled rigid petals that fan out from the holdfast. It will grow on sand or live rock.

5. Finger sponge; a 5-8" red sponge with vertical branches.

Gorgonians; 6. Corky Finger, a photosynthetic encrusting gorg that has purple skin and tan-brownish polyps. 7. Purple Ribbon, a dark purple gorg with flattened branches that are often angular.

Today I rearranged some coral and rock in the display tank to make room for the new addition. I expect them to arrive around Wednesday of next week. I am excited about adding more color and texture to my aquarium. Since my aquarium has been up 6 or so years it has a mature look and these new additions will even make it appear more established.

 

[vlangel]

Here is a pic of the tank as it stands today. Hopefully the new additions will spruce it up.