DeanoL
Active Member
Hi everyone :)
Posted this in the FTS thread - just saw the member tank thread section and thought i'd post it here as well as it's a good way to keep track of what is happening with my tank over time.
From Australia here - near Canberra. There's a couple of decent LFS in Canberra (about 45 min drive) that have a good selection of marine fish. Have bought all my fish from the one store that quarantines them for a few weeks before they are put out for sale. You can go out the back and see the fish in quarantine to know what is coming up.
Tank has been up and running for a bit over 2 years - it was a 40th bday present from my partner. However, due to my stupidity about a year ago all the fish died and I had to restart my tank (long story short - turned pumps off for maintenance, forgot to turn back on - went away for work for 3 days, middle of winter - fish died as heater was in sump).
Here's a full shot of my 60 g waterbox 90.3:
Hard to tell in the photo, but there are a fair few caves/crevices between all the rocks for fish to hide or swim through. I add copepods about every 2 months, coral is mainly softies and LPS. Some of the corals have gotten really large - in particular a thistle coral. I also started with one bubble tip anenome but it has split a couple times and i now have four of them.
I do roughly a 15% water change each week. Have a RedSea skimmer and roll mat both in about a 15g sump. We live out of town and are on rain water, but do use an RODI.
Have auto-feeder spitting out small amount of pellets twice a day. I generally feed frozen once a day too. Have just started trying to add nori, but none of the fish seem too interested yet.
Few more close up pics:
Current inhabitants:
Chocolate Goby (hence the sand on the rocks...)
Striped fang blenny
Gold Nugget Wrasse (currently very green, but I know it will change colour - most expensive fish in the tank).
Pair of ocellaris clownfish
3 chromis (1 x Blue-green, 1 x barrier reef, 1 x vanderbilt)
Lawn mower blenny
Spotted mandarin (male)
Blue assessor
Diadema dottyback
Invertebrates: multiple snails (trochus, astrea, nassarius, strombus), 1 cowrie, 3 peppermint shrimp, 1 tuxedo urchin
The Vanderbilt chromis, blue assessor and diadema dottyback were the most recent additions - about a week ago. Before that, I hadn't added fish for months - I was making sure everything was pretty stable. No major issues when adding these three. The only tank mate that actually took interest in them was the barrier reef chromis. He chased the Vanderbilt and dottyback for the first day. Vanderbilt came out first, occasionally chasing, but has settled down, and they swim well together now. Dottyback is slowly coming out, but barrier reef still occasionally chases it. Dottyback is very small, the smallest fish in the tank. Blue assessor likes to stay under the thistle coral most of the time but has ventured out in the open a few times. The clownfish (who have claimed the thistle) appear to be fine with the blue assessor staying there.
Posted this in the FTS thread - just saw the member tank thread section and thought i'd post it here as well as it's a good way to keep track of what is happening with my tank over time.
From Australia here - near Canberra. There's a couple of decent LFS in Canberra (about 45 min drive) that have a good selection of marine fish. Have bought all my fish from the one store that quarantines them for a few weeks before they are put out for sale. You can go out the back and see the fish in quarantine to know what is coming up.
Tank has been up and running for a bit over 2 years - it was a 40th bday present from my partner. However, due to my stupidity about a year ago all the fish died and I had to restart my tank (long story short - turned pumps off for maintenance, forgot to turn back on - went away for work for 3 days, middle of winter - fish died as heater was in sump).
Here's a full shot of my 60 g waterbox 90.3:
Hard to tell in the photo, but there are a fair few caves/crevices between all the rocks for fish to hide or swim through. I add copepods about every 2 months, coral is mainly softies and LPS. Some of the corals have gotten really large - in particular a thistle coral. I also started with one bubble tip anenome but it has split a couple times and i now have four of them.
I do roughly a 15% water change each week. Have a RedSea skimmer and roll mat both in about a 15g sump. We live out of town and are on rain water, but do use an RODI.
Have auto-feeder spitting out small amount of pellets twice a day. I generally feed frozen once a day too. Have just started trying to add nori, but none of the fish seem too interested yet.
Few more close up pics:
Current inhabitants:
Chocolate Goby (hence the sand on the rocks...)
Striped fang blenny
Gold Nugget Wrasse (currently very green, but I know it will change colour - most expensive fish in the tank).
Pair of ocellaris clownfish
3 chromis (1 x Blue-green, 1 x barrier reef, 1 x vanderbilt)
Lawn mower blenny
Spotted mandarin (male)
Blue assessor
Diadema dottyback
Invertebrates: multiple snails (trochus, astrea, nassarius, strombus), 1 cowrie, 3 peppermint shrimp, 1 tuxedo urchin
The Vanderbilt chromis, blue assessor and diadema dottyback were the most recent additions - about a week ago. Before that, I hadn't added fish for months - I was making sure everything was pretty stable. No major issues when adding these three. The only tank mate that actually took interest in them was the barrier reef chromis. He chased the Vanderbilt and dottyback for the first day. Vanderbilt came out first, occasionally chasing, but has settled down, and they swim well together now. Dottyback is slowly coming out, but barrier reef still occasionally chases it. Dottyback is very small, the smallest fish in the tank. Blue assessor likes to stay under the thistle coral most of the time but has ventured out in the open a few times. The clownfish (who have claimed the thistle) appear to be fine with the blue assessor staying there.
