Diving back into the deep end with a 135 gallon cube

[ScottD]

Hey Scott nice progress. Do you have a mesh top on that tank to keep fish from jumping out? Do you plan on adding corals?

Thanks. No I have a semi solid cover on the top. It’s actually the corrugated plastic they use for the political signs and such along the side of the road. It’s just temporary until I build a canopy for on top of the tank to house my lights when I get around to building it. It came as 2 pieces 18”x36”. I just cut one down a little and then used shipping tape to connect them and it makes for a nice hinge. Also cut a small strip and hot glued it to the other piece to give some strength to it and keep it from sagging in the middle. It’s worked out pretty good for $10. It also has helped cut down on evaporation this winter as we use a wood stove for supplemental heat in our house that is in the same room as the tank.

Eventually I will add some corals to the tank to give it some more life and movement. Plan is probably going to be mostly a softy tank. I need to get my canopy and lights on first before I can add any though. I have 4 older ai primes (13 led version) that I’m planning on swapping out with the luxdium pucks and running that for my lighting. That’s the one thing I’ve struggled with was figuring out what to run for lighting on the tank as it’s not a standard size.

 

[ScottD]

So I guess I should do an update on the tank.

Current stocking:
2 clowns
1 royal gramma
1 carpenter wrasse
1 tail spot blenny
1 line spot wrasse
2 banggai cardinals
1 yellow headed goby
1 exquisite wrasse

I tried a Scott’s fairy wrasse but didn’t survive. I think it had a swim bladder issue. I also tried a yellow wrasse but it didn’t survive after a month or so. I think it was getting bullied too much by the clown fishes.

For clean up crew:
I’ve got an assortment of snails. Mostly turbos but also 3 nassarious 1 limpet that came in with the tbs sand and maybe a Trochus snail still left.
1 strawberry conch
9 or 10 hermit crabs, hard to count them all

And the new additions last Friday
1 pencil urchin
1 Halloween hermit

The urchin I got because we just got back from a trip the the outer banks and took the kids to an aquarium there where they had a touch tank with them in it and the kids loved getting hugs from the urchins when they put their fingers next to the spines.

The tank is doing ok, need to do another water change and see if I can bring down the nutrients a little. An algae turf scrubber is on my list of things to get, just need to save up some money for it.
Currently battling some cyano in the sand along the edge of the glass and a couple small spots on some of the rock.

I plan on ordering some more pods to put in the tank, hoping that will help with the sand line.

Still not running any lights yet on the tank, waiting for the workshop to get finished up so I can start building stuff, one being a canopy for the tank. I think I’ve come to accept that I’m going to have to chip out the slab in and have it redone. I’ve never been happy with it. As you walk around you can feel the ups and down of it and it’s cracking already. The guy I hired did not do a good job on it. I had someone else come in to see what they could do about maybe doing a combination of grinding and pouring self leveling concrete and his recommendation to me was it’d be cheaper to just rip it out and redo it. I had already come to the conclusion beforehand that might be the better and cheaper solution, but hard to stomach throwing away the money I spent the first time around on it. Work is about to get crazy for me so will revisit it after when things slow back down again.

 

[ScottD]

Well I finally got around to it and added lights to the tank. I also replaced the corrugated plastic top with some plexiglass glass to allow the light through it. Without further ado here’s the tank with lights.