Easton's Fluval Evo 13.5 Build

[EastonsReef]

Weekly Update - Yasha Goby

It’s been a while!
All the corals are doing well, it took some experimenting with placement but both the hammer and torch are doing well. The new zoa is looking much more like utter chaos so we’re good there!

Testing wise, I’ve had issues with low phosphates (0.00) and low alk (been dipping to mid 6s) so I’ve started my dosing journey. Still dialing in parameters but it’s looking like .5ml of Reef Fusion2 for alk a day and .75ml of NeoPhos every other day. Nitrates are sitting around 20 which is a tad high but reasonable, feeding more dry food to hopefully boost phosphate without dosing and lower nitrates.

Now for the exciting news, I added my second fish this past week, a yasha goby. It took about 30 minutes for it to realize there was a pistol shrimp in the tank and now I can watch them in the evenings. Very shy but, with time, I’m hopeful that it will become more confident. It’s also nice being able to see the pistol shrimp occasionally now.

Will add a photo dump soon. Thanks for reading!

 

[EastonsReef]

 

[EastonsReef]

View attachment 20250921_201046_38F07394-5A5D-491E-A770-499BF58F7FB7.mov

View attachment 20250921_201131_273BB771-66F4-48B5-A41D-DA9DE028E62C.mov

 

[EastonsReef]

Weekly Update - Consistency and Impulse Brittle Stars

Been a while since I've had a good update.
Tank is doing okay. I'm still struggling with my parameters (I know understand why people say go as big as you can) but am confident I'll have them dialed in. Working on achieving a baseline right now to know my starting point and how much my regular water changes can help (I've been slacking and doing this around 10 days instead of 7.) Ideally, regular water changes will do most of the work for me and if I need to bump from 20%-30% so be it, what's one more gallon of saltwater.


I've officially paused on adding any new corals. Picked up 3 new Zoa colonies(okay so one's a paly but Magicians are too cool) (there's a 4th in the tank but it's going to a friend). If someone shows up with a free coral I want I'm not going to say no but I think part of my issue is that the corals are just sucking the nutrients out of the water faster than I can replace it right now. I've committed to keeping this tank 1 year before upgrading/adding a new tank.

I impulse bought a brittle star and while I regretted it at first I've come to like this massive sea monster that has claimed an entire corner of the tank. It's fun seeing it's arms reaching out from the rockwork when I feed. I still want to add some more inverts (planning on 3 sexy shrimp and some sort of cleaner shrimp) but if anyone has thoughts on why I shouldn't or have alternatives I'm open to it.

The yasha has grown much more comfortable, it's out every evening and usually stays out whenever I walk up to the tank. Such a cool fish and I'm glad to have went that route.

Going to post some videos in the next post. Before they went in as links so those will be added as well.

 

[EastonsReef]

*Removed my new video, import went wrong. Will provide pictures of new corals on next update*

 

[EastonsReef]

Some more media

 

[EastonsReef]

Weekly Update - Dosing and Filtration Chambers

Back on my weekly update.

I have a new piece of equipment, a doser, that I'm using to dose for ALK. I'm still struggling with low parameters here but it is slowly climbing. Once I hit 8 I'll be cutting in back and dialing in the daily consumption amount only. I'm testing on Sunday (pre-WC), Monday, and Thursday. Weekly consumption of Calc is 20 ppm (according to testing so far) but I'm going to continue testing without dosing this for the time being. None of the corals are showing signs of distress and I don't have any SPS and very little LPS so I'm not super concerned atm.

Removed the center chamber filter from the tank (long overdue, the foam had begun to clog and cause issues with water levels) and set up a small refugium. Just a cheap amazon light and some chaeto. I did have some phosphate levels without dosing yesterday so I'll be keeping an eye on that. I've been exclusively feeding pellet food so I may be able to start doing 50/50 frozen/pellets. All about finding that balance.

Coral growth, the new stuff is all staying open and looks good. The scrambled egg zoas are starting to spread, noticed 5-6 new heads on it with is good! I'll keep replacing the frag plug I have beside it and trading/giving the new frags away.

Next purchase for me are some frag racks. I have a few I'm eyeballing now but am also attending the Memphis show next month which should have some good deals. Time to wait and see!

 

[EastonsReef]

Weekly Update - New Clown, Flow, and Gluing Frags

Phosphates are starting to rise so swapping back to feeding a majority of frozen foods. The longer I'm in this hobby the more I understand the issues with small tanks, starting to throw some ideas around for next tank.

On Tuesday I added a new addition to the tank, a small picasso clown. I'd been playing with the idea of adding a second for a while now and the price/appearance of this one won me over. The introduction could have gone smoother but at almost a week in the tank the clowns are friendly but I'm not sure I'd considered them "paired". Time will tell.

I did reglue a frag and was a little ambitious with the glue. Looks terrible at the moment and I may not be able to handle the appearance.

I've not been happy with my flow and am suspicious that my return pump may be slightly clogged. It has some filtration media in the chamber that I'll most likely be removing. It's still the stock pump so will be adding a replacement pump to my "to-do" list. For now, I had a small spare pump that I've set up in the tank for now as a powerhead. Shifted the euphylia around slightly as a result.

One day the tank upgrades will be finished and I'll finally stop poking and prodding in the tank.

 

[EastonsReef]

Weekly Update - The Ich Menace

As the title suggests, dealing with a bit of ich in the tank. I did not QT any fish in this setup. I did so knowing I was taking a risk but, with a full livestock of only 3-4 fish, I decided to take the gamble and lost. It's not a bad outbreak and I'm treating the entire tank and feeding more. I think with the light treatment and keeping everyone's bellies full we'll make it through this fine. The clowns have not paired but tolerate each other, hopefully with time this changes.

Still playing with flow, I've shifted things around in the tank and added a frag rack. Alk is in the mid 8's (which has been my goal for a while) I'll roll my alk dosing back slightly as I aim for 9. Only parameters having issues still are calcium (and I'm assuming mag but haven't tested) but I'll continue to raise these levels via water change. (upped it to 30% this week) I did lose my larger clove polyps. I think detritus may have built up around the base and killed them as the smaller new growth on rock is fine.

 

[EastonsReef]

Weekly Update Pt1 - You thought it was ich but it was I, Brooklynella!
Weekly Update Pt2 - Corals on Corals on Corals

It has been an eventful two weeks for the tank. I'll go through the events briefly two parts:

Part 1 - Fish
On Oct 28th I went by my LFS where the owner surprised me with a free fish that was one my stocking list, a tailspot blenny. Being a free fish, I decided to risk it in the tank since the disease outbreak seemed minor. When I got home, the outbreak was not minor.
My original clown looked bad and, with the help of some great members here, was able to diagnose Brooks (potentially ich as well). Hospital tank was setup, clowns moved, and began a heavier treatment for them.
In primary tank, the blenny seemed to be settling in well but I found half his body less than 48 hours after adding. No sign of disease so I'm unsure of what happened.
I ended up losing the smaller of the clowns (also the culprit of these problems) the same day. I was then down to my 2 original fish.
Since then, I've continued treating the clown and monitoring the yasha. Both are looking good, the clown is under observation for 2-3 more weeks before going back in display. Yasha never showed any signs of disease so it looks like it missed them. I think I'm on the upward momentum on this and have learned my lesson on quarantines.

Part 2 - Coral
So there's been a lot of changes with coral the last few days. I lost my one head of utter chaos zoas, not sure exactly what happened (I have suspicions) but it's gone which is unfortunate. However, Friday, a local hobbyist called me with some free corals. I now have a grafted monti plate, what I think are GMK zoas, and a mystery encrusting (Maybe a cyphastrea).
Then, I had my first reef show on Saturday. I came home with a few things and have a few more that I'm holding for a friend while he's in the middle of a move. I didn't get names of everything but I got a replacement utter chaos, white zombie zoa, blue sky zoas, mystery lepto (I think it's a tan lady), mystery cyphastrea, mystery zoa/paly, and a montipora digitata (freebie from friend at show). So the tank is looking pretty full! Pictures inbound

I've swapped to dosing all for reef to work on my nutrient issues and am going to be investing in some more tank flow asap. It's wild that the number of corals have doubled in the tank so I will need to be on my game regarding parameters and maintenance.

 

[EastonsReef]

 

[Fishn28]

I've been thinking about setting my 13.5 up again this might be the thread to make me do it

looking great

 

[EastonsReef]

I've been thinking about setting my 13.5 up again this might be the thread to make me do it

looking great

Hearing that's encouraging you to set yours back up is a great compliment! Thank you

 

[EastonsReef]

Monthly Update - And then there was one...

It's been a tough few weeks for the tank and, between work and personal life, I've not been able to update as much as I'd like. I'm going to keep this short for the same reasons.

- On Corals I did lose my red monti cap. It was in a bad spot with the rack and I noticed too late. The monti digitata went to a new tank as it wasn't doing well in mine. Everything else is growing slowly, I'm still having Calc issues but have ordered Salifert tests instead of API. Need something a bit more reliable.
-On Fish I unfortunately lost the Yasha two weeks ago. It did what they do and found a gap to jump. Definitely hurts as I looked forward to seeing him every evening. I added a Fire Shrimp a few days prior and I'm guessing it spooked it but no way to know. Clownfish has moved back into the tank from QT so, in a way, I'm back to where I was on Month 2. I'll be getting a new Yasha and Tail Spot blenny at some point but I'm not rushing anything, will be investing in a new lid before that.
-On Equipment I did add a cheap cheap powerhead for flow (like 10$). It took some dialing in but is working to add a little flow for the torch. I'll be replacing this in the future.

Looking to the future, I'm starting to run low on space and have been looking at upgrading sizes. I said I would run this tank for a year before doing so and I'm only 1/2 through that so we'll see. Losing 3/4 fish I've added to the tank is humbling but I'm learning from the experience and will do what I can to prevent making the same mistake twice.