Trillaman954
Active Member
Was wondering if it was possible to keep a single eel in a 20 gallon hexagon. It would literally just be the scape and the eel with nothing else. Is there any species that I would be able to keep long term?
Eel in 20 gallon hex
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MantisShrimpMan
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If you’re really wanting to do this, my suggestion would be going for eel-like nano fish, like a curious wormfish. While you might find some small snowflake morays at a store, they’ll outgrow a 20 in no time, probably within a month, and hence any moray or ribbon eel would be a really bad idea.
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Trillaman954
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cool so the idea is dead. I saw a snow flake eel and that’s what gave me the idea. But google says they get 39inches…that’s huge. I just got a new tank so want to do something cool to the hex.
MantisShrimpMan
Active Member
what size is your new tank?
If you could turn the hex into a slowly tumbling ball of macroalgae, you could make for a visually stunning display refugium plumbed into the larger tank?
I am not an expert on refugium sizes, but I’d imagine that, while a 20G fuge is a LOT, this could maybe be alright for something as small as like 50-75 gallons provided you don’t LOAD it with chaeto and a bright light
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Trillaman954
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Cool butt idea. It’s a 32 biocube with the stand. I can do like a cool neon light strip theme around the doors and a nice fuge light. Let me check if it fits. I have a mandarin so it will love it!
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Trillaman954
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Just measured it. And it fits in the biocube 32 stand with the doors closed. Ima do this! Make it a five tank with hellla micro algae. Now I can add more mandarins to the 32. It’s the top fin 20 gallon hex btw. Thx broski
MantisShrimpMan
Active Member
My only concern with a main DT that small would be whether or not the Chaeto completely chokes out the nutrients. But if that’s the case, you can resort to adding more nutrients, so it could end up being like, REQUIRED that you add more fish and livestock, otherwise you might just be totally incapable of keeping corals happy if the chaeto can zero out your nitrates and phosphates so easily.
Also, I’m not a copepods expert nor do I have direct experience with a mandarin, but it’s my understanding even a single mandarin will be a LOT for the copepod population of a nano tank to handle. And I’m not sure to what extent having a fuge actually changes that- because they’re not hunting in the chaeto, the pods will only be slowly trickled out to the mandarin, versus their availability when they’re already living in rocks in the DT. My point being, I don’t think this is an ample reason to get MORE mandarins in such a small tank, I’d assume you’re pushing your luck with one as it is.
Lastly, I’d suggest finding a way to make the fuge visible without opening the stand! My point was that the hexagon, with proper flow to turn a ball of chaeto, would be an incredibly unique form factor for a display fuge. So whether it’s hacking open one of the doors and giving a viewport to the fuge from the outside, something like that, I think would look dope.
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Trillaman954
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Ok so the mandarin tank idea is dead. I’ll just keep the 1 I have. And if it chokes out nutrients then I guess it will be leaning more towards an sps dominated tank? I have 2 ai primes. I can dose and maybe set up an auto doser on the biocube kf need be. But I like the hex idea of a fuge because it gives me the option to keep my tank and use it for later when i have more room to do a hex tank again. And it does fit the the doors of the stand closed which is perfect. But will the nutrient export of the chaeto be that detrimental to the growth of a mixed reef? And if chaeto is a problem can’t I mitigate it with a macro that pulls “less”?
MantisShrimpMan
Active Member
I took this pic at a local reefers house the other day, he has a multi thousand gallon setup divided between a bunch of tanks, he grows out Corals for money, but here’s where I got the idea from:
A 55 gallon drum connected to his sump that acted solely as a fuge. Obviously you can’t tell by the photo but those diagonal pipes are adding flow that keep the chaeto tumbling clockwise. Seeing a side shot of this, I get the sense would be sick.
For what it’s worth, while his sps do pretty good, he has a hard time keeping zoas their happiest given just how clean that fuge keeps his entire system.
Although, if I’m being completely honest, based on your “so that idea is dead” I get the sense you’re a very new reefer?
Sure, you might be able to pull off this fuge concept with a HOB overflow, but I’d argue that you’d be far better off with a drilled overflow, whether internal or external, and that’s not something I’d consider to be a casual experience for a beginner. It might make more sense to simply keep the hex tank on hand for when you’re ready for some new project in the future, but prioritize learning the basics within your biocube?
I’m only at about a year into the hobby and I’ve spent all 12 months of that in the same position that you’re in. Like “ok how about this idea for a tank theme? Scratch that. How about this one?”
It is obviously ridiculously fun but you’ll end up honing in on specifics instead of learning the most about the basics. I’d think you’d be better off with a theme less, normal reef in your biocube and figuring out what works and what doesn’t. I think the 2 AI primes should throw off more than enough par in an interesting spread that will allow you to accomplish one heck of a mixed reef, so pursue that instead of honing in on like, one eel, or only mandarins. I say this because my first thought was “garden eel garden” and I never followed that through. I also wanted a seagrass bed tank… never followed that either. IME you learn a lot more from following the standard progression and thus encountering the regular issues, than you do by focusing on something super uncommon or niche
A 55 gallon drum connected to his sump that acted solely as a fuge. Obviously you can’t tell by the photo but those diagonal pipes are adding flow that keep the chaeto tumbling clockwise. Seeing a side shot of this, I get the sense would be sick.
For what it’s worth, while his sps do pretty good, he has a hard time keeping zoas their happiest given just how clean that fuge keeps his entire system.
Although, if I’m being completely honest, based on your “so that idea is dead” I get the sense you’re a very new reefer?
Sure, you might be able to pull off this fuge concept with a HOB overflow, but I’d argue that you’d be far better off with a drilled overflow, whether internal or external, and that’s not something I’d consider to be a casual experience for a beginner. It might make more sense to simply keep the hex tank on hand for when you’re ready for some new project in the future, but prioritize learning the basics within your biocube?
I’m only at about a year into the hobby and I’ve spent all 12 months of that in the same position that you’re in. Like “ok how about this idea for a tank theme? Scratch that. How about this one?”
It is obviously ridiculously fun but you’ll end up honing in on specifics instead of learning the most about the basics. I’d think you’d be better off with a theme less, normal reef in your biocube and figuring out what works and what doesn’t. I think the 2 AI primes should throw off more than enough par in an interesting spread that will allow you to accomplish one heck of a mixed reef, so pursue that instead of honing in on like, one eel, or only mandarins. I say this because my first thought was “garden eel garden” and I never followed that through. I also wanted a seagrass bed tank… never followed that either. IME you learn a lot more from following the standard progression and thus encountering the regular issues, than you do by focusing on something super uncommon or niche
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Trillaman954
Active Member
I’m not trying to make it difficult that’s why lol. If it does t work there’s no point in spending the mental energy. I can just save it for later when I’m ready since I’m a new reefer, I have a lot to learn. Btw what type of fish is that on your pfp?I took this pic at a local reefers house the other day, he has a multi thousand gallon setup divided between a bunch of tanks, he grows out Corals for money, but here’s where I got the idea from:
A 55 gallon drum connected to his sump that acted solely as a fuge. Obviously you can’t tell by the photo but those diagonal pipes are adding flow that keep the chaeto tumbling clockwise. Seeing a side shot of this, I get the sense would be sick.
For what it’s worth, while his sps do pretty good, he has a hard time keeping zoas their happiest given just how clean that fuge keeps his entire system.
Although, if I’m being completely honest, based on your “so that idea is dead” I get the sense you’re a very new reefer?
Sure, you might be able to pull off this fuge concept with a HOB overflow, but I’d argue that you’d be far better off with a drilled overflow, whether internal or external, and that’s not something I’d consider to be a casual experience for a beginner. It might make more sense to simply keep the hex tank on hand for when you’re ready for some new project in the future, but prioritize learning the basics within your biocube?
I’m only at about a year into the hobby and I’ve spent all 12 months of that in the same position that you’re in. Like “ok how about this idea for a tank theme? Scratch that. How about this one?”
It is obviously ridiculously fun but you’ll end up honing in on specifics instead of learning the most about the basics. I’d think you’d be better off with a theme less, normal reef in your biocube and figuring out what works and what doesn’t. I think the 2 AI primes should throw off more than enough par in an interesting spread that will allow you to accomplish one heck of a mixed reef, so pursue that instead of honing in on like, one eel, or only mandarins. I say this because my first thought was “garden eel garden” and I never followed that through. I also wanted a seagrass bed tank… never followed that either. IME you learn a lot more from following the standard progression and thus encountering the regular issues, than you do by focusing on something super uncommon or niche
MantisShrimpMan
Active Member
It’s a red rooster Pygmy waspfish, paracentrogon zonatus. I had been reading up on them while I was away from my tank during winter break last year and when I returned to school in January, my tank (which I had set up in November and was only holding some inverts at the time) was done cycling, looking great, AND my local store had one of these in stock when I got back. I went for it pretty much instantly.
Mine must have had some kinda internal parasite, it only lasted about 2.5 weeks and in the back half it was acting weird. Also, I’ve heard varied stories, but my personal one was super picky. Didn’t eat live brine, didn’t eat liquid mysis, I finally got him to eat with live blackworms. Admittedly, that made him a bit of work compared to feeding a normal fish, but man was it fun to watch him feed. Within the two weeks he learned to recognize that a pipette entering the aquarium meant his food, and when the blackworms came in contact with saltwater and started having osmotic shock seizures, he’d be super excited by the squirming and his predatory ambush behavior would come out. Seeing a venomous ambush predator like that get all excited and dart throughout your tank to swallow blackworms whole is quite the satisfying experience.
Even in spite of having a bad experience with the one I had, I’d be willing to try again for sure. Red rooster waspfish are really really cool critters.
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Trillaman954
Active Member
My mandarin eat like a horse. I made this for it. And I throw tigs in there occasionally. I’ve noticed some really big ones when I look closely and it’s been working for several months now.
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Trillaman954
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MantisShrimpMan
Active Member
Oh wow very cool
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