Erk's Attempt at a Reef

erk · Jun 21, 2019

I've noticed a trend over the past couple months. A couple days before my weekly water change certain corals, specifically hard corals, begin to look a bit down. After the water change they rebound. Finally decided to test potassium as I noticed the season's greeting monti test frag I added is very slowly fading and from online research potassium is one of the observed reasons for this fading. Found that potassium was sitting at 380 ppm per Salifert test. Will dose it back up to 420 ppm to give me wiggle room. Soft corals are growing quickly and surprisingly so is the goniopora I got from UC's anniversary live sale. Since the live sale it has grown many new polyps with new buds showing up weekly.

Jon Fishman · Jun 21, 2019

I'm terrible at testing, but I do what you do..... things look off, I test some stuff!

erk · Jul 3, 2019

Replaced the Coral+ bulbs with 6500K grow bulbs. Didn't like the look of the tank being too blue. Been awhile since I checked PAR, so I might break out the sensor and take some readings.

Got a lot of gorgonian frags I plan to take in for store credit. Also need to frag the eagle eyes to slow them down a bit. Want to leave some area for my newer zoas to grow. Probably need to frag the toadstool as well. Only had it a couple months and it is very large. Same as the nephthea.

LPS are happy and growing. I've tried keeping goniopora in the past with no real success, but the latest frags I purchased are growing very quickly. The frag I purchased from the UC Anniversary live sale months ago has around 15 or more new polyps with many small buds showing up. Purchased a green eye red goni that is super happy and growing new polyps a couple weeks ago. As of this entry, I am dosing 38mL of two part daily. Not sure who is consuming more, coralline algae or coral.

I keep testing SPS frags to see if I can keep them or not. So far only moderate success. Maybe in a couple more months. Only want to keep some montipora or birdsnest. Really want to keep setosa again.

Bubble algae has cropped up. Growing super fast too. I think I need to buy some more emerald crabs. Haven't seen the ones I originally purchased in awhile. I think they became a snack for the melanurus.

Aiptasia is slowly dying out. I've spotted the berghia nudibranchs I added several months ago a couple times. They are big now. Guess they are doing their job. My ORA Aiptasia eating filefish doesn't touch any Aiptasia.

The NPS softie, not sure if it is dendronephthea or something else, has been looking better. When I originally added it to the tank it was open and happy. Then a month or so later it shriveled up and seemed to be rotting. I think this period of decline was due to my issues with flow.

My gyre xf150 died and so I had to use some stand in power heads while I figured out what to replace it with. Then after I replaced it with a pair of controllable Tunzes, the mp10 that provided cross flow had to be taken down. The ceramic coating on the prop shaft cracked and jammed the prop. Now I just have two Tunze 6055 controlled via a 7097 pulsing to create a wave/gyre in the tank. Really like the flow in the tank and corals seemed to like it as well. Heck, the fish are even out more.

najer · Jul 5, 2019

Sounds like it is doing very well.

I have been getting into nps recently, 2 questions, what are your nitrates and phosphates at and how do you do your gorg frags please, I need to do some?!

erk · Jul 5, 2019

najer said:
Sounds like it is doing very well.
I have been getting into nps recently, 2 questions, what are your nitrates and phosphates at and how do you do your gorg frags please, I need to do some?!

NO3 is down to 2.5 ppm per Salifert. PO4 at .15 ppm per Hanna ULR. I'm currently dosing 2.1mL of vodka per day, going to lower it to the sustainment dose soon. Might give it another week.

For fragging gorgs I just cut them with a pair of scissors. The thicker branches take some effort. The LFS I take them to prefers I don't mount them. But when I do mount them, I use two part epoxy. I make a little cone, hole in the top. Then I scrape the flesh away from the base and stick into the hole. Healthy frags heal in a day or so. Everything I cut a couple days ago has healed up and starting to grow again.

erk · Jul 6, 2019

I made a bunch of frags tonight. 8 large frags of eagle eye zoas. 20 or so frags of various gorgs. Should get about $100 worth of credit from my LFS when I trade them in tomorrow. Also going to trade in some gear I don't use anymore. 2 eheim professional canister filters, a large UV filter, and 36" 4 bulb T5 fixture. Going to use the credit to buy salt and maybe some other goodies.

erk · Jul 6, 2019

Noticed that the SPS I add, specifically "easy" SPS, i.e. encrusting monti and birdsnest, tend to bleach over the course of a week or more. They don't STN or RTN. Just slowly fade. I don't think anything is wrong with my numbers since LPS and such are growing, but the LPS I put into partial or direct shade. The SPS I stick on the sand bed in direct light. I stuck a season's greeting monti into direct shade after about a week of it slowly bleaching and it seemed to be coming back. Stuck it back into direct light and it started fading again. Purchased a birdsnest a week ago, placed it on the sand bed and it has had PE the whole time, but bleaching on the branches facing the light. Underside of branches are still good. Retained PE the whole time.

Been reading to see if maybe my lighting is actually too strong. My PAR readings with a 3 year old Apogee SQ-120-SS wouldn't seem too high. Sand bed ranges from 100-150. Top shelf reads 200-250. But the way the corals are acting would imply differently. If I stick the LPS into the direct light, they also react negatively. Lost several before, but I thought it was other issues. I know the lighting is strong because my zoas grow very close to the rock work, even on the sand bed. I think I'm going to try and "calibrate" my PAR sensor. Maybe if I can take it outside around noon in full sun and see what it reads. Should read 400mV on the DMM.

From what I read, a 6 bulb T5 fixture should be enough light for a reef tank. I have 6 bulb and two Lumia 5.2 pucks. Recently swapped out the coral+ bulbs for 6500K bulbs. Like the warmer color better. I have been running my T5s for 12 hours a day, going to shorten that down to 10 hrs starting tomorrow. Will run that way a week or two and see what happens. I have a black light flashlight and will monitor florescence of the corals. From a Dana Riddle talk, he discussed that coral fluorescence, specifically polyps, increases as photosynthesis decreases. Have noticed that the SPS I put in the tank tend to glow very brightly under the black light just before they start to die.

Another observation is that the neon green goni I have inflates really big early in the morning and stays like this for most of the day, but the last several hours of the T5 period it stays extended, but wilted looking. Not sure if this is the lighting or not. The red goni doesn't deflate as much, but does look less inflated. Maybe getting too much light. Have a Psammacora that I had in partial light and it started to bleach. Moved into full shade and it has grown a good amount.

Might buy a lux meter just to compare to the PAR meter.

Sorry to those reading my posts. I know they ramble on, but I use my build thread as a journal.

NY_Caveman · Jul 6, 2019

erk said:
Sorry to those reading my posts. I know they ramble on, but I use my build thread as a journal.

Nah, it is great to see how other reefer’s minds work.

erk · Jul 6, 2019

Just got back from my LFS. Got about $200 worth of store credit and used $82 bucks before I left. Bought a couple different things to test out the tank and see what I can keep. Got to talking with the staff there and they agree with me, based on the info I provided, that I'm providing too much light to my corals. Turns out 12 hrs of T5 is a bit too much. I got their lighting schedule, LED for 12 hrs and 4-6 hrs of T5. I'll start with 6 hrs of T5.

I'm very confused because the Apogee PAR sensor is telling me 250 max at the water surface directly below my lights that are 12 inches about the water. 6 T5 bulbs, two of which are 6500K, and two Lumia 5.2 pucks with all 5 channels at about 50%. PAR level of 100 on the sand bed in a 40B. I really need to see what this sensor says in full sun. I have a lux meter coming to use as a backup/comparison. I know I can grow corals because several hard corals are growing and my 2 part consumption has increased a great deal. I just don't have enough cave space for all my corals if I'm going to leave my light as it is

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erk · Jul 7, 2019

I took my Apogee PAR sensor outside to see what it would read in the direct sunlight. In direct sun, I was getting a reading of 356-357 mV max. Should be 400mV. Based on this, I'd estimate the water surface is somewhere between a PAR level of 400-500. This makes sense considering how much light I have over the top of the tank. Now the question is do I reduce this or leave it. Per the talk Dana Riddle gave in 2016, the porites in the talk only needed 100-200. I'm certainly giving more than that. I just got a Lux meter and tried it. At the water surface I'm getting 25000 LUX. Not going to try and convert this to PAR, but makes me think my 400-500 might be low as well. Gonna try and reduce my LEDs a bit and get the 25000 down to 20000.

I can send the Apogee sensor in for calibration, but I'm not sure if I want to. It's a minimum of $65.

erk · Jul 7, 2019

Something interesting to note, my zoas and palys are more open today. Some had started to take on a dome shape, which I thought was due to lack of light. Seems I was wrong and it was too much light. The ones that were showing the dome shape are flattening out. Glad I finally figured this out. I was afraid I was going to lose some really cool looking zoas. Even my gorgonians look happier.

Thinking back to when this started, I replaced the Lumia 5.2 pucks with new ones and replaced the cheap T5 ballasts with Fulham ones. I didn't think I had done much of a change, but I guess it substantially increased the amount of light I was giving the tank, even with the fixture 12 inches off the water. Fixture is now at 16 inches.

erk · Jul 7, 2019

Decided to reduce the photo period to 10 hrs total, 4 hrs of T5 in the middle of the day. The bubble gum digi I added yesterday had great PE until the last hour or so of the T5 period. T5 period was 6 hours. The last hour the polyps closed up. Will see how it does tomorrow.

NY_Caveman · Jul 8, 2019

erk said:
I can send the Apogee sensor in for calibration, but I'm not sure if I want to. It's a minimum of $65.

It is a pain, but I say do it. Your tank is so nice, you should strive for the best possible tools.

erk · Jul 8, 2019

NY_Caveman said:
It is a pain, but I say do it. Your tank is so nice, you should strive for the best possible tools.

I think I'll email them and see what can be done. I checked the original cal date and it was in 2015. If it costs less than $100 then I'll probably pull the trigger.

erk · Jul 11, 2019

Talked with Apogee and they can try to recal my SQ-120. Might get it cal to an SQ-110 so I can use it for my orchids.

Received my order from LA. Ordered blue flasher, plakat betta, setosa frag, and stylo frag. Got a refund on the stylo before it shipped because it was damaged and couldn't be shipped. Released the flasher from acclimation this evening. Ate some frozen and is looking good. Setosa has had PE since day 1.

Alk has risen since adjusting the lighting schedule. Corals adjusting to the new lights. I'll have to monitor alk closely for the next week or so. Corals looking good otherwise. Birdsnest is healing up since bleaching due to the previous light schedule. Many of my soft corals that I thought were happy are looking better than ever before and responding with increased growth.

erk · Jul 13, 2019

I typically look at the tank with a flash light a couple times a week. I use a UV flashlight as well as a standard. Noticed a ton of sponge growth. I've always had sponges, typically the white fungus looking type, growing, but tonight I've noticed the rock work is infested with the stuff. Not too noticable with the lights on, but definitely with the lights off.

My pair of bangaii cardinals are going to town eating something in the water column. Not sure what they eating. I'm guessing pods. Maybe fish larvae. My scissortail damsels almost continuously spawn. Maybe some of the eggs are hatching. I find it interesting that they are active at night. Didn't realize they are nocturnal.

erk · Jul 15, 2019

Did my weekly testing this evening. NO3 was 2 ppm last week, this week it is 5 ppm. PO4 was .144 ppm last week, .227 ppm this week. Not sure the source of this rise in nutrient levels. I'm wondering if the bubble algae is beginning to die. I had a bit of a bubble algae take over, I've noticed the growth has slowed/come to a stop. No fish or invert deaths. Guess I'll just keep an eye on things. Here are some long over due pics.

I'm annoyed with this FTS. Should've shot at a higher speed. I'll take a better pic soon.

erk · Jul 15, 2019

A better front shot. The previous one bothered me.

And a straight on FTS for good measure.

erk · Jul 18, 2019

Sent PAR sensor to Apogee for calibration. Having it calibrated to the SQ-110 standard. This way I can eventually use it for my orchids.

Had to add a frag rack to the tank. Didn't want to do this. My melanurus wrasse has been on a rampage lately. Won't leave the corals on the sand bed alone. Keeps throwing them around and it has had an effect on the corals. Not looking very happy. Alk consumption has dropped as well. I attribute this to me having to stick my hands in the tank several times a day to flip the corals back over. I don't know what to do. Don't want to get rid of the wrasse as I've had him for about 3 years now.