Felicia's 40B Mixed-Reef Predator Tank

[FeliciaLynn]

FTS 8/12/15

Fu Manchu Lionfish (Dendrochirus biocellatus) - Mushu


Dwarf Zebra Lionfish (Dendrochirus zebra) - Draco


Antennata Lionfish (Pterois antennata)


Specifications

Tank

• 40g Breeder Tetra glass aquarium (36"W x 18"D x 17"H)
• Drilled 700 gph Glass Holes overflow kit and 3/4" return kit
• Aqueon black pine stand

Rock and Sand

• 28 lbs of KPA cured live rock
• 10 lbs Real Reef rock
• 40 lbs of CaribSea Arag-Alive Fiji Pink sand

Lighting

• Maxspect R420R (Razor) 27" 160 watt 16k

Flow

• 2 Vortech MP10's

Filtration

• Sump - 20g long Tetra aquarium (30"W x 12"D x 12"H); Jebao DC-3000 return pump
• 4" Felt Filter Sock
• Phosban 150 Media Reactor with TLF NPX Biopellets
• Reef Octopus NWB110 skimmer
• Refugium with chaetomorphia, rubble rock, and Maxspect Razor Nano 10K light

Heating

• 125 Watt Eheim Jager Heater
• Finnex Max-300 Digital Aquarium Heater Controller

Auto Top-Off

• JBJ ATO Water Level Controller
• Tom Aqua Lifter Vacuum Pump

Dosing

• Jebao DP-4
  • Channel 1: Acropower
  • Channel 2: B-Ionic Mg
  • Channel 3: B-Ionic Ca
  • Channel 4: B-Ionic Alk

RO/DI System

• BRS 5 Stage RO/DI System
• Purtrex 5 micron sediment filter
• Catalytic carbon
• ChlorPlus 10 carbon block
• 75 GPD Dow Filmtec membrane
• DI resin (color-changing)

Livestock

Fish

• Fu Manchu Lionfish (Dendrochirus biocellatus) - Mushu
• Dwarf Zebra Lionfish (Dendrochirus zebra) - Draco
• Antennata Lionfish (Pterois antennata)
• Snowflake Eel (Echidna nebulosa) - Falkor
• Blue Star Leopard Wrasse (Macropharyngodon bipartitus)
• Darwin Ocellaris Clownfish (male) (Amphiprion ocellaris)
• Standard Ocellaris Clownfish (female) (Amphiprion ocellaris)

Inverts

• 2 Fighting Conchs
• Squamosa Clam (from Gena May 27, 2015)
• Squamosa Clam (purchased Oct. 2013)
• Tiger Derasa Clam (purchased March 2014)
• Turbo snails
• 2 ruby red mithrax crabs
• 2 serpent starfish
• Scarlet and blue leg hermit crabs

Sump Design






History
7/16/15

7/5/15

6/23/15


5/28/15

3/22/15


2/19/15

 

[FeliciaLynn]

Here are a bunch of the latest photos of the tank.

Let's start with the newest FTS!




Left side




Center


Right side

 

[FeliciaLynn]

Ok, so let's continue with some photos of the fishies.

First off, Falkor the eel!




He really loves the clams!




And a photo showing how long Falkor is!


Alright, now for the lions!
Draco was being his usual photogenic self.






The antennata


Mushu


Time for some photos of the newest addition, the blue star leopard wrasse!
She's really settled in and has been doing really well and is eating good! Its too bad she's just super hard to photograph because she moves so fast and she's still a bit shy if I'm up against the tank.








And finally some members of the CUC.
Blue leg hermit on a gorg.


One of the fighting conchs and the giant red mithrax crab.

 

[FeliciaLynn]

Ok now its time for shots of the corals!

German blue digi, micromussas, and the fox coral.


The micromussas.


Bali green slimer with the german blue digi below.


Side shot of SPS island. There are a few pieces that had partial die off or that browned out during shipment, so looking a bit ragged, but everything is doing really well and recovering nicely!


Duncan


Pretty Hawaiian zoas and magicians.


The clowns in their BTA castle.


Gorgs galore!!!






Giant squamosa clam has been in the tank 3 months now and is doing great!


Check out the growth rim on the little squammy! Its trying to catch up to the big one!

 

[FeliciaLynn]

Ok, and to finish out the photoshoot, I also snapped some top-downs! I turned the return pump off for these, which makes the lionfish and eel think its time for food, so all the fish were up at the water surface begging

Piggies!

The antennata


Draco is such a ham! Falkor photobomb!




Mushu


Part of the left side.


The duncan colony.


Blue sponge and a bunch of the acros.


Full view of SPS land. Again, a lot of these are still coloring up or recovery from some shipping die off. Should look awesome once they all get their color and it starts to grow in!


Clams!


Clownfish and their rainbow nems

 

[FeliciaLynn]

And finally a video of the tank!
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[philfree]

Nice system!
Love it!!!

 

[FeliciaLynn]

Nice system!
Love it!!!

Thank you!

 

[iyad_nadi]

Very cool tank

 

[FeliciaLynn]

Very cool tank

Thanks so much!

 

[jlanger]

Beautiful tank!
Looks much bigger than a 40Br; much bigger!
A predator reef is a great idea!

I have a R420R fixture on my newly set up Fluval M60. And I have a couple of questions; if you don't mind.
What are your feelings about this fixture? And can you share your lighting schedule?
Your pictures are fantastic. Do you change the light's settings during photography so the pictures don't look so blue?
Thanks.

 

[FeliciaLynn]

Thank you! I had a 30 gallon before this and it was about the same dimensions, but only 13" deep. The extra 5" of depth on the 40B really makes it look a lot bigger. I'm really loving the dimensions of it! Glad you like the predators! I'm really enjoying them as a change of pace of the run of the mill reef fish that will fit in a 40B.

I really enjoy the razor light. I don't have any complaints. For the price its very sleek, easy to program, and has all the features I need. I feel like I get good coral growth and color from it too. I do change the light when I'm taking photos, because I just do my photography with my iPhone. There's not a really good way to correct white balance on the iPhone, so it picks up everything WAY more blue than it appears to the eye in person. So what I do is just change the light setting until the photos with my iPhone closely match what I see with my eyes on the normal light setting.

My lighting schedule is roughly (trying to do this from memory):
Midnight to 1:30 pm - A: 0% and B: 0%
3:00 pm - A: 40% and B: 60%
4:00 pm to 10:00 pm - A: 90% and B: 100%
11:00 pm - A: 0% and B: 60%
12 am - A: 0% and B: 0%

 

[Jizu Puentes]

Wow this tank is only 6 months old?!?! I love the coral layout. How long will the eel fit in there?

 

[Philt56]

Nice, but that snowflake will soon outgrow it! I had to switch to a 100 gal from a 30 to accommodate my eel then. Also what are you feeding them? My snowflake was very active when food was around, is he too competitive for the lions?

 

[FeliciaLynn]

Wow this tank is only 6 months old?!?! I love the coral layout. How long will the eel fit in there?

Well some of the corals and clams and rock moved over from my previous tank. This tank was an upgrade, so it started out with some more mature corals. I'm sure that helped in making it look so grown in at only 6 months.

My eel is pretty tiny. He's about 10" long but he isn't very big around and his mouth is pretty small. I've had him for 3 months now and haven't seen any noticeable growth, so I'd say I've got a while before I have to worry. I'd say a year or even more. From what I read, they'll basically eat endlessly if you let them and then they'll grow very fast. However in the wild, most predators like eels only eat 2-3 times per week. I'm sticking to that schedule with the eel so he doesn't grow too fast.

Nice, but that snowflake will soon outgrow it! I had to switch to a 100 gal from a 30 to accommodate my eel then. Also what are you feeding them? My snowflake was very active when food was around, is he too competitive for the lions?

Well he's been in there for 3 months, and I haven't seen any noticeable growth, so I think I have a while. I know he will eventually, but as I said above, I think not over feeding them is the key to keeping them from growing too fast.

My eel is very active at feeding time, but I hand feed all the lions and the eel with feeding tongs, so they all get their fair share of food.

 

[FeliciaLynn]

Oh and I feed the eel silversides, PE mysis, and frozen krill right now. I'm planning to start going to the seafood market and getting a variety of fresh seafood and then chopping it up into chunks and dividing into individual portions that I can freeze. I want to get more variety for the predators.

 

[Ssminnow81]

Awesome tank

 

[vm70]

That's a very original setup, so many corals in a predator tank! And all looking fantastic! Are you planning to add more predator fish species?
I love the photosynthetic gorgs collection! If you don't mind, could you please mention the species? (I think I only recognize two of them).

What are the water parameters? How do you keep phosphate low for such healthy Acropora coloration and polyp extension?
Do you perform water changes?

 

[FeliciaLynn]

Awesome tank

Thank you so much!

That's a very original setup, so many corals in a predator tank! And all looking fantastic! Are you planning to add more predator fish species?
I love the photosynthetic gorgs collection! If you don't mind, could you please mention the species? (I think I only recognize two of them).

What are the water parameters? How do you keep phosphate low for such healthy Acropora coloration and polyp extension?
Do you perform water changes?

Thank you! I wanted to do something different! There's really no reason that the lionfish and eels can't be in a reef environment as long as there are no small fish or inverts for them to eat. They don't bother the corals and all and its nice to see them swimming about in a more natural habitat.

I 'm not going to add any more species because my tank is maxed out on bioload and space right now. I'm probably already a bit overstocked with 3 lionfish, a snowflake eel, 2 clownfish, and a leopard wrasse in a 40 breeder. Luckily my tank seems to handle this bioload really well, so I don't want to upset that balance by adding anything else!

I'm glad you like the gorgonians. I bought them all from KP Aquatics. Here's the list of common names and the scientific names if I know them for what I have. I also listed their location in my tank so you can figure out which is which from my full tank shots.
1) Angular sea whip (aka purple ribbon gorgonian) (Pterogorgia anceps) - right side in front of nepthea leather
2) Knobby sea rod (genus Eunicea) - just to the left of the large squamosa clam
3) Purple sea feather (Pseudopterogorgia sp.) - right side just behind the nepthea leather
4) Yellow sea feather (Pseudopterogorgia sp.) - far left side behind the frogspawn
5) Purple plume gorgonian (Muriceopsis flavida) - far right side in front of the big green toadstool
6) Purple sea rod (Plexaura flexuosa) - very far left in the front

My water parameters have been staying stable at:
Alk: 8.1
Ca: 430
Mg: 1410
PO4: 0 to 0.03
NO3: 5
SG: 1.025
Temp.: 79 F

I do a 10 gallon water change about once every 2 weeks. I was originally doing a 10 gallon water change once a week, but realized that every 2 weeks is sufficient to maintain my water parameters. I have a skimmer that is rated for a 100 gallons and a TLF 150 media reactor running the TLF NPX biopellets. I was having a lot of nitrate issues at the beginning with the predator fish, but when I added the biopellet reactor, I was able to get them down from 25-50 to being pretty stable between water changes at 5. I think this is a perfect level because its low enough to not bother my SPS corals, but there's still enough nutrients in the water to keep the clams and other filter feeders (sponges, gorgs, etc) happy. I really think the biopellet reactor was the perfect addition for a predator tank and keeps everything in a really nice balance! I don't run any GFO for phosphates, but the biopellet reactor does help remove a small amount of phosphates. According to the Redfield ratio, for each 16 parts of nitrate removed, 1 part of phosphate will be removed. Since I have a lot of nitrates to remove and my phosphates were never really high, this works out really well for my tank.

 

[steve&mari]

Gorgeous setup I hope our 40b reef looks as nice one day.