Reefy nano!

[EagleEye121]

IME it’s normal. Mine were undetectable for a long time until I started dosing NO3 and PO4 to battle dinos. Phosphates can bind up in live rock until the rock basically has no more room, at which point it will release back into the water column and show up on tests.

Try to keep your nutrient level low but not 0 for extended periods of time. 0 nutrients can open the door for dinos to take over and that’s not a problem you want to have - trust me!

 

[154162]

@EagleEye121 thanks! Yah was thinking it might need to build up!

Speaking about avoiding Dino’s... I have been researching adding biodiversity to my tank as I started with dry liferock (I was scared of adding bad critters with live rock)
But what I found a lot of people saying that people with live rock didn’t have nearly as many problems with Dino’s compared to people that start with dry rock...
anyway I’m thinking about adding a small piece of live rock now, hopefully get some good hitchhikers with it...

 

[EagleEye121]

Certainly not a bad idea. That and you could even grab a scoop of sand from an established tank.

 

[154162]

Good call on the sand, kinda Maximizing what I can bring over, I’ll talk to my LFS

 

[Sandalio]

Hi there, new to saltwater as well! I used to be in freshwater along time ago. Your setup looks great! I plan on getting the same tank, and looking on lighting options, I’d like to keep the lid as well, but I love your lightning setup, I definitely want to go more purple colors in mine as well. May I ask where you got your glo- light strips from and which TrueLumen option you went for I am seeing different color options? Thanks again!

 

[154162]

@Sandalio welcome!
Yeap I kept the lid on, I got warn you though, you will easily see you tank rise up to 82-83F, during full peak of lights, the stock lights run really hot! And lid doesn’t help. I bought an inkbird temp controller (fail safe for the heater, but also kicks in the fan when it goes above 79) for now the fan clips on to glass on the back panel so I have to take off the the back lid, but I’m going to try and find a better fan, and better way to point a fan through the feeding hole and not have it look ugly... maybe in winter it won’t be so bad!
Anyway as long as your fine with that, I went with two 12” truelumen actinic (all blue) you need a splitter and a power supply for those. And the glo light is From glo fish, it’s for those glo up fish, it’s nothing special but it add a nice touch (you won’t really notice it when the full lights are on, but when you dim the full lights or switch to just the truelumen it looks nice) also just so you know you can dimm the stock light and the true lumen strips with a timer dimmer like nicrew but the glo lights will emit a weird High pitch sinewave sound when you dim, they are not meant to be dimmed! I had it on hand, so it didn’t cost anything, maybe some cheap waterproof led strips would work too! I have the 55 gallon version it gives you two strips, I just super glued all the strips to the lid nice and easy
Here is the link

 

[Sandalio]

@ash1176 Thanks so much I’m actually in a unique situation where unfortunately the only place I can place my aquarium will be in front of my A/C window unit, but no direct sunlight. (also live in the basement) was possibly worried about it getting too cold so I may end up having a balance. It’s definitely something I want to try out atleast. I definitely want that nice purple glow and really want to atleast try it out.

 

[154162]

Was away Friday and Saturday night, came back to a half empty return chamber, nothing bad happened, and salinity didn’t drop too much, but I did top up the water before I left and kept the back lid and front lid on...I really want expecting that much water to evaporate! Soooo I’m ordering an ATO today, I’m still unsure which one:
-tunze osmolator 3155
-Auto aqua smart ATO
-xp Aqua duetto
The tunze has track record of being reliable and has extra fail safe, but it will take up a lot space in the back chamber, the auto aqua seems to be like too and the duetto seems really slim design and well reviews too? Any input what you would choose or have?

 

[revhtree]

Alright alright alright....
these guys are still shy, but here is the best pics I could get!
Orchid dottyback


was originally going to go for a goby, firefish or gramma, The Lfs had a wild purple firefish (but it looked in a weird shape) and wild normal firefish... but I prefer the captive bred aspect of things, so that’s why the orchid dottyback appealed to me, plus it’s a little bit different than the usual combo we see in these tanks, made sure to check it wasn’t a purple dottyback haha... as these can be feisty.
and living in the same holding tank was a scarlet skunk cleaner fish, so that was a no brainer as I knew I already wanted a cleaner shrimp, and they we were already buddies! The shrimp is still super shy...



Also got 3 nassirius snails, there are some extra food pellets and brine shrimp around the sand so I figured it would be good addition right about now, especially with the added livestock. They buried in the sand right away although the clownfish went to bite the smallest snail’s little siphon trump so hopefully he’s ok.

Also picked up my first coral, ZOA’s

Looking good!

 

[154162]

Looking good!

The rev himself!
Thank you

 

[154162]

Some new shots, everybody is happy!

 

[154162]

Stopped at the LFS today! Got 3 trochus snails, a hammer hybrid branching Euphyllia and a pulsing Xenia frag... the pulsing Xenia is just going to go on a small piece of rubble in the sand at some point don’t want a lot of it, just a little of that pulsing magic. The Xenia Is all shriveled up Right now, but the Euphyllia is doing great got 2 out of its 3 main polyps out!

 

[154162]

Some bad news, coming home from work last night I noticed the fish just caked in white stuff, I got speaking to humblefish over on his forum, and decided it was brook, And decided to the hybrid ttm with h202 baths at every transfer, but the both fish were dead this morning... S.I.P
i don’t know if this is something the clown was harbouring (mostly common in clowns) maybe the dotty...
can brook pass on through coral too, or the snails? It’s just weird how it happens the day after adding new coral and snails...

so going fallow for 6 weeks and will be setting up my QT!
lesson learned the hard way...

 

[154162]

the tank feels empty without the fish. But the corals are doing great, The Euphyllia opened up its 3rd head, it’s in full force now, loving the look of it! It’s also got some Zoa or palys Growing on it on the side of the main stem, so will have to frag that and will do that soon, first time fragging so wI’ll see how that goes.

Moved the Xenia to the front, prefers to be out of the main flow.

Found a chiton on Zoa plug, seems to have eaten all that algae that is pictured there, but also pulled ou the plug last night to clean the rest of it off.

Might get a couple of corals this week and some live rock as I want to add more biodiversity, also load of pods appeared on the glass over the weekend! Will be going fallow for 76 days after that, I know brook is 6 weeks, but by the time I cycle the qt tank and then at new fish I might aswell wait that period to be sure that there is no ich.

 

[154162]

ATO is here! And I found a relatively nice container that wasn’t $130 hahaha

 

[154162]

QT tank is set up, had the filter, heater and light on hand. found a nice 5.5 gallon tank at the Lfs, added fritz zyme 9 and some ammonia today

The DT is going fallow, so instead of having to look at an near empty tank, I might as well add a few things!
Zoa:

Montipora:

Acan:

And last but definitely not least, a rainbow bubble tip anemone:

 

[154162]

BTA blowin’ in the wind

 

[154162]

Still going fallow, the end is near... doesn’t feel like it though hahaha!
QT tank is still cycling. Twiddling my thumbs... hoping for a watchman goby as the first fish to go back in.
Had some algae breakout a little as I was feeding the tank too much trying to avoid bottoming out my nutrients, the Zoa plug that bought that algae in was getting covered, so I tried a hydrogen peroxide dip, seems to be doing some good so far!
Still trying to figure out a spot for the Xenia, it doesn’t seem to like even minimal flow...
And my BTA finally left it’s Little Rock it came on and is on the walkabout to find its new spot... living in the edge here!

Does anybody know what this red branching circle is? Under the zoa, growing from under the plug...
It seems to be growing

 

[154162]

Been a while since I added to the thread...
battled some hair algae, some low nutrients and heavy diatoms, the ugly phase is clearing up, although haven’t been hit with Cyano Yet
QT tank is still cycling... Ugh it’s taking a while, but we will get there!
Added a few corals this week, I needed to add some green to the tank!
also got a porcelain crab, him and the nem are best buds now! I’ve usually made a point to stay away from the usual crabs, as I run a snail only CUC to avoid problems, but this guy is 100% reef safe no drama !

 

[154162]

my led strips under the lid started corroding and rusting! I guess to close to the water splashes, was supposed to be waterproof but I guess I wasn’t diligent enough to clean the salt creep on them...

the good news is that I upgraded to a prime HD!
need to find a netted lid though!

My QT is now ready so also picked up a purple firefish form the Lfs, I saw her eating Mysis shrimp at the shop, she seems healthy, super shy but that’s expected for a firefish! She will be in QT for a month, just observing for now

got a nice little spring groung under one of my Zoa plug, gonna cut it off and attach to a Little Rock that I’ll glue to the back wall, hopefully it works out nice!

And here’s a full tank shot so far