From snakes to fish

[dvgyfresh]

Hey everyone , this is a long overdue build thread. Life has been hectic but great! Little about me , I’m 27 living in SoCal , just got engaged and have a love for all animals but mainly reptiles and fish. I’ve always been fascinated by saltwater but always saw it as hard too time consuming , until my fiancé encouraged me to try and I can say I love it! I only have a saltwater tank now as I didn’t want to have too many pets , but I’ve attached some pictures of my past snakes , I’ve kept reptiles for over 20 years. Now onto the actual build

 

[dvgyfresh]

I started the build in may of 2020, having only reptiles before it didn’t take long to realize that I had no idea what I was doing but I was determined to have a reef of my own! Ordered dry rock from Amazon and a live rock from a LFS to seed the tank , day 1

 

[Lost in the Sauce]

First!

 

[Lost in the Sauce]

Hey everyone , this is a long overdue build thread. Life has been hectic but great! Little about me , I’m 27 living in SoCal , just got engaged and have a love for all animals but mainly reptiles and fish. I’ve always been fascinated by saltwater but always saw it as hard too time consuming , until my fiancé encouraged me to try and I can say I love it! I only have a saltwater tank now as I didn’t want to have too many pets , but I’ve attached some pictures of my past snakes , I’ve kept reptiles for over 20 years. Now onto the actual build

Third pic down, is that a Boaphile enclosure?

I used to have a lot of snakes. Boas almost exclusively. Mostly BCC localities with Suriname being my favorite. Bred a new really nice hypo monster tail Siri's back in the day.

 

[dvgyfresh]

First inhabitants were snowflake eel , clowns , damsel, and cleaner shrimp. Due to my snake knowledge I wanted an eel to try out , it was going well , weekly water changes plus I had the eel trained to eat from tongs (silversides and krill)

 

[dvgyfresh]

Third pic down, is that a Boaphile enclosure?

I used to have a lot of snakes. Boas almost exclusively. Mostly BCC localities with Suriname being my favorite. Bred a new really nice hypo monster tail Siri's back in the day.

Yes boaphile enclosure and vision cage underneath , and that’s so cool ! I have to say my favorite snake is still false water Cobras , they don’t get too huge and have a bit of spunk to them

 

[dvgyfresh]

A bit later things were still going well in my new tank , I sold the eel in exchange for some frags / bubble tip anemone. Here’s where I messed up , my tank wa probly too knew and the anemone withered away sadly.. but the frags I still have

 

[Lost in the Sauce]

Yes boaphile enclosure and vision cage underneath , and that’s so cool ! I have to say my favorite snake is still false water Cobras , they don’t get too huge and have a bit of spunk to them

Thought so. I had a stack of (8) 42D1's from Jeff and a bunch of the 22D's as well. Amazing kit with belly heat.

I got my monster tail from Jeff directly. You're making me whish I never got out of snakes.

 

[dvgyfresh]

Not too long after this my tank after some good deals with other reefers , I had rescued the tang from a lfs with ich all over ( I don’t qurantine ) and it recovered! Ye introducing disease probly wasn’t the best … but I believe healthy fish don’t get sick so I always supplement feedings with vitamin enrichment

 

[dvgyfresh]

Thought so. I had a stack of (8) 42D1's from Jeff and a bunch of the 22D's as well. Amazing kit with belly heat.

I got my monster tail from Jeff directly. You're making me whish I never got out of snakes.

Oh wow! And yes the tanks are very good at holding humidity / heat very ideal. We can enable each other lol I have a snake tattoo and I currently don’t have any! I do plan on having another snake one day , probly the white lipped python

 

[dvgyfresh]

If you couldn’t tell my build was basically buying off other reefers / budget af. Only filtration was power heads / rock/ hob filter for 29g

 

[dvgyfresh]

I guess I lost my pics but I transferred everything into a 40b , (also fought Dino’s , installed GKM UV ) and put macro in display to bring competitors

 

[dvgyfresh]

Met an amazing guy from socali reefs and was able to trade my yellow tang for the overflow box and sump , installed in my move to new place

 

[dvgyfresh]

Sadly I’ve lost many anemones along the way probly around 6-7. Was sad about losing the Sherman BTA as well as a big rainbow , I can’t say why they didn’t make it but there has been a lot of changes. Most recently I’ve had to go back to just hob filter / hob skimmer. Power went out and my HOB overflow box did not keep syphon , so basically the sump water was all over the floor once the power was back on, these are my current tank shots

 

[dvgyfresh]

Here is the zoas from earlier , the purple one has been with me almost a year and has barley grown , I am stil learning and still consider myself a newcomer. Thanks to R2R my tank is still standing , I’ve gotten all my knowledge from here!

 

[Lost in the Sauce]

Sadly I’ve lost many anemones along the way probly around 6-7. Was sad about losing the Sherman BTA as well as a big rainbow , I can’t say why they didn’t make it but there has been a lot of changes. Most recently I’ve had to go back to just hob filter / hob skimmer. Power went out and my HOB overflow box did not keep syphon , so basically the sump water was all over the floor once the power was back on, these are my current tank shots

Tank looking great. I really like the colors on that pastel rainbow your clowns are loving up on.

Is your plan to stay hob? Looks like you've got everything ready for a sump, just need to drill the 40b.

 

[dvgyfresh]

Tank looking great. I really like the colors on that pastel rainbow your clowns are loving up on.

Is your plan to stay hob? Looks like you've got everything ready for a sump, just need to drill the 40b.

Thank you, my clowns have always enjoyed hosting so I got lucky there. I do not want to stay HOB but I do not know / have a drill and I’m banned from any HOB overflows due to power outages. For now I will continue HOB until I can either get a new tank or drill current

 

[Lost in the Sauce]

Thank you, my clowns have always enjoyed hosting so I got lucky there. I do not want to stay HOB but I do not know / have a drill and I’m banned from any HOB overflows due to power outages. For now I will continue HOB until I can either get a new tank or drill current

We can fix that!

 

[Gqch]

compare these pics you posted, i can see big different to the first pic, good job man!!!

 

[dvgyfresh]

compare these pics you posted, i can see big different to the first pic, good job man!!!

Thank you! Still learning but happy to still be here.
Another thing I’ve learned along the way is my love / hate for urchins.. they do a great job of keeping algae away but that’s not all! My pencil urchin has eating GSP, clove polyps , and two big feather dusters (tube and all!) so I’m thinking it may be time for him to go