Hannahrain's 1st Reef Tank

[Hannahrain]

I've been researching reef tanks and learning all I can the past 3 months or so, watching lots of BRS TV on youtube and other channels, joined several saltwater groups on FB and have been doing lots of internet reading. Anyway I decided to go with the Fluval Evo 13.5 because of it's peninsula shape and the fact that it would fit well and look great on our pass-thru bar between our kitchen and living room, allowing it to be seen from both rooms. I hope to keep this tank as simple as possible w/very little added equipment.

The tank was started up this past Friday 1/12/2018 and is cycling, dosing with Brightwell Aquatics Microbacter 7 daily. I am in love with looking at it, can't wait to put something in but am planning to take it slow and add things slowly as the advanced reefers recommend.

Currently consists of:

• Caribsea Ocean Direct Sand
• Dry Rock unsure how many pounds as I didn't add all 15lbs (from World Wide Corals, we visited in person, loved that place!)
• Wet live rock rubble... 4-5 pieces
• Cobalt Neotherm Heater 75w

As of now, I have no plans to upgrade the light as I need the canopy to help prevent evaporation and to protect the tank from contaminants as it's nearly in the kitchen...

Undecided on upgrading the return pump at this time but I've looked into the Sicce Synca 1.0 and the Tunze 1073.008

No plans yet to get a skimmer but I do plan on getting the Intank media baskets or at least one of them and maybe making the other one myself if I can find the egg crate diffuser in black (hate seeing the white show through the sump).

The pics were taken right after it was filled, it has since cleared. I ended up adding more sand after pics were taken. The rocks are stabilized with Holdfast Epoxy.

Right now my fish/CUC stocking plans include:

• 1-2 Ocellaris Clowns
  
• 1 Skunk Cleaner Shrimp
  
• Turban snails
  
• Nassarius Snails
  
• Copepods

Kitchen View:

Living Room View:

Doing this on a budget (horses are my main hobby and they aren't cheap either) so not adding too fast probably won't be too difficult, lol.

Any thoughts/suggestions are welcome.


Thanks for looking!

 

[nautical_nathaniel]

Looks like you're off to a great start so far, good work!

 

[revhtree]

Nice start and looking good!

The only potential problem I see is maybe those returns being positioned so low in the water. I worry about the siphon back into your sump. Would you have enough room for the extra water?

 

[Hannahrain]

Nice start and looking good!

The only potential problem I see is maybe those returns being positioned so low in the water. I worry about the siphon back into your sump. Would you have enough room for the extra water?

So you think I need to add more water or adjust the output nozzles? They are pointed differently now, I have one directed towards the surface and the other pointed more the other direction.
There is maybe about an inch left about the water line, so more could be added I guess. I have it about 2 sections above where the honeycomb print starts if that helps. I filled it to where the directions showed.

I'll post better pics this evening. Thanks for your help, I see you know your stuff!

 

[SashimiTurtle]

I agree with rev. Aim the returns at the surface for some gas exchange and get a small power head for flow. You only need around a 500gph pump. I use the Jebao SW4 pumps in my 30g cube. The SW2 would work well in yours. Koralia and Tunze have nice small sized power heads also.

 

[Hannahrain]

 

[SashimiTurtle]

Lookin' good.

 

[Hannahrain]

Tested the water for first time yesterday (API Saltwater Master Test Kit):

Ammonia- 0

Nitrite- 0

Nitrate-0 (tested it twice just incase)

PH- 8.2


Salinity- 1.026


I'm only 5 days in but I started with the Ocean Direct Live Sand and some live rubble and have been adding Microbacter 7 daily and ghost fed a few times.



So I put in more pellet food and a couple freeze dried brine shrimp last night along with the Microbacter after testing. I'll test again tonight or tomorrow, I'll probably have my lfs test it over the weekend just to see if they get different results with a better test kit.



I'll upgrade the return pump and get an intank media basket in the next couple of weeks. Having a hard enough time beating my husband home and getting rid of the Amazon boxes as it is

lol. He is enjoying going to the fish stores and looking around though, he's already been studying the tank looking for life.

 

[Hannahrain]

6/20/2018 Update:

Tank has been doing well and as of today it's been running for 5 months 8 days. I did upgrade to a AI Prime HD w/12" flex mount and a mesh top lid, Sicce Syncra 1.0, Koralia Nano 240 (wish I would have got the 425), I also bought a Intank media basket for the 2nd chamber. Ive been running Chemi Pure Blue in the basket, carbon and poly filter floss, the original biomedia, also have a mesh bag of Matrix (17 oz) in the overflow chamber. I need to get some up to date pics.

Tank is stocked with:

2 clowns that have not bonded both seem to be female but they don't fight much anymore either about to trade 1 of them in or move to other tank once I have it running)

1 skunk cleaner shrimp

1 sleeper banded goby (traded in a yellow watchman goby for him, the watchman was boring and not a sand sifter)

CUC- a few various snails


I had been totally neglecting my 75 gallon fresh water tank, so I listed it for sale last Thursday, sold it on Saturday and on Sunday we bought a used but new to me 60 gallon cube with unfinished stand and lots of used equipment. Equipment includes: Gen 2 Radions, 1 mp10wqd vortech wave maker, Building an Obsession Acrylic Sump, Super Reef Octopus 1000 INT Skimmer, Hydor ATO, and a few other pieces all for $500.

Tank is drilled with Eshoppes Eclipse L overflow.

 

[Hannahrain]

Some random pics of the Evo.

 

[Hannahrain]

I added a bottle of tibse pods (which were a reddish color) back on 6/29, never saw one after I put them in that night.
Now suddenly there are tiny white pods of some sort all over the glass and rocks the past few days, I actually thought it was specks of sand until I realized they move.

Another new appearance is pineapple sponges, they are all over the sump.

The goby eats well when fed but seems more inactive that usual and looks a little skinny. I've only been feeding once a day so he probably needs more? I have alot of hair algae right now so I had slacked down on feeding and have only been feeding frozen.

 

[Slowlane]

Nice looking setup!

 

[Hannahrain]

Nice looking setup!

Thanks! We are really enjoying it

 

[Hannahrain]

This rasta started as 2 tiny heads, got it for $5.

I'm thinking this is an alveopora? It looks like my goniopora below when it's closed up. Nothing like a zoa, paly or duncan (some guy on FB kept insisting it's a duncan).

So far the only thing I've killed was a 2 headed duncan that wasn't open when I bought it (lfs had just got it in) never fully opened in my tank and was totally dead after a month. So this is round 2 and so far it's been happy. Not sure where it's going to end up at.

 

[Hannahrain]

Lost the goby the day after my last post, pretty sure it was my fault as I was thinking he was a carnivore and was mainly feeding meat! Will not make that mistake again.

However there was plenty of hair algae in the tank and it's only got worse since he's been gone.

Added 2 emerald crabs on 8/17 to help get it under control.

O detectable phosphate, 10-15 nitrate (which is what tank has been at the past several months), 0 nitrite, 0 ammonia

4 gallon water change every 10-14 days.

The airstone is in there because it's been so stormy this summer here in central FL and it comes on automatically if the electricity goes out.

See all the algae...clear lights were just on to get the pic. Looks like I need to find a different spot for the goniopora from these pics.

 

[Hannahrain]

This tank is still up and going but most of the corals have been moved to the 60 cube. I really want to re-scape this one and frag the zoas and mushrooms. I've got to get up the nerve to do it. The 3 rocks in this one are ex-poxied together this stresses me out to think about removing the rock and quickly chiseling the corals off it. Breaking the remaining rock up into smaller pieces and then coming up with a new scale quickly to get it back in the water. I'm wondering if I should just buy new rock and take my time to come up with a scape first. The tank has a gold flake maroon and a royal gramma in it, so I don't want to mess up the cycle. It does have quite a bit of Matrix in the over flow chamber and the sand would remain so maybe it would be ok...?