HTown Reef - 200g Waterbox Reef LX 270.6 (SPS Dominant)

[Ugin]

As the cycle is over and that I'm now dosing CLEAN once per week, I've gone ahead and done a full Nitrate/Phosphate test and below are my results:

- Nitrate: 5.6ppm
- Phosphate: 0.07ppm

Nitrates are down and on the lower end and phosphates are a little elevated but are actually down from the .08 from my last test a week ago. I will continue to phantom feed till my fish arrive and monitor my no3/p04.

 

[ryshark]

As the cycle is over and that I'm now dosing CLEAN once per week, I've gone ahead and done a full Nitrate/Phosphate test and below are my results:

- Nitrate: 5.6ppm
- Phosphate: 0.07ppm

Nitrates are down and on the lower end and phosphates are a little elevated but are actually down from the .08 from my last test a week ago. I will continue to phantom feed till my fish arrive and monitor my no3/p04.

I agree, I don’t see a reason to do a water change now, unless your nitrates were really high. But they aren’t.

 

[Ugin]

It's been 5 days since my last update. Everything has been generally coasting at the moment, but here are a few notable events:

1. Fish are arriving NEXT WEEK!!! This is assuming the weather stays up and everything goes well, but here's to hoping!
2. My Cheato is basically dead. Not sure why, light is good, my nutrients are detectable.
3. Nitrates are nearing 0 even though I'm phantom feeding. Because of this, I'm still leaving my lights off till my fish arrive.
4. Phosphates are around .09

I'm looking forward to the fish showing up next week! I need to bring this tank to life!

 

[Shiesty2000]

We’re you able to find and hookup your clarisea? I just ordered the sk5000 and most likely plumbing mine into the drain. I thought about hooking it up to the manifold as well but how would I know if there is enough flow?

 

[Ugin]

We’re you able to find and hookup your clarisea? I just ordered the sk5000 and most likely plumbing mine into the drain. I thought about hooking it up to the manifold as well but how would I know if there is enough flow?

Nah I didn't. I just decided to go the skimmer + refugium route. If I want to add a roller mat in the future, I will. I'm still very interested in one, but at the moment I'm passing it up.

 

[Crabby48]

I dose clean daily in sump. Tank started cycle with bottle bacteria couple bricks and plates, no rock. Added fish day one. Tank is doing its thing just fine.

if no3 po4 is in check don’t do a water change. If you do just don’t let nutrients get to low or chance of Dino’s.

 

[Ugin]

Update!

The Fish
My first batch of fish from DrReefsQuarentinedFish are arriving early this week. I'm extremely excited! This includes:

• Radiant Wrasse
• Orange-back Fairy Wrasse
• Marbled/Checkered Wrasse
• Midas blenny
• (5) Lyretail Anthias (all female)
• 10 trochus + 10 nassarius snails (QT'd inverts, fallow tank for 100+ days).

Protein Skimmer
I finally got my NYOS 220 from back order on Friday of last week. It's up and running, albiet still in the break-in phase and just in the sump with the cup off. The 2nd chamber is very deep, so I'm working on a PVC + Egg Crate contraption to raise the skimmer

Nitrates/Phosphates
Phosphates went up to 0.1ppm on feb 11th, so I dosed Brightwell Aquatics Phosphate-E which I'm pretty sure is just like any other lanthanum chloride, but it's what I had on hand. Phosphates are now sitting at around 0.06ppm. The fact I have no coral in the tank makes adjusting things like this pretty easy.

Nitrates are sitting at 5ppm.

I'll post pictures later of the skimmer / DIY tank lid / auto-feeder / fish ring later!

 

[Ugin]

As promised, here's some photos!

Protein Skimmer

The NYOS 220 is almost broken in. Been running in my system for 36-48 hours~ and I can finally put the cup on without it overflowing. It also taught me that my bubble trap in my last baffle works amazing as no microbubbles were produced at all, even with constant bubble overflow.



DIY Screen Top

I'm working with TopLids on a custom acrylic top, but as a few wrasses are showing up this week I wanted to have a temporary solution to prevent any jumps. It's actually pretty dang form fitting to the top and has little/no sag.



AutoFeeder + Feeding Rings

I kinda went overboard ... I have 2 finding rings, one to catch the autofeeder pellet food, another that's better suited for tossing in frozen cubes of mysis and letting them thaw while slow releasing the food.


(You can see the larger ring in the above picture near the AFS output)




That's about all I got for tonight. The next update will be when my fish arrive!

 

[Crabby48]

Congratulations on fish coming. Did Dr Reef have them in stock? How long did it take to ship? Herd he was way behind a while back

 

[Ugin]

Congratulations on fish coming. Did Dr Reef have them in stock? How long did it take to ship? Herd he was way behind a while back

He had all but the Checkerboard wrasse in stock, so I just waited for everything to be shipped after the 30~ day prophylactic treatment. It was only after ordering from Dr Reef that I stumbled upon the drama on Humblefish's website, but so far it's been a pretty good experience. He's communicated with me, been very helpful on the phone, etc.

I'll provide a full brief/review after the fish are in the tank for a few days.

 

[Ugin]

Just spoke to Dr. Reef, the fish should be shipping out tomorrow and arriving Thursday. All the shipments go through Memphis and apparently their about to get some rough weather, but it should still be good enough for deliveries.

 

[Ugin]

I dose clean daily in sump. Tank started cycle with bottle bacteria couple bricks and plates, no rock. Added fish day one. Tank is doing its thing just fine.

if no3 po4 is in check don’t do a water change. If you do just don’t let nutrients get to low or chance of Dino’s.

Just tested my Alk out of curiosity and it's @ 7.5. The last time I tested was nearly 1 month ago on Jan 18th when it was 8.5. I know Alk is consumed during early setup by your biological filtration even without coral, but I was surprised it dropped that much. I'm still not planning on adding coral for awhile, so I'm still not going to do a water change just yet, but it's interesting to at least see where I'm at.

 

[Crabby48]

Just tested my Alk out of curiosity and it's @ 7.5. The last time I tested was nearly 1 month ago on Jan 18th when it was 8.5. I know Alk is consumed during early setup by your biological filtration even without coral, but I was surprised it dropped that much. I'm still not planning on adding coral for awhile, so I'm still not going to do a water change just yet, but it's interesting to at least see where I'm at.

I would check it again to make sure nothing went wrong. I never rested the big three in a new tank so don’t have much of an opinion. Without coral it’s not a big deal and 7.5 isn’t real low.
I would rather have low alk then water change and lose po4 and no3.
Could dose alk but then I would check calcium and mag first.

Safe journey little fellows.

 

[Ugin]

I would check it again to make sure nothing went wrong. I never rested the big three in a new tank so don’t have much of an opinion. Without coral it’s not a big deal and 7.5 isn’t real low.
I would rather have low alk then water change and lose po4 and no3.
Could dose alk but then I would check calcium and mag first.

Safe journey little fellows.

I tested it twice (using a hanna checker) to be sure, same value. I think my game plan is to let the fish establish, then as long as nutrients aren't going up too much I'll do a WC in a week or so after the fish are added to see where my alk sits.

 

[Badfish405]

That's a nice fish list so far.

 

[Ugin]

That's a nice fish list so far.

Thanks! Talking about fish...

Just got the overnight Fedex tracking details!

 

[Ugin]

Big Fish Update

The fish came in at 1.021 and my tank is @ 1.025. I exchanged 300-400ml of water every 10 minutes till it was in balance (about an hour).

Fish are IN!




After seeing a 3pt difference, i added airline tubing on an external air pump to provide some oxygen. Egg crate on top to prevent my 2 cats from doing .... cat things.


The midas blenny is nearly black. My experience with them is that this is typical during shipment and that stress effects their colors more than many fish.


2 Lyretail's hiding in the rocks


Orange-back fairy wrasse right after putting in the tank


10 Trochus + 10 Nassarius snails



Some Fish are MISSING
I originally was expecting 5 more fish:
- 3 more Lyretails
- 1 Radiant wrasse
- 1 Checkerboard wrasse

I spoke with DrReef after receiving the order and they informed me that the fish in question were held back because they were not eating. They are going to hold them till they eat normally and then will ship them out (I'm not paying for shipping). While I'm disappointed that I didn't receive all my fish, I'm happy that DrReef is this careful with their live stock.

I'll provide updates later this evening on the fish's status!

 

[Crabby48]

Awesome fish look good! Happy they made the travels for you

Dr reef shipped at 1.021. That’s a shame as some wrasse should never go up more then a couple points a day. Also no warning your order isn’t complete?
Shame on Dr. Reef it’s been a couple years of the same stories.

 

[Ugin]

Awesome fish look good! Happy they made the travels for you

Dr reef shipped at 1.021. That’s a shame as some wrasse should never go up more then a couple points a day. Also no warning your order isn’t complete?
Shame on Dr. Reef it’s been a couple years of the same stories.

Yes, no warning. While communication should have been made, I'm not necessarily upset as most/all retailers would just bag the fish up and send them on their way. I'm not defending DrReef necessarily, but no one cares more about the fish's health then me so I'm happy he didn't ship sick fish.

 

[fowler279]

I got mine from him last night (live in same area). Mine came in at same 1.021 and acclimated. Also missing 2 fish which he told me about and refunded right away. In no way upset with not getting the 2 additional fish as I would rather have healthy fish that are eating than getting semi healthy or not eating fish. Im happy so far with my purchase.