OP
OP
TheLegendaryBarlowe072
Active Member
So once again its been a minute since my last update. First off, I believe the changes to my light schedule have been positive. Algee growth has almost completely stopped. My corals are doing very well. Ive noticed considerable growth from my hammers and leathers and gsp. My Zoas seem to be doing about the same as before. However I was able to barrow a par meter from the LFS, and found some glaring problems with my lighting setup. I have nearly no spread. I've very high par in the top 3rd of the tank, its nearly perfect in the middle center of the tank (where the hammers, leather and gsp are) and its almost none exsistant in the bottom 3rd, as well as the parimater of the tank. Even turning down the lights, I know my zoas are still getting blasted. I dont have any way to combat this without tearing apart my hardscape, or replacing the lights. There just isnt enough real estate in the optimum par zone.
I have an option for the lighting now, because I purchased another tank setup off of FB marketplace.
I bought everything but the stand and glass box because I didnt want to deal with moving or disposing of it. I got all the live stock, rock, skimmer, pumps, over flow, sump, powerheads, lights and axcessories. The price for everything was less then the cost of the lights alone.
I got 2 very large one spot foxfaces, 1 mature large horseface blenny, and 3 very big pajama cardnail fish. That were all two big to fit into my display tank. I held them in my 75 gallon basement tank for 2 days and then traded them to my LFS for $220 store credit. I feel like I was a little lowballed but I couldnt complain because I didnt have anywhere appropate to home them.
There was also a black scopas tang, that originally went in my basemant temp holding tank that was supposed to make it to the LFS for trade, but on the day of I couldnt catch him. After removing every piece of liverock from that holding tank. Hes now in my display tank. Its much smaller then the recommended tank size for his spieces but I dread trying to catch him again and so far hes been a model citizen.
I also elected to keep a large watchman gobie, and a bicolored angel. I was worried about the bi color not being reef safe but so far has seemed to leave everything alone. But I'm watching him.
I also got another clown in that purchase. Its slightly larger then Paul and I kept it in a holding box for a week before I let him swim free. There was no aggression and now the pair are almost inseparble throughout the day. However they bed down for the night when the lights go out in diffrent corners of the tank, which I find interesting.
I also got a random assortment of snails, hermit crabs and some tiny star fish. As well as another colony of zoas.
There was a very large green toadstool leather, that seemed fine when I took it out of the tank for transport, but when I took it out of the bucket to dip it, part of it seemed like jelly and part of it disapated into the water like a cloudy dust. I called it a loss.
and there was a very large carpet of GSP but very little of it had any polop extension and parts of it had let go of the rock it had been ancoured to. I put in the tank in the basement with plans to frag the healthier looking sections of it, but the overwhelmingness of the whole project made me slow to get to it. There arent any lights on the basement tank and by the time I went to frag it, it didnt look like it was worth the effort.
Anyways I've spent alot of time cleaning pumps, and sumps and skimmer ect in vinigar, and now I have backups and extras to play with or sell, trade. And my tank is stocked to the max, bordering hard on overstocked.
I also have two radion xr15s that would probably fix my lighting issues, but I havent swapped them out yet because I need a mounting solution, which will probably require another lid solution, snowball rolling down hill ect ect $$$$$$$
Oh and I have over 200 lbs of very old established liverock in my basement tank, that I need to sell or trade. And I thought about adding a small piece or two to my own tank, because I know it will be benifical, but they have so many bristle worms (which I know are mostly harmless, even helpful) but my GF saw them and was terribly grossed out. She does not want them to get into the display tank no matter what. I told her they may be unavoidable, could come in on a coral frag. But either way shes been so supportive of the tank I dont want to intentionally do anything with it that will turn her off from it.
When I took all the rocks out to catch the scopas tang I took a pair of tweezers and manually removed every visable bristle worm I could find. And even after if you look around the basement tank you'll see hundreds of them. And some of the ones I removed were 4-6 inches long. I feed that tank a pinch of flakes every 4 or 5 days, and when I change my water in the display tank I add it to the basement tank.
I'm also an avid drawer and added the reef2reef logo to scetch book.
Thanks for following along and happy reefing
I have an option for the lighting now, because I purchased another tank setup off of FB marketplace.
I bought everything but the stand and glass box because I didnt want to deal with moving or disposing of it. I got all the live stock, rock, skimmer, pumps, over flow, sump, powerheads, lights and axcessories. The price for everything was less then the cost of the lights alone.
I got 2 very large one spot foxfaces, 1 mature large horseface blenny, and 3 very big pajama cardnail fish. That were all two big to fit into my display tank. I held them in my 75 gallon basement tank for 2 days and then traded them to my LFS for $220 store credit. I feel like I was a little lowballed but I couldnt complain because I didnt have anywhere appropate to home them.
There was also a black scopas tang, that originally went in my basemant temp holding tank that was supposed to make it to the LFS for trade, but on the day of I couldnt catch him. After removing every piece of liverock from that holding tank. Hes now in my display tank. Its much smaller then the recommended tank size for his spieces but I dread trying to catch him again and so far hes been a model citizen.
I also elected to keep a large watchman gobie, and a bicolored angel. I was worried about the bi color not being reef safe but so far has seemed to leave everything alone. But I'm watching him.
I also got another clown in that purchase. Its slightly larger then Paul and I kept it in a holding box for a week before I let him swim free. There was no aggression and now the pair are almost inseparble throughout the day. However they bed down for the night when the lights go out in diffrent corners of the tank, which I find interesting.
I also got a random assortment of snails, hermit crabs and some tiny star fish. As well as another colony of zoas.
There was a very large green toadstool leather, that seemed fine when I took it out of the tank for transport, but when I took it out of the bucket to dip it, part of it seemed like jelly and part of it disapated into the water like a cloudy dust. I called it a loss.
and there was a very large carpet of GSP but very little of it had any polop extension and parts of it had let go of the rock it had been ancoured to. I put in the tank in the basement with plans to frag the healthier looking sections of it, but the overwhelmingness of the whole project made me slow to get to it. There arent any lights on the basement tank and by the time I went to frag it, it didnt look like it was worth the effort.
Anyways I've spent alot of time cleaning pumps, and sumps and skimmer ect in vinigar, and now I have backups and extras to play with or sell, trade. And my tank is stocked to the max, bordering hard on overstocked.
I also have two radion xr15s that would probably fix my lighting issues, but I havent swapped them out yet because I need a mounting solution, which will probably require another lid solution, snowball rolling down hill ect ect $$$$$$$
Oh and I have over 200 lbs of very old established liverock in my basement tank, that I need to sell or trade. And I thought about adding a small piece or two to my own tank, because I know it will be benifical, but they have so many bristle worms (which I know are mostly harmless, even helpful) but my GF saw them and was terribly grossed out. She does not want them to get into the display tank no matter what. I told her they may be unavoidable, could come in on a coral frag. But either way shes been so supportive of the tank I dont want to intentionally do anything with it that will turn her off from it.
When I took all the rocks out to catch the scopas tang I took a pair of tweezers and manually removed every visable bristle worm I could find. And even after if you look around the basement tank you'll see hundreds of them. And some of the ones I removed were 4-6 inches long. I feed that tank a pinch of flakes every 4 or 5 days, and when I change my water in the display tank I add it to the basement tank.
I'm also an avid drawer and added the reef2reef logo to scetch book.
Thanks for following along and happy reefing
