Innovative Marine 30 Gallon Long AIO Build

[flchamp89]

Love the stand and scape. Looks great. Sorry about the basement.

 

[Hallowhead]

Updates updates !

Why the whole basement was apart and water main was exposed I ran a clean priority pex line for my RO system.. seems to be giving me ~50 TDS better out of tap.

Late nights are for tank fills !

Skimmer setup.. seems to be filling with water though so fine tuning it

Water parameters started at 2 weeks ago:

Ammonia

Nitrite

Nitrate

Added a media basket with chemipure blue floss and seachem

Got a pump for filling my water changes

Parameters as of last night!

Ammonia

Nitrite zero!

Nitrate coming way down !

Ammonia appears just about zero in person nitrite is a hard zero and nitrate appears 40 in person. The pictures are tough.

I'll probably look at ordering my black & white clowns friday! Thoughts ?

 

[Hallowhead]

Major Update!

Giant coral sale on reef2reef by cherry corals!

After I temperature acclimated them

Closeup of the utter chaos

Closeup of the Awesome Aussie Micro

Closeup of the small Fruit Loop zoa

IN THE TANK featuring half pint & merwin my clowns!

Algae and diatom is starting to grow so I will be getting a gobster & some snails & crabs tonight. Def got scared a bit that it was aiptasia.

 

[Hallowhead]

Update!

I bought more coral

Major sale again by POTO and won a huge zoa raffle by them. Pictures will come.

Currently dealing with bryopsis I just administered reef flux HD

 

[Hallowhead]

Time for an update! 5/14/19.

I am on day 4 of bryopsis treatment! I couldn't really get a before picture as the algae was in baby sprouts... I see no more algae blooming or sprouting so it's kicked butt! I will wait till next Friday and run it for 2 weeks. I am debating turning my protein skimmer back online to cycle some gunk out today or tomorrow. Any thoughts?

I lost my first snail today and potentially a hermit crab. I don't know if they got into a fight but the snail was in bad shape to begin I could tell he wasn't doing great but he was moving around a little today when I woke he was in the same spot as last night so I removed him and you could visually and sensory tell he was dead (stunk). My ammonia spiked a little however, none of my corals have closed even the slightest they seem GREAT. I am wondering if the protein skimmer being back on will help out at all??

Either way here is the huge coral update!

I AM AWFUL AT TAKING SHOTS UNDER BLUES OR WHITES - can someone help me get better shooting on a pixel 3.

Sunny D Zoa's! (Look insane under blues)

My happy happy Duncan (Looks roughly the same under blues) Should be more blue.. I think

Fruit Loops

Vibranium (LOOKS INSANE UNDER BLUE) need to learn to take better pics

Orange Hornet (Super cool under blue) Gummie Bear & Frutti Tutti

Fallen Angel (seems finicky - doesn't look like picture from live sale just yet... ) That crab is the one that has legs missing.. not sure if he's gonna make it.

Utter Chaos (One of my favorites... getting some new polyps)

Spongebob & Awesome Aussie Micro

Cool Caulastrea Coral (I think it might be in too much flow? is that why it's melting?) featuring merwin!

This is half pint.. he gets in EVERY photo

Let me know what you all think! I realized not pictured is my nirvanna frag.

 

[jazzfisher]

Following! Going to transfer my 26g this weekend to my new 30l. Apprehensive about the transfer but excited too. Thanks to everyone who has given hints & tips so far.

 

[Hallowhead]

Following! Going to transfer my 26g this weekend to my new 30l. Apprehensive about the transfer but excited too. Thanks to everyone who has given hints & tips so far.

Always here to answer any questions that you may have. Glad to help where I can

 

[jazzfisher]

Thanks! I’m sure I’ll be asking!

 

[Hallowhead]

Update 5/19/19

My tank is nearing two weeks of reef flux HD treatment... I no longer see a single sign of bryopsis which is wonderful but lack of water changes and purigen and chemipure the uglies broke out full form! ahhh

I am wondering when I do my first water change Thursday if siphoning some of it out is okay? Thoughts?

There are like long seaweed like looking pieces sprouting from the diatoms is that normal?

 

[Ruben's Reef]

Nice tank setup. Get a law mover Blenny and that sand will be clean in no time. Probably you need to add more CUC.

 

[Hallowhead]

I have

Nice tank setup. Get a law mover Blenny and that sand will be clean in no time. Probably you need to add more CUC.

I have 5 nass snails, 1 turbo, 2 astrea snails, 2 Scarlet's and 1 blue claw any thoughts on improvement ?

I need to get a goby! I want a yellow watchmen shrimp goby but they're hard to find

 

[Ruben's Reef]

I have

I have 5 nass snails, 1 turbo, 2 astrea snails, 2 Scarlet's and 1 blue claw any thoughts on improvement ?

I need to get a goby! I want a yellow watchmen shrimp goby but they're hard to find

Great.. I have a yellow watchmen goby with the shrimp but he do nothing to the sand. The shrimp works for him. Now, the lawn mover blenny is a bulldozer with the sand.

 

[Hallowhead]

Great.. I have a yellow watchmen goby with the shrimp but he do nothing to the sand. The shrimp works for him. Now, the lawn mover blenny is a bulldozer with the sand.

I will have to take a look. I don't want the shrimp goby combo as I heard the shrimp decimates CUC and other fish.

 

[Ruben's Reef]

I will have to take a look. I don't want the shrimp goby combo as I heard the shrimp decimates CUC and other fish.

Hummm, I have a good CUC for over a year and no one is missing yet.

 

[Hallowhead]

Hummm, I have a good CUC for over a year and no one is missing yet.

What does your CUC consist of?

 

[Ruben's Reef]

What does your CUC consist of?

Red leg Hermit crabs, Blue legs Hermit Crabs, Emerald Crabs, Mexican turbo snails, few Nassarius Snails, Cerit Snails, Peppermint shrimp, cleaner shrimp.

 

[BC-reefer]

Congrats on the tank! The stand looks great.
I have the same tank, running for a year and a half now. I had a 120g for a decade and then was out of the hobby for a bit. This was a great way to get back into it. I am running the IM media basket with the same three media you have, working well.

Lots of good advice here and the only other item I would mention is flow. Go big! I went with two 660gph wave pumps which where part of the orbit loop system I purchased. They were a disappointment even though the tank was within the recommended size. Recently, I bought a third WaveMaker and went with their 2100gph. I only run it at 20% but it has been a game changer for the tank. Because the tank is long, you need a good push to get the water going across. I run the big one on the top and the effect of the strong ripple looks awesome. Corals are getting better flow. The fish have also been much more active.

 

[Nem0]

Congrats on the tank! The stand looks great.
I have the same tank, running for a year and a half now. I had a 120g for a decade and then was out of the hobby for a bit. This was a great way to get back into it. I am running the IM media basket with the same three media you have, working well.

Lots of good advice here and the only other item I would mention is flow. Go big! I went with two 660gph wave pumps which where part of the orbit loop system I purchased. They were a disappointment even though the tank was within the recommended size. Recently, I bought a third WaveMaker and went with their 2100gph. I only run it at 20% but it has been a game changer for the tank. Because the tank is long, you need a good push to get the water going across. I run the big one on the top and the effect of the strong ripple looks awesome. Corals are getting better flow. The fish have also been much more active.

where did you put the stronger wave pump? i put mine on the side and it seems to stir up/move sand because it crosses with the return pump's flow.

 

[Hallowhead]

Congrats on the tank! The stand looks great.
I have the same tank, running for a year and a half now. I had a 120g for a decade and then was out of the hobby for a bit. This was a great way to get back into it. I am running the IM media basket with the same three media you have, working well.

Lots of good advice here and the only other item I would mention is flow. Go big! I went with two 660gph wave pumps which where part of the orbit loop system I purchased. They were a disappointment even though the tank was within the recommended size. Recently, I bought a third WaveMaker and went with their 2100gph. I only run it at 20% but it has been a game changer for the tank. Because the tank is long, you need a good push to get the water going across. I run the big one on the top and the effect of the strong ripple looks awesome. Corals are getting better flow. The fish have also been much more active.

I am looking at getting a second wave maker for the opposite end of the tank. I had to redirect some of my flow recently because it was causing my caulastrea to melt.

 

[Hallowhead]

Update as of today 5/29/19

In regards to zoa issues - separate thread copied over

Everything looked much better at the end of the day near the shut of the lights. I have my mom send me periodic pictures throughout the day. I don't know if it has any correlation to my lights being too powerful and they get weaker at the end of the day or if it's just because my parameters are leveling out.

Here is a picture of my lights and how close they are to the water. They reach a max intensity of 45 at peak during the bulk of the day.. is that too much for that close to the water? or how big the tank is? They used to do fine at that intensity in the beginning.

Left side Vibraniums (Doing Well)

Left side Spongebobs I believe (Starting to do much much better but growing weirdly up..)

Left side Fuit Loops (Doing much better)

Left side Futti Tutti (Doing better now)

Middle Utter Chaos Paly (Never looked bad)

Right side Orange Hornet (Still struggling - used to be INSANE)

Right side Gummie Bear (Not doing well)

Right side Sunny D's (Always been doing good)

Right side Fallen Angel (Super closed until today)