Introduction to my tank

Dr. Dendrostein

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Hi!

Been on this forum for a while, but only recently started being an active member. I have entered the hobby 1,5 years ago by keeping 2 clownfish in a 15 gallon tank. Outside of the reefing hobby I work as an airline pilot and enjoy studying all kinds of scientific stuff (including reefkeeping).

Once I got the hang of keeping the small tank stable and healthy, I quickly upgraded to a red sea max 250 and kept some basic leather corals and fish.

I fell in love with the hobby and upgraded to a 125 gallon reef tank 2 months ago. Now that this tank is moving in the right direction. I would like to introduce myself and my little ocean.

Tank is 6” in length and has a volume of 125 gallons. System is running with following equipment:

- 2 heaters
- Nyos 2.0 (not activated due to tank age)
- Powerflotor L skimmer
- Aqua medic DC runner 5.2
- 2 Jebao wave makers (up to 9000l/h)
- 2 Amtra led system reef 48W, 1 24x3W JMB reef led

The tank has 80 pounds of sand and 150 pounds of Revoreef 3DM reef rock, seeded with some LR from previous tank.

Took 5 weeks to establish the initial cycle of the tank. Still fighting with some algae, but has been a lot worse than how it looks today. Livestock from previous tank has been added over the last 4 weeks.

Livestock:

- Spotted Mandarin (closely monitored in new tank, eating frozen mysis and pods)
- 2 Occelaris clownfish
- 1 Paracanthurus Hepatus (Blue tang)
- 1 Firefish
- 1 Goby
- 1 Royal Gramma
- 1 Yellow tail damsel
- Cleaner shrimp

Attached are a few pictures of my tank. Corals and fish have been doing fine and are growing. Full tank shot wastaken 2 weeks ago, and the other one with additional (white) dry rock was taken today. (Fish and corals are a bit freaked out by the addition of rock and more sand at the moment).

I hope I can find some good info and inspiration on R2R.

D8FDAE92-3614-48B5-AE2C-850AC3C9503C.jpeg 761CEC04-EBD2-4174-82DA-BF8E85F73F9B.jpeg 9C91B633-2ECA-4383-A838-4D8B600D0B42.jpeg Leather is shredding.
9D38C7F6-6E14-48F8-BF75-3A58E51DB93D.jpeg 19F94F1A-816B-4480-BF03-A75E84146376.jpeg E873CF8B-0F59-4736-AC3A-2354EFA9B62A.jpeg D6EDF5F1-DCF3-4A16-B485-DC4C6C0C6417.jpeg E743B8BE-9028-4953-9288-ED143B0167E1.jpeg A0BB2950-F171-4BC4-8BCB-08A29F4A72FB.jpeg D705639D-6CFE-4537-BE67-D2B2D2745A18.jpeg 4FFE0CE6-F5AC-431A-867C-B338FC4B5011.jpeg C0F2B9D5-280D-44B1-8868-4CB760838BD5.jpeg 4F2D6FC3-62FE-4CAE-BC74-5DD7A8027FE5.jpeg

Welcome, comrade. Someone loves softies, beautiful. My softies are these....

1 of 16 carnation coral, dendronephthya sp

20191117_190004.jpg 20191117_190613.jpg 20191116_193506.jpg IMG_20191114_215816_530.jpg
 

vetteguy53081

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Euphyllia97

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So as I hit the 4 month mark ,I will give a little update on my tank!

I have been adding some livestock over the time whenever my parameters allowed for a higher bioload. I consider my tank to be fully stocked concerning fish/inverts. I chose to have 2 additional tangs in the tank, keeping in mind their family and color. Using a mirror next to the tank I have observed some agression the first hours coming from the kole tang towards the (also new) scopas tang. There were never any incidents with the established hippo tang. To this day I have not observed agression anymore. (Knock on wood)

Tank has gotten a lot less dirty by the addition of the sandsifting goby and kole tang. They both do a great job of keeping the sand and rocks clean.

Overall I have seen some coral growth. Especially in my zoanthids and GSP noticable changes have taken place. All other corals are looking good and steady so far. Good signs of calcification in the tank!

By adding the more demanding SPS corals, I noticed the need of dosing my system for alkalinity. (Alk 5,4) I have bought a 4 pump doser which is dosing Alkalinity (no influence on Ph) on an hourly basis. The alkalinity has rised to a steady 7,2 dkh.

last but not least I have installed aqua medic hopstops to prevent fish from jumping out of the tank.

Also some less positive news! I have noticed a part of a zoa colony which closed without any easy explanation. I have observed the colony and few days later obtained my answer. Zoa-eating nudibranch!!! Immediately did a freshwater dip and now waiting for the results. I’m planning on doing another dip in a few days so that the hatched nudibranches will have no chance to reproduce any further!

Had some problems with voltage in the tank due to a broken heater (not enough flow around the heater). Detected the fault and replaced the heater without any noticable change in coral/fish behaviour. This experience however made me install a grounding probe!


Current parameters:
Ammonia : undetectable
Nitrite : Undetectable
Nitrate : 5 - 10 ppm
Phosphate: 0 - 0,03
Alkalinity : 7,2 Dkh (steady)
Calcium : 440 ppm
Magnesium: 1310 ppm
Ph: 8,1 - 8,3
Salinity: 1,025

Livestock additions:
- skunk cleaner shrimp
- sandsifting goby and Orange stripe prawn goby
- Brazilian gramma
- Scopas tang
- Kole tang (Striatus/ No yellow eye)

Coral additions:
No new soft/leathers have been added to the system.

LPS:
- Euphyllia Paraancora

SPS:
- Purple Stylophora
- Seratoporia/ Birdsnest
- Pocillopora Damicornis
- Orange red plate montipora
- Green plate Montipora
- Orange/red montipora digitata

Technique:
- 4 pumps doser installed
- Additional wavemaker
- Carbon and biopellets added to reactor
- Grounding probe in Display and Sump
- Aquamedic hop

On top of this I am really enjoying my tank!

6F0FFC77-C8F7-486A-91C9-66D108978352.jpeg 1818F2BC-C4AC-49A0-AC80-7CA969014295.jpeg 85FC1026-ABD2-4B8B-A1C6-2A8CBBEBAE7C.jpeg CACC92CC-1940-43F4-BD45-588907CEBD2C.jpeg F3CC54FF-9DF9-4C07-9F27-6B7733C43937.jpeg 14DF1F46-D0A7-441E-ADB0-EB7C518A8403.jpeg FC1AEAEB-EE60-4BD1-B080-C58B871B6F78.jpeg 3DA08227-7220-4443-8947-6F8D13AAE075.jpeg B584D126-C46E-44A3-8C32-5BC9787B0679.jpeg A8D4FF86-DBB3-4DDC-9058-DE05EF67C0C4.jpeg 06EEBD6B-7004-4F1E-9246-6FAB4747CCCD.jpeg F492C36B-AC61-483A-89A2-AD5D82222C6D.jpeg 71A19B8D-915A-4E52-9E7B-7ACDCF4AD596.jpeg E66D3940-8818-45AB-BEA6-94DADD5DA35D.jpeg E302357F-AA21-4D15-935F-A5CB29800198.jpeg FBF474C9-8C00-439D-B3E4-E5D5FFF75574.jpeg
 

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So as I hit the 4 month mark ,I will give a little update on my tank!

I have been adding some livestock over the time whenever my parameters allowed for a higher bioload. I consider my tank to be fully stocked concerning fish/inverts. I chose to have 2 additional tangs in the tank, keeping in mind their family and color. Using a mirror next to the tank I have observed some agression the first hours coming from the kole tang towards the (also new) scopas tang. There were never any incidents with the established hippo tang. To this day I have not observed agression anymore. (Knock on wood)

Tank has gotten a lot less dirty by the addition of the sandsifting goby and kole tang. They both do a great job of keeping the sand and rocks clean.

Overall I have seen some coral growth. Especially in my zoanthids and GSP noticable changes have taken place. All other corals are looking good and steady so far. Good signs of calcification in the tank!

By adding the more demanding SPS corals, I noticed the need of dosing my system for alkalinity. (Alk 5,4) I have bought a 4 pump doser which is dosing Alkalinity (no influence on Ph) on an hourly basis. The alkalinity has rised to a steady 7,2 dkh.

last but not least I have installed aqua medic hopstops to prevent fish from jumping out of the tank.

Also some less positive news! I have noticed a part of a zoa colony which closed without any easy explanation. I have observed the colony and few days later obtained my answer. Zoa-eating nudibranch!!! Immediately did a freshwater dip and now waiting for the results. I’m planning on doing another dip in a few days so that the hatched nudibranches will have no chance to reproduce any further!

Had some problems with voltage in the tank due to a broken heater (not enough flow around the heater). Detected the fault and replaced the heater without any noticable change in coral/fish behaviour. This experience however made me install a grounding probe!


Current parameters:
Ammonia : undetectable
Nitrite : Undetectable
Nitrate : 5 - 10 ppm
Phosphate: 0 - 0,03
Alkalinity : 7,2 Dkh (steady)
Calcium : 440 ppm
Magnesium: 1310 ppm
Ph: 8,1 - 8,3
Salinity: 1,025

Livestock additions:
- skunk cleaner shrimp
- sandsifting goby and Orange stripe prawn goby
- Brazilian gramma
- Scopas tang
- Kole tang (Striatus/ No yellow eye)

Coral additions:
No new soft/leathers have been added to the system.

LPS:
- Euphyllia Paraancora

SPS:
- Purple Stylophora
- Seratoporia/ Birdsnest
- Pocillopora Damicornis
- Orange red plate montipora
- Green plate Montipora
- Orange/red montipora digitata

Technique:
- 4 pumps doser installed
- Additional wavemaker
- Carbon and biopellets added to reactor
- Grounding probe in Display and Sump
- Aquamedic hop

On top of this I am really enjoying my tank!

6F0FFC77-C8F7-486A-91C9-66D108978352.jpeg 1818F2BC-C4AC-49A0-AC80-7CA969014295.jpeg 85FC1026-ABD2-4B8B-A1C6-2A8CBBEBAE7C.jpeg CACC92CC-1940-43F4-BD45-588907CEBD2C.jpeg F3CC54FF-9DF9-4C07-9F27-6B7733C43937.jpeg 14DF1F46-D0A7-441E-ADB0-EB7C518A8403.jpeg FC1AEAEB-EE60-4BD1-B080-C58B871B6F78.jpeg 3DA08227-7220-4443-8947-6F8D13AAE075.jpeg B584D126-C46E-44A3-8C32-5BC9787B0679.jpeg A8D4FF86-DBB3-4DDC-9058-DE05EF67C0C4.jpeg 06EEBD6B-7004-4F1E-9246-6FAB4747CCCD.jpeg F492C36B-AC61-483A-89A2-AD5D82222C6D.jpeg 71A19B8D-915A-4E52-9E7B-7ACDCF4AD596.jpeg E66D3940-8818-45AB-BEA6-94DADD5DA35D.jpeg E302357F-AA21-4D15-935F-A5CB29800198.jpeg FBF474C9-8C00-439D-B3E4-E5D5FFF75574.jpeg

Nice update...things are looking good.
 
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Euphyllia97

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Hi guys! Just a quick update on my tank as we hit the 6 months mark. Haven’t had any big problems yet (knock on wood). I have seen good growth in most of my corals and fish are doing great.
I added some chaeto in the sump.

Only bad thing that happened so far was losing my squamosa clam (prob due to lighting). Saw some STN on my green montipora, but it has been growing and is covering the dead part with new tissue. Have seen my corals taking off lately!

Livestock:
- Pair of clowns
- yellow coris wrasse
- Kole tang
- Blue tang
- Scopas
- Sand sifting goby
- Mandarin
- Yellowtail damsel
- Brazilian Gramma
- Cleaner shrimp
(Fully stocked)

Added quite some corals ( sps/lps/softies)
Removed most of my zoas.
One of the specials I have been succesfully keeping and growing now is a blue haliclona sponge!

Parameters:
Sg: 1.026
Alk: 8,5
Cal: 425
Mg: 1350
Phos: 0.03
Nitrate: 10 ppm

C6E5BFEF-E817-46E8-86F6-B3ADD2F01656.jpeg C8E2D485-BD54-4CA7-8167-FF024B81292A.jpeg 706F5E39-61D4-4E5C-94F5-5E9729DC2FA4.jpeg 48D20E5E-60F9-4D4D-A6B7-10A20A768B95.jpeg 3C566AD6-89EE-4A5F-89C3-BB68BE34F04F.jpeg A0B464B0-DCA5-483B-BE98-54FBEDC857E1.jpeg A9B70061-84B4-4699-8FDC-DBAFEE69FFC5.jpeg 205D9021-0834-4068-8636-270F5B0E76CF.jpeg 919D2C21-BED2-4830-A3B9-2EF40DA42B0C.jpeg AA84FC7D-E55C-457F-9308-856685C9DA97.jpeg 78DF6E37-02F7-43CA-A5C2-3F8F18537724.jpeg 2CCB6D3C-79EF-4EBA-BE4B-C3DA033B5609.jpeg 24875043-7024-44DC-B1F0-DD2D8DC58531.png CF7C1905-80DD-4283-96CB-1A24381BF783.jpeg FAF149E6-BD4A-4CCF-8EDC-368DD897AAB1.jpeg FA7B5CCB-B54A-4183-9FA5-F70383DD0A64.jpeg
 

vetteguy53081

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Great work and Pics !!!
 
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