Hello!
Off and on reefer/mostly fowler since I was teenager, back with a Landen 28.5 AIO. Tank has been setup for a couple months now. I took a good long break this time. Been about 8 years since my last reef tank. Feeling like a complete newbie again with how much things have changed. I'm making lots of mistakes and being impatient. ;Shamefullyembarrased
____________________________
Going to add a FTS here each month!
April
May
June
July
August
September
October
_____________________________
Husbandry
Weekly 5 gallon water change(bout 20% total volume)
Testing
Alkalinity - Hanna Checker & Salifert
Calcium - Salifert
Magnesium - Salifert
NO3 - Red Sea
PO4 - Hanna Checker
Tank/Rock/Sand/Salt
Landen 28.5g AIO
18lbs Caribsea Life Rock
2lbs Aquacultured Live Rock
10lbs Special Grade Dry
Tropic-Marin Pro Reef
Lighting
CoralCare Gen2
Flow
AI Nero 3 (2)
MP10wQD (2)
MightyJet 326gph Return
Heating/Cooling
Dual Stage Ranco Controller
Eheim 75w Heaters (2)
Fan pointed at glass for cooling
Filtration
Tunze 9004 DC Skimmer
Oxydator D
Seachem Matrix
Filter Floss(stopped using)
Carbon(stopped using)
Controller
Hydros X3
ATO
Kamoer One SE
Dosing
Kamoer X1 Pro 2(All-For-Reef)
RODI
SpectraPure 90gpd MAXCAP
Fish
Black Ocellaris Clownfish
Six-Line Wrasse
Lawnmower Blenny
Coral
Cheap hardy SPS, some Zoa/Palys, and a GSP rock.
CUC
(3) Pitho Crabs
(1) Fighting Conch
(a bajillion) Trochus Snails
(2) Bumble Bee Snails
(6) Nassarius
(4) Florida Cerith
(6) Nerite Snails
_____________________________
LIVESTOCK CASUALTIES
Coral
Hollywood Stunner Chalice (5/7/21)
- early introduction
- RTN
- pretty sure I nuked it with my LEDs
PC Rainbow Acro (6/22/21)
- early introduction
- this was ballsy, but it was cheap and I'm dumb
- STN'd, but saved some small frags
- ALK swing finished off the little frags when I started dosing AFR
No name acro frag
- moved it up too early, nuked it under LEDS
- it was recovering, but kept getting knocked around
- it's somewhere in the sand bed now
Fish
- none
Inverts
Turbo Snail
- Lawnmower Blenny murdered it. Or recognized it's decline and gave the final blow. =(
Cleaner Shrimp
- Had it for about a week. Never mentioned it in this thread. I really am not sure what killed it.
- It may have died due to a brief spike in nitrates
- My clown may have killed it after one too many attempted cleanings
- I miss it trying to clean my hand
Peppermint Shrimp (8/21/21)
- Found against the side of an MP10 this morning.
- It had been in hiding since adding a six-line, only to come out at night
- I think the six-line finally got him
_____________________________
Mistakes or regrets thus far are...(will continue to update)
- not going with real ocean rock. I miss all the life and biodiversity that comes with it
- using Caribsea Live Fiji Pink(sandstorms)... ended up siphoning it out for Special Grade Dry
- buying an Aquatic Life RO buddie 50gpd(cheap point of sale)
- running my new Spectrapure RODI for a month+ before I realized I needed a special carbon block to more efficiently filter chloramines
- Wrasse and Blenny should probably be in a bigger tank and not getting a pair of Clowns
- using Chemi-Pure Elite(phosphates bottomed out)
- feeding corals too much, too soon into cycle
- being not intelligent
- starting All-for-Reef(AFR) too high and spiking my ALK(almost lost my stylos)
- being ill prepared for a 16 hour power outage
- feeding too much TDO Chromaboost and spiking phosphates
_____________________________
My humble beginnings...
I used Fritz Turbo Start and cycled in about a week with a Clownfish. I read a lot about corals adding biodiversity in dry rock setups and decided to take a chance on some cheap frags. Brought home a hollywood stunner, red monti cap, green monti cap, gsp, pandora palys, and some unknown zoas.
The stunner lasted about a week before melting away. GSP, Pandoras, and most of the zoas are growing quickly as expected. Monti caps are fine, but growth is slow.
Shortly after introducing these frags, I experienced my cycles diatom bloom. It never got severe and only lasted a few weeks. This was quickly followed up by what I believe was cyano and hair algae. I purchased a small CUC from reefcleaners during this period.
This is right about when I started going a little overboard feeding my coral and fish. I was dosing coral aminos daily and reef roids maybe every other day. I didn't realize how much this was fueling the algae. I scaled back and also picked up a Lawnmower Blenny.
My nitrate levels were pretty high. 40ppm, but still fairly low .1 phosphates. Did a series of larger(10-15 gallon) water changes to reduce nitrates. I switched from IO to TM Pro Reef at this time as well. I also initially purchased a cheap RO buddie unit off Amazon. I was naive to the fact it was producing water way too fast, like 2-3x its advertised rate. It showed 0 TDS, but I was motivated to do bigger water changes, more confident, with my new Spectrapure unit. I returned the RO buddie.
After my larger water changes, I found my nitrates and phosphates remaining stable at 5ppm/.03ppm. I started to dose more coral foods(ab+ & aminos daily, roids 3x/week). My levels remained stable despite the increased feedings. This is about the time I got a 10 pack of sps and zoa frags. Everything acclimated well and was showing good polyp extension. I did make the mistake of not light acclimating slowly. I was increasing intensity by upwards of 5% everyday. I came home to see some frags were lightened up considerably and showing signs of bleaching on the outer edges. I reduced my intensity down to 25% and have it set to increase to 70% over 90 days. After about a week, things were looking better. Polyp extension was back.
My algae issues were gaining a foothold again and it was starting to look pretty bad. My corals, however, were looking their best. Dino paranoia took over and I tested Ns and Ps every 2-3 days. Nutrients were slowly going down each week. When I hit 2ppm nitrates and near undetectable phosphates, I pulled the chemi-pure and purigen. Switched to filter floss and carbon only.
Nutrients came back up to 2 nitrate, .05 phos. Algae is still looking bad. I'm getting some weird stringy stuff and once again I'm paranoid of dinos. I watch too many dino videos, read threads, and decide I'm going to dose phyto.
I dose 10ml phyto daily for a week. Algae is mostly gone in span of a week. Nutrients have nearly bottomed out, though. Nitrates test at 0, phosphate at .02. Now I'm double extra paranoid about dinos. I stop dosing phyto for a couple days. Phyto release nutrients back into water earlier this week and I'm sitting at 5ppm nitrate and .1 phosphate.
My water clarity and algae levels are fantastic as of this post. However, my coral not so much. Polyp extension has been very poor the last few days. The few cheap acros I did get are starting to STN(I think). Going to keep an eye on them and frag what I can if it gets worse. My other SPS frags(stylos, birdsnest, montis) are showing pretty poor polyp extension. My pandora palys are multiplying quickly, but I've noticed them reaching for what I assume is more light(or nutrients?) the last couple days. I plan to stay the course with my 90 day acclimation, but I thought it was worth mentioning.
I think the up and down nutrient levels have taken a toll. Not to mention the changes in lighting and flow. I started with a single prime and nero 3. Now have two of each. The goal as of now is to keep things as simple as possible. Stop making changes or if I do, be as gentle as possible. Do the thing all the videos and threads advise, but you ignore the first time. =)
Filter floss and carbon for the time being. I just picked up a used Tunze 9004 DC Skimmer. I will use that rather than any chemical filtration. I've lowered my phyto dosing to just a couple ml mixed in with my frozen Rod's food for my daily feeding. I think reef roids, ab+, and aminos are out for now.
I did recently setup a dosing pump with All-For-Reef. I'm starting low at 2.5ml/day dosed equally over 24 hours. Just ordered a hannah alk checker to help dial everything in.
Most of my issues are obviously due to such a new, unstable tank...paired with my inexperience, impatience, and occasional heavy hand. It's great to be back, though!
Hopefully my next update I'll have some healthier coral.
Thanks for reading!
_____________________________
Some pics to share.
Final aquascape glued together. Caribsea life rock.
Wet! Fiji pink sand. Loved the look, but ultimately had to replace.
Clown!
First corals.
Diatoms! Moved GSP to isolated rock. Bought what I believe is a stylo.
Bunch o frags delivered. Moved them up over a day or two.
Need to rethink all this. Hopefully have something more organized to show in the future. Installed dedicated GFCI inside cabinet. Using my PCs backup battery in the meantime. Need to figure a better backup. Nero 3s dont seem to be compatible with most backups unfortunately.
Off and on reefer/mostly fowler since I was teenager, back with a Landen 28.5 AIO. Tank has been setup for a couple months now. I took a good long break this time. Been about 8 years since my last reef tank. Feeling like a complete newbie again with how much things have changed. I'm making lots of mistakes and being impatient. ;Shamefullyembarrased
____________________________
Going to add a FTS here each month!
April
May
June
July
August
September
October
_____________________________
Husbandry
Weekly 5 gallon water change(bout 20% total volume)
Testing
Alkalinity - Hanna Checker & Salifert
Calcium - Salifert
Magnesium - Salifert
NO3 - Red Sea
PO4 - Hanna Checker
Tank/Rock/Sand/Salt
Landen 28.5g AIO
18lbs Caribsea Life Rock
2lbs Aquacultured Live Rock
10lbs Special Grade Dry
Tropic-Marin Pro Reef
Lighting
CoralCare Gen2
Flow
AI Nero 3 (2)
MP10wQD (2)
MightyJet 326gph Return
Heating/Cooling
Dual Stage Ranco Controller
Eheim 75w Heaters (2)
Fan pointed at glass for cooling
Filtration
Tunze 9004 DC Skimmer
Oxydator D
Seachem Matrix
Filter Floss(stopped using)
Carbon(stopped using)
Controller
Hydros X3
ATO
Kamoer One SE
Dosing
Kamoer X1 Pro 2(All-For-Reef)
RODI
SpectraPure 90gpd MAXCAP
Fish
Black Ocellaris Clownfish
Six-Line Wrasse
Lawnmower Blenny
Coral
Cheap hardy SPS, some Zoa/Palys, and a GSP rock.
CUC
(3) Pitho Crabs
(1) Fighting Conch
(a bajillion) Trochus Snails
(2) Bumble Bee Snails
(6) Nassarius
(4) Florida Cerith
(6) Nerite Snails
_____________________________
LIVESTOCK CASUALTIES
Coral
Hollywood Stunner Chalice (5/7/21)
- early introduction
- RTN
- pretty sure I nuked it with my LEDs
PC Rainbow Acro (6/22/21)
- early introduction
- this was ballsy, but it was cheap and I'm dumb
- STN'd, but saved some small frags
- ALK swing finished off the little frags when I started dosing AFR
No name acro frag
- moved it up too early, nuked it under LEDS
- it was recovering, but kept getting knocked around
- it's somewhere in the sand bed now
Fish
- none
Inverts
Turbo Snail
- Lawnmower Blenny murdered it. Or recognized it's decline and gave the final blow. =(
Cleaner Shrimp
- Had it for about a week. Never mentioned it in this thread. I really am not sure what killed it.
- It may have died due to a brief spike in nitrates
- My clown may have killed it after one too many attempted cleanings
- I miss it trying to clean my hand
Peppermint Shrimp (8/21/21)
- Found against the side of an MP10 this morning.
- It had been in hiding since adding a six-line, only to come out at night
- I think the six-line finally got him
_____________________________
Mistakes or regrets thus far are...(will continue to update)
- not going with real ocean rock. I miss all the life and biodiversity that comes with it
- using Caribsea Live Fiji Pink(sandstorms)... ended up siphoning it out for Special Grade Dry
- buying an Aquatic Life RO buddie 50gpd(cheap point of sale)
- running my new Spectrapure RODI for a month+ before I realized I needed a special carbon block to more efficiently filter chloramines
- Wrasse and Blenny should probably be in a bigger tank and not getting a pair of Clowns
- using Chemi-Pure Elite(phosphates bottomed out)
- feeding corals too much, too soon into cycle
- being not intelligent
- starting All-for-Reef(AFR) too high and spiking my ALK(almost lost my stylos)
- being ill prepared for a 16 hour power outage
- feeding too much TDO Chromaboost and spiking phosphates
_____________________________
My humble beginnings...
I used Fritz Turbo Start and cycled in about a week with a Clownfish. I read a lot about corals adding biodiversity in dry rock setups and decided to take a chance on some cheap frags. Brought home a hollywood stunner, red monti cap, green monti cap, gsp, pandora palys, and some unknown zoas.
The stunner lasted about a week before melting away. GSP, Pandoras, and most of the zoas are growing quickly as expected. Monti caps are fine, but growth is slow.
Shortly after introducing these frags, I experienced my cycles diatom bloom. It never got severe and only lasted a few weeks. This was quickly followed up by what I believe was cyano and hair algae. I purchased a small CUC from reefcleaners during this period.
This is right about when I started going a little overboard feeding my coral and fish. I was dosing coral aminos daily and reef roids maybe every other day. I didn't realize how much this was fueling the algae. I scaled back and also picked up a Lawnmower Blenny.
My nitrate levels were pretty high. 40ppm, but still fairly low .1 phosphates. Did a series of larger(10-15 gallon) water changes to reduce nitrates. I switched from IO to TM Pro Reef at this time as well. I also initially purchased a cheap RO buddie unit off Amazon. I was naive to the fact it was producing water way too fast, like 2-3x its advertised rate. It showed 0 TDS, but I was motivated to do bigger water changes, more confident, with my new Spectrapure unit. I returned the RO buddie.
After my larger water changes, I found my nitrates and phosphates remaining stable at 5ppm/.03ppm. I started to dose more coral foods(ab+ & aminos daily, roids 3x/week). My levels remained stable despite the increased feedings. This is about the time I got a 10 pack of sps and zoa frags. Everything acclimated well and was showing good polyp extension. I did make the mistake of not light acclimating slowly. I was increasing intensity by upwards of 5% everyday. I came home to see some frags were lightened up considerably and showing signs of bleaching on the outer edges. I reduced my intensity down to 25% and have it set to increase to 70% over 90 days. After about a week, things were looking better. Polyp extension was back.
My algae issues were gaining a foothold again and it was starting to look pretty bad. My corals, however, were looking their best. Dino paranoia took over and I tested Ns and Ps every 2-3 days. Nutrients were slowly going down each week. When I hit 2ppm nitrates and near undetectable phosphates, I pulled the chemi-pure and purigen. Switched to filter floss and carbon only.
Nutrients came back up to 2 nitrate, .05 phos. Algae is still looking bad. I'm getting some weird stringy stuff and once again I'm paranoid of dinos. I watch too many dino videos, read threads, and decide I'm going to dose phyto.
I dose 10ml phyto daily for a week. Algae is mostly gone in span of a week. Nutrients have nearly bottomed out, though. Nitrates test at 0, phosphate at .02. Now I'm double extra paranoid about dinos. I stop dosing phyto for a couple days. Phyto release nutrients back into water earlier this week and I'm sitting at 5ppm nitrate and .1 phosphate.
My water clarity and algae levels are fantastic as of this post. However, my coral not so much. Polyp extension has been very poor the last few days. The few cheap acros I did get are starting to STN(I think). Going to keep an eye on them and frag what I can if it gets worse. My other SPS frags(stylos, birdsnest, montis) are showing pretty poor polyp extension. My pandora palys are multiplying quickly, but I've noticed them reaching for what I assume is more light(or nutrients?) the last couple days. I plan to stay the course with my 90 day acclimation, but I thought it was worth mentioning.
I think the up and down nutrient levels have taken a toll. Not to mention the changes in lighting and flow. I started with a single prime and nero 3. Now have two of each. The goal as of now is to keep things as simple as possible. Stop making changes or if I do, be as gentle as possible. Do the thing all the videos and threads advise, but you ignore the first time. =)
Filter floss and carbon for the time being. I just picked up a used Tunze 9004 DC Skimmer. I will use that rather than any chemical filtration. I've lowered my phyto dosing to just a couple ml mixed in with my frozen Rod's food for my daily feeding. I think reef roids, ab+, and aminos are out for now.
I did recently setup a dosing pump with All-For-Reef. I'm starting low at 2.5ml/day dosed equally over 24 hours. Just ordered a hannah alk checker to help dial everything in.
Most of my issues are obviously due to such a new, unstable tank...paired with my inexperience, impatience, and occasional heavy hand. It's great to be back, though!
Hopefully my next update I'll have some healthier coral.
Thanks for reading!
_____________________________
Some pics to share.
Final aquascape glued together. Caribsea life rock.
Wet! Fiji pink sand. Loved the look, but ultimately had to replace.
Clown!
First corals.
Diatoms! Moved GSP to isolated rock. Bought what I believe is a stylo.
Bunch o frags delivered. Moved them up over a day or two.
Need to rethink all this. Hopefully have something more organized to show in the future. Installed dedicated GFCI inside cabinet. Using my PCs backup battery in the meantime. Need to figure a better backup. Nero 3s dont seem to be compatible with most backups unfortunately.
Last edited: