Matty’s Peninsula

[Lilmatty5dimes]

Well, changing out hobbies again and it’s the slow season for lawn service right now so decided to jump back into reefing. I Found a killer deal in FB marketplace I couldn’t refuse.

Got all the equipment plus brand new 660 wave maker and extra caddy basket and additives I’m not going to list for $450 over about 45mins away. It came with a 3-4” red carpet, fire and cleaner shrimp, few rock flowers, and green hairy shroom.

My first problem was the tank had some algae on the rocks so decided to sell the livestock to a buddy for $175 and acid wash all the rock to start over. Buddy had a 40lbs bag of ocean direct Caribbean live sand I traded a refractormeter for so I didn’t have to clean the sand I could just toss it.

Tank location was already set on looking up or finding a few amazing peninsula tanks on NR I wanted to copy. Ever since we bought the house I wanted a peninsula right inside the front door on the right side and next to the dining room table and living room. With that being said I needed to get a flat area the was level so off to Home Depot for a sheet of pine wood. Got that stain and needing to put a polyurethane on it today. Hopefully that’s be ready for tomorrow where I can level it out and screw it down so I can get the cycle going. I’m sure I’m forgetting something I’ll add later on.

Equipment:
Tank: Innovative Marine Nuvo Fusion 20 Peninsula
Lighting: AI Hydra 26HD
Heater: Cobalt Neo-therm 75w
Media: Not quite sure which yet.
Return: Mighty jet 326gph
Wave Pumps: Aqamai kps wavemaker
ATO: hydrofill with 5g hydrofill container
Skimmer: don’t plan on running one.
Doser: manually for now.

 

[Lilmatty5dimes]

Starting cycle 1-18-2021

 

[Lilmatty5dimes]

First coat of polyurethane has been applied now waiting till I can do another later today. Played around with the rocks and think I’ve found this the winner. Should be plenty of room and caves for the fish and plenty of real estate for coral placement. Hopefully tomorrow I’ll be able to place the board where it’ll rest level it and then screw it in and fill the tank with sand and rock till my bag of salt gets here. Few pics along the way.

 

[Lilmatty5dimes]

Well, got the base board all coated with 3 thick coats of polyurethane but when I brought it in to level the board the wife pointed out a white hazy on the board. I tried to put some wood polisher on the board and it wasn’t coming out so back outside to try and put another coat on and start over. ‍‍‍
Hopefully today I’ll get it corrected and I’ll be able to throw the sand and rock inside. Got the call my salt cane in yesterday so I’ll grab it from the LFS. Should be able to clean the equipment and figure out where to put everything.

 

[Lilmatty5dimes]

Was able to set the tank up top after the finally coat of polyurethane to get an idea of what it’ll look like.

 

[Lilmatty5dimes]

Finally got sand in the tank yesterday. Hooked up the hydra led to my WiFi. Don’t think they really could have made that any easier. Basically join hydra WiFi and then go on the myAI app and click the hydra and boom you’re done.
started mixing up my fritz pro salt and After mixing up about 20g I was loving the salt. Only took about 20-30mins to become clear and was quite easy measuring as well. Just over 2 cups for a 5g bucket. That’s going to make water changes so easy.
water level none 5g, 10g, and 15g. Probably only took about 17g to fill the tank up.

 

[Lilmatty5dimes]

Probably the easiest way of cycling a tank and takes about 2 weeks. I’ve been doing this for quite some time and I’ve never had a problem doing it. Cap full of Janitorial strength ammonia and then I drop 2 drops of AF bio s for the first 4-5 days then 1 drop after that.

 

[Lilmatty5dimes]

Well, not to much to report right now. Tank is cycling still and doing its thing. I’ve been adding a drop of aqua forest bio s in every day now and starting to get the nitrite to appear. I probably added way to much of the ammonia to the tank when starting it up.
I did add quite a few pieces of coral into the tank and so far the only casualty has been an acan. It got brown jelly from taking it off a piece of rock and I’m guessing it teared some of the tissue. The brown jelly got onto a Kryptonite candy cane and killed 4-5 heads. But everything else is looking great.

 

[Lilmatty5dimes]

Last week took the time to set up the AI 26HD. Found a pirate setting on a AI group on Facebook that looked pretty good so decided to try that schedule out and so far I like it beside it being on I think way to long so I had to shorten it up some.

I also ended up changing wave makers. I skipped the eflux and went with a Aqamai kps. The setting and diversity of being able to change patterns every 30mins was pretty awesome plus it’s all WiFi so I can change it on my phone to something else. it’s got a night, wave, constant, smooth, and random mode you can set along with the % of how strong you want it.

 

[Lilmatty5dimes]

Well, not to much to report. Cycle is nearing the end. Still have a tad bit of nitrite and the nitrates are up around 10. Plus I’m getting so funky algae now as well. Probably going to do a water change today and try and grab some more snails to start cleaning the rocks.

My big show piece shroom ended up making a donut so I think it was rotting inside the tank and I took it out. Pretty sad sight to see. Definitely a nice piece to have and I was looking forward to having it. Everything else is looking great. Found a pair of blacker ice snowflakes for $100 so pretty excited. Definitely a nice pair. Here’s a few pics.

 

[atlantean]

Well, not to much to report. Cycle is nearing the end. Still have a tad bit of nitrite and the nitrates are up around 10. Plus I’m getting so funky algae now as well. Probably going to do a water change today and try and grab some more snails to start cleaning the rocks.

My big show piece shroom ended up making a donut so I think it was rotting inside the tank and I took it out. Pretty sad sight to see. Definitely a nice piece to have and I was looking forward to having it. Everything else is looking great. Found a pair of blacker ice snowflakes for $100 so pretty excited. Definitely a nice pair. Here’s a few pics.

Is that a red leather coral in there?

 

[Lilmatty5dimes]

Is that a red leather coral in there?

No it’s not. I wish it was a red leather. Not sure I’ve seen one before.

 

[Lilmatty5dimes]

Oh WoW!!!! It’s been quite a while since I’ve done really anything with the tank. Basically had it on cruise which wasn’t a very good idea. Got Dino really bad in the tank and it basically covered all the rocks and most of the glass. Started doing weekly water changes and changing out the floss even sooner than before. I added a Aqua gadget media reactor with some Dr. Tim’s NP active pellets to help clear the Dino. Think I may hook up the UV light I’ve got if the pellets don’t do good.

Fish in there are doing great. I ended up buying my buddies tank to sell for him and it had a tail spot blenny and a yellow watchman to add to the tank. YW found his home pretty quickly in between the 2 rock structures.

Found a buddy selling a really nice kryptonite shroom and a momma interstellar shroom space monster Zoa, with a looney toon and a rainbow chalice for a steal. Well, the shrooms melted within 4-5 days which hurts but the other pieces I got from him are doing pretty good. Go figure the shrooms are the ones to melt.

 

[Lilmatty5dimes]

Here’s a few pics from last night. Not the greatest lol

 

[Lilmatty5dimes]

So good and bad news. Think my little clown is on his last leg. Found him sitting on a rock breathing heavy and not really able to swim anywhere. I came back about 30mins later and found him on the sand bed doing the same thing.
I found a local guy selling a 12 head Duncan and a 6-7 head blasto for $100 and pulled the trigger and ended up grabbing those yesterday and also found a melanurus wrasse at a lfs. Stopped by another local Thursday night and ended up walking out with a few sps and monti pieces a decent size cap some of the nicest utter chaos’s and a toadstool. He Also let me borrow his apex display to get my apex reset and hooked up to the internet so I can finally switch out my hydra led for the ati fixture with reef brite. Just need to figure out how I’m going to mount the light now. Here’s a few more photos.

 

[KellyCorals]

Nice tank Matt! You still living in Cocoa? This is Jay we met a couple years back...don’t know if you remember me but we met thru Myles. I’ll be watching the progress on your build!

 

[KellyCorals]

Sorry to hear about the clown. It sucks losing fish...

 

[Lilmatty5dimes]

Nice tank Matt! You still living in Cocoa? This is Jay we met a couple years back...don’t know if you remember me but we met thru Myles. I’ll be watching the progress on your build!

Hi man. You own the shop next to rev cut right?
Thanks. I’m going to Carly try on this build. Lol usually love the building project but once I get done with that I tend to get bored. Lol

 

[Lilmatty5dimes]

Sorry to hear about the clown. It sucks losing fish...

Thanks. It unfortunately comes with the hobby. Try your best to prevent it from happening.

 

[KellyCorals]

Hi man. You own the shop next to rev cut right?
Thanks. I’m going to Carly try on this build. Lol usually love the building project but once I get done with that I tend to get bored. Lol

Yes sir that’s me! Yeah I know what you mean about getting bored after the build is done! Gotta try and keep it interesting with new corals or fish and if that doesn’t work just do another new tank LOL