Mehaffy's 1100+ gallon Plywood display in North Alabama

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mehaffydr

mehaffydr

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I was also at one of my favorite reef stores in St. Louis over the weekend and they had this really nice pair of Lyretail Anthias. The male has got to be 4-5" and is just a beautiful fish I also bought a Choati Wrasse. The Wrasse was eating frozen Mysis in the shop and is already eating in my observation tank. I did put some sand in the tank so it would not stress. The tank I am using has been running for months and is the same tank I used to fallow my Gulf live rock so it has pods and good bacteria. I have decided not to treat these fish but just have in observation for a while.
Ill try to get a picture of the Wrasse tomorrow.
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mehaffydr

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This was a busy weekend. I built light racks and got 12 of the 18 Noopsyche lights mounted and programmed. Still need to build 1 more light rack for the last 6 lights. I have to say so far I am impressed with the lights. Seem to be well constructed and I sure have a lot more light than I had before. As others have said the instruction book on programming leaves a lot to be desired but after watching the video programming was quick and easy.
I built the light racks out of angled aluminum from Lowes. Fairly simple but time consuming.
This is a pic of the light racks completed so far and you can see on the back wall the 18 Power blocks for the lights.
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The lights and rack look awesome! I can't wait to see what it looks like during the day with them all at full blast.
 
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mehaffydr

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Tonight I built the 3rd light rack so I now have 18 Noopsyche K7V3 lights over my tank. I got to say so far I am so happy I did this. Yes it was kind of expensive but compared to other LED's these were a bargain. One thing I have noticed is the the light is concentrated downward. With the Halides a lot of light shined in my eyes when I would look at the tank and I do not get that now and they do shimmer! I have them all programmed and having a ramp up and down time is cool. Before with just T5 and Halides I just did not have that. Also the amount of light I now have is incredible. I will be ordering a PAR meter from BRS later this week so that I will be able to get some readings. But with my Nitrate and Phosphate number coming down and the corals I do have growing it is now time to start adding more. I'll post some pics with the daytime lights soon but I may not have a chance to get that until the weekend. Soon I may finally get a chance to start building a canopy.
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One thing you may consider doing sooner versus later is marking/numbering the power supplies along with each light (so you know which goes to which). This will be helpful in case you have a power supply go bad... it will be easy to find and replace it. I used to have 9 lights over my tank and when I had to replace a couple of power supplies it was a bit of a pain. I'm sure this won't be an issue for some time but better to mark them now when it's easiest.
 
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I am very happy with the Noopsyche lights so far.
I just ordered PAR meter so I will have some numbers next week.
Still working on Phosphate and Nitrate
Phos .31
Nitrate 11.3

No algae problems at all and all tank inhabitants are doing great.
I am going to start slowly adding some corals and see how that goes.
I still have not set up my Calcium reactor but for now the DOS is keeping things very stable.
 
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Good evening its a good time to update. Not a lot new going on right now just letting things stabilize. I have decided I do like the New Noopshyche lights. The few corals I do have seem to be responding well and growing. I plan to add more corals in the coming weeks.
I did get a few fish 2 Engineer Gobys, 1 Melanarius Wrasse 1 Neon Dottyback 1 urchin 1 cleaner shrimp and some snails and 100lbs of rock, from a Guy who was breaking down a tank. The fish are now all in QT and the shrimp urchin and rocks are all on a 75 day fallow wait. Hers a short video of the fish when I first got them home.
New Fish
 

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Good evening its a good time to update. Not a lot new going on right now just letting things stabilize. I have decided I do like the New Noopshyche lights. The few corals I do have seem to be responding well and growing. I plan to add more corals in the coming weeks.
I did get a few fish 2 Engineer Gobys, 1 Melanarius Wrasse 1 Neon Dottyback 1 urchin 1 cleaner shrimp and some snails and 100lbs of rock, from a Guy who was breaking down a tank. The fish are now all in QT and the shrimp urchin and rocks are all on a 75 day fallow wait. Hers a short video of the fish when I first got them home.
New Fish
Are you interested in a horseshoe crab?
 

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Are you interested in a horseshoe crab?
They are interesting inhabitants. My LFS has tried them a few times. They don't seem to last very long. He believes they are not well adapted to tropical temperatures. We have them around here where the water temps range 44-72F.

But maybe there are tropical versions? IDK.
 
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They are interesting inhabitants. My LFS has tried them a few times. They don't seem to last very long. He believes they are not well adapted to tropical temperatures. We have them around here where the water temps range 44-72F.

But maybe there are tropical versions? IDK.
Looking at them I would think they may be like Bulldozers
 

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I don't think that a horseshoe crab would be a good idea for a number of reasons but primary is their food requirements. Even though your tank is quite large it's probably still not big enough to provide enough "stuff" in the sand to keep them going for very long... especially in a new tank. Besides that, it would be very disruptive all around. Cool critters but I'd stay away.
 
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Good evening just thought it was a good time for an update. So far the corals I have are doing good but the Nitrate and Phosphate are very high.
Phosphate .26
Nitrate 23.6
So I have decided to start Vodka dosing.
Today is day 1 and I plan on spitting into 2 doses per day. With my water volume The recomended seams to be approx 5ml daily. I started tonight with 3 ml and I will dose 2.5 morning and night and monitor and see what happens.
I really want to start adding more SPS a coupel of clams and some SPS but really want these nutrients under control first.
 

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I'm glad to hear things are doing well in the aquarium! How has the refugium been performing? Are you pruning quite a bit of chaeto weekly? I'm surprised your nutrients are still this high after the GFO and increase in the refugium light time.

In my opinion I would be extremely cautious with vodka dosing, over the years idk how many people I've seen crash or almost crash their aquariums by over dosing vodka and spiking their nutrients (or creating bacterial blooms). If you start to see a hint of dinos I would stop dosing immediately, in that big of a tank they'll be a nightmare to tame.
 
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I am definatly taking it slow as Vodka dosing is something I have never done before. The extended light hours seam to be helping but Ive been trying to get Phosphates down fo over 6 months now ( I have patients) but just decided I needed a new plan. I am starting with a minimal amount and I will monitor close daily and see what happens. I do have a very powerful skimmer and I am cirulating through the sump anout 5000 GPH so I am not too concerned aboy O2 levels. If nutrient levels start coming down I will sdjust dosing so that I don't bring levels down too far. Also I feed alot and I have about 30 fish now so I have a fairly heavy bioload.
 

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I am definatly taking it slow as Vodka dosing is something I have never done before. The extended light hours seam to be helping but Ive been trying to get Phosphates down fo over 6 months now ( I have patients) but just decided I needed a new plan. I am starting with a minimal amount and I will monitor close daily and see what happens. I do have a very powerful skimmer and I am cirulating through the sump anout 5000 GPH so I am not too concerned aboy O2 levels. If nutrient levels start coming down I will sdjust dosing so that I don't bring levels down too far. Also I feed alot and I have about 30 fish now so I have a fairly heavy bioload.
I absolutely understand that, you've been extremely patient with trying to reduce the nutrients. I'm glad you're taking it slow, I think it'll work out well!

30fish!? We need more pictures!!
 
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I absolutely understand that, you've been extremely patient with trying to reduce the nutrients. I'm glad you're taking it slow, I think it'll work out well!

30fish!? We need more pictures!!
Ill try and list them

Naso Tang
Blue Hippo Tang
Sailfin Tang
Clown Tang
Powder Brown Tang
Chocolate Tang
Orange Shoulder Tang
Scopas Tang
One Spot Foxface
Bicolor Foxface
Leopard Wrasse
Melanurus Wrasse
2 Blue streak cleaner Wrasse
2 Engineer Goby
2 Clown
5 Bluegreen Chromis
2 Diamond Watchman Goby
spotted watchman Goby
3 Pajama Cardinal

So thats 29 if I didn't forget anyone. I am having NO issues with any aggression so very pleased about that.

I am planning on ordering from Dr Reef
1 Aiptasia eating File fish
Yellow Eye Spotted Kole Tang
Maybe a copper Band Butterfly
Lawnmover Blenny
Green Mandarin

Im on the fence with the copperband right now. I would love to have one but tere are concerns. I am thinking if I order from Dr Reef its already eating which is a plus and I already have a good supply of live blackworms. I actually have it in a cart ready to order and have just not pushed th ebutton to buy.
 

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