Mike and Terry's 300g Reef

[Mike&Terry]

Gorgeous tank!

what an absolutely beautiful tank...beautiful colors and the fish. wow

The vid is stunning Terry

Great vid!! Love the fish selection, very soothing to watch.

Wow realy nice

Thanks everyone for the kind words - very much appreciated!

Always enjoy seeing your pictures & videos - they are always so well done! You have some mad photo skills! You guys are braver than I am with that selection of fish. I have played the angel & butterfly game before but they ended up costing me a fortune. They look fantastic in the reef so I hope they remain the model citizens for you that they appear to be now. Thanks for sharing.

Thank you so much Greg - coming from you that means a LOT! As for our fish selection, we made a bad choice with a C. flavissima in the spring of last year and paid dearly before we could remove him. The Genicanthus Angels (semifasciatus and Bellus) don't pay any attention to corals. The Regal, Flame and Tink's will occasionally pluck at our SPS, but don't do any serious damage.

Love your tank, Everything looks awesome!
Got any good tips for a person who has no luck with tanks bigger then 10 gallons? LOL

Thank you KorD! The best advice we could give is to do your research, make a plan, and take it slow. Nothing good happens fast in this hobby.

-M&T

 

[Mike&Terry]

Houston, We have a problem... :shocked: Nearly freaked when we found this on the sand bed day before yesterday:

It is definitely a molt, not a dead crab. :squigglemouth: :frusty:

 

[evolved]

I'm still convinced it's a black mithrax, but of course that still leaves some risk.

Happy hunting! :shocked:

 

[MrDJeep123]

I'm still convinced it's a black mithrax, but of course that still leaves some risk.

Happy hunting! :shocked:

I'm inclined to agree that it's a mithrax, just of the red variety. The below image is of one out of water. Looks identical.

Houston, We have a problem... :shocked: Nearly freaked when we found this on the sand bed day before yesterday:

It is definitely a molt, not a dead crab. :squigglemouth: :frusty:

 

[KoleTang]

I agree that it looks similar to mithrax. Hopefully you can catch it. I had one of the emerald variety decide that my acropora polyps were better tasting than algae.

This guy had one that looks to be the same species. Black Emerald Crab? - Reef Central Online Community

 

[Mike&Terry]

I'm still convinced it's a black mithrax, but of course that still leaves some risk.

Happy hunting! :shocked:

I'm inclined to agree that it's a mithrax, just of the red variety. The below image is of one out of water. Looks identical.

I agree that it looks similar to mithrax. Hopefully you can catch it. I had one of the emerald variety decide that my acropora polyps were better tasting than algae.

This guy had one that looks to be the same species. Black Emerald Crab? - Reef Central Online Community

I'm still convinced it's a black mithrax, but of course that still leaves some risk.

Happy hunting! :shocked:

I'm inclined to agree that it's a mithrax, just of the red variety. The below image is of one out of water. Looks identical.

I agree that it looks similar to mithrax. Hopefully you can catch it. I had one of the emerald variety decide that my acropora polyps were better tasting than algae.

This guy had one that looks to be the same species. Black Emerald Crab? - Reef Central Online Community

We agree it's more than likely some type of mithrax. Just not comfortable with an omnivorous crab of this size in our reef.

 

[spspirate]

I had one in my first 75 gallon reef. Snatched up all my chromis who slept in the coral at night. One by one. Ended up plucking him out but do have to say it was a bit scary.

 

[Mike&Terry]

I had one in my first 75 gallon reef. Snatched up all my chromis who slept in the coral at night. One by one. Ended up plucking him out but do have to say it was a bit scary.

We're pretty sure this is the beast that munched a good portion of one of our A. spathulata colonies and has been knocking over some larger mini colonies. We're going to have to come up with a trap with a large enough opening since beast is too large to fit into a bottle trap. It's always something, LOL!

 

[Tek]

What size is it? I found a brown crab with hairy legs and dark claws sitting in my acros one night. It was eating polyps for months from different colonies. I am sure it came in with a maricultured piece and mistakened it for a good one.

 

[Mike&Terry]

Well, he's larger than the molt we posted, LOL! The bottom of the quart size container the molt is sitting in measures about 3.25" across. The nickel was placed in there to somewhat give a comparison of it's size.

This beast of a crab more than likely came in with rock as we look for crabs on coral and save the good ones before dipping and qt.

Here's a cymo sp. crab that lived in our A. hyacinthus for 5 years without causing any problems:



We also have a few tetralia sp. crabs (small) and trapezia sp. (these can get pretty large) that don't cause any problems.

 

[revhtree]

Wow! Good thing you got him! Warm up the butter! LOL!

 

[Mike&Terry]

Wow! Good thing you got him! Warm up the butter! LOL!

but we haven't gotten him yet, LOL!:tongue: This is just the molt:

 

[Aquaph8]

I had a red one that looked just like him years ago that took out a clam. I dont why but everytime Ive added a trapezia I never see them again.

 

[Mike&Terry]

I had a red one that looked just like him years ago that took out a clam. I dont why but everytime Ive added a trapezia I never see them again.

Our Trapezia's gravitate to pocillopora, stylophora (larger colonies), and seriatopora (in that order). They don't seem to care for hanging out in Acro colonies. I'll have to see if I can get a pic of the Trapezia that resides in the large pocillopora that sits on the front right side of the tank. :bigsmile:

-Terry

 

[Aquaph8]

Maybe that's my problem, I keep trying to place them in my A. Hyacinthus colony. I'll try the stylo next time I come across one and see if it works better
Thanks for the tip

 

[Fishmania21]

All I can say is WOW.......your tank pic just as beautiful as those reef poster...Thanks for sharing

 

[Mike&Terry]

All I can say is WOW.......your tank pic just as beautiful as those reef poster...Thanks for sharing

Thank You Fishmania21!

 

[revhtree]

Hey how current is your fish list?

 

[Mike&Terry]

Hey how current is your fish list?

Probably not very, LOL!

Current Fish List:
Regal Angel - Pygoplites diacanthus
(3) Japenese Swallowtail Angelfish - Genicantus semifasciatus (1 male, 2 female)
Bellus Angelfish - Genicanthus bellus (female)
Flame Angelfish - centropyge loricula (male)
Tinker's Butterflyfish - Chaetodon tinkeri
Desjardini Tang - Zebrasoma desjardini
Spotted Yellow Eye Tang - Ctenochaetus truncatus
Lyretail Anthias - Pseudanthias squamipinnis (male)
(2) False Percula Clownfish - Amphiprion ocellaris
Tomentosus Filefish - Acreichthys tomentosus
Bangaii Cardinalfish - Pterapogon kauderni
Red Velvet Fairy Wrasse - Cirrhilabrus rubrisquamis
Lineatus Wrasse - Cirrhilabrus lineatus
(2) Rhomboid Fairy Wrasse – Cirrhilabrus rhomboidalis (2 males)
(2) Earl's Fairy Wrasse - Cirrhilabrus earlei
Hooded Fairy Wrasse - Cirrhilabrus bathyphilus
Dwarf Pintail Fairy Wrasse - Cirrhilabrus cf lanceolatus
Johnson's Fairy Wrasse - Cirrhilabrus johnsoni
McCosker's Flasher Wrasse - Paracheilinus mccoskeri
Carpenter's Flasher Wrasse - Paracheilinus carpenteri
Royal Flasher Wrasse - Paracheilinus angulatus
Eightline Flasher Wrasse - Paracheilinus octotaenia (male)
(2) Blue Star Leopard Wrasse - Macropharyngodon bipartitus (1 male, 1 female)
Choat's Leopard Wrase – Macropharyngodon choati
African Cleaner Wrasse - Labroides dimidiatus
Neon Goby - Elacatinus oceanops
(4) Blue Green Chromis - Chromis viridis
Black Axil Chromis - Chromis atripectoralis

In the frag tank:
Tomini Tang - Ctenochaetus tominiensis
Yellow Tang - Zebrasoma flavescens

 

[Chris Aldrich]

Absolutely beautiful reef, Mike and Terry! And brilliant photography skills for capturing it to boot. I love the recent Tinker's picture you posted. I hope you don't mind that I shared it on the Saltwater Smarts Facebook page. It's a great shot!