Mot's RSR 525XL - Aquascape No.3

Jeff Miotke

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Recently had a tank crash due to equipment failure/dino overrun. As part of the restart I decided to move my journal here as this is where I spend most my time online. Im in the middle of collecting photos and will sift through them and post shortly.

Here is what the tank looked like prior to the crash.

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soter

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Very sorry to hear about what happened to your tank. Superb tank! I like a lot your lights, what kind of lights are?
 
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Jeff Miotke

Jeff Miotke

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After the crash I decided to make some changes to make the tank lower maintenance and more stable.

Remove some rock that was infested with aiptasia and bleach it. I really screwed up as I removed some questionably structural pieces and confirmed when I so lightly bumped the structure and my arch collapsed. I had used polyglue and it appears to have weakened over time. So lucky the arch fell straight down into the sand and not into the glass. So new aquascape time.

Have battled dinoflagellates since I set the tank up. More specifically amphidinium in the sand bed. Finally decided to take the sand bed out. I left just a small patch behind the rocks that wrasses could sleep in. The siphoned sand/water was just swimming in dinos.

Switch to the Triton method. To do this I wanted to modify my RedSea Reefer sump. I had it already setup with a macro fuge and skimmer. With some patient cutting of silicone I was able to remove the ato/drain and sock holders. Then added a partition to create a separate skimmer chamber.

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Here is what I have so far on the aquascape while I let the bleached rocks cure.

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Remaining corals are in sad shape but appear to have turned the corner.
 

Mark

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Excellent to hear. Im around all the time if you want to hang out and talk tanks Mark.

Sounds good. I just tore down my 225 and downsized to a Reefer 625xxl. Battling some dino's as well. Hoping to get the ecosystem stable again. My last tank was set up similar to your changes(barebottom, refugium, skimmer) for 3 years with great success. I'm going the opposite direction and added a sand bed to the reefer.

Old tank:
overflow - 1.jpg
 
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Jeff Miotke

Jeff Miotke

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Worked on the aquascape some yesterday. I'm out of rock so Ill have to sit back and think about if I want to add some more. I wanted another vertical element to hide the left side of the overflow like I did on the right.

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Some of the corals seem to be recovering after the modifications to the sump and removing the dino filled sand. Long way to go.
 

Brew12

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Not sure how I lost track of your build but glad I found it again. You have an amazing way with setting up your aqua scape! I'm sorry you are having issues but it does sound like you are working through them.

I know it will take awhile, but the coral on the right side will eventually grow and hide the left side of the overflow imo.
 

Preme

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sweet aquascape! what did you use to hold the rocks together
 
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Jeff Miotke

Jeff Miotke

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Not sure how I lost track of your build but glad I found it again. You have an amazing way with setting up your aqua scape! I'm sorry you are having issues but it does sound like you are working through them.

I know it will take awhile, but the coral on the right side will eventually grow and hide the left side of the overflow imo.

Yes I think it will fill in with coral as well so I'm sticking to the scape I have.

Quick update:
Aiptasia - All gone on the rock work and in the sump. Some still in the overflow that don't seem to be hurting anything so Im just going to leave them alone.
Dinos - Gone. Solution was to remove the sand. No matter what I tried over the 2 year period I couldnt beat them so I removed there home. This apparently worked. I have just a light dusting of sand on the bottom about 2 or 3 grains thick.
SPS - encrusting and sending out new tips. These were almost all dead. I had to remove dead tips back in July that were growing algae. Some encrusting SPS that were visibly gone have popped up and are now growing quickly. Alkalinity consumption is slowly increasing over the months. Went from 5ml of Triton Core 7 per day in August and now am up to 16ml per day to keep parameters steady.
LPS - These all look sad and dieing still. Ive given up on them and whatever survives does and whatever dies does. I wont be getting any more LPS at this point. I wanted an SPS dominated tank to begin with so Im fine with this.
Equipment Changes - I changed the lights out to Ecotech Radions running AB+ program and modified the sump to triton. I think these two things made a huge difference. Im doing far less maintenance and my parameters are rock solid. Im pulling a large clump of macro algae every week and it all looks very healthy. Skimmer production is minimal now and probably could just be removed from the system but Im not going to mess with it as I dont want to unbalance things now that its going smoothly. Plus it is no effort to clean the cup once per week.

Bottom line:
Really enjoying the tank now and not fighting battles. I was spending around 10 hours / week maintenance in July before changes. Now I spend about 30 minutes a week and that is mostly feeding. Much more reasonable. Really happy with my fish selection as the tank is colorful and always active. I have Acros on hold with Battle Corals that Ill have them ship next month once Im confident that all my sticks are healthy and flourishing and the LPS decide if they are going to live or die.
 

Brew12

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Aiptasia - All gone on the rock work and in the sump. Some still in the overflow that don't seem to be hurting anything so Im just going to leave them alone.
Sounds great! FYI... rumor has it there may be a new product coming out for these that is reef safe and can be dosed into a reef tank. It's at least a few months out yet from the sounds of it.
Skimmer production is minimal now and probably could just be removed from the system but Im not going to mess with it as I dont want to unbalance things now that its going smoothly. Plus it is no effort to clean the cup once per week.
I'd recommend pulling the cup so you get the extra aeration. No maintenance that way and easy to put it back in service if you need to. Just a thought.
 
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Jeff Miotke

Jeff Miotke

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Thought about pulling the cup but I get crazy micro bubbles in the display so I would have to make modifications. Just easier to leave as is at this point it and if something happens to the macro algae then at least I have the protein skimmer to pick up the slack.

A product to wipe out aiptasia sounds to good to be true!
 

Brew12

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A product to wipe out aiptasia sounds to good to be true!
And it may turn out not to work or it may turn out not to be reef safe, either. It is still fairly early in testing I think. It is one of the 2 pests that I am dealing with right now. The other is vermitid snails, and I'm working to see if CaCO3 dosing will take those out. Some people have anecdotally claimed it did in their systems. I'm a bit over 2 weeks in and all I can say for sure is I have cyano now. :confused: At least I know I can quickly get it cleaned up when my trial is over.
 
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