Mr_Knightley's 210 gallon acro and anemone dominant build!

[Mr_Knightley]

So, I've got an update. Sadly no pictures, I can't find my camera charger lol

So for the past month or so, the tank has been battling Cyanobacteria really hard. My parameters have been ok, I had been having trouble keeping Kh up though, and PO4 has been at zero, which is confusing.
In this time frame, my invertebrates haven't been looking too hot, but I couldn't figure out why. I decided to test the salinity, and it tested 1.023! I usually keep it up at 1.026, I have no idea how it had dropped so low. That's what I'm working on now, that and feeding a bit more to raise PO4.
Sadly, the trigger passed away for unknown reasons. It had been hiding for the last day or two, but had no signs of ich or any other diseases, even after death. All that I found on the body was a small welt near his gills, which makes me think he was stung by something. It was very sad, I had been working up to that fish for a whole year.
So in the meantime, I'm working on expanding my CUC a lot. I realized I only had 3 snails, 3 urchins and a handful of hermits to clean my whole 210 gallons of space! I'm thinking I'll try cerith snails, and I want to try some emerald crabs as well, it's been years since I've had those.

Well, John B. signing off. Until next time! Maybe I'll have a working camera by then.
God bless!

 

[Mr_Knightley]

Another larger update, again sorry for no pics. I am now fully convinced my camera charger has grown legs and moved to CHAZ xD

Back to business, I received a shipment of snails from Gulf Coast Ecosystems a few days ago. I got 60 mini ceriths, 40 giant ceriths and 20 nassarius. At first I though the ceriths were all dead, but that night I saw them all burrow into the sand.
My dosing with Chemiclean has been successful, at least for now. No more signs of any cyano, and I'm now in a position where I can be more diligent with handling it. My assumptions of low nutrients were correct, my phosphate has been zeroed out for several weeks now.
I have been having a lot of trouble with the tank recently, I'm not sure what the problem is though. All of my corals have been closed up recently, namely my acanthophyllias and other fleshier corals. All of my acros browned out and I ended up moving as much of my LPS to my 24g tank I have set up next to the 210, which I'll get to later. I had recently been dosing Vibrant to take care of a bit of an algae outbreak (started in early may/possibly late april) and I have to say it has worked pretty well. I am concerned, though, that the bacteria in the product may have been damaging my already weak population of beneficial bacteria, causing a bit of a mini crash. As stated my corals have been looking a bit rough, with all three of my acanthophyllias bleaching pretty drastically afterwards, though they have been recovering slowly in the 24g. My point in all of this is I've begun to realize my bacterial populations are insufficient for my size tank, and they seem to be insufficient because I've treated the tank as if it were my 24g. It is way understocked, causing there to be not enough waste for the beneficial bacteria to convert and feed on, causing there in turn to be a smaller population of BB and thusly a very unstable tank. My current mission for the tank is to raise nutrients and severely up my stocking fish-wise, and I've got a decent plan for it all, but it will require more money than I have currently. So as I write this I'm working on getting some artworks ready to sell, I'm a big sculptor and painter and I plan to dabble in some diorama making as well. I'll most likely sell on Etsy or my own website. If you guys are interested, I can share pictures of some artworks in the following weeks, if I can find my darned camera charger ;Facepalm
Now regarding the tank itself, I now have a more direct vision for what I want it to be. originally it was a basic mixed reef, but I've fallen in love with the idea of an acropora dominant setup with LTAs all over the sandbed. Flow may end up being a problem later on, but if I can be careful with it I think I can succeed. For increasing the stocking in the tank, I've ordered 5 pink skunk clowns from my LFS, as well as a trio of ignitus anthias, a radiant wrasse and a pinkmargin wrasse. I may purchase some chromis as well, though I'm not sure how long they would last with the anemone (soon to be anemones!) I am very excited though for the future progress of the reef, I hope someday I can work it enough that it'll become the masterpiece I dreamed of as a beginner.
Now on a quick note, I do finally have an idea where to go with the 24g tank! A few days/weeks ago, the reef of the day was a beautiful 120g with acanthophyllias completely shrouding the sandbed. I can't recall the name of the owner, but that tank had me in tears it was so gorgeous. Of course, I couldn't afford to cover the whole bottom of the 210 with acanthos, I would go even more broke than my already broke self, but in a 24g, that could be pulled off realistically, and that is what I plan to do. I'll be searching for sales and tank breakdowns vigilantly to fill it up, maybe even some trades!

Well, that wall of text is all I have in me for now. I'll keep you all posted, maybe if I can find that darned charger I'll do another update with pictures of the current situation. Until then, good day and God bless you all!
-John

 

[LRT]

Following along.

 

[Charlie’s Frags]

Another larger update, again sorry for no pics. I am now fully convinced my camera charger has grown legs and moved to CHAZ xD

Back to business, I received a shipment of snails from Gulf Coast Ecosystems a few days ago. I got 60 mini ceriths, 40 giant ceriths and 20 nassarius. At first I though the ceriths were all dead, but that night I saw them all burrow into the sand.
My dosing with Chemiclean has been successful, at least for now. No more signs of any cyano, and I'm now in a position where I can be more diligent with handling it. My assumptions of low nutrients were correct, my phosphate has been zeroed out for several weeks now.
I have been having a lot of trouble with the tank recently, I'm not sure what the problem is though. All of my corals have been closed up recently, namely my acanthophyllias and other fleshier corals. All of my acros browned out and I ended up moving as much of my LPS to my 24g tank I have set up next to the 210, which I'll get to later. I had recently been dosing Vibrant to take care of a bit of an algae outbreak (started in early may/possibly late april) and I have to say it has worked pretty well. I am concerned, though, that the bacteria in the product may have been damaging my already weak population of beneficial bacteria, causing a bit of a mini crash. As stated my corals have been looking a bit rough, with all three of my acanthophyllias bleaching pretty drastically afterwards, though they have been recovering slowly in the 24g. My point in all of this is I've begun to realize my bacterial populations are insufficient for my size tank, and they seem to be insufficient because I've treated the tank as if it were my 24g. It is way understocked, causing there to be not enough waste for the beneficial bacteria to convert and feed on, causing there in turn to be a smaller population of BB and thusly a very unstable tank. My current mission for the tank is to raise nutrients and severely up my stocking fish-wise, and I've got a decent plan for it all, but it will require more money than I have currently. So as I write this I'm working on getting some artworks ready to sell, I'm a big sculptor and painter and I plan to dabble in some diorama making as well. I'll most likely sell on Etsy or my own website. If you guys are interested, I can share pictures of some artworks in the following weeks, if I can find my darned camera charger ;Facepalm
Now regarding the tank itself, I now have a more direct vision for what I want it to be. originally it was a basic mixed reef, but I've fallen in love with the idea of an acropora dominant setup with LTAs all over the sandbed. Flow may end up being a problem later on, but if I can be careful with it I think I can succeed. For increasing the stocking in the tank, I've ordered 5 pink skunk clowns from my LFS, as well as a trio of ignitus anthias, a radiant wrasse and a pinkmargin wrasse. I may purchase some chromis as well, though I'm not sure how long they would last with the anemone (soon to be anemones!) I am very excited though for the future progress of the reef, I hope someday I can work it enough that it'll become the masterpiece I dreamed of as a beginner.
Now on a quick note, I do finally have an idea where to go with the 24g tank! A few days/weeks ago, the reef of the day was a beautiful 120g with acanthophyllias completely shrouding the sandbed. I can't recall the name of the owner, but that tank had me in tears it was so gorgeous. Of course, I couldn't afford to cover the whole bottom of the 210 with acanthos, I would go even more broke than my already broke self, but in a 24g, that could be pulled off realistically, and that is what I plan to do. I'll be searching for sales and tank breakdowns vigilantly to fill it up, maybe even some trades!

Well, that wall of text is all I have in me for now. I'll keep you all posted, maybe if I can find that darned charger I'll do another update with pictures of the current situation. Until then, good day and God bless you all!
-John

Vibrant is irritating your corals.

 

[Mr_Knightley]

Vibrant is irritating your corals.

Interesting, what makes you say that? Most reviews I've seen haven't really said much about irritation, but I can see how that would be overlooked. I've been dosing some nitrifying bacteria recently just to run the vibrant out anyway, but I guess the vibrant itself could be a bigger issue, as you suggest. Though, I started dosing vibrant shortly after the big stressors seemed to have appeared, but it definitely could have contributed to the stress. Do you have any recommendations to help run the Vibrant out it's course?

 

[Mr_Knightley]

So. Another pictureless update, I found my charger but I just didn't feel like taking any ;Dead I'll get some tomorrow, for sure.
So, I've been following a thread about putting glass bottle in reef tanks, and I've decided I'll be trying that in the reef. My plan of action as of now is this:
Dilute the Vibrant from the water and work on getting the tank livable again for my prized pieces, then I'm going to buy a crap ton of Caribsea Liferock, I love that stuff. My reason being, most of the rock in my tank (excluding the liferock I already have) is solid and base-like, and to be honest most of it is pretty ugly. So I'll be getting the liferock to replace some of that. Another reason is I need to pre-cement the structure beforehand, just for peace of mind, as I've had way too many close calls with big colonies, and besides I can make much more complex structures by pre-cementing them together. I'll have to remove the hood while putting them in, but I needed to re-mount the lights anyways so that'll work out well.
In all, this whole 'event' has given me so many opportunities to learn and grow as a hobbyist, and it's also freed up the tank so I can really do what I want with it. I'm just eternally grateful that this has all happened before I had too many big colonies to loose, I could learn now instead of later.
Thanks to those of you who follow the build, I'm sorry it's been kind of slow with pictures but hey, that's life. I do want to take some though, so you all can visualize what's going down.
luckily, my parameters are good right now, the only outliers are phosphate (0 ppm), salinity ( 1.023, too low for me), and Kh (5.5 dkh, also too low). I'm perplexed as to why my salinity keeps dipping, I'll have to keep adding salt with top off I guess.

Thanks for reading and God bless! I'll have another update tomorrow, mainly for pictures.

 

[DSEKULA]

Nice tank, can't wait to see the current up dates
Sorry if you know this but LTA like their foot burried in a dsb area, if it finds a spot push alittle extra sand around it, it helps them stay put ime. Mine has stayed in the same spot for about two years now... But since I mentioned it I'm sure it will walk tomorrow .

 

[Mr_Knightley]

New update, with picture finally!

So I'm prepping for a water change right now, just a tiny one (5 gallons, almost nothing). I'm going to start doing them every week, just little pidlies.
I've just got some pictures of some of the animals, no major updates to speak of really. First round is from 210g, second is from 24g.

Enjoy!

 

[Mr_Knightley]

Hi! So today was... Interesting.
Today I went to my LFS to get some water (20g for a water change, my mixing area is a mess right now) and I went ahead and bought some Caribsea Liferock like I was talking about, to re-do the scape. I ended up with around 85 pounds of it... Which totaled to a end price way higher than I feel confident divulging... If you want to do the math, it was $8 per pound.
Brushing that embarrassment aside, I also bought a bag of Caribsea Fiji pink sand and some crushed coral to make up for sand lost during water changes over the total time elapsed. I'm not sure if I'm going to rinse or not, I probably will but I'd want to do it in tank water, so I'll wait until I get the water change done (tomorrow?). Until then, I have the new scape built in-tank and now I just need to attach it together, I'll be using Aquavitro Bond because it was on sale I'll get that done tomorrow though, it's lights-out time in aquarium world.
So until tomorrow, I'll give you guys a sneak-peek of the new scape:

If you look hard enough, you may be able to spot the reflection of my shirtless bod in the glass...
Until tomorrow, God bless!

 

[DSEKULA]

Hi! So today was... Interesting.
Today I went to my LFS to get some water (20g for a water change, my mixing area is a mess right now) and I went ahead and bought some Caribsea Liferock like I was talking about, to re-do the scape. I ended up with around 85 pounds of it... Which totaled to a end price way higher than I feel confident divulging... If you want to do the math, it was $8 per pound.
Brushing that embarrassment aside, I also bought a bag of Caribsea Fiji pink sand and some crushed coral to make up for sand lost during water changes over the total time elapsed. I'm not sure if I'm going to rinse or not, I probably will but I'd want to do it in tank water, so I'll wait until I get the water change done (tomorrow?). Until then, I have the new scape built in-tank and now I just need to attach it together, I'll be using Aquavitro Bond because it was on sale I'll get that done tomorrow though, it's lights-out time in aquarium world.
So until tomorrow, I'll give you guys a sneak-peek of the new scape:

If you look hard enough, you may be able to spot the reflection of my shirtless bod in the glass...
Until tomorrow, God bless!

Much more awesome scape imo, good job!!

 

[Mr_Knightley]

Much more awesome scape imo, good job!!

Thanks man! Yeah, I'm super happy with it myself. We'll see how it hold up.

 

[DSEKULA]

Thanks man! Yeah, I'm super happy with it myself. We'll see how it hold up.

It looks like you got some nice flat stable pieces. I never used Aquavitro Bond but if it's halfway decent it should hold up fine. When you bond the pieces together if you keep some rubble handy and toss it over the bond area it will make the seam look more natural.

 

[Mr_Knightley]

New update!
So, the time has come to show the final scape! I ended up not using the Bond, it was essentially sticky wax and was I nightmare to work with. Luckily, Liferock is designed to fit together nicely, so no more chances of random rockslides.
I've also attached pictures of the 2 bottles I've included into the reef, one is completely done and the other isn't quite done yet. I plan to add more on the future as well.
Here are pics!

 

[Mr_Knightley]

No pictures today, but I do have some news.
The tank has been looking average lately, I can tell it's still not at it's 100% yet but I'm hoping I can add back my corals this or next week. The fish have been happy with the new scape, though I'm facing the problem of too little flow now ;Facepalm I've got to get a few more little powerheads for the corners of the tank, nothing huge but enough to keep detritus moving. The corals in the 24g are doing wonderful though, loads of growth on the shrooms and the Caulerpa is looking swiggy as well.
I'll see if I can get a more whelming update tomorrow, I'll make sure to snap pics though! I feel like an update isn't really an update without pics lol
Well, until tomorrow. Good day!

 

[Mr_Knightley]

Sad news.

As of the 7th, the big tank is officially out of order. I glossed over what happened in my other build thread for the 24g, so I'll give a more detailed summary.
On the 5th, I noticed a small amount of water pooling between the plastic underbrace and the glass in the bottom lefthand corner. I dabbed it up thinking I must have just spilled something, but it was back the next day. I checked underneath the stand, and there was a dribble from that corner down the side. I slathered the seam with silicon (ruining the stand's edge finish) and went to bed. When I woke up, there was a very small puddle on the ground at that corner and I called it quits and started taking apart the tank. Luckily my mother had just ordered a dumpster and I can put the tank in there. Today, I'm going to put a payment down on the new replacement tank (Planet Aquariums 125 gallon crystal with white stand) and I'll also be borrowing a set of plungers to take out the old tank. Hopefully, I'll be able to get the new tank running withing the weekend. I'll post pictures after the whole ordeal is done.
This thread will most likely be ended and a new one started, I'll link to said new one after we get the tank.

 

[Mr_Knightley]

Link to the new thread, I'll start updating it with news of the transfer in a few days:

Mr. Knightley's Planet 125 The Culmination of Indecision

And a new saga begins... After 2 failed attempts at a 220 gallon tank, I'm going full power towards perfection. This build will be a culmination of 5 years of experience and hardships, hopefully budding into something beautiful. Thank you for following along on my journey. The tank will be...

www.reef2reef.com

Goodbye, old thread.