Manpeckz
Active Member
What you are about to see is a very beginner, simple build. I have had this aquarium up since June 30th of 2022. It was up one time before then and found the shelf of my garage for quite some time.
Although there is no significant growth yet and the signs of skeletons in this tank, they are there for a reason. I have to remind myself that I led a poor husbandry spree at one point and this is the result of that. I would like to explain a little bit of the hard part of my journey, as I think some newer reefers may be able to relate.
When I first got the tank I had an Oce Clownfish that would always flick the top of the water, and when I would manually turn the light out at night during that time he would sometimes find his way out of the tank. Well jumpers are just that, or so I thought.
Down the road I decided I would get an Orchid Dotty, I happen to think this fish is beautiful. Which I think is the initiation to the brutal awakening that this hobby can be. Not that they are bad fish, but the hobby is about more than what is beautiful in our tanks. I had this fish for about 2 weeks and things were going great but I also decided I would add a rather large bicolor blenny as well for major algae control. He did a wonderful job and was seriously fun to watch! But I dont QT and within the second day of his arrival my Dottyback was showing signs of Ich. This was a killer for me because both fish seemingly looked great and instantly took a turn for the worse within about a weeks time.
During the entire first run of my aquarium and AFTER A FULL YEAR in June 2023 I decided that I needed to make a switch to RODI water. While I had tested during the early months of my tank nothing ever seemed to be rising as far as phosphate and nitrate, I didnt think with a small tank of frags that calcium and alkalinity would be depleted at any point, so I stopped testing.(at this point Alk was 11) As most mistakes go, I tested once again only after I started having fish problems. With a mostly unnecessary switch from Blue bucket to Red Sea Coral Pro I had given myself an Alkalinity of somewhere near 17 or 18 with my tap water. I could only believe that I took the mucus coat right off of every living creature that went in and they slowly succumbed to disease.
After a long period of neglect and some sadness during the fallow period I realized that my husbandry was so poor that corals were shrinking and dying. I got the tank back to normal levels with a few water changes within a week and things stared to turn around. Purchased 2 Court Jester Gobies(1 survived), and 2 Tuxedo Urchins from AlgaeBarn in October of 23' with a free addition of Galaxy Pods. Once again, slack husbandry and honestly some poor feeding resulted in a lot of different types of algae exploding through the tank. Hair and Bubble algae being tougher on corals.
The biggest battle the aquarium has recently started to overcome is Vermetid Snails, these little ****ers can grow everywhere and they can suck the compounds for your skeletal corals right out of the system. It seemed while they were unnoticed and unattended they managed to cover nearly every surface.. glass, heaters, flow pump, you name it. They irritated the living daylights of my frags and most of the surviving frags have had one or more cut from the side of their skeleton base(or still have them). An order from ReefCleaners allowed me to get some biological counters for problems I was having. Which I am still unconvinced the bumblebee snails are working against them, but numbers seem to be in control now. Thanks for reading.
The Critters:
1x Court Jester Goby
2x Cleaner Shrimp
2x Tuxedo Urchin
2x Emerald Crab
2x Red Leg Hermit
2x Peppermint Shrimp
4x Bumblebee Snails
The Frags:
2x Skeletons
1x Failing GSP
3x Zoanthids
3x Acans
1x Favia
1x Sympodium
The Gear:
Dry Rock, and Gravel
Aqueon 20L
Aqueon 50W heater
Aqueon QuietFlow 30
Sicce Voyager Nano Stream Pump(530 GPH)
Kessil A160 Blue Tuna w/gooseneck
The Acan in pictures 3/4 is my main focus right now. About 2-3 weeks ago it was fully deflated and looking like it was on its way out. I have to try and save it because it was beautiful when I received it. Any thoughts on that would be appreciated.
Although there is no significant growth yet and the signs of skeletons in this tank, they are there for a reason. I have to remind myself that I led a poor husbandry spree at one point and this is the result of that. I would like to explain a little bit of the hard part of my journey, as I think some newer reefers may be able to relate.
When I first got the tank I had an Oce Clownfish that would always flick the top of the water, and when I would manually turn the light out at night during that time he would sometimes find his way out of the tank. Well jumpers are just that, or so I thought.
Down the road I decided I would get an Orchid Dotty, I happen to think this fish is beautiful. Which I think is the initiation to the brutal awakening that this hobby can be. Not that they are bad fish, but the hobby is about more than what is beautiful in our tanks. I had this fish for about 2 weeks and things were going great but I also decided I would add a rather large bicolor blenny as well for major algae control. He did a wonderful job and was seriously fun to watch! But I dont QT and within the second day of his arrival my Dottyback was showing signs of Ich. This was a killer for me because both fish seemingly looked great and instantly took a turn for the worse within about a weeks time.
During the entire first run of my aquarium and AFTER A FULL YEAR in June 2023 I decided that I needed to make a switch to RODI water. While I had tested during the early months of my tank nothing ever seemed to be rising as far as phosphate and nitrate, I didnt think with a small tank of frags that calcium and alkalinity would be depleted at any point, so I stopped testing.(at this point Alk was 11) As most mistakes go, I tested once again only after I started having fish problems. With a mostly unnecessary switch from Blue bucket to Red Sea Coral Pro I had given myself an Alkalinity of somewhere near 17 or 18 with my tap water. I could only believe that I took the mucus coat right off of every living creature that went in and they slowly succumbed to disease.
After a long period of neglect and some sadness during the fallow period I realized that my husbandry was so poor that corals were shrinking and dying. I got the tank back to normal levels with a few water changes within a week and things stared to turn around. Purchased 2 Court Jester Gobies(1 survived), and 2 Tuxedo Urchins from AlgaeBarn in October of 23' with a free addition of Galaxy Pods. Once again, slack husbandry and honestly some poor feeding resulted in a lot of different types of algae exploding through the tank. Hair and Bubble algae being tougher on corals.
The biggest battle the aquarium has recently started to overcome is Vermetid Snails, these little ****ers can grow everywhere and they can suck the compounds for your skeletal corals right out of the system. It seemed while they were unnoticed and unattended they managed to cover nearly every surface.. glass, heaters, flow pump, you name it. They irritated the living daylights of my frags and most of the surviving frags have had one or more cut from the side of their skeleton base(or still have them). An order from ReefCleaners allowed me to get some biological counters for problems I was having. Which I am still unconvinced the bumblebee snails are working against them, but numbers seem to be in control now. Thanks for reading.
The Critters:
1x Court Jester Goby
2x Cleaner Shrimp
2x Tuxedo Urchin
2x Emerald Crab
2x Red Leg Hermit
2x Peppermint Shrimp
4x Bumblebee Snails
The Frags:
2x Skeletons
1x Failing GSP
3x Zoanthids
3x Acans
1x Favia
1x Sympodium
The Gear:
Dry Rock, and Gravel
Aqueon 20L
Aqueon 50W heater
Aqueon QuietFlow 30
Sicce Voyager Nano Stream Pump(530 GPH)
Kessil A160 Blue Tuna w/gooseneck
The Acan in pictures 3/4 is my main focus right now. About 2-3 weeks ago it was fully deflated and looking like it was on its way out. I have to try and save it because it was beautiful when I received it. Any thoughts on that would be appreciated.
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