Myka's 69 SPS Tank 2015

[Myka]

I know you saw them on the "other" forum already, but here area few that are OK...

Here's one of the better FTS I took last night. The colors are a bit "meh" in the photo. I'll have to try tweaking a bit... I took this one for you Stoyan. @biom

Streaker:

Polyps have been minty-white, but now a limey-greeny-yellowy. Not sure what it's up to. The skin still looks patchy on it. Has big polyps for a "deepwater", and seems happy.

Sorry, that's all I got guys...

 

[revhtree]

I know you saw them on the "other" forum already, but here area few that are OK...

Here's one of the better FTS I took last night. The colors are a bit "meh" in the photo. I'll have to try tweaking a bit... I took this one for you Stoyan. @biom

Streaker:

Polyps have been minty-white, but now a limey-greeny-yellowy. Not sure what it's up to. The skin still looks patchy on it. Has big polyps for a "deepwater", and seems happy.

Sorry, that's all I got guys...

This is the only forum that counts! Post everything here! Beautiful reef!

 

[biom]

I know you saw them on the "other" forum already, but here area few that are OK...

Here's one of the better FTS I took last night. The colors are a bit "meh" in the photo. I'll have to try tweaking a bit... I took this one for you Stoyan. @biom

Thank you Mindy , I like very much picture of the Streaker

What about the Coral Snow? I use in replacement of carbon.

I am fairly certain that the homemade mash I feed is low phosphate, all the ingredients are inspected for phosphate preservatives on the packaging, regardless the tank certainly doesn't have a phosphate issue. Here is a typical recipe (all human grade ingredients except the FAF gelatin and vitamins):

White shrimp (shells on) 500 g
Wild Pacific salmon 200 g
Green Lipped Mussels 200 g
Squid 100 g
Flying Fish Roe 15 g
Florida Aqua Farms vitamins 10 g
Nori (green, dry) 5-8 g
Wild Salmon Oil 5000 mg
Hawaiian Astaxanthin 600 mg
Florida Aqua Farms Gelatin 50 g

Coral snow is ok, it is made of chalk, but you dont need to dosing it every day,. Once or twice weekly is enough. I prefer to dose pure calcium carbonate powder. Coral Snow is not substitute of GAC, Coral Snow (calcium carbonate) is flocculant and is effective against yellowing of the water, but has noting (or little) to do against toxins and heavy metals. I'm using small amounts of GAC once monthly for 3 days, because it is effective against phenol, some heavy metals and toxins.

The problem with homemade mash is not only phosphate preservatives, but the phosphorous content of the food itself, some foods are very rich of phosphorus naturally. For example when I'm feeding with frozen mysis shrimps phosphates are going very high, that's why I stopped all homemade foods may be 5 years ago.

 

[Myka]

Thank you Mindy , I like very much picture of the Streaker

Coral snow is ok, it is made of chalk, but you dont need to dosing it every day,. Once or twice weekly is enough. I prefer to dose pure calcium carbonate powder. Coral Snow is not substitute of GAC, Coral Snow (calcium carbonate) is flocculant and is effective against yellowing of the water, but has noting (or little) to do against toxins and heavy metals. I'm using small amounts of GAC once monthly for 3 days, because it is effective against phenol, some heavy metals and toxins.

The problem with homemade mash is not only phosphate preservatives, but the phosphorous content of the food itself, some foods are very rich of phosphorus naturally. For example when I'm feeding with frozen mysis shrimps phosphates are going very high, that's why I stopped all homemade foods may be 5 years ago.

Haha, thank you! Streaker is the easiest fish to take pictures of - as long as you don't want a picture of his whole body!

Some people say Coral Snow is chalk, others (such as "reefvet") say it is clay. Yes, I use it as flocculant for water clarity (turbidity & yellowing). It is quite effective, I will go forward with 2x weekly, and will dose it on the same mornings thats I use ProBioS. I haven't used GAC since July. I saw no effect one way or the other besides removing yellowing. I could use it once or twice per month going forward, I will try this.

At this point, I'm not scared of phosphates. The most nutritious fish foods are naturally high in phosphate. I would rather use a little GFO than give my fish poor nutrition. I was surprised when reading your thread that you use Brine Shrimps to avoid phosphate, as I am surprised you choose low phosphate over nutrition since Brine Shrimps are notoriously poor nutrition. As a side note, you should try maintaining MO broodstock with Brine Shrimps! Hehe, it will not work. The homemade mash I use is the same homemade mash I was using for my own MO broodstock when I had a small commercial hatchery - I was getting 1200+ eggs out of my Ocellaris, and 99.5% hatch rate. That's very good for Ocellaris. I will watch the PO4 though, and will get a Triton test soon to make sure PO4 isn't unknowingly rising. Thank you for your input on this, I will not discount it.

This is the only forum that counts! Post everything here! Beautiful reef!

Haha, thanks Rev! I was wondering when you would say something like this! I would post more in this thread if more people would make comments/follow along on the journey. My thread gets much more action on the "other" forums. Maybe if my thread was in the SPS forum instead of the Journal forum? I know all us SPS freaks on the other forum have our journals right in the SPS forum. If you feel so inclined, please move it.

I follow 3 forums regularly, and I like each one for different reasons.

 

[bubbaque]

I follow your thread on the other forum because I never knew you had one here. I will be following this one as well.

 

[Myka]

 

[Myka]

Today:

Jan 1, 2016:

 

[RamsReef]

Love it Myka. You going to be selling frags sometime?

 

[Myka]

Love it Myka. You going to be selling frags sometime?

Thanks! I prefer trades rather than selling frags. I'm in Canada though, where are you?

 

[bubbaque]

Looks amazing and growth seems to be taking off! I believe a while ago you were getting diatoms from feeding tons. Are you still having diatoms?

 

[Preme]

Beautiful reef!!

 

[RamsReef]

Love it Myka. You going to be selling frags sometime?

Edmonton

 

[Chrisfish]

Beautiful tank

 

[Myka]

Beautiful tank

Beautiful reef!!

Thanks guys!

Looks amazing and growth seems to be taking off! I believe a while ago you were getting diatoms from feeding tons. Are you still having diatoms?

Yeah growth is picking up now that I've found a magic ingredient. The magic ingredient for my tank is Zeovit Pohl's Xtra which is dosed 2 mL every evening after I turn off the skimmer (I just remove the skimmer cup, goes back on in the morning). Aside from the Aquaforest 1+2+3+, that's the only thing being dosed into the tank. Well, I add 2.5 mL Coral Snow once every week or two, and I try to remember to add 6 drops or so of the ProBioS once a week, but I often forget. The particulate feedings (Reef Roids, Reef Chili) really didn't seem to make a difference for the corals, same with AcroPower when I tried that. I'm told that Xtra is ammonia, nitrate, and aminos. Seems to be what the tank needs, and simpler than adding all the other things. I still get lots of diatoms and green microalgae on the glass, though now you mention it, it is a sniff less in the last month or so. The bright red/burgundy algae all over the rocks is what drives me nuts - gives the tank a very dark look. The urchins eat it, but they don't eradicate it. Oct, Nov, Dec I was inconsistent with waterchanges - once a month or so and I noticed colors fading on the Acros. Last week and this week are the first two "weekly" water changes I've done in awhile, and things have started to perk up.

Edmonton

I was thinking your username was familiar. You're on Canreef I think?

 

[justingraham]

So I to at now following so I expect the same if not more updates then u do on the other forms

So I saw u said u have low ph at night correct? So why don't u shut the skimmer off during the day and skim at night?

I enjoyed reading thru ur thread please keep us posted.

 

[Myka]

So I to at now following so I expect the same if not more updates then u do on the other forms

So I saw u said u have low ph at night correct? So why don't u shut the skimmer off during the day and skim at night?

I enjoyed reading thru ur thread please keep us posted.

Hi Justin, thanks for following along! pH isn't really low 7.9-8.0 at night and during the day it is 8.1. The skimmer cup is removed at night, but the skimmer continues to run. The Acros feed at night (check out their nighttime feeder polyps!), so I do the feeding at night.

 

[Myka]

About a month ago I accidentally turned the doser off, and didn't notice until I could see the corals reacting to low KH. The KH hit 5.7-5.85 dKH (depending which test you believe), and the damage was already done. The first thing I did was turn the T5s down by 50%, then I corrected the KH by taking a week to slowly bring it back up, and then I sat back and waited for the apocalypse. ;Shifty After about 3 weeks I started seeing the affects. About 20-25% of the Acros browned out completely, about 40% of the Acros paled/brown a bit, and the rest were unaffected. Now things are just starting to turn the corner and look a bit perkier. New corals added to the system post-apocalypse are doing fine.

In January I had removed the fish to treat for a minor strain of Ich that made its way into my reef. The corals paled about a month into this because of lack of nutrients. So frustrating since the tank had finally gotten to a point where color was good from finding the right potions to add to feed the Acros. So now I only added 4 fish back into the system (I had been wanting to make changes for awhile). So nutrients bottomed out, and this sure didn't help the Acros during the KH apocalypse. ;Shifty

I decided to start adding PO4 and NO3 about a week ago to try to help the Acros. I'm getting a decent green cyano outbreak which I'm hoping will cycle out on its own once the tank gets used to more nutrients. Currently sitting at about 5 ppm NO3. I add 0.02 ppm PO4 in the evening and by the following evening it's gone from cyano uptake. hopefully the corals are getting a bit too! I'm using Sodium nitrate and Monopotassium phosphate.

I took a bunch of photos last night. The photos have a yellow hue - the white balance was off...

Most of the following corals are new to me, so are still adjusting and changing colors quite a bit.


Got this one in Feb. LFS ordered me a blue Echinata from a wild Aussie supplier, and this showed up.

Blue mille

This I've had for a number of months now. Maricultured piece.

The one on the left is a green tabling piece that is getting the boot. The one on the right is tenuis I got from another reefer in mid-Feb right in the middle of the dosing pump disaster.

Nice blue Tort I got last fall has finally woken up and put out a couple growth tips at the base. Unaffected by the dosing pump disaster. The yellow hue you see in the pic is just from my wacky white balance - it is a true blue in person. Very pretty.

Got this mariculture piece a couple days ago because of the pretty tips. I'm hoping the base doesn't go green, but I think it probably will and then I'll have to get rid of it. Andrew will tell me it's ugly. Haha

This one is supposed to be an Oregon Tort that I got in mid-Feb during the dosing pump disaster. It didn't seem to mind either. Seems to have a green hue that I thought Oregon Tort should never have. Everything turns green in my tank though, so I don't know what to think about it. Ha.

This I got a couple days ago too. There were bigger pieces - looks very stag-ish. I was looking for a nice blue stag, so hopefully this is it. The fragged piece looks like an austera though with those purple polyps. Hmmm.

Sunset mille

Maricultured tenuis I got about a month ago. It had pink hues in it when it was first imported and looked a lot like a pseudo-Home Wrecker. I'm interested to see how it turns out. I have it under PAR of about 400. Base is just starting to encrust.

 

[Myka]

Oops

 

[bubbaque]

I love seeing updates on the tank!

 

[Myka]

For anyone interested, the latest article I wrote for Reef Hobbyist Magazine is now available to read online. It highlights my experiences with Cirrhilabrus johnsoni.
2nd quarter 2017 page 6. http://www.reefhobbyistmagazine.com/magazine-tiled-q2-2017-6.html
Most of the photos are taken by R2R's own Hunter Hammond, thanks Hunter! @evolved

This is the best photo I managed to capture of Big Bad John, but still not magazine-worthy.