NBurg's Red Sea Reefer 450 mixed reef

[Nburg's Reef]

So today I discovered my bangaii cardinals, that have been in my display for only about a month, are going to be parents. I caught them doing the nasty and noticed the male had a mouth full of eggs. I got it on video and may upload it later. Now I need to decide if raising them is something I want to pursue. I successfully raise 2 clutches around 10 years ago, but I remember it kind of sucking raising BBS every 3 days.

I guess that's a good sign my home made food is good. Now I expect my clowns to start laying eggs again, which they haven't since last October (pre-big move).

A little throw back: my first youtube video of my baby Bangaiis eating in 2009

 

[Nburg's Reef]

Things look like they’re going well since heavy feeding fresh foods and dosing nitrates. My purple gorgonian finally got its white polyps back. The female clownfish looks Pregnant and they looks like they’re prepping the torch hosting them to lay eggs once again. My yellow tang is the most yellow I have ever seen a yellow tang and has a nice fat belly. Note patiently waiting for some acros to color up. I’m happy that my Oregon tort and orange passion never lost color.

 

[Nburg's Reef]

I've been slow with updates, mostly because I had a cyano outbreak, mild Dino outbreak and now diatoms from some new rock I added. All which occurred while I was out of town for a week. I had a tank sitter, who knew nothing about tanks before hand but I trained her to basically feed and fill ATO. She was able to blow off any major cyano covering corals, but it was rough. I ended up losing my orange passion, ORA pearlberry, JF TNT anacropora. My kryptonite candy canes almost kicked it too but they are recovering a little. Also ALL of my montis took a hit. My dragon fruit monti, OG grafted cap and forest fire all started to die off, but hopefully they'll recover as well. Funny because half of my Acros didn't skip a beat, stayed colored up and even continued to grow, while others paled out and stopped growing. I felt that was not a bad loss given me being out of town.

When I got home I dosed chemiclean which cleared the cyano up as advertised and added a 55w cheapo UV which then killed the remaining dinos. The dinos were not bad, but I used a microscope to possitively ID them. I was able to track their demise as well with the microscope. I didn't want to take a chance so I bought a UV filter. About a month later and everything is looking good. Still have some stringy diatoms, but they are subsiding now too. My snails seem to like them.

Dinos

Unknown Diatoms

Thankfully everything is now looking good and coloring up.

 

[Nburg's Reef]

Now for some pics of how things are doing.

Got a great shot of my yellow tang. Since feeding 90% homemade frozen and mysis, my fish are super colorful and fat.

WWC Blueberry fields - This one really browned out during my cyano/dino outbreak but is rapidly brightening up. The tips are not brighter than when I got it from WWC, which is saying a lot because it was very bright when I got it.

RRC Pink Cadillac is starting to get pink and the base is encrusting well with a nice green color. Polyps are turning purple as well.

WWC Dragon Slayer - this one is starting to branch out and parts of the green tissue is starting to turn neon green compared to the winter green else where.

My WWC Illuminatis are growing really well. When I got it, it was pretty much 1 large polyp and 4 small babies... not bad for 3 months of growth. It did get pretty pale during the mini crash, but its starting to get darker and richer tissue. The skirt is still pretty light.

My WWC Pixie Dust Zoas are really looking good as well. These are pretty small polyps so I wonder if they are always going to be small, or if they will get a little bigger. Either way, its a cool zoa. the polyp tissue is deep purple, much darker than the oral disk and skirt which makes a nice contrast as it opens up.

My orange rock flower anemone has really bounced back from the move. I didn't think it was going to make it but its back to being stunning.

My pink gorgonian never skipped a beat. I need to prune it to emphasize more of the branches. Its getting too bushy in the middle. You can see my forest fire digi that took a hit. Its starting to bounce back and hopefully it regrows over the dead branches soon.

Lastly, nothing fancy, but I thought this fruit loops zoa pic turned out well

 

[Nburg's Reef]

Welp, decided to get some more corals. I ordered a few things including the two acros at the last @AquaSD sale and then got a battle box from @Battlecorals.

Here's what I got. I must say I am impressed with the size and coloration of both vendors. I knew what I was getting from Aqua SD so that met what I was expecting and Adam at battle corals definitely impressed me with what he picked and the sizes of these chunky frags.

Left to right: BC Pink Stelleton Bones, Sanjays Leprechauns Beard, BC Kermit Song Granulosa, BC Flamethrower Table and BC Nero Table.
______________________________________________________________________________________________

Left to Right: BC Bohemia, BC Ultimate Soli, BC Magic Wand, ASD Blue Phreak Tenuis, ASD Seven Rings Tenuis

 

[Nburg's Reef]

Minor update. I decided to buy an Icecap Smartphone filter and while its not as good as my DSLR, it definitely makes iPhone pics much clearer and less blue.

Couple of un-edited iPhone XR photos with the filters. This is with 3 ATI Blue+ and 1 Coral+ along with a pretty blue LED mix giving it the appearance of something around 15k-20k. Filter does a decent job of filtering out the over-blue saturation but still looks a little more blue in pics than in reality.

This filter is great for quick photoshoots. I am glad I bought it.

As for my tank, all frags have been glued down and some of my older frags are starting to really color up and grow.

 

[Nburg's Reef]

little update: so after getting rid of a mild case of dinos and some aggressive cyano, I now have chrysophytes. Which I think is photosynthetic bacteria or some sort. It’s not bothering anything but is quite ugly. I am going to try manual removal and UV to see if I can get it to pass quicker.
So I have my red-neck style UV setup again:

I haven’t shown off my sump in a while, so here’s my sump with inline frag tank. I’ve replaced my AI Prime HD with the Noopsyche light I won from last month’s giveaway. It’s a nice light other than the controller being a bit archaic. Cords are not well managed but everything is ‘stuck’ to the back so it’s not in the way. You can also see my DIY CO2 scrubber with a skimmate settling chamber to not suck up skimmate into my scrubber media.

I have a BRS co2 scrubber on the way, but for now, I’ve been happy with my DIY opti

Lastly, I wanted to share a pic of a blue tenuis I got from aqua SD which they named blue phreak. It’s prettt accurately colored in this pic and almost as blue as my Oregon tort. I’m surprised it’s not more popular as it’s doing well for me and was prettt inexpensive. I think I got it on sale for $25.
I’ll have to shoot it with my DSLR soon. This is from my iPhone + icecap filter.

 

[Nburg's Reef]

Made some equipment changes. First, my diy CO2 scrubber worked well but it greatly restricted airflow since it was on a 1/4 OD line and not a 3/8 ID line, so I installed a @Bulk Reef Supply CO2 scrubber which is working nicely. So much so, I have my Apex turn my skimmer off when my pH goes above 8.3.

I made that change because I also got a new skimmer. I’m not going anywhere in this hobby so I decided to invest in a Deltec 1000i skimmer to replace my ConeS CO-1. The old skimmer was having trouble keeping up as I add more fish and feed heavier. This wasn’t an issue in my prior setup because I’m sure all the leathers kept the water clean enough to not need a big skimmer.



I also added a sapphire damsel to protect and potential flatworm issues and they’re pretty. And, I also decided to get a fish I have wanted since I began in 2006... a blue mandarin. I was able to snag an ORA female that is small but appears very healthy.

 

[Nburg's Reef]

Another big change. I replaced my ATI Hybrid with a pair of ATI Stratons, and I have to say I love them!

 

[Nburg's Reef]

Shout out to Adam at @Battlecorals for an amazing battle box and 2 frags I bought off the website. One of the corals I purchased must not have been in stock but Adam substituted it with a much nicer frag. Really happy with the one. The pictures are taken with my iPhone and are true to life. These things glow!!

And a FTS while we’re at it to show off the new Stratons.

 

[ReefLaw]

Any updates on your tank? I have the same tank and currently running an ATI powermodule hybrid that I’m not completely satisfied yet. Considering adding a reef brite bar to the front for more led pop. How are you liking your Stratons compared to the ATI?

 

[Nburg's Reef]

Any updates on your tank? I have the same tank and currently running an ATI powermodule hybrid that I’m not completely satisfied yet. Considering adding a reef brite bar to the front for more led pop. How are you liking your Stratons compared to the ATI?

Funny, I was just about to post a little update.
Tank is doing very well! No algae in my DT, acros are starting to take off and I’m satisfied with acro colorization.

I LOVE the Stratons. Extremely uniform color - zero disco effect or color banding, nice light shimmer (like MH with T5s to soften it a bit.) and color mix is perfect.

the spread and coverage is similar to T5. A little dimmer than my 4 bulb hybrid, but not in a bad way. No harsh shadows. By far the best LED I have seen and I have owned most. 100% recommended if they’re in your budget. Plus my electric Bill dropped a bit.

Here’s my iPhone 1/2 tank shots.

 

[Nburg's Reef]

@WWC Dragon Slayer Acro - Really starting to take off from the little nub I got in the Gold Subscription.

@Battlecorals Flame Thrower Acro (starting to get interesting coloration)

BC Count Pinkula - still slower growing, but colors are very vibrant

BC Miss Scarlet - Slowly growing for now, but nice colorization.

BC Nero Table - has green from the top down, but from head on, it just looks red/pink/orange.

BC Poletti Yellow Tips - This grew from a little bit of encrusted tissue left on the rock from when I moved the colony. from literally a few polyps on the rock to this in only a few months.

 

[Daniel@R2R]

Loving those sticks!

 

[ReefLaw]

I have the same tank and just picked up two stratons. I’m getting a ton of light spill. How high and what setting are you running yours on?

 

[Nburg's Reef]

I have the same tank and just picked up two stratons. I’m getting a ton of light spill. How high and what setting are you running yours on?

About 10 inches off the water surface. They're 8" from the edge and split 9" apart from the center line.

I run them about 85% at max peak right now and maybe there is some spill, but not at defined as MHs that I used way back when... maybe i'm just not as sensitive to the spill. I noticed some in the back along the wall, but not much off the sides. I used to feel like I was blinded by the old MH/LED hybrid fixutre, and I feel I can look directly at the panels without getting blinded.

 

[loli2010]

NIce tank! What light configuration are you using for straton?

 

[Nburg's Reef]

NIce tank! What light configuration are you using for straton?

I made a custom one. The SPS one was too white, the blue was too blue. If you want, I can post it.

 

[loli2010]

Yes please, I made a custom one too from the same reason as you.

 

[Nburg's Reef]

Yes please, I made a custom one too from the same reason as you.

I go back and forth on increasing white to like 43, then I go back to 39... can't quite make up my mind.