New to hobby, here's my build and the plan!

[Aeiyr]

Just getting into Saltwater. been lurking on the forums for a few months now, watching a lot of BRStv, Fragbox, etc. Reading every little articles i can get my fingies on. About 3, coming up on 4 weeks ago I went ahead and made the wallet punching leap and got myself what I'd need. Build is as follows:

Tank: IM Nuvo Fusion Pro 2 14 Peninsula.
Pumps: Comes stock with MightyJet 326gph DC pump. Also have a Nero3 incase i need more flow later on.
Lighting: 2x AI Blade Coral Grow mounted parallel 5" above water surface, 6 inches apart. via AI HMS arm.
Sand: 10lbs Caribsea Arag-Alive Fiji Pink.
Rock: Dry MarcoRock. Purchased around 20 lbs of various shapes, have around 10~ish in the DT. See filtrations below, as Maxspect adverts every 10 "spheres" to be equal to 20 lbs of rock, i have about 20 sphere's in the back chambers.
Filtration: InTank basket in chamber 1 with 1.5" thick floss and Maxspect bio media. InTank media basket in chamber 2 with more Maxspect Bio media for now.
Heater: IM Helio 100W Titanium heater w/controller. Currently set to 80F to propagate bacteria.
ATO: I don't remember what my ATO is, but it works great for now. will likely upgrade it for an Osmolator Nano in the first year along with buying or building a larger container for the top off RO/DI water.
Salt: I am using AquaForest Reef Salt. I'll be fish and inverts only for atleast 3 months minimum before buying my first couple soft corals. I could have saved money on a fish and invert only targeted salt but, from what I gather it seems best to set your baseline from the start and stay with it, so that's what I'm doin.

The plan: 2 Mocha Occelaris Clowns. That's it for fish. I had considered adding either a Two Spot Signal Goby(which may be pushing it on fish) or a Clown Goby, but I have concerns about the Clowns pairing, spawning, and then annihilating a third fish in a territorial tangent. (if anyone has experience that airs on the safe side please let me know, as I think clown gobies are just so friggin adorable)

For corals I would like to stay with softies and LPS. Yuma's, Hammers, Zoa's, and if I can find them, bubble corals and things of that like.

Invert CuC team will likely be standard fair. a couple each of Astrea, Trochus, and Nassarius snails. along with a small team of hermits. I have also considered a single orange or pink lip conch as the flagship invert. CuC will be added as the uglies begin, as food becomes available and not a day before. I'm also looking at adding a jar of copepods and feeding phyto before even the Fish go in. The recent experiment run that BRS did on microfauna and combatting the uglies by having something as simple as a few pod species present from the start has me looking at cycling a whole new way.

I'd also like to look at the possibility of a clam. I really like Crocea's, but i know they can require SPS levels of PAR, and I don't know if i want to struggle trying to balance that while not bleaching out the softies. I would still be fine with something like a Derasa, and simply donating it if it gets too large and I haven't upgraded tanks by that time.

Anyways, that's my build and plans. I know plans don't always go accordingly, and I'm as ready for that to be the case as I realistically can be. I will include some photo's of the setup to show the rockwork I have thus far. I'm optimistic, and I know smaller tanks are harder to maintain than larger ones because smaller problems snowball faster. This is set directly beside my desk. it's in a place where I work from home for 8 hours a day, and typically spend another couple on top of that recreationally each day. I decided to make it deskside specifically so it cannot be ignored, and changes can be noticed much sooner. I'm ready and excited for the challenge!

Any input is of course welcome.

 

[Propane]

Love the aquascape!

 

[Aeiyr]

Love the aquascape!

Thanks! I did the best I could. The flat platform is the most recent one I've "glued" together using marcorock nano shelves and AF stone fix cement. I wanted something i could place corals on easily in tiers without them trying to kill one another. I may order a box of twolittlefishes Stackerz and see if I can pull out the overhang I made in favor of another tiered spiral platform thing. My main concern at this point is hurting the cycling progress by removing bacteria that have settled on that rock though.

 

[Propane]

Thanks! I did the best I could. The flat platform is the most recent one I've "glued" together using marcorock nano shelves and AF stone fix cement. I wanted something i could place corals on easily in tiers without them trying to kill one another. I may order a box of twolittlefishes Stackerz and see if I can pull out the overhang I made in favor of another tiered spiral platform thing. My main concern at this point is hurting the cycling progress by removing bacteria that have settled on that rock though.

If it’s gonna bug you do it now lol.

 

[Aeiyr]

If it’s gonna bug you do it now lol.

Lol, that was my exact thought. before the biosphere gets totally seeded. with it being a smaller tank I keep humming and hawing about inverts having enough "sand space" to thrive so I'm trying to keep away from large boulder type scaping. I do have an extra bottle of Dr. tim's. If I do the switch I'll likely pour that in afterward to bolster it.

 

[Reef.Raider]

Great looking aquascape, corals will be happy!

 

[Aeiyr]

Updates:

Changed some rock during the 6 weeks of cycle, now has two rock formations made with flat plates cemented. The idea here was coral platforms. However I feel like with 3 rocks I'm eating my space up in a weird way. Might come back to it but if I change it it'll be after I slowcook some rock and bio media in a bucket for a couple months so I don't Bork my nitrifyers.

I ordered a small cuc of 5 blue leg hermits, one scarlet, 3 trochus snails, 3 nassarius, and two astrea. Dr. Reefs made a mistake and sent me 10 of everything instead, lol. All of the Trochus died in 48 hours. One was doa in the bag and nuked the others. All other critters are alive.

I now have a massive amount of CuC. I'll try feeding them what I can but nature's bound to take its course in a 14 gallon.

One of the 10 Scarlets crabs I ordered isn't a scarlet at all. He's 4 times the size of the others, and has been identified as a white speckled hermit. I'm told he is not reef safe, which is a bummer because he is very neat to watch. He's an absolute hoover for the only algea I've had so far in the form of diatoms.

I also received my two Mocha Clownfish. I ordered smalls between 1.25-1.5 inch, as I wanted to enjoy watching them grow and have them smaller before I got a bigger (25gal lagoon) in a year or two. Dr. Reefs also made a mistake here, and instead sent me two adults about 2.5 and 3 inches long. Behavior so far makes me think they have bonded or were already bonded. I will keep them, I still enjoy them and they are very healthy and active.

Photos and some mp4 video is included. Thank you for checking out my journey into the hobby!

 

[Aeiyr]

More pics

 

[Aeiyr]

Just an update. Tank was set up last week of April, finished the cycle the last week of May and first fish and inverts arrived on first week of June.

As things progressed, I became unhappy with my aquascape. It felt crowded and unnatural. The last week of June I purchased a nano reef liferock kit (CaribSea), tossed it all in a 5 gallon bucket with some turbostart900, and let it go for 5 weeks. Tonight I swapped the full aquascape. Pictures with new aquascape will be included.

I've had no real "ugly" phase, likely due to having so many crabs and the 7 astrea snails with them. But I'm struggling really hard with nitrates. The tank has a skimmer, and the two clowns are being fed once a day, small pinch of PE Mysis pellets, and frozen food with selcon on alternating days. Nitrates are still nuts.

I'm worried if I can't get it under control, I'll never get to start picking up my first soft corals. Any feedback will be helpful.

 

[Gumbies R Us]

Just an update. Tank was set up last week of April, finished the cycle the last week of May and first fish and inverts arrived on first week of June.

As things progressed, I became unhappy with my aquascape. It felt crowded and unnatural. The last week of June I purchased a nano reef liferock kit (CaribSea), tossed it all in a 5 gallon bucket with some turbostart900, and let it go for 5 weeks. Tonight I swapped the full aquascape. Pictures with new aquascape will be included.

I've had no real "ugly" phase, likely due to having so many crabs and the 7 astrea snails with them. But I'm struggling really hard with nitrates. The tank has a skimmer, and the two clowns are being fed once a day, small pinch of PE Mysis pellets, and frozen food with selcon on alternating days. Nitrates are still nuts.

I'm worried if I can't get it under control, I'll never get to start picking up my first soft corals. Any feedback will be helpful.

Tank is doing really well!

 

[Xniv]

Gotta give love to peninsula tanks! looking good on the scape!

 

[Aeiyr]

Gotta give love to peninsula tanks! looking good on the scape!

Thanks! I can't wait to get corals in there. It's about 4 months old now, and it should be ready for softies. But I can't sort this nitrate out so I'm afraid to add them. I did heavy 50% changes every other day for a week to beat it down to 5ppm nitrate. I fed once, third cube of frozen mysis with selcon, checked the next day, 10ppm. It's driving me insane. Nothing is dead or decaying unless it's a nassarius under the sand or something.

 

[Xniv]

Yeah, better start slow on the corals. But a lot of reefers have different opinions about phosphates and nitrates. Some have really high ones and all their corals are thriving. I guess it's best to look at how the corals are doing instead of chasing numbers.

 

[Aeiyr]

Yeah, better start slow on the corals. But a lot of reefers have different opinions about phosphates and nitrates. Some have really high ones and all their corals are thriving. I guess it's best to look at how the corals are doing instead of chasing numbers.

I may do that. Perhaps a low cost mushroom and star polyp island to see what happens would be best.