Nick’s 20G Nuvo

[Nick Steele]

We moved about three weeks ago and I finally got around to setting the tank back up and will document the progress going forward!

Tank sits on a custom made stand from father-in-law.

Will cycle with microbacter and ammonia source. To get this thing up and running and ready for some beginning corals asap!

Tank equipment

Nero 3
Jebao sow 15
2x AI prime 16hd
Intank filter holder
IM UV sterilizer
Sicce 1.5
Tunze ato
2x VCA rfg


Tank inhabitants
2 black ice clownfish
1 azure damsel
1 sexy shrimp

Corals
Blue eye blondie zoa
Snitches? Zoa
Green star polyp
Xenia
Rock flower nem
Bubble tip nem
Green torch (had peach tips)
Cotton candy torch
Yellow octospawn
Birdsnest (stung by torches first night)
Monti cap (recovering hopefully lives)
Banana stylo
Pumpkin patch psammocora
Acan
Green avelopora
Bizzaro cyphastrea


Start of tank (April 2024)

Most recent full tank shot! 11/4/24

 

[tzabor10]

Looking good so far

 

[Gumbies R Us]

We moved about three weeks ago and I finally got around to setting the tank back up and will document the progress going forward!

Tank sits on a custom made stand from father-in-law.

Will cycle with microbacter and ammonia source. To get this thing up and running and ready for some beginning corals asap!

Tank equipment

Nero 3
Jebao sow 15
2x AI prime 16hd
Intank filter holder
IM UV sterilizer
Sicce 1.5
Tunze ato
2x VCA rfg


Tank inhabitants (planning stage atm)
Tailspot blenny
Two clownfish
Neon goby
Bangii cardinal
Shrimp (sexy or blood shrimp)

Love the aquascape!

 

[Jim Gomoll]

Off to a good start.

 

[Nick Steele]

Love the aquascape!

Thanks! Love arches but still want some separation for gsp and/or xenia for the wife and daughter. Plus some sand for a trachy.

 

[kevgib67]

Welcome back!

 

[Nick Steele]

Got back from RAP Orlando and I returned with 3 zoa frags and 3lbs of Tampa bay live rock! Frags are being slow to open but that’s usual from past experience.


Zoas before dipping!

Live rock!

Frags in tank some opening a little!

Live rock in the AIO sump area (giving the macro some spill over light)

 

[Nick Steele]

Well everything’s doing good today and most are happy! While I dipped the frags I knocked my blondies off the frag plug and had to re glue them so little slower to open.


I’m not a name person but I believe I have purple monsters, snitches and blue eyed blondies.

 

[Nick Steele]

Grab my first fish yesterday! He’s still getting acclimated with the tank and is hiding still. Going to start feeding tonight and get him in the habitat for seeing me at a certain to get him use to me! Also picked up 2 sexy shrimp and a rock flower nem for them. All last night nem floated around the tank looking for the right spot. And this morning the sexy shrimp found him and has stayed put since.


Starting to see the ugly stage which is welcomed in my house! Going to grab some snails in the next few days as I’m just now seeing brown spots on rock.

Full tank shot (love the polyp lab lens!)

Yes the nem is small but it’s gorgeous!

Zoas

Closed due to me having to scrub some diatoms off it

The banishment corner! Xenia and GSP

Also just found my first shrimp molt!

 

[Brandon3000]

Loving the simplicity of the aquascape!!

 

[Nick Steele]

Loving the simplicity of the aquascape!!

Thanks! It’s mostly done for my plans of corals so hopefully in about a year it will look how I envision it. Euphyllia on the lower right hand side, zoas/rock flowers on the left. Trachy/scoly on sandbed somewhere. And a nice monti growing from the top of the arch. And eventually acros on top of arch

 

[scubatan]

Did you test any parameters during your cycle? Are you testing anything going forward?
What’s the purpose of the live rock if you’ve already done bottle bac and ammonia?

Looks great!

 

[Nick Steele]

Did you test any parameters during your cycle? Are you testing anything going forward?
What’s the purpose of the live rock if you’ve already done bottle bac and ammonia?

Looks great!

I did check ammonia nitrites and nitrates during the first week. I’m keeping eye on ammonia weekly for a little but i’m sure corals will tell me before a test. I have all normal reef test (alk, Calc, etc) for going forward. I added the live rock just to be sure I was cycled when adding corals as it couldn’t hurt any and was really cheap for peace of mind!

 

[Nick Steele]

Ran some test today and here’s what they came up with!

Temp 78
Alk 8.8
Ph 7.8
Nitrate 5ppm
Phosphate .31 (high and idk why) will be checking more frequently

Will do Calc and mag tomorrow as well. Planning a small water change this week too!


Also sadly the nem went for a walk and ended up getting beat up pretty badly and is now in a pvc cap on the sand bed.

 

[Nick Steele]

Things are going mostly great!

Added a tailspot blenny who was doing well for a few weeks eating and enjoying the tank then woke up one morning to find him in my RFG dead. No clue what happened. Also I noticed flatworms on the tank a few weeks back and I’ve been trying to control them during water changes and sucking them out in between but they are still going strong with zero slowing down.

Corals are doing good! Zoas are spreading with new polyps xenia is happy and gsp is starting to grow on the rock! The rock flower is still in the tank although it’s staying buried in the sand all the time. Hoping it will turn around soon. Also I’m seeing plenty of coralline growing which is a first for me! Even my old tank at 2 years old didn’t have any coralline.

This all leads me to today! I got the go ahead to get fish for myself for Father’s Day and I went and got 2 black ice clowns and an azure damselfish.

Will get pictures after fish have settled down some!

 

[Nick Steele]

Here’s some pics!

3 new fish! 2 black ice 1 azure damsel

Full tank! (Cloudy due to just turkey basting/siphoning flatworms out)

 

[Nick Steele]

Over the past two months I’ve had some good things and bad things happen that I’m still dealing with! Everything was growing good so I got some more corals.

Picked up a zoa, red Goni and a green alveopora. Everything went well for a week after adding them. Then the old zoas started to close and wither away. I ran test and noticed that my nitrates and phosphates had bottomed out I don’t know why. So I started to dose both and monitor testing every other day. For three weeks I kept getting 0 for both so continued to does. Then yesterday my newer zoa and Goni are retracted a bit and when I ran test before dosing and BAM!!! Nitrates at 25-45ppm and phosphate at .06ppm.

I did not dose any further and am prepping a water change for tonight! I know this will take time to lower with water changes and I hope my zoas make it through.

Current parameters
Alk 11.3 (rising without adding anything)
Calc 480
Mag 1450
Phos .06ppm
Nitrate 25-45
pH 7.9 (I know this is low but can’t help it)

Sadly been busy with life and don’t have pictures but I’ll grab some when I can!

 

[Nick Steele]

So things have turned around a bit. I lost my purple monster zoas and my red Goni sadly. Everything else is going good! Zoas are opened although with weird colors I’m assuming to being closed for over a month! I’ve added some more corals today to see if I can add some better pieces here soon! Will need to grab a full tank shot tomorrow when lights come on as I didn’t tank one after I glued my cap and birdsnest down.

These 3 corals were added today as rescue/rehabilitation corals

Burning banana excited for this one!

Pumpkin patch psammocora?? Nice colors

Bizzaoro cyphastrea?? Bad coloring

Scrambled eggs! (Wonderful yellow!)

Blue Eyed Blondes (extremely washed out was hardest hit surviving zoa)

Gsp

Fire and ice or snitches not sure

 

[Nick Steele]

Haven’t updated in awhile!

Added a few more corals and getting some slight growth on older corals! Everything seems to be falling into place coraline algae is growing good!

Gold hammer

Acan

Yellow octospawn (bright yellow in person)

Birdsnest (stung by torches first night I had them I believe as this happened then)

Green torch (had peach tips when I bought)

Cotton candy torch (one head not opening)

Full tank shot (I leave the side glass dirty for snails and ease of maintenance lol)