Nuvo 20 mixed reef build

[Sshannon]

Did water change today. Noticed two asterina starfish attacking 2 separate paly polyps. One on my purple monsters and another on the pink mowhawks. Sigh.. I see them pop up like vultures if I damage any polyps, but these showed up on healthy undamaged palythoa polyps. Makes me wonder what they are normally eating. Also...only the bigger individuals seem to be coral eaters. Have not yet observed this "glomping" behavior by the small variety. Maybe the small ones dont eat coral?

 

[STEEZY]

Check out this google maps link. It's got most Saltwater stores in miami-Dade, Broward, Palm beach, Martin and some in hillsborough County. I update it now and again, as new shops show up and old ones close down.

Mostly Saltwater Aquarium shop · Sam Shannon

57 places -

maps.app.goo.gl

This is awesome! I’m in Broward so very helpful. Aquatic Jewels is my favorite of the ones I’ve been to on the list, probably only about 10-15 of them tho.

Also, I really enjoy the way you’ve documented the corals progression over the months. Great thread!

 

[Sshannon]

So I splurged a little for Black Friday. Thanks @areefcreation!

Obligatory Full Tank Shot

 

[Sshannon]

Fragged my jack-o-lantern lepto yesterday. Fingers crossed ti does well.

Also noticee my bambam zoanthids are intruding on my pc rainbow. It's time to stop that.

 

[dvgyfresh]

Nice growth! Seems like everything is doing well keep it up

 

[Sshannon]

Splurged again today. I FINALLY found an Oregon Blue Tort acro today. Reasonably priced at $30, too!
That and i also got, The Beast monti frag, haha.


*Edit* Turns out the Oregon Blue tort was a Miyagi tort. Laaame.

 

[dvgyfresh]

Splurged again today. I FINALLY found an Oregon Blue Tort acro today. Reasonably priced at $30, too!
That and i also got, The Beast monti frag, haha.

Always wanted a blue coral , good splurge! Lol

 

[sotoreef]

Love your update and coral progression every month. I am starting my own 20 nuvo build near future, wish me luck!

 

[Sshannon]

Love your update and coral progression every month. I am starting my own 20 nuvo build near future, wish me luck!

Luck granted!

 

[ceaver]

JF Jack-o-lantern Leptoseris. I've been told it is near impossible to kill this coral, that its similar to green star polyp. But I almost did, haha. I had it for a number of months before it started to bleach and then undergo tissue loss. This was my fault as I put it way too high up in the tank right after I increased my light intensity. I thought it was a lost cause, but I forgot about it. Nearly a year after it was, "dead" I noticed a single polyp! One sole polyp had survived. I will continue to document its growth.

Before the bleaching - est. 2018

The polyp is first noticed May 2021



The polyp is growing and coloring up nicely - June 2021

July 2021

August 7th 2021


August 14th, 2021

Sept 11, 2021 Notive how quickly new polyp mouths were formed!

Oct 2021....JBJ nano ATO failed and killed the poor sucker....

But I already had bought a new frag from Hydra aquatics International (permanently closed 2021) before I realized this guy was making its initial comeback...

sad this guy ultimately didn't make it. That was a great comeback story! How did the ATO fail kill it? Too much freshwater and salinity decrease? Or kalk in the ATO?

 

[Sshannon]

sad this guy ultimately didn't make it. That was a great comeback story! How did the ATO fail kill it? Too much freshwater and salinity decrease? Or kalk in the ATO?

The coralvue icecap nano ato just started beeping for no reason and stopped working while i was away. My salinity shot up to 42ppt for at least a solid week while I was away in Pennsylvania for a 2 week period. I immediately shot it back down to 35 when I returned, but he was already a goner. Sighhhh. I'm surprised I didn't kill anyone when I lowered it back down tbh.

 

[ceaver]

The coralvue icecap nano ato just started beeping for no reason and stopped working while i was away. My salinity shot up to 42ppt for at least a solid week while I was away in Pennsylvania for a 2 week period. I immediately shot it back down to 35 when I returned, but he was already a goner. Sighhhh. I'm surprised I didn't kill anyone when I lowered it back down tbh.

Holy crap. Good thing you didn't have worse losses! Looks like things have recovered well since!

 

[Sshannon]

Holy crap. Good thing you didn't have worse losses! Looks like things have recovered well since!

I was looking in the tank and I noticed a single polyp survived!! I've updated the photo log

 

[Sshannon]

Been quite busy this week. My local Aquarium maintenance friend is setting up a storefront. I helped out with building a stand meant for quarantine tanks for them.

Back to coral updates.

Todays specimen update is for Rock Flower Anemones. I have three adults and many babehs

June 2021

August 2021. I had my AC go out in the building. I'm not sure if the raise in temperature caused the spawning event or not, but a few weeks later I notice baby RFA's throughout the tank.

I rounded them up as I found them throughout the following weeks. I put them in a PVC coupling with holes for circulation. They had very little color at this size.

January 2022. It wasn't until 2~3 months after I first noticed them that color started to appear in all of them.

February 2022

I'm seriously considering selling all my RFA's, as I want to focus more on SPS in the future. I've been having trouble trying to remove one of my rock work, so I used an anemone cannon today. Hopefully I'll have it off by the end of the week.

August 2022. Rock flower babies are coloring up nicely. I find them wandering around the tank occasionally. But then push them back near the parents. I removed one rock flower adult along with the rock it was on.

September 2022 (The rock flower adults had a second spawning event, as I am finding new small babies all over the tank. I have had a nice pederson's shrimp chilling out in my rock flower garden for about a half year. I want to get a lot more).

 

[ramona]

Congratulations for your babies, mine 3 RFAs are stubborn....

 

[Saltyreef]

Love the tank. This is actually going to be my next tank too.

Small AIO much simpler to maintain than my 40g breeder.

 

[Sshannon]

Monthly update.

A lot of ups and downs. Quit my old job, started a new job. Moved my tank and only lost one acro during transport. Rescaped the tank with a beautiful piece of fiji rock from my lfs. Will update backlog of coral growth progression pictures when I get a chance.

 

[Sshannon]

August Update. I apologize for the lack of updates. I moved to a new county, started a new job, and had someone "tanksit" for me for several months.

I made the tank move just last month and still have some corals not happy with the move.

I removed the Orchid Dottyback and replaced with a pederson's shrimp and a yellow clown goby. However, the clown goby refused to take frozen food. Instead eating coral mucous. I thought i had large enough colonies that they wouldn't suffer too much. I was wrong, and he went to jail.

 

[ceaver]

I'm about to move my IM 40 full of acros across the country. I'm a little nervous to say the least...

How did moving your acros go and how long of a move was it?

 

[Sshannon]

@ceaver
The acros did pretty darn good. I did not lose any acros during the move, which for me was 2 hours packing coral up, 9 hours driving, and 1 hour unpacking coral.

Key pointers.

• If you can take the coral off the scape, DO IT. Bag them individually and you can glue them back later. You can get bags from your local fish shop if you ask nicely.
• Mini colonies on the rockscape are trickier. I succeeded by keeping the entire rockwork underwater in several large Styrofoam coolers. Fill up the boxes as high as you can with water. The more air inside the box, the more wave crashing action you can generate when braking.
• Make sure to tape all the seams. I had saltwater spill out the seams each time I hit the brakes because I thought I was better than tape. Just do it.
• Styrofoam coolers kept temperatures stabile, but they still change slowly. Keep the boxes in an AC part of the vehicle and keep temp between 74 and 82 where possible.
• Stagnation is lethal. Have a battery operated airstone ready for each box containing large colonies on your rockscape. Bagged coral are fine in their bags for at least a day. You can drill a hole in the styrofoam lid to slip an airline tube through. (remember to drill a 2nd hole to allow air pressure to escape.
• I bagged the fish and inverts separately and they were good for the 12 hours with no supplemental air.