Pico in a Pickle Jar

[lil sumpin]

After a year of nano reefing fairly successfully I’ve found that a low tech, simple approach is the right one for me. Luckily the roller coaster ride in the beginning of my journey taught me a bit about patience. Gonna try to hone this approach with a pico reef.

For the vessel, I’m going with an Anchor Hocking 2gal jar. Equipment will be very minimal. I’m thinking I can get enough flow and surface agitation with a return pump rated for 50gph, I’ve seen many videos of folks opting to simply use airline and an air pump. I will experiment between the two to see which style suits the scenario best. Lighting will be provided by a ReefSmart pico pro LED.

Currently we’re already cycled, there’s about 3lbs of LR branch pieces I picked up from a local reefer’s established tank. The rock came with pods, some sponges, and spirorbid worms. There’s also a little bit of algae and a couple vermetids but nothing very alarming to me. I’m planning to migrate a trochus and some bumblebee snails over from my nano soon.

Taking a bit of inspiration from the likes of Maritza Reef Vase, Nathalia_la_loca and @brandon429. I don’t anticipate having a little system as amazing as their masterpieces but I sure as heck have an idea of what I want. Gonna start off with some hardy, robust softies and LPS first and slowly work up to more challenging coral.

Pico reefers, please advise :smiling-face-with-sunglasses:

 

[brandon429]

That's going to work great it already looks good and the rock is nicely cured

If it helps any, Maritza relayed to me about 18 mos ago they'd been feeding their 9 yr old pico solely benepets reef food and I switched to that. Easy feed, doesn't pollute most convenient although lots of different feeds will work, that's just the easiest.

Thank you so much for posting, we welcome seeing this new build mature out!

 

[Gumbies R Us]

After a year of nano reefing fairly successfully I’ve found that a low tech, simple approach is the right one for me. Luckily the roller coaster ride in the beginning of my journey taught me a bit about patience. Gonna try to hone this approach with a pico reef.

For the vessel, I’m going with an Anchor Hocking 2gal jar. Equipment will be very minimal. I’m thinking I can get enough flow and surface agitation with a return pump rated for 50gph, I’ve seen many videos of folks opting to simply use airline and an air pump. I will experiment between the two to see which style suits the scenario best. Lighting will be provided by a ReefSmart pico pro LED.

Currently we’re already cycled, there’s about 3lbs of LR branch pieces I picked up from a local reefer’s established tank. The rock came with pods, some sponges, and spirorbid worms. There’s also a little bit of algae and a couple vermetids but nothing very alarming to me. I’m planning to migrate a trochus and some bumblebee snails over from my nano soon.

Taking a bit of inspiration from the likes of Maritza Reef Vase, Nathalia_la_loca and @brandon429. I don’t anticipate having a little system as amazing as their masterpieces but I sure as heck have an idea of what I want. Gonna start off with some hardy, robust softies and LPS first and slowly work up to more challenging coral.

Pico reefers, please advise :smiling-face-with-sunglasses:

Following along! I always love seeing unique tanks like this, so this will be neat to watch.

 

[lil sumpin]

That's going to work great it already looks good and the rock is nicely cured

If it helps any, Maritza relayed to me about 18 mos ago they'd been feeding their 9 yr old pico solely benepets reef food and I switched to that. Easy feed, doesn't pollute most convenient although lots of different feeds will work, that's just the easiest.

Thank you so much for posting, we welcome seeing this new build mature out!

I have some reef roids on hand but I barely even use it to feed my nano. I've had elevated nutrients in that tank since I started and from what I've read roids is kinda messy and creates nutrient spikes. I would like to keep favia and acans in this jar so feeding will likely be necessary to get them growing. For now, I'll start by migrating one of the smaller toadstools I have in my nano over and likely the GSP covered frag plug.

I've seen many picos running with sand and many without. I'm still not sure if I want to add any yet. Will have to figure that one out before any major life goes in there. To sand or not to sand?

 

[lil sumpin]

Got some more life in there. It's very nice to see the bumblebee snail demolishing the vermetids. Currently have a tester GSP frag, some codium and gracilaria going.

 

[lainamarie]

ya’ll making me say **** it and imma give a 1litre jar a hot attempt here lol

 

[lil sumpin]

Took some chaeto and more gracialiari out of my nano cus I started using reef flux in hopes of ridding bryopsis that’s been recurring. I think they’ll grow fine in here for a little bit. Unfortunately I lost the codium. It was doing fine in my nano for months so I assumed it was hardy but it began to disintegrate :(

I added a couple frags to my nano last week but I’m not quite sure what I wanna put in the jar yet. CUC is currently a bumblebee snail and blue leg hermit There’s hardly any evaporation in the tank and I’ve barely had to do any maintenance on it. After a couple weeks, just beginning to see film algae. The soft corals in there make life a little easier since they’re pretty worry free. Here’s the pico for now

 

[lil sumpin]

Still haven’t decided what kinda corals I wanna put it here. Im liking the chaeto ball and hayi clusters for now. Would like to add another interesting macro or two.

 

[lil sumpin]

The rock is slowly getting a some pink and purple specks. Vermetids are mostly gone. I spotted some aiptasia and am seeing an influx of what appears to be bryopsis. It was in my nano, now it’s in here