Randy's Tank and Learn Thread

[dwest]

You folks who have used and tested the Seachem ammonia alert, any idea how long it takes to begin operating usefully? The package says it could be days, which seems somewhat high to me.

I’m thinking more like several hours.

 

[jonelder68]

I think it depends. Rock first means no sand, or hard to get sand into gaps between rocks, under rocks that are not flat on the bottom, behind the back rocks, etc.

Unless the rocks are very flat, rock will only touch the bottom at a few places. Sand first then rocks pushed into it will still touch the bottom, but will have sand under the remainder, provide more stability toward rocking back and forth.

Anyway, I appreciate the comments and realize there's no perfect answer. :)

Get the ol beer bong out :rolling-on-the-floor-laughing: It’s how I placed my sand in a controlled manner and allowed me to get sand under rock edges etc.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

I’m thinking more like several hours.

Thanks. Assuming that’s true, all looks good at 15 h after adding the alert. That’s good since Rick and sand are expected at the local airport in a half hour. :)

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

Reef Tank Day 1: Live Base Rock and Sand Arrive!

TBS shipped the live base rock and sand (Part 1 of "The Package") by Southwest air cargo. It caught an early flight and arrived perfectly at Boston just before 8 AM. Before 9 AM, it was in my car heading home. Southwest at Boston does a good job, although the lady joked that they saw it said coral and were going back and forth on whether to put it in the fridge lol (note that it was only 46 degrees out so it's not like it was a hot day). Anyway, I could back up a ramp and she brought a pallet right to the back of the car, and helped load it. I coincidentally arrived just as the rock was getting checked in there, and I was in and out in a flash.

No containers leaked. Each is packed as a bucket inside a box. I added a couple of buckets of live rocks (about 3-4 pretty big rocks per bucket) as a base layer, then added the sand. I had previously lowered the system water level and had no flow going to allow for a substantial volume increase and to avoid stirring things up and making it too cloudy to see.

The live sand was in a bag in the buckets. Three buckets of sand (IIRC). Lifting the bags out of the buckets took some strength, especially with suction under the bags, but I was able to lift them up and into the tank as per their suggestion, letting the bag down onto the bottom, then tipping it out. Worked perfectly. I had to manually move sand into spaces between some of the base rocks.

At that point I turned back on the return pump circulation at a low level (to help clarify the water) and added all but one of the remaining buckets of rock. They last one went directly to the sump. I also added all of the water that came with the shipment, and the system volume lowering prior to arrival allowed that without issue.

I did not try too hard to carefully aquascape, since I expect things to change a lot when I see the premium rock and decide what should go where, but the bulk of the base rock went on the right hand side where I expect a lot of rock to end up, and one large flat piece went on the left where I expect to make a "rock island".

Overall, I am very happy with the rock and sand. Thanks very much, TBS! There were some small hitchhiking crabs (I’m not any sort of crab expert, but one is pictured below). Also some snails. Many of the rocks have good coralline coverage, as well as various color sponges and plenty of things clearly alive that I cannot identify. All buckets and bags smelled faintly of the ocean. No bad smells or other apparent issues.

Here are some pictures of the event, and I'll post more of the tank itself once the water settles a bit more. FWIW, the Seachem ammonia alert is unchanged at no ammonia 3 h after the additions started.

 

[LiverockRocks]

Reef Tank Day 1: Live Base Rock and Sand Arrive!

TBS shipped the live base rock and sand (Part 1 of "The Package") by Southwest air cargo. It caught an early flight and arrived perfectly at Boston just before 8 AM. Before 9 AM, it was in my car heading home. Southwest at Boston does a good job, although the lady joked that they saw it said coral and were going back and forth on whether to put it in the fridge lol (note that it was only 46 degrees out so it's not like it was a hot day). Anyway, I could back up a ramp and she brought a pallet right to the back of the car, and helped load it. I coincidentally arrived just as the rock was getting checked in there, and I was in and out in a flash.

No containers leaked. Each is packed as a bucket inside a box. I added a couple of buckets of live rocks (about 3-4 pretty big rocks per bucket) as a base layer, then added the sand. I had previously lowered the system water level and had no flow going to allow for a substantial volume increase and to avoid stirring things up and making it too cloudy to see.

The live sand was in a bag in the buckets. Three buckets of sand (IIRC). Lifting the bags out of the buckets took some strength, especially with suction under the bags, but I was able to lift them up and into the tank as per their suggestion, letting the bag down onto the bottom, then tipping it out. Worked perfectly. I had to manually move sand into spaces between some of the base rocks.

At that point I turned back on the return pump circulation at a low level (to help clarify the water) and added all but one of the remaining buckets of rock. They last one went directly to the sump. I also added all of the water that came with the shipment, and the system volume lowering prior to arrival allowed that without issue.

I did not try too hard to carefully aquascape, since I expect things to change a lot when I see the premium rock and decide what should go where, but the bulk of the base rock went on the right hand side where I expect a lot of rock to end up, and one large flat piece went on the left where I expect to make a "rock island".

Overall, I am very happy with the rock and sand. Thanks very much, TBS! There were some small hitchhiking crabs (I’m not any sort of crab expert, but one is pictured below). Also some snails. Many of the rocks have good coralline coverage, as well as various color sponges and plenty of things clearly alive that I cannot identify. All buckets and bags smelled faintly of the ocean. No bad smells or other apparent issues.

Here are some pictures of the event, and I'll post more of the tank itself once the water settles a bit more. FWIW, the Seachem ammonia alert is unchanged at no ammonia 3 h after the additions started.

Crab in photo is a porcelain, love those. Snail is a cerith.
Be sure to look in the tank at night with a flashlight, probably some surprises, lol.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

Crab in photo is a porcelain, love those. Snail is a cerith.
Be sure to look in the tank at night with a flashlight, probably some surprises, lol.

Good to know! Thanks :)

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

I saw a couple of small hermit crabs messing with each other on the sand. White legs. Looking at pictures, might be long wrist hermit crabs. Maybe I can get a picture some time. :)

 

[lubeck]

I got the same crabs in my shipment they are nice. You will be surprised how many hitchhikers you actually got. It took over a week to see them come out. I had multiple mantis as well. Two are still alive and are coming out in the open more.

I’m wondering if gulf mantis are those that don’t get that big?

I got stone crabs and red crabs that look like emeralds but red.

 

[lubeck]

Randy I always had the assumption that you have a warehouse of scientific marine testing equipment stacked in your garage. It’s odd seeing you use household items from seachem.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

Randy I always had the assumption that you have a warehouse of scientific marine testing equipment stacked in your garage. It’s odd seeing you use household items from seachem.

Lol

Im destroying my image, I see.

 

[lubeck]

Lol

Im destroying my image, I see.

Never! But I’m probably not the only one with that thought ;)

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

FWIW, one of the rock pieces is quite unusual. It is large (the largest rock, I think) with several significant openings through it. My wife wants to put it out front where it can be seen easily, like windows into secret caves, but I suggested that we should wait to see how it fits with the final plan once the second batch arrives. I’ll try to get a picture tomorrow. :)

 

[rishma]

FWIW, one of the rock pieces is quite unusual. It is large (the largest rock, I think) with several significant openings through it. My wife wants to put it out front where it can be seen easily, like windows into secret caves, but I suggested that we should wait to see how it fits with the final plan once the second batch arrives. I’ll try to get a picture tomorrow. :)

That sounds like excellent.

 

[LiverockRocks]

I got the same crabs in my shipment they are nice. You will be surprised how many hitchhikers you actually got. It took over a week to see them come out. I had multiple mantis as well. Two are still alive and are coming out in the open more.

I’m wondering if gulf mantis are those that don’t get that big?

I got stone crabs and red crabs that look like emeralds but red.

• I need to look up the name of the cream/white color hermits. They seem to enjoy working the sand bed, while blue legs prefer rock.
• Mantis on the farm have all been smasher Neopgonodactylus Wennerae, which max out around 3". They are built for clubbing bivalves and crab/shrimp exoskeletons. Feed or trap them with shrimp or grocery store clams.
• Red crabs are mithrax forceps or pleuracanthus.

FWIW, one of the rock pieces is quite unusual. It is large (the largest rock, I think) with several significant openings through it. My wife wants to put it out front where it can be seen easily, like windows into secret caves, but I suggested that we should wait to see how it fits with the final plan once the second batch arrives. I’ll try to get a picture tomorrow. :)

Sounds like a Walt Smith honeycomb shape.

 

[BryanM]

Ugh, I hated moving the live sand from box to tank, it was quite heavy!

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

Sounds like a Walt Smith honeycomb shape.

Sounds like an appropriate description. The water has cleared and the rock looks great. The right hand side of the first picture below is the rock i was referring to. It's a little hard to see the openings at this angle, but several go through.

 

[twentyleagues]

Nice! and I do like the sand.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

I do like the sand.

Yes, so do I!

Last tank I used Southdown oolitic aragonite, a small size white round particle sand.. It was very cheap then (maybe 40 pounds for $3 at Home Depot) and initially gave a nice white sand, but was quite boring, and clouded the water a long time when added. Eventually (years) some grains became coralline covered, and there were many bits of other things in it. I still have some baggies of that sand if I ever want to do experiments with it.

This sand is interesting to look at, with little shells and such. I'd much rather have the look of this sand, even if it wasn't live. :)

 

[Miami Reef]

You did a nice job with the aquascape. I like the small rock coming out of the sand on the right; that’s the best part.

It reminds of a rocky shore or an island.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

Lighting: AI Blades Freshwater plus Coral Glow

The light in the pictures above is from one Ai Blade freshwater, set to some partial brightness (forget what exactly) with all colors equal. The picture is taken straight with an iphone. I like the look and, in fact, when I explained spectrum control to my wife, she said, "Oh, so it can be made warmer?". Which it can, but the point is that it is not unattractive or too warm right out of the box. Once I add the coral glow, it will be far bluer and I'll need to tone down the blue substantially, I expect. At this brightness setting, the top of the blade is not very warm to the touch.

I'll have a lot more discussion on the lights when I set them all in place, but right now I only have one for whatever on the base rock appreciates some light. When I add the next batch of rock, I'd need to remove some of these lights again, so may just hold off.

Here's the mounting setup, which I expect is fairly unusual.

The canopy is shown in the first picture, where the front face folds back onto the top, leaving a wood brace across the front, maybe 9" back from the front face. To hold the AI blades by their clip mounts, I drilled 2 holes in this wood brace and 2 holes in the back brace of the canopy. Then I put a 316 stainless steel rod (1/4" diameter) through both sets of holes, as seen in the second picture. These rods then act as rails for mounting the 4 AI Blades.

Each AI clip has an eye bolt attached to it, and a double ended clip that grabs both the eye bolt and the rod, securing the lights in place. The lights can be removed entirely by unclipping them, and they can be slid forward and backward along the rod (although the front brace impedes motion near it.).

I determined the height for the rods based on a BRS video where they studied the best height for multiple AI Blades. I'd need new double ended clips (longer or shorter) to change the height, but I cannot see a likely reason for that to be needed.

I also decided to replace the supporting side rails of the canopy. Originally, the entire canopy rested on two thin pieces of plywood stapled inside the end faces of the canopy. years of salt spray have both corroded the staples and weakened (delaminated) the plywood. I removed them entirely and replace them with sold rails of cedar (left over from a deck project) and screwed them in with 5 stainless steel screws on each side (third picture). Hopefully the canopy will last another decade or more. :)