Red Sea 425XL Build, Colorado

[Chrisv.]

I moved our sun coral onto the glass, below the gyre pump. This thing is so much work trying to shove food Into the mouths. I am hoping being bow the pump will drag some food to him as was suggested in a video we watched about these corals.

My powder tang is such a jerk. He scared the bejeezus out of our new lyretail anthius. The lyretail has herself wedged tightly behind some rocks. I hope it ends up OK tomorrow. If the powder tang continues to bully I may have to move the lyretail to the 250.

When I added my shrimp and goby it was more than a month before the goby emerged!

Good call on the sun coral. Those things are beautiful but such a pain!

 

[Kayanarka]

When I added my shrimp and goby it was more than a month before the goby emerged!

Good call on the sun coral. Those things are beautiful but such a pain!

Tell me about it, that sun coral has an insatiable appetite.

I did see the new goby one more time before lights out, he was hiding under some shells to the left of the pistol shrimp hideout.

 

[Kayanarka]

I am behind on testing. I had my LFS run a test for me about a week ago but do not have the results to post. So here is today's round of testing.

Alkalinity = 9.3
Calcium = 440
Phosphates = 0.42

I'm stopping my testing here for now. After getting two wildly different results with the Hanna copper tester I am a little frustrated and also hungry. Maybe I will continue later.

Since I had a Hanna copper tester I figured I would run a copper test.

Copper 0.13 this worries me. Why am I reading copper? How do I get rid of it?

Well, I ran the copper test a second time and got 0.03 so I do not know what to think. Could the copper have been stuck to my test vial from when I was testing my Quarantine hospital tank?

 

[Kayanarka]

Ok, going to try another round of testing tonight. Let's see how it goes.

Salinity 1.025 @ 78.3F
Phosphate 0.39
Nitrates between 25 - 40 ppm, closer to 25 then 40
Alkalinity 9.0
Ammonia = 0
Nitrite 0 to 0.025
Calcium 469 to 486
Magnesium 1425

 

[craftsman1983]

Ok, going to try another round of testing tonight. Let's see how it goes.

Salinity 1.025 @ 78.3F
Phosphate 0.39
Nitrates between 25 - 40 ppm, closer to 25 then 40
Alkalinity 9.0
Ammonia = 0
Nitrite 0 to 0.025
Calcium 469 to 486
Magnesium 1425

Awesome build so far! I am in the preparation stage of my 425 xl build. Definitely have some good ideas from your build. What type of sand did you use from the LFS? Those sand shifting gobies sound fun-my kids would love watching them do their thing!!

 

[Kayanarka]

Awesome build so far! I am in the preparation stage of my 425 xl build. Definitely have some good ideas from your build. What type of sand did you use from the LFS? Those sand shifting gobies sound fun-my kids would love watching them do their thing!!

Hi, thanks for following. I used Caribsea live sand. Definitely remember to find the little packets of magic juice inside the bag. The tank came with about 2" of established sand, and I added another 2" after. It made a mess of the water, but cleared up with in a day or two.

I lost the packet when I added some sand to my 250, and it never cleared up, I ended up having to run a carbon reactor to get the water clear.

Be aware, if you like sand shifting creatures, they WILL rearrange the sand, so do not go crazy trying to make the sand all even or anything. Also, Sand Shifter Gobies we discovered are jumpers. We lost our little guy and found him behind the tank a week later. We now leave our screen top on all the time. Unfortunately our new sand shifter seems really shy, and not as interactive as the one we lost.

Please forgive the algae, the stuff on the glass is that really hard to scrape off algae, we need to get something better to scrape it.

 

[Kayanarka]

I have been neglecting my build thread and I apologize. I built a screen top for the tank, it is just a simple window screen, 4 corners, nothing fancy at all, but it gets the job done. I do find it gets in the way a little when needing to work in the tank, but it is better then finding fish on the floor.

It has turned into a place to store frequently used items like feeding containers and my cleaning brush. I worry about the amount of salt that collects on it and how that affects my salinity. I find my self having to mix the water for the weekly change at about 1.027 to keep my salinity up.

 

[Kayanarka]

My wife found this cabinet, which is pretty amazing, it fits the 5 gallon buckets right inside, and has tons of shelving right on the door for test kits ect.

If you have read all of my posts, you know I have been frustrated with the test kits and my results. I am way to anal for the inaccuracy of my test kits, so I have just stopped testing weekly.

I leave my dosing pumps alone, and leave the tank alone. I do my water changes once a week or once every other week, and my sump maintenance once or twice a week. The skimmer gets a complete tear down every other week, and filter cups are weekly.

I did a complete sump tear down and clean up about 2 weeks ago because I was not pleased with the amount of crud on the bottom. I was surprised to find my two peppermint shrimp alive and well in the sump, I was worried they had gone jnto the skimmer. I lost the cheato algae in my 250 from running the refugium light 24/7, the algae did not like that. I need to get a timer or a control device for the light in the 250 sump.

I still like my Hydros control Unit on the 450xl, even with the minor problems with disconnects ect.

 

[Kayanarka]

I picked up two new probes for the hydros controller. I did not realize they are supposed to have glass bulbs on the bottom. Both of the used probes I received with the Hydros controller had broken bulbs. It turned out buying that unit used was a waste, because by the time I bought the new probes I could have had a completely new unit.

I know everyone likes pictures, but I do not want to remove the probe right now. Just know, if you are looking into the probes, there should be a very obvious glass ball around the sensing element at the bottom. You can kind of see the round shape of the glass bulb in this photo. You can clearly see the hungry sun coral, time to get that guy fed.

I kind of regret getting this sun coral. He needs so much food, and it is hard to get it to his mouths. I placed him on the glass below my gyro, as I saw a video that suggested that may pull food his way. It seems to be working, as I am sure I do not directly feed him often enough, but he is growing, not shrinking.

The blue fan coral is another story. I do not think I am feeding this enough, and I feel like it will eventually die off. I made a feeding cup for it, but I am horrible at feeding it every night. I guess time will tell, but the research I did on this guy says not even professional aquarium keepers have had much luck getting them to live longer then 6 months. He is at about three months now, and I think it has been shrinking.

It is too late to get phot9s of the rest of my Coral, they are all sleeping right now. Our Torches are doing amazing. The little Zoa That Could from the very start of the tank setup is doing amazing.

We have has no luck keeping stick corals, I think our algae issue kills them off, or my flow is too week. We have given up on stick corals for now.

 

[Kayanarka]

Lots of updates tonight. I have done a lot of work to the tank, but I was horrible at documenting it.

I moved my single stage carbon reactor to the 250, and the 450xl got a new dual stage GFO and carbon reactor. This weekend will be the time for the first media change. I installed this around the 15 of December. My phosphate levels have been difficult to maintain as we are heavy feeders. The sun coral and blue fan coral demand a lot of food be put into the tank. Most of the coral seem to love all the food availability, but the Algae loves it also. My wife was kind enough to crawl down to put the screws in for me to hold the reactor up, I think it looks nice in there.

I bumped the skimmer up a notch, and I am getting much more skimmer in the cup now. It still looks very dark, so I feel good about this setting. It is at 80 on the controller.

So far the GFO seems to be helping. I scrubbed the rocks after I put it in, and very little algae has returned.

I also turned my white light schedule down to about 3 hours a day. I lowered the intensity on my blue lights also as it just seemed like everything was acting like it was too bright in the tank. I have been slowly increasing the levels to reach where I was when I did my par readings.

I wonder now how accurate the par meter was. One of the things that worry me is if I was using the par meter correctly. I set the blue lights up to about 75%, then slowly increased the white until I got the par to about 150 in the middle of the tank I wonder is I should have set blue and white equal, and then increased intensity of all of them equally until par was correct, then just backed off white as needed. I am interested in advice here.

 

[tritonpower]

Lots of updates tonight. I have done a lot of work to the tank, but I was horrible at documenting it.

I moved my single stage carbon reactor to the 250, and the 450xl got a new dual stage GFO and carbon reactor. This weekend will be the time for the first media change. I installed this around the 15 of December. My phosphate levels have been difficult to maintain as we are heavy feeders. The sun coral and blue fan coral demand a lot of food be put into the tank. Most of the coral seem to love all the food availability, but the Algae loves it also. My wife was kind enough to crawl down to put the screws in for me to hold the reactor up, I think it looks nice in there.

I bumped the skimmer up a notch, and I am getting much more skimmer in the cup now. It still looks very dark, so I feel good about this setting. It is at 80 on the controller.

So far the GFO seems to be helping. I scrubbed the rocks after I put it in, and very little algae has returned.

I also turned my white light schedule down to about 3 hours a day. I lowered the intensity on my blue lights also as it just seemed like everything was acting like it was too bright in the tank. I have been slowly increasing the levels to reach where I was when I did my par readings.

I wonder now how accurate the par meter was. One of the things that worry me is if I was using the par meter correctly. I set the blue lights up to about 75%, then slowly increased the white until I got the par to about 150 in the middle of the tank I wonder is I should have set blue and white equal, and then increased intensity of all of them equally until par was correct, then just backed off white as needed. I am interested in advice here.

I ended up getting a bag of phosguard and put it in one of my filter cups. I also run my fuge light for 12 hours. That has dropped my phos down nicely. With 2 tangs and a lawnmower blenny I have no algae at all (except bubble, argh)

I have the redsea lights. I use the charts they put out regarding PAR. I have never used a par meter. Acros are happy so far.

 

[Kayanarka]

I ended up getting a bag of phosguard and put it in one of my filter cups. I also run my fuge light for 12 hours. That has dropped my phos down nicely. With 2 tangs and a lawnmower blenny I have no algae at all (except bubble, argh)

I have the redsea lights. I use the charts they put out regarding PAR. I have never used a par meter. Acros are happy so far.

Bubble algae was hitting me hard a week or two ago, it seems to have stopped gaining ground since I put in the reactor. I had my Chaeto in the sump for a couple months at least, but it could not keep up with the load. I tried putting some GFO in a single stage reactor with carbon, but it just was not enough.

I wish there were some more resources for my Nico Bars. I have not been happy with trying to dial them in.

How do you like the lawnmower blenny? We have thought about adding one but was worried about how reef safe he would be.

 

[tritonpower]

Bubble algae was hitting me hard a week or two ago, it seems to have stopped gaining ground since I put in the reactor. I had my Chaeto in the sump for a couple months at least, but it could not keep up with the load. I tried putting some GFO in a single stage reactor with carbon, but it just was not enough.

I wish there were some more resources for my Nico Bars. I have not been happy with trying to dial them in.

How do you like the lawnmower blenny? We have thought about adding one but was worried about how reef safe he would be.

I have had a couple of lawnmower blennies. They starved to death because of the tangs. I now have a starry blenny who looks similar (I like the looks better than a lawnmower) but he eats the algae pellets I feed (both lawnmowers did not) and so he is fat and happy. I would recommend a starry and not a lawnmower. They are reef safe. Emerald crabs are great for the bubble but they also starve if there is no other algae to eat.

 

[Kayanarka]

Making a quick record of my fish stock.

450xl:
2 Clowns
1 Powder Tang
1 Blue Tang
1 Bi Color Angel
1 Hawk Fish
2 Redhead Goby
1 Diamond Goby sand shifter
1 pink Anthias
1 Yellow Head Goby
1 Cardinal
1 Royal Gramma (missing)
1 Green Wrasse (missing)
Non Fish:
1 Pistol Shrimp
1 Fire Shrimp
1 Cleaner Shrimp (was 2 one MIA)
2 Anemone Crabs
1 Emerald Crab
1 Horse Shoe Crab
1 PomPom Crab
Numerous snails and hermit crabs

250xl:
1 Clown Tang
2 Clown Fish
1 Blue Wrasse
2 Dart Fish
1 Cardinal

 

[Kayanarka]

I have had a couple of lawnmower blennies. They starved to death because of the tangs. I now have a starry blenny who looks similar (I like the looks better than a lawnmower) but he eats the algae pellets I feed (both lawnmowers did not) and so he is fat and happy. I would recommend a starry and not a lawnmower. They are reef safe. Emerald crabs are great for the bubble but they also starve if there is no other algae to eat.

Wow that starry blenny is a beautiful Fish. I posted my fish stock, do you think it would fit?

 

[tritonpower]

Wow that starry blenny is a beautiful Fish. I posted my fish stock, do you think it would fit?

For a while, yes. Eventually the powder blue and blue tang will get too big for your tank.

 

[Kayanarka]

For a while, yes. Eventually the powder blue and blue tang will get too big for your tank.

Oh I meant do you think I could add a starry blenny to that fish load.

How long will it take the tangs to out grow the tank? I have had them since the start of my tank and they have not grown a millimeter.

 

[tritonpower]

Oh I meant do you think I could add a starry blenny to that fish load.

How long will it take the tangs to out grow the tank? I have had them since the start of my tank and they have not grown a millimeter.

The blenny will likely be fine. My tomini tang picks on him occasionally but nothing major. The blenny has a great personality. Like a male model!
Not sure how long it will take your tangs to get big. Don't worry about it until they do.

 

[i cant think]

Beautiful tank so far!!

 

[Kayanarka]

Beautiful tank so far!!

Thank you, let's see if I can upload this video. Could use an ID and suggestions on what to do about the green algae looking stuff.