Ruby

[RubyU235]

Hi all, I recently set up a new 140g tank!

Started build on 17 Jun.

Equipment;

120g Innovative Marine display tank 6ft long, 15 inches wide, 20 inches deep, 20g in sump. 140g total volume. Reef octopus 100, Sicce 5.0.

Durso setup with two return lines draining into fine filter.

Startup;

Water generated from 4 stage RO/DI with new filters (TDS was still 2-3 for some reason, just installed a water softener and need to generate new water to see if this helps, water had a hardness of 17 and comes from Edward’s aquifer in San Antonio) reef crystals used for mix.

recycled (used/previously rinsed/dried) Fiji pink sand

Started bacterial colony with 1 liter of material from another saltwater tank I had and 40 lbs of clean live rock along with water from my other tanks water change waste

Added 2 liters of new sea chem matrix

Cycling

Tank cycled quickly (I think), ammonia 0.25 nitrite 0, nitrate 0 (API test kits, can’t afford the Red Sea or salifert right now)

Stock fish: 2 clowns 1-2 inches, yellow watchman goby, cleaner wrasse, chocolate tang, blue hippo tang (all added incrementally, not all at once) everything is healthy, eating and respirating normally with no signs of stress.

Stock coral: 4 micromussa polyps, 3inX4in GSP mat, firework clove polyp colonies, 3 heads of green hammer coral, small neon green cabbage leather frag, Leptastrea frag, Favites frag, platygyra frag, 3 Ricordeas, and some other blue mushrooms, several colonies of various zoas, and some pulsing Xenia.

No signs of stress in any of the corals… except… the zoas and the GSP have been pretty ticked off, I think because algae keeps growing on them.

Also have a small ball of chaeto

lighting: 3, AI Prime HD on a modified sac by program 4 hour ramp up and ramp down time. Peak output between 30-50%, whites below %30. Reds and greens very low.

Feeding; 3 times a day, pinch of ocean nutrition prime (red and green) flakes, and some frozen meaty food. Once a day, AB+, once a week reef roids.

Dosing: iodine once a week. Fluconazol treatment a week ago to kill some very light, residual hair algae on some of the rocks I transplanted (I feared I had the start of some bryopsis and didn’t want it to proliferate).

I don’t dose 2 part or trace, elements are replenished with water changes, currently replacing 10-20 gallons a week along with top offs of 1-2 gallons a week.

 

[vetteguy53081]

Tank looks good
As for your ammonia-nitrate-oh readings, I would get a second opinion taking a water sample to a trusted LFS that does Not use API test kits and see what readings they come up with and for comparison as api notorious for false readings hence the Low price for a master test kit

 

[RubyU235]

Tank is coming along nicely.

A couple of set backs along the way.

Had a long tentacle nem, got rid of it. The nem came with a juvenile ocellaris clown that was hosting it. The nearest I can tell, the nem ate the clown (it was tiny, less than an inch). Not having good luck with nems, this is the third one and I'm over it.

My oldest clown fish disappeared. I assume it passed away and was consumed by bristle worms.

I have since found a large population of bristle worms, I started to remove them but put them back to leave them as clean up crew.

I added 2 small bags of Chemipure blue.

July tank parameters

I 3d printed a pod hotel and added a bottle of tig pods to the sump last week. I just looked and they are doing well in the sump, establishing themselves.

My chaeto is dark green, it does not tumble. I throw a power head on it ever day or so. My sump only has two changes with one weir bubble trap. I want to get a bigger sump to better separate the equipment from the chaeto from the pump etc. For now I am ok with the set up. The pods don't seem to be suffering the wrath of the skimmer intake.

I am constantly having to manipulate the reef octo 100; My solution has been to put a section of water purifier line with a gang valve in the air gap chamber to fine tune the bubbles, otherwise it just goes bonkers at the lowest setting. Fluctuations in the water level have a role in the amount of fiddling that must be done and how much it outputs. Need an ATO, almost traded some frags for a neptune ATK yesterday but the guy flaked, se la vie.

I created a frag rack out of diffuser material for some of my specimens, I later realized the value of snails having access to my frags to make snacks of any nuisance algae that might pop up.

Current tank inhabitants:

Chocolate tang

Cleaner Wrasse

Blue Hippo Tang

Diamond Watchman Goby
[pic]
Pulsing Xenia

Green tipped frog spawn with 3 heads

Tubbs blue zoa colony

Purple People Eater Zoa colony

Unknown Zoa colony (Green mouth, blue/grey center, yellow lashes)

WWC Neon Cabbage Leather

UC Fascination Favites

WWC Lavender Platygyra

Blue marine mushroom colony (has some palythoas attached, unknown)
Neon Acro
Poppin Lime Ricordea Mushroom

GSP Colony/mat encrusting on a tank decoration.

Radioactive dragon eye zoa colony
Eagle eye zoa colony
WWC Spooky Leptastrea
Jason Fox Stargazer zoa colony
Rainbow troll zoa colony
Volcanic Aussie Lord (micromussa)
Teal rimmed Acan (micromussa)

New tank inhabitants:

Peach tipped braching octospawn
Lawnmower blenny
10 margarita snails
5 Hermits

Planned additions:

10+ more snails
5+ more hermits

Planned Aquascape
More live rock

25g water change today

 

[RubyU235]

A strange thing happened today. I topped off some water this morning and added some iodine. No swings, checked parameters last night and everything was still within my previous ranges. 25g Water change was on Sunday.

My frag disc that had about 6-10 blue discosoma mushrooms… (Had for 9 months.

melted, all of them… I am so confused.

ok maybe not all of them except the larger ones. I initially threw the disk in the trash not wanting deal with it. I just took out to the garage and shook it vigorously in RO water then placed it under one of my rocks.

Also my toadstool leather, which was situated on the rack next to the disk, was completely retracted. Starting to extend its polyps now that I removed the disk from its vicinity.

Only thing I can think is a lighting change… I had been running a modified saxby profile

I mimicked the radion actinic setting recommendation from BRS mixed with a saxby type profile to try to get better coloration.

Nothing else in the tank is looking off… all other corallimorphs, softies, and LPS are open and sunning.

Update: I went to check the bucket I rinsed the disk in and saw a small bit of mushroom I thought might be able to be saved… turns out no… it was actively melting

So I thought better about putting the disk back in the tank. I went to check it and take pictures… the remaining mushrooms were still melting.

This is the stalk from the largest mushroom… I think I’m seeing messenterial filaments here.

I cracked the disk up after seeing this and removed the palys that had come in on the disk onto a cone plug and put it with my new zoa garden arrangement. Threw the rest of the disk away.

 

[RubyU235]

Quite a lot has progressed since I had the great NoPoX meltdown of 2022. Surprisingly I only lost the colony of blue mushrooms…

I added an Apex FMS that I bought on Craigslist for $100!

I got my RODI station just right, built a bucket height stand for the brute trashcan, plumbed a 2inch pvc pipe through it at the bottom with a gate valve and 90 elbow pointing down, and sealed it with flex paste on the outside and it is water tight… can fill my 5G containers in under a minute.

I was running a really intense lighting schedule and noticed one of my zoa colonies wasn’t too happy about it so I dialed it back…

before

after

Added alot of livestock! Here’s my current stockage list with pics
Softies

Tubbs blue zoa

JF star gazer zoa

WWC Metallic Red Zoa

WWC Fortune Cookie Zoa
(colony is melting back so in the shadows for now)
Rainbow Troll Zoa
Everlasting Gobstopper Zoa
Purple People Eater Zoa
Radioactive Dragon Eye Zoa
Eagle Eye Zoa
Firework clove polyp

WWC Nirvana Zoa

WWC Capt America Palythoas
Green rhodactis mushroom colony

Poppin Lime Ricordea Mushroom

WWC Neon Cabbage Leather

Toadstool leather

LPS

UC Fascination Favites

WWC Bullion Favites (I think, came as a mystery frag.)

WWC Spooky Leptastrea

WWC Lavender Platygyra

Volcanic Aussie lord

Mystery Aussie Lord from WWC

Local shop acquired Aussie Lord (Teal rim I think)

Rhubarb Pie Bowerbanki

EUPHYLIA

Green Frogspawn (had two heads, now is growning somewhere between 8 and 10)

Peach Tipped Octospawn

Green tipped octospawn

Splatter Hammer
Indo Gold Hammer

Duncan

Pachysepta

SPS

Green Goblin Acropora

JF Burning Banana Stylocoeniella

WWC Aussie Golden Eye Chalice

WWC Tangerine Psammocora

Hollywood Stunner Chalice

ANEMONE

RBTA (Was Massive, split.)

Corals I’ve lost so far in my reef keeping journey… RIP

WWC Midnight Daisy Polyps

WWC Green Goblin Stylophora

Blue mushroom colony



FISH

Purple tang (they are a rescue from an owner who surrendered them to me for rehab)

Blue hippo tang

Chocolate tang

Sail fin tang

Ocellaris x 4 (2 are in the sump, they were rescues.)

Smiths pink damsel x 2

Lawnmower blenny

Yellow watchman goby

Cleaner wrasse (too busy to be photographed)

Cleaner shrimp x 2

Cleanup crew

Tiger pistol shrimp
Pin cushion urchin
Astrea snails
Bumblebee snails
Turbo snails
Cerith snails

Fish I’ve lost so far in my reef keeping journey:

Red dragonette (they jumped out over night)