So I got more fish!

[Captain Quint]

Healthy looking livestock.

 

[Philipgonzales3]

Healthy looking fish. Great pics too. What are you using for a camera?

Samsung Note 8. I planned on getting a DSLR but being a federal contractor, I've decided to wait until all this shutdown stuff blows over. I've been happily surprised at how good some of the picture I can get. Lots of them are blurry, but I just spend a few minutes to try and get a good one.

 

[Philipgonzales3]

How's the damsel doing with the Melanurus?

Everyone seems to be minding their own business and swimming in their own lane. The Damsel will kind of dart at pretty much everything now and then. I think it has little fish syndrome, but I think everyone will be fine.



My Goby is also getting more comfortable wandering around the whole tank. He even is trying his hand at converting over to a rock sifting Goby.

 

[Hemmdog]

Everyone seems to be minding their own business and swimming in their own lane. The Damsel will kind of dart at pretty much everything now and then. I think it has little fish syndrome, but I think everyone will be fine.



My Goby is also getting more comfortable wandering around the whole tank. He even is trying his hand at converting over to a rock sifting Goby.

It looks great man! Happy fish!

 

[Fudsey]

That is the most calm Melanurus I have seen. Mine swims around crazy circling my nori feeder

 

[Philipgonzales3]

That is the most calm Melanurus I have seen. Mine swims around crazy circling my nori feeder

He'll dart around a bit sometimes but is usually pretty calm.

Not really related but I think this is a bit unusual. My cat grooms my dog... lol.

 

[Sailingeric]

Thank you! I sure will.

Everyone showed up for roll call today and a quick photo session. My puffer puffed up for a minute, but then puffed back down. To me everyone looks happy and healthy.

Nice looking puffer. I have had mine for about 9 months, they are fun to watch and always looks a little confused or deep in thought. I have only seen mine puff once not long after got it. The funny thing mine does is at night when it sleeps it wedges itself in the corner pointing straight up and is usually dead the world.

 

[Philipgonzales3]

Mine colors down and naps on the left side of my tank. Him and the clownfish are the only ones I can see with the lights off.

 

[Philipgonzales3]

I tested with my new reagents and color card. Honestly compared to the color card it looks closer to .25, but I believe this to be a 0 reading of ammonia. To test, I mixed half a gallon of RODI with 1/4 cup of salt mix. To me there is no perceivable difference between the two test tubes. My ammonia badge also still shows no presence of ammonia.

 

[Philipgonzales3]

So my only concern is that my wrasse came out of the sand at 8AM and went back in at 5PM. Guess he works an 8 to 5 with no overtime. I feed at either 6AM or 6PM most days. Usually 6PM is better.

Hopefully he adjust his schedule. I fed today around 9 AM to make sure he ate. The rest of the fish are happy to oblige to whatever schedule I run the lights.

This is him in the sand.

 

[Fudsey]

They will adapt to your light schedule. Mine took a couple days but now is up until 9:15pm. Not sure what time he gets up as when I leave for work the tank is dark and on weekends I sleep in

 

[Philipgonzales3]

Nice looking puffer. I have had mine for about 9 months, they are fun to watch and always looks a little confused or deep in thought. I have only seen mine puff once not long after got it. The funny thing mine does is at night when it sleeps it wedges itself in the corner pointing straight up and is usually dead the world.

Do you feed yours anything hard to wear down it's teeth down? I've read with rock in the tank it might wear it down on its own. I have seen it pick at the rocks but not sure how often it is doing this. I saw it picking at the rocks the first day or two, but since then it has been aggressively going after the frozen food I feed so I suspect it may not be picking at the rocks as much.

I think eventually I will get some half shell clams. I think that's what they are called. Don't want to start yet as I want to ensure I don't have an ammonia spike and I don't want to be fishing out anything from the tank while everyone is settling in to their routine.

 

[Sailingeric]

Do you feed yours anything hard to wear down it's teeth down? I've read with rock in the tank it might wear it down on its own. I have seen it pick at the rocks but not sure how often it is doing this. I saw it picking at the rocks the first day or two, but since then it has been aggressively going after the frozen food I feed so I suspect it may not be picking at the rocks as much.

I think eventually I will get some half shell clams. I think that's what they are called. Don't want to start yet as I want to ensure I don't have an ammonia spike and I don't want to be fishing out anything from the tank while everyone is settling in to their routine.

Mine the teeth are visible but I don't think it has gotten any bigger. I do throw a mussel or clam and it will nibble from it (as do most of my fish). I have put in several small crabs and they often disappear and I suspect it is snacking on them.

 

[Why-Me]

Try this?
https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/so-i-ordered-a-valentini-puffer.365302/#post-4662623

http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=2510827

 

[Philipgonzales3]

Try this?
https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/so-i-ordered-a-valentini-puffer.365302/#post-4662623

http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=2510827

Ok, I'll give that a try. Going to see if I can find it local and if not then online. I'd rather use stuff packaged for fish even though that may not be necessary. I've also seen that you can hand feed them shrimp with the shell on it.

 

[Philipgonzales3]

@Dom
Tomorrow will be 7 days and no ammonia spike yet . My thinking is if I can go 1 week then I am good (as far as ammonia spike relating to overloading the BB). Unless somehow they figure out how to produce more ammonia in week 2.

 

[Philipgonzales3]

So no real updates as far as the livestock goes. The only thing different I have noticed is the smaller clownfish likes to shake/flash/boogie right at the sand level and uncover shells. Although I guess it's possible he could be trying to scratch an itch related to parasites, I don't think this is the case. I believe he knows he is digging up the shells by moving the lighter sand.

The goby cleans my sand better than I do! Which is great, he's doing his job.

I noticed the puffer only eats white foods. It will eat LRS reef frenzy Nano and mysis shrimp but it will not eat pellets, brine shrimp, or V20 Fish & reef #1. The pellets are brown and the brine shrimp are brown and the V20 is more reddish.

Will be going to the LFS tomorrow or Monday so I can start adding clams/muscles on the half shell to the rotation. Do you think the puffer will be the only one to eat this or will the whole tank eat clams? May try to hand feed a frozen shrimp still in the shell.

Now I did do a "thing" today. So the biggest hassle so far, outside of ATO (I top off twice daily, pending purchasing a cabinet to install an ATO reservoir in) has been turning on my lights on and off every morning for both my SW tank and my son's FW tank. I leave for work near 6 AM and return near 5:30 PM daily. This meant I had to either feed at 6AM or 5:30PM and turn the lights off near 6 or 6:30 PM to not have a crazy long photo period. Another thing that was a hassle is cutting off the return pump during feeding. I started just leaving the return pump on to avoid the hassle of crouching under the tank and yanking out the plug. I dreamed of getting a new return pump with a feed mode. While I'm still likely going to upgrade the return pump and lights on my SW tank soon, I will not be doing so on my son's FW tank. Decided to kill 2 birds with one stone.

Smart plugs! ~10 each on Amazon BTW
(I do plan on moving the power strip to another cabinet that is not directly above water. It doesn't have enough slack to go anywhere but still doesn't seem like a good idea the way I currently have it.)



I can turn on or off any device from the app or also by voice by tying into either Amazon Echo or Google Assistant. Haven't tried the voice part yet.



I can also schedule my lights or devices to turn on or off on a schedule. You can actually set to actual sunrise and sunset times and even add an offset. This will allow me to turn on the lights after I leave, via a schedule and as a result be able to view the tank longer in the PM. I used static values now to ensure everything works as intended.


I think I'll order another for my skimmer. There were other brands of smart plugs that measured power consumption. This is one feature I wish this particular plug had but no biggie. Maybe it's better not to know. I could always plug another plug that measures consumption (or use a kilowatt meter) before the power strip.

 

[Why-Me]

That's a great route to go at this point.
Almost went that route as well but I ended up getting a used Apex with some decent add ons for under $300 bucks from a local reefer. Look around and join a local reefing community, go to the frag swaps and meetings. People give up on this hobby daily it seems and they are looking to unload good equipment at decent prices just to be rid of it, sometimes it's barely to lightly used.
I also got a used BRS 6 stage 150 gallon per day deluxe RODI system for under $200
The marketplace here on R2R is full of great equipment as well.
BUT it seems:
A - Here we all know what these items cost and are rightfully trying to get as much as possible back on our return.

B - Joining your local reefing community you also get to inspect these items personally and then decide if it's worth your money.

C - With your local reefing community you will meet other as or more dedicated than you are at this hobby which is great for connections for things like, trading, selling, helping, visual learning etc.

 

[Philipgonzales3]

That's a great route to go at this point.
Almost went that route as well but I ended up getting a used Apex with some decent add ons for under $300 bucks from a local reefer. Look around and join a local reefing community, go to the frag swaps and meetings. People give up on this hobby daily it seems and they are looking to unload good equipment at decent prices just to be rid of it, sometimes it's barely to lightly used.
I also got a used BRS 6 stage 150 gallon per day deluxe RODI system for under $200
The marketplace here on R2R is full of great equipment as well.
BUT it seems:
A - Here we all know what these items cost and are rightfully trying to get as much as possible back on our return.

B - Joining your local reefing community you also get to inspect these items personally and then decide if it's worth your money.

C - With your local reefing community you will meet other as or more dedicated than you are at this hobby which is great for connections for things like, trading, selling, helping, visual learning etc.

Just tested linking to my Google Assistant. Man this is sweet. I can say "turn on my SW light" (it is recommended not to use the word light in the device name since "light" is a control in Google Assistant, but it still worked anyway lol). I can also say turn off everything in the living room etc. The good thing is I can use this for other applications at home as well. I am probably going to set one on the outlet we use the iron on. You can set it to automatically turn off after X minutes. I was tempted to buy an upgraded light just for the timer or smart capabilities, but having two tanks this makes more sense right now. I will likely still upgrade my SW light soon but this buys me some time to research and not rush it.

 

[Why-Me]

Agreed. no need to grab a light for a while, research what you want/need and be happy in the end.