The Frugal Forty

[NY_Caveman]

Is that a Kessil? AI? I really like circle of diffusion and how you mounted it on the floor. Seriously, though, it is looking great.

 

[DuPageReef?]

Time for an update. I noticed one of the clowns had some white stringy poop a few days ago, so I bought some metroplex and focus which arrived today. I mixed that up with mysis and will be feeding them that for the next few days.

Other than that, the doors on the cabinet are done, so now I'm just waiting on lights to hopefully go on sale, and keep adding livestock in early December.

 

[DuPageReef?]

Time for an update. It was a hard decision, but I decided to upgrade my lighting. 2 ai primes (which unfortunately weren't on sale anywhere) arrived today and are installed.

I got an osmolator on black friday, and will install that tomorrow. I've moved the inverts from qt to the dt, and went to my lfs today and picked up a chalk bass that's now in the qt, some free chaeto for the refugium, and a small favia frag. First coral I've ever bought, hopefully I can keep it alive.

 

[DuPageReef?]

So unfortunately during the ramp up and down times, one of the primes is the correct color, but the other one for some reason turns the red channel all the way up, causing half the tank to be incredibly purple. I'm contacting BRS, does anyone have any experience with this? Could it just be I programmed it weird, or an issue with the fixture?

 

[NY_Caveman]

So unfortunately during the ramp up and down times, one of the primes is the correct color, but the other one for some reason turns the red channel all the way up, causing half the tank to be incredibly purple. I'm contacting BRS, does anyone have any experience with this? Could it just be I programmed it weird, or an issue with the fixture?

Never heard of that specifically.

 

[DuPageReef?]

Still waiting on direction from BRS on what I should do about the light, I've tried reprogramming multiple times with no change, I'm pretty confident it's an issue with the fixture.

I've also started to get some algae, and what I'm assuming are diatoms. Was hoping going with essentially no light for a few months I skipped the ugly phase, but looks like I've got it now. Nitrate is between 5 and 10, any opinion on scrubbing the rock and doing more water changes, or just let it do it's thing for a few days?

 

[DuPageReef?]

So while I understand it's still really early and there could be worse coming or other factors at play, I'm definitely sold on the refugium. The tank looked horrible, diatoms covered every surface, so Friday I brushed off all the rock, did a water change, siphoned the sand so the tank looked ok. I was expecting more uglyness, but almost a week later, it looks perfect. No algea, and almost no nitrate (it was 10ppm before I put lights on).

The favia frag had lost color, but it's all back now and looking good. I was able to feed it on Monday which was oddly satisfying as well. Assuming the tank keeps looking good and my testing is still good, my LFS has their one year anniversary sale this Saturday and Sunday, so I'm planning on getting a few more corals.

Also, I finally got everything with the light straight, AI is sending a replacement prime which should get here tomorrow and I'll send the faulty one back.

 

[DuPageReef?]

This weekend my lfs had his one year anniversary sale, I stopped in and got 3 frags. Candy cane, an acan, and blasto (I think. Feel free to tell me if I'm wrong)

I can't get a good pick of the acan, it's in the back and phone doesn't want to focus on it. Everything seems good and healthy, but all coral is on the sand. Today a pair of bone cutters arrived from BRS, I'm planning on cutting the frag plug stems off and gluing to the rock in the next day or two. I'm thinking these locations, let me know what you think, I've never had or placed coral so honest opinions would be great.

 

[NY_Caveman]

Looks about right to me, not knowing your flow of course.

 

[DuPageReef?]

Looks about right to me, not knowing your flow of course.

Flow is two nano koralias, one 425gph on left, right is 565gph. At this point they both run all the time, no wavemakers or anything.

I've placed three of the four frags, just the acan is still in the sand. I also took some chaeto out of the fuge, it felt like I took out a ton, but there's still a lot left, it really grew like crazy. I also got the osmolator hooked up yesterday which has already been awesome.

 

[DuPageReef?]

I haven't posted in quite a while, but everything is going really well. I've put a chalk bass and tailspot blenny through QT and they've joined the clowns in the display. I've also added a few more corals, about one or two a month.

Going skimmerless has seemed to work out so far, I haven't gotten a nitrate reading in months of testing. I've lowered the amount of time the fuge light is on and upped my feeding, slowly to not cause any spikes. My only other issue is high alk, sitting around 11.3, and it won't drop. All other parameters are fine and I'm not dosing anything. I have a fair amount of lps, and one birdsnest frag, all of which are growing so it should be dropping some. My only conclusion is my top off water is adding it, I'm using treated tap, not rodi. I've seen no other issues, so I'm not in a major hurry to fix that just so I can dose it instead. Maybe someone with more experience has a different opinion?

So far, keeping as simple as possible with a $25 Amazon grow bulb over a giant hunk of chaeto and bi-monthly 15% water changes has been working out pretty well.

 

[DuPageReef?]

I've also been considering dosing some amino's, either Red Sea or the Bright well amino's. Color could be better, some of the polyps, especially candy cane, are a little contracted. I'm assuming this is just the high alk with zero nitrate.

At this point I've decided to hold off on any of that, I've read reviews that have said those products have caused cyano and other bad algae outbreaks, which I've avoided so far. My feeling is I'd rather have it all alive, growing and looking ok, than possibly cause much greater issues trying to chase very slight improvements. Anyone with more experience have any thoughts?