Tony's 72g Mixed Reef Build

[TonysReef]

Bunch of updates:

Got a pair of Banggai Cardinals. So far they seem smart or lucky enough to avoid the carpets. Been in the tank since Friday. Still quite shy and reluctant eaters, but it's nice to have some fish life while I try to source the clowns I want.

Got a great acropora on divers den the other day, replaced the one I had on the top structure.

Right side of the tank. Got a new clam, it's actually gorgeous, I need to take a top down shot in my next post:

Top Right rock. Setosa is growing against the back wall already.:

Left side/Goni Garden:

Goni wall rock:

Top Left Rock:

Some new frags in the sand, waiting on glue to place them better. I ran out the other day. I hate reef glue more than anything, btw.

Side view from right:

Rightmost Goni closeup:

Upgraded my frag Nuvo 10 to a Nuvo 20:

And finally, a FTS:

Been broadcast feeding Marine Snow twice a day, dosing All For Reef. Everything seems pretty happy and is growing. Other than the splotchy carpet which doesn't seem super happy lately. But with 8 other happy carpets I don't think it's the tank.

Nothing new on the horizon, hoping to find these types of orange saddlebacks:

That's it for now. Hello to any new followers from Reef Tank 365. Loving my shiny new badge.

 

[Fudsey]

Looking good Tony ! !

 

[TonysReef]

Few new pieces from this weekend.

Got a new Stoly

Found a bucket list Glitter Goni that I love for a great price:

Close up of one of the gonis:

Left side of the tank, rearranged the gonis a bit and placed a few around the tank to make space. Surprisingly the different ones occasionally sting each other or try to eat each other's tentacles, so it's hard to place them too closely depending on the polyp shape/length. Little jerks:

Middle of the tank:

Right side of the tank, glitter goni behind the clams:

Full tank shot:

 

[TonysReef]

Can't believe it's been two months since I did an update. Had some things die off, glitter goni didn't last a week, started to dissolve. Then I had some brown jelly take a couple of other gonis and other LPS/leptos. Tank seems to have stabilized though. I really regret not handling the flatworms early on. Now there are so many I'm afraid to do anything about it and nuke my tank.

Last weekend I got tired of not having fish and picked up a lot of them. Figured the carpets would claim a few, but so far everyone is happy and healthy and wary of the carpets. Fingers crossed it remains that way.

New fish:

green chromis
pink damsel
purple tang
powder blue tang (my favourite fish in the world, should have gotten a smaller one though)
bimaculatus anthias (quartet)
mandarin (hoping he takes to frozen or the flatworms, time will tell)

I also tried three other saddlebacks, but my clownfish got really territorial with them and I had to get rid of them as they were cowering in the top corners of the tank.

Anyway, lots of pics:

SPS rock:

Top left. May relocate king pow monti. Doesn't seem happy there.

BTA's are thriving, elegance seems unhappy on occasion though. And I need to move the goni to the right of it as they don't like each other. Also got a red xenia and put some of my fuge xenia in the main tank.

Top right. Setosa is doing awesome and I love it.

Male bimaculatus, chromis, and cardinal.

Orange Saddleback and tons of flatworms in sand.

purple tang.

Anthias and space invaders:

Pink damsel and anthias cave on the back right.

Goni garden:

Sympodium is successfully growing on the first clam:

Right side of the tank:

Left side of the tank:

Full tank shot. Feeding tanks nori on a reusable zip tie. Best solution I've found.

Hope everyone's tanks are well and happy new year!

 

[Gene Ashton]

Saw this little guy this morning popping out of a rock. I would imagine aptasia, but would like confirmation before I attack...

Decided it probably was and even if not it definitely wasn't a carpet anemone or designer BTA, so it had to die. Used a heavy kalk mix and a syringe I just picked up. It got into the rock quickly, which also seemed to have an outlet, but hopefully I got the job done. Will keep an eye on the space.

Also working on getting some real camera shots of the fish today.

Where did you get the cool syringe with that tip?

 

[KevinC]

Nice tank! Man, I have a carpet in my tank and my storm clownfish pair just stays away from it. I suppose the sting from the carpet is too strong? It gave me quite a sting when I accidentally touched it before. Any tips to make the clownfish host the carpet?

 

[TonysReef]

Been a while since I updated again. Here we go...

Stupid impulse purchase of the week:

I've always wanted a little lionfish and couldn't resist. He's still not eating, so hopefully he makes it. And while we're on the topic of impulse purchases, I realized the powder blue was too big for my tank and gave it away last month. He's in a great new home though.

Mandarin still seems fat and happy, although I'm not actually sure what he's eating. I do have far fewer flatworms, but I can't say with any confidence he's the reason:

Got a Starcki damsel that I love:

And a purple psuedochromis:

Got an awesome coco worm for $50:

Love this clam from the top:

BTA's are growing:

Porcelain crab in the splotchy carpet:

Full tank shot:

Left Side:

Left:

Middle:

Right:

Right Side:

 

[dbl]

Great update...things are looking great.

 

[TonysReef]

Suppose I'm overdue for a quarantine update.


My setosa, which I love got attacked by a hitchhiker limpet, which I never realized would do much damage. But you can see what it did in the back right of the coral before I caught it one morning.

Here it is relocated to the fuge. It was hard as hell to pull off the coral.

And about a week later here is the setosa before the lights came on one morning just disintegrating. This one really ticked me off, that coral had grown a lot and I loved the colour. Once I saw this I pulled it out completely before waiting for the lights to come on or to see if maybe it could be saved as a frag. I was just upset and figured it was a gonner.

Got a nudi to take care of my snails, which are all gone now. I am going to buy a sponge for it to eat soon and love the colour.

Clam top down. Got a reef rax clam jammer for my larger one to stop it from always being on it's side. So far so great.

Stupid impulse purchase:

It now lives in the sump after it was destroying my corals. I was hoping it wouldn't be much of a nipper as it's a dream fish, and I was willing to sacrifice some corals to have one. But it was demolishing my trachy and the final straw was my looney toons stylo.

Also went to war with the tank two days ago to get my purple tang out because it kept picking on my trachy, which I think it learned from the emperor angel. I realized I like the coral more than the fish, so at the moment this one lives in the filter. I feel kinda bad because the fish and my saddleback seemed to be friends.

Goni/trachy garden

Right side of the tank

Middle. Pectinias have grown a lot. The upper stylo got picked on by the emperor a lot, but should recover. It has been growing otherwise.

Right side top back, clove polyps are coming back. I lost most of them when I treated for bryopsis which was growing amongst the clove patch.

Left top back, tubbs stilleta isn't doing great. And the orange monti took a turn for the worst, but seems to be holding on and getting a little better. Definitely done with new SPS in this tank though.

Gonis just before LPS feed time.

Rainbow Trachy

Top down

Full tank shot after LPS target feeding, which I try to do once or twice a week

Closeup of red carpet and crab/shrimp.

Full tank top down shot

Full tank shot:

 

[Mr_Knightley]

Woah, your aquarium is stunning! This is what I plan to do with my tank, except instead of carpets, I'll be doing long tentacles.
Very inspiring tank man, keep up the good work! Good day and God bless you!

 

[MrNYCeGuy]

His tank looks even better in person! It makes any reef keeper jealous. Check out the growth of sympodium on the clam shells...really awesome touch. You’ve got to post about your mandarin...that thing is one of the biggest I’ve seen in the hobby!

 

[New Jersey REEF]

Nice update @TonyNYC !
I had to go and do some research on limpet hitchhikers, thank you! Keep it up!

 

[TonysReef]

Realized that images don't really tell the whole story, so I made a little video to give everyone a real sense of the tank.

 

[DeniseAndy]

Crazy beautiful nems. After they ate so many of my fish (including a magnificent foxface), I gave them their own tank. They have a few corals and btas, but just saddlebacks for them. I love the colors, but cannot break the budget on those babies. Yours are amazing!

 

[Bpp124987]

One of the more kooky dooks tanks I’ve ever seen. Stunning.
Almost no rock now! Gorgeous.

did you have any nem losses? Carpets aren’t trivial to keep right? losses of other inhabitants?
Could you share more about the water Parms, equipment, feeding and testing and dosing regimes?

 

[TonysReef]

did you have any nem losses? Carpets aren’t trivial to keep right? losses of other inhabitants?
Could you share more about the water Parms, equipment, feeding and testing and dosing regimes?

I had one carpet loss a while back. It wasn't in the best shape when I got it and eventually it just died. But I have 8 in the tank at the moment that have been in great shape for the better part of 6 months, so I'm confident that one death wasn't my fault.

Having said that, I do think that there are too many carpets in the tank and there is likely some chemical conflict between them. Lately mine shrink/close up quite often and some are far smaller than they used to be. So I may downsize. I actually just pulled out the splotchy carpet and have it holding in the refugium until I can sell it to start.

I have lost other fish to the carpets for sure. I didn't realize it until after the fact, but when I attacked my tank to pull out the purple tang the other day I lost a sunburst anthias and a female bimaculatus. They just disappeared. Fortunately I've been lucky and my fish seem to be pretty good at avoiding the carpets left to their own devices. I do turn all of my circulation pumps off at night though to make life easier for them.

Solid question about dosing and feeding and testing. I've been slacking posting about that stuff.

I'm terrible at testing and realistically only do it about once every two months. I know, shame on me. Measurements as of today:

Nitrate: 2
Calcium: 420
Alk: 7.3
Magnesium: 1250

Other than my Alk being low, I'm happy with all of that. I ordered some Red Sea alkalinity to dose going forward. Otherwise here is my tank "stuff":

I also use kalkwasser in my ATO, although I slacked on adding it for a while. I feed two or three times a day with Rod's, often soaked in reef snow for the corals, even though the rods food is meant to have that stuff already. Zootinic single pump once a day. Try to spot feed my LPS with Reef Chili twice a week. Acropower maybe 15ml two or three times a week. All for reef 25ml every couple of days. A- and K+ maybe 10ml once a week. Maybe once a week a decent amount of PhytoChrom broadcast. Sporadically I'll run carbon in a bag in the filter. Poly Filter gets thrown in on occasion also.

Every couple of months I also try to do a 25% water change, which I'm making water for now:

Filtration is fairly straightforward. Clarisea is pretty amazing and the rolls last me about 10 weeks. Also no complaints about my red sea skimmer.

Here is the full sump with a middle refugium compartment and two bio blocks on the left. I use it to throw stuff from the main tank when necessary. So at the moment some sympodium and xenia growing. Also a purple tang, emperor angel, and the splotchy carpet until I can find them homes.

Chaeto grows pretty quickly so I keep it weighed down with egg crate in between harvesting (throwing away).

 

[TonysReef]

Realized it's been a while. Lots of changes. Just a few pics for now though.

FTS

Left

Middle

Right

Hope everyone is enjoying their tanks in quarantine.

 

[New&no clue]

Holy cow, just read through this hole thread... productive day at the office I'd say. There were lots of twist and turns. I can't believe all those pistol shrimps. Your tank looks great.

 

[chizerbunoi]

How many of the 8 carpets do you still have? I can only see 3 from the pics.

 

[revhtree]

This is an awesome reef! It's also our Reef Of The Day today! More updates please!