Turtle's Miniature Menagerie

SashimiTurtle

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The Ocean

The Ocean has its silent caves,
Deep, quiet, and alone;
Though there be fury on the waves,
Beneath them there is none.

The awful spirits of the deep
Hold their communion there;
And there are those for whom we weep,
The young, the bright, the fair.

Calmly the wearied seamen rest
Beneath their own blue sea.
The ocean solitudes are blest,
For there is purity.

The earth has guilt, the earth has care,
Unquiet are its graves;
But peaceful sleep is ever there,
Beneath the dark blue waves.

Nathaniel Hawthorne
 
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SashimiTurtle

SashimiTurtle

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Tank
Innovative Marine Abyss 20 gallon peninsula drop off.
Tank: 6mm glass 15"×20"×17"
Pedestal: aluminum frame 15"×20"×4"

Stand
Custom refurbished plywood cabinet. Dimentions 20"x24"x36"

Equipment
Return pump: Innovative Marine Mighty Jet desktop
Flow: 2x Innovative Marine Wavelink desktop
Heater: Cobalt Neotherm 75W
Filtration: inTank media basket with filter floss, 4x Brightwell 1.5" Xport Bioblocks, MicroBacter7
Light: Nanobox Duo
 
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SashimiTurtle

SashimiTurtle

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Media album dedicated to this tank. Here

First FTS 2-2-19

20190202_190155.jpg


4-29-19

20190429_160219.jpg


9-16-19

20190916_161341.jpg
 
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SashimiTurtle

SashimiTurtle

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Let me tell you a little bit about ourselves. For all our life we've been fascinated with the ocean, we've had fish tanks since we were a child and we've been reefing for two years now. Since we can remember, morays have been one of, probably our favorite species of sea creature.

Turtle recently pulled the trigger on a Golden Dwarf Moray, hence the title of my build.(he buys all the expensive stuff) I was lacking a bit of morale with the hobby, so he figured this would pick me up. We are currently awaiting delivery of an Innovative Marine Abyss 20 gallon peninsula drop off tank. Of course the eel is the showpiece, but we plan on having a few other fish and some inverts as well.
 
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SashimiTurtle

SashimiTurtle

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By this point you're probably wondering where the eel is. Well it's in a holding tank for now, perfectly comfortable inside a rock.

Here it is, shortly after acclimation. Shipping was delayed as it missed the plane. Ended up getting trucked all the way and was boxed up for 48 hours. It was packed extremely well and seems to be just fine despite the long shipping.

20190116_131632.jpg


Here is the holding tank. I bet you're wondering where the eel is. Yea, we were too. The morning after we got the eel, we go to check on it. We saw no eel. We moved the rocks, looked in the skull pulled the big rock completely out, took the filter appart. Nothing.

20190117_080512.jpg


While searching the floor in a panic thinking that maybe somehow it found a hole in the tight fitting lid with a 5lb rock on top of it, we looked up at the tank...

20190117_094903.jpg


Yep, it had found a hole inside the rock big enough to fit the entire 6-8" of its body inside. Talk about a relief...
 
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SashimiTurtle

SashimiTurtle

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For a cabinet we had been looking at different options. Innovative Marine does not make an APS stand for these tanks, and we weren't sure we wanted to go that route anyway. We decided to refurbish a failed stand for our other reef, a SCA90 cube.

The original stand was 36"×24"×36". This is the intact one under the 90 gallon.

20190119_004942.jpg


Here you can see we've cut the old stand to shorten it for only one door, leaving enough to be able to reattach the trim.

20190114_132258.jpg


Removed the trim we needed to, trim... and cut the excess off both sides. Test fit to measure everything up for trim and new plywood.

20190114_151526.jpg
20190114_152741.jpg


And everything back together and trimmed out. Just needs paint now.

20190118_195752.jpg
20190118_195759.jpg
20190118_195810.jpg
20190118_195829.jpg


The stand is sturdy, and can hold my weight. I even bounced on it a few times. I'm confident it can hold the weight of a 20 gallon tank. The finished dimentions are 20"×24"×36". The tank has a 15"×20" foot print and is 17" tall with its own aluminum pedestal for the drop off portion that puts the tank at 21" high. The rim of the tank will be 4'9" high, which is a good viewing height but not so tall I can't reach inside.
 
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siggy

My Aquariums Going Again
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And the cats out of the bag!
err... wouldn't that be, the eels finally out of the bag? any how, The stand came out great and I'm exited to see a drop-off come alive.
BTW how is the eel acclimating? has he or she Eating yet? and have you come up with a name ?
 
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SashimiTurtle

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BTW how is the eel acclimating? has he or she Eating yet? and have you come up with a name ?

It ate on Thursday. Something white and fleshy in the LRS Chunky. Looked like fish. Those "chunks" are decent size. Full grown snowflake eel size. There's mush mixed in too, so it would still probably work as broadcast food in a large tank with various sized fish. I could probably just thaw out a chunk of the Fish Frenzy, and pick a good sized piece from it and then feed the rest of my fish the leftovers. This eel's mouth is so small I have to cut up most things for it to eat. I think the piece from last night may have been a small scallop, or muscle of some sort. I was firmer than fish meat, but not as tough as squid or octopus. It was round, big as a quarter and about 1/8" thick.(the entire thickness of the pack of food)

It showed some interest last night, but either wasn't hungry, or can't figure out the feeding stick. It acted like it wanted to bite it a few times but never could figure out where to put it's mouth. I'm using wooden grill skewers right now, as I had to toss my old stainless tongs because they were pretty rusted. Someone forgot to rinse them off after using them, a couple times. Eels only need to eat about 2 to 3 times a week, so it may just not have been all that hungry.

For a name, we have an idea... but it hasn't given us that yea that's it feeling yet. We'll have one soon enough.
 
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SashimiTurtle

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An interesting twist for an eel tank. I never thought of a nano tank for one.
With any other eel, I wouldn't suggest a small tank. The aggression from the eel and the filtration just couldn't handle it. My 90 is probably as small a tank as I would put a snowflake or skeletor in... and I'd have to get a bigger skimmer, mine is at it's limit now. Probably past it.

Golden dwarves aren't really aggressive. At least, I've never seen one be aggressive. Their bioload also isn't that much either. They do eat a "large" meal every few days, by large I mean the new guy ate a pea sized piece of fish and was satisfied. I can handle the filtration with a 5g bucket water change every week. For one GDM, 20g is as low as I would go permanently with good filtration and water changes. I'm going to be using the Brightwell Aquatics Xport Blocks with Microbacter7 in hopes that will help control nutrients in this tank.
 
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SashimiTurtle

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Dr. Dendrostein

Marine fish monthly
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For a cabinet we had been looking at different options. Innovative Marine does not make an APS stand for these tanks, and we weren't sure we wanted to go that route anyway. We decided to refurbish a failed stand for our other reef, a SCA90 cube.

The original stand was 36"×24"×36". This is the intact one under the 90 gallon.

20190119_004942.jpg


Here you can see we've cut the old stand to shorten it for only one door, leaving enough to be able to reattach the trim.

20190114_132258.jpg


Removed the trim we needed to, trim... and cut the excess off both sides. Test fit to measure everything up for trim and new plywood.

20190114_151526.jpg
20190114_152741.jpg


And everything back together and trimmed out. Just needs paint now.

20190118_195752.jpg
20190118_195759.jpg
20190118_195810.jpg
20190118_195829.jpg


The stand is sturdy, and can hold my weight. I even bounced on it a few times. I'm confident it can hold the weight of a 20 gallon tank. The finished dimentions are 20"×24"×36". The tank has a 15"×20" foot print and is 17" tall with its own steel pedestal for the drop off portion that puts the tank at 21" high. The rim of the tank will be 4'9" high, which is a good viewing height but not so tall I can't reach inside.
That's :)thinking outside the box. Thanks for sharing, comrade
 
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SashimiTurtle

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So, we watched it come all the way out of the cave, double back on itself and go back in and then somehow poke its head back out of the cave, all without really leaving that little entrance... I was almost like it tied itself in a knot, then just came unraveled and was back in the same spot.

I can barely see the entrance to that cave and it has enough room to turn around on itself...
 
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