UNS 7 Gallon (beginner)

[nano7g]

Tank: UNS (Ultum Nature Systems) 30A Dual AIO (7 gallon)
Light: AI Prime 16HD
Heat: Aquael Ultra 50W
Pump: UNS Sigma pump
Media:
Mechanical: Filter Floss.
Biological: Seachem Matrix
Chemical: Purigen, mini activated carbon (Imaginarium)
Other equipment: Most Aqua Micro ATO, picture frame glass to use as a lid
Livestock: red razor algae, grube’s gorgonia, yellow clown goby, koji wada pink nepthea

Cycling:
Day 1: Caribsea Arag-alive special grade live sand, 3 lbs of rock, and 100g of Seachem Matrix added and water dosed up to 2ppm with Dr Tim’s ammonia.
Day 6: Cobalt Neotherm heater arrives. Amazon gave me a used older version. Sent it back and went to Petsmart and bought a new and cheaper Aquael 50W heater (same company as Cobalt and likely the same heater technology). I live in the SF bay area where temps were around 59F/15C. Too cold. Temp tank raised to 84F to speed up metabolic activity.
Day 9: Ammonia: 1ppm, NO2: 2ppm, NO3: 20ppm
Day 10-12: Ammonia: 0-0.25ppm, NO2: 2-3ppm, NO3: 20ppm
Day 13: NO2 drops overnight to 0. Dosed Ammonia back up to 2ppm,
Day 14: Ammonia drops overnight to 0.25-0.5ppm. Cycle finished.

Today is day 19. Unfortunately, the arm bracket was missing from my light body shipment that arrived on day 12 . Turns out it’s coming at a later date likely from overseas so that delays my plans to add any coral for the next 2 week at least. I may add a fish or shrimp in the meantime, we’ll see.

 

[Gumbies R Us]

Following along!

 

[nano7g]

Since my light isn’t coming for a while, today I went out and got a yellow clown goby. The salinity in the bag was much lower than my tank, but still went ahead with the typical freshwater acclimation that I did when I was a kid. Floated the bag, did the 25%, 50%, 100% dilution. Risked it and didn't quarantine since it’s the first inhabitant, and the store I got it from looked really clean. Also because the fish was only $15.


Goby got it’s bearing, then went straight to the back of the tank behind the rockwork. After about an hour, went to the front of the tank and hopped around the sand a bit. And then went back and is now exploring different crevices of the rock. It occasionally peaks out to see what’s going on out in front of the tank. We’ll see if the fish can acclimate but signs are good. I’ve read some stories where they just go into hiding, starve and are never seen again.

Also, chose a small packet of Seachem Purigen as my "chemical” filtration media, though Seachem claims it as uncategorizable.

 

[Ben's Pico Reefing]

Following along. Setup mine just over a month ago. Issues to watch for:
Usb wall charger may short out on you. Went through 2 wall plugs. Using my own and no ossues. The randomflow nozzle was noisy and would work either from a couple days, to a few minutes. Replased with innovative Marine spinstream. The uns random flow was also very noisy. Hopefully you have better luck. With those. Following along.

 

[nano7g]

Following along. Setup mine just over a month ago. Issues to watch for:
Usb wall charger may short out on you. Went through 2 wall plugs. Using my own and no ossues. The randomflow nozzle was noisy and would work either from a couple days, to a few minutes. Replased with innovative Marine spinstream. The uns random flow was also very noisy. Hopefully you have better luck. With those. Following along.

I definitely don’t have better luck. It already happened while I was cycling. The usb shorted out last week on the pump and I thought my fuse went out on that outlet. Hasn’t even been a month. Switched to an apple usb charger that I had. I’m still thinking about the IM spinstream or just staying with the non-rotating nozzle. The rotating one was completely useless. I take it IM isn’t noisy?

 

[Ben's Pico Reefing]

I definitely don’t have better luck. It already happened while I was cycling. The usb shorted out last week on the pump and I thought my fuse went out on that outlet. Hasn’t even been a month. Switched to an apple usb charger that I had. I’m still thinking about the IM spinstream or just staying with the non-rotating nozzle. The rotating one was completely useless. I take it IM isn’t noisy?

The IM spinstream is really quiet, there are some saying its noisy but could be just an odd ball for some. Report the issue to Ultum Nature System. This could end up being a huge fire hazard. They need to rework this.

 

[nano7g]

Got the UNS media tower and added Imaginarium H mini filter (carbon) to my AIO. Also got my first coral, Grube’s Gorgonian. A little darker than I had hoped for. It’s kind of a dirt brown color. Does anyone have any experience with young Gorgonian? I’m hoping it develops more nuance in color once the polyps start to extend. Dipped it in Seachem for 10 minutes and straight to the tank. It had some tips with exposed skeleton that I cut off as well. It opened up on the second day. The goby took to it immediately and perched itself in it that night.

Also got a Lominie light because the Noopsyche I had intended is taking longer than expected and I needed something for the coral. The lominie light doesn’t blend very well, almost like Christmas lights. I plan on returning it.

 

[Ben's Pico Reefing]

This gorgonia is photosynthetic. Good choice it seems. https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/thoughts-on-gorgonian.907338/

 

[Pico_Libre]

I'm pretty new to the salt stuff myself but I was having phosphate problems, still am a little. It was really hard for me to feed the tank originally the bulk of it would just get sucked out. My tank like yours I'm sure turns over very fast. I was at a .37, I switched to an app controlled pump so I could turn it off when feeding and I'm down to .09 now. Just something to think about.

 

[nano7g]

day 42 update:

New purchases: AI Prime, Lominie Nano light (returned) red razor algae, koji wada nepthea

Light situation: Bought the lominie light in the interim while waiting for the Noopsyche arm bracket to come. A serviceable light, but returned it do to the lack of timer function. The Noopsyche arm bracket came and realized it was way too heavy for the tank. Also came to the conclusion, based on the lominie which is strong at just 16 watts, that the Noopsyche (140 watts) was also way overpowered for this tank. Plan to list it on the selling thread. Splurged on a AI Prime 16HD (55 watts) which is amazing and easy to set up and so well-built. The gooseneck arm bracket is so secure and light and discreet. The bracket base, unlike the lominie, no longer accommodates the chamber lid. If it bothers me too much I much try to get a custom glass cut lid for it.

1) The red razor came with little green algae hairs attached to it. I’m kind of worried about that. I picked off as much as I could, but nearly impossible to get it all. Am I setting the tank up for an invasion?

2) The Koji Wada nepthea came sad and dead looking, fallen over. Was somewhat worried, but can’t imagine it dying with overnight shipment. Day later it stood up, and then 2 days later it looked twice as big.

3) The Grube’s Gorgonian doing well, extending beautifully.

4) The yellow clown goby is no longer hiding but now comfortable in my presence. Finally found the right foods after wasting some cash on bad buys. So, cut up frozen brine shrimp, mysis, and copepods can o'cyclops are the diet. Tried 2 different pellets and dried copepods and it wouldn’t eat it.

5) Diatom phase. Small spots started with the lominie. Grew full on with the AI prime. I have the prime set to no more than 10-40% channels, and 8 hr a day, 1 hr ramp up/down. Keep forgetting to turn off the ATO when I’m cleaning the sand. So after the water change, instead of 1.025 it was 1.023. Lowered the ATO and will just let it evaporate for a day.

6) Found that a toothbrush is way more effective than the algae scrapers I bought (magnetic and razor).

 

[Ben's Pico Reefing]

Really like the scape and the look of the tank. Love the gorgs and so does the goby it seems lol. Prime 16hd is a great choice. I have just the older HD version. Looking to upgrade to more of a bar light by end of this year. I am using a reptile stand and wall mount to hang the prime currently. I ordered a lid from octo aquatics that should fully seal the display or close to it and stop evaporation mostly. Ill get it saturday and let you know how it fits.

 

[kevgib67]

I’m always amazed at how beautiful these pico tanks are, well done!

 

[nano7g]

Really like the scape and the look of the tank. Love the gorgs and so does the goby it seems lol. Prime 16hd is a great choice. I have just the older HD version. Looking to upgrade to more of a bar light by end of this year. I am using a reptile stand and wall mount to hang the prime currently. I ordered a lid from octo aquatics that should fully seal the display or close to it and stop evaporation mostly. Ill get it saturday and let you know how it fits.

Thanks. I’m still contemplating stands, but I’m trying to find a solution where I can secure it directly onto the stand brackett rather than doing a wire hang. I might have found a clamp solution just now though that might allow me to keep the chamber lid.

 

[Ben's Pico Reefing]

Thanks. I’m still contemplating stands, but I’m trying to find a solution where I can secure it directly onto the stand brackett rather than doing a wire hang. I might have found a clamp solution just now though that might allow me to keep the chamber lid.

Another reason why ill probably go with a bar light when I upgrade lol.

 

[nano7g]

New additions just came in. A pair of spotted cleaner (anemone) shrimp. These are my first CUC inhabitants. I believe one is a male because it’s twice the size of the female (which is carrying eggs). These were worth holding out for until it was available. I check online frequently, grabbed two and then it went back to out of stock. I wanted a Pederson cleaner shrimp to go along with it, just for the color variation, but middle of the night didn’t want to research whether they’ll kill each other or not. Safe bet was 2 of the same species. The male is slightly more than an inch in size.

Put them in 5 hours ago. Did the 20 minute float, 3x water addition acclimation, which hasn’t failed me yet. But I dropped the feisty male on the carpet trying to scoop it out with my hand. The LFS water was high in salinity which I think made acclimation easier (?). I think I read high to low salinity acclimation is easier than low to high.

This thing is a beauty.

 

[nano7g]

Well, this was an eventful first day with the shrimp. I turned on the AI Prime light and it must have startled the shrimp because she suddenly released all of her fry. Caught most of them and then realized what am I going to do, raise them? So I put them back in the tank. The goby snacked on a few of them and then they all died as the pump blew them into the glass walls or got sucked up by the return pump.

I know some people have attempted to raise them with little success. They’re really fragile creatures. I might try it if the female gets pregnant again, but then again, it might be beyond my budget.