UNS 7 Gallon (beginner)

[nano7g]

Diatoms now gone. Now I’m dealing with cyanobacteria.

Newly added today: Trochus snail and cerith snail, a second kogi wada (more purple than pink).
Added a couple weeks ago: Purple candelabra gorgonian, a pink lemonade nepthea. I have my heart set on a Julian’s gorgonian, but still waiting to find one online.

Also, switched out the razor algae for a red bush.


My nitrates dropped to zero which has me a little worried. My ammonia is still zero. Phosphates at 0.03. Either the cyano and macroalgae is just taking up all the nutrients, or I need more livestock.
Cyano still an issue on the second week. I’m dosing Dr. Tim’s eco-balance to add more microbial diversity.

New pump: Decided to go with the AI axis 20 instead. Currently keeping it at 50%. It’s a little tight in the 3rd chamber as I have my heater in there as well. Also got the Innovative Marine spin stream nozzle. Clown goby is not liking it. Hides on the side of the rock to avoid the flow, which I really don’t think is too high, I calculate to only be 15x.

The smaller kogi wada is not growing. It’s kind of smaller lately than its largest form. I’m trying to figure out what it is. I don’t think it’s the flow. I suspect it’s the nutrients in the tank. But it might be the light as it “blooms” more when the lights are off and the house lights are the only thing illuminating the tank. But I can’t imagine it’s too high. This is my light schedule with ai prime 16hd about 12 inches from the surface of the water.

I don’t think adding copepods helped. I don’t see them anywhere and suspect the goby ate them all up or they’re trapped in the filter media.

 

[LegalReefer]

Would love to see those new corals you've added! The Koji Wada are always gorgeous

 

[nano7g]

Would love to see those new corals you've added! The Koji Wada are always gorgeous

Certainly! Will try to get a photo after my next water change, but I'm actually dealing with my nepthea regressing. My nitrates are consistently 0 for the past week, so I need to fix this issue to see if they recover. Turns out, I can't ignore cyano in the ugly phase (monopolizes the nutrients). Dosed some neo-nitro a couple days ago and they perked up a bit. Will see if they recover by end of week as I try to up my numbers a bit.

 

[nano7g]

Tanks shots of my cyanobacteria bed from last week. Also you can see the size and color difference between the new kogi wada that I got from an LFS labeled as a “leather coral” compared to the smaller one I got online. Pic of the pink lemonade nepthea as well. Also ordered a diffuser for my ai prime which is coming today.

I think I may be getting a handle on the cyano by stirring up the sand bed for the past couple days, burying the cyano and releasing the detrius to get taken up by the filter, and dosing nitrogen which keeps bottoming out. Did my weekly water change yesterday and this morning has seen no sign of the cyano bed. Will check again when I get home and update in a couple days. Was planning a black out but there might not be a need.

 

[Ben's Pico Reefing]

No issues with spinstream right? I haven't had a single one lol. I turned my axis 20 up to 50 percent last week as well lol.glad everything is getting better.

 

[nano7g]

Tanks shots of my cyanobacteria bed from last week. Also you can see the size and color difference between the new kogi wada that I got from an LFS under as a “leather coral” compared to the smaller one i got online. Pic of the pink lemonade nepthea as well. Also ordered a diffuser for my ai prime which is coming today.

I think I may be getting a handle on the cyano by stirring up the sand bed, burying the cyano and releasing the detrius to get taken up by the filter, and dosing nitrogen which keeps bottoming out. Did my weekly water yesterday and this morning, no sign of the cyano bed. Will check again when i get home and update in a couple days. Was planning a black out but there might not be a need.

No issues with spinstream right? I haven't had a single one lol. I turned my axis 20 up to 50 percent last week as well lol.glad everything is getting better.

No issues. Works great. But Im worried about the corner right underneath the spin stream though. Thats where detritus collects the most as the nozzle pushes the water in a clockwise pattern but gets pulled into the return before water circulates back to that corner. Thinking of a wavemaker if I still have issue with the cyano, but hoping not as i want to minimize equipment as much as possible

The axis 20 works great too but i cant figure out how to take it apart to clean it. Have you? I can take the bottom cage off but all the parts seem immovable.

 

[Ben's Pico Reefing]

No issues. Works great. But Im worried about the corner right underneath the spin stream though. Thats where detritus collects the most as the nozzle pushes the water in a clockwise pattern but gets pulled into the return before water circulates back to that corner. Thinking of a wavemaker if I still have issue with the cyano, but hoping not as i want to minimize equipment as much as possible

The axis 20 works great too but i cant figure out how to take it apart to clean it. Have you? I can take the bottom cage off but all the parts seem immovable.

There is video on BRS that shows how in review. As long as it gets kicked around it can eventually work itself to the overflow. If it's stuck in corner, you can always just syphon that area if reachable to clean.

 

[nano7g]

This week I went full lights blackout for 4 nights to handle the cyano issue. Also adding Dr Tim’s Waste Away bacteria to handle the detritus. In the mean time, I’ve added some copepods and phytoplankton to add some diversity. The copepods survived. This time around I acclimated the copepods. While looking at them with my magnifying glass, I realized I had microscopic planaria about half the size of a copepod. Haven’t been able to get much information if they’re a danger to the tank or normal. They’re not the usual ones I see that suffocate corals, but at the same time they might just be juvenile. Either way, I treated the tank with Salifert Flatworm Exit just a few hours ago. Nothing effected in the tank. I still spotted one flatworm but will need to do this weekly for the next few weeks to eradicate them.

Also got my filter from 3D reefing for my AI prime. While I was getting the Flatworm Exit, I decided to get a blue porcelain crab as well. It’s hiding right now so close-ups yet.

 

[nano7g]

Yesterday the tank was the cleanest it looked in a long while, with cyano receding, but the nitrates and phosphates were at 0 and my pink lemonade nepthea has not been doing too well so I dosed some nitrates and today the cyanobacteria is a little stronger than yesterday on the subtrate. Not as horrible as it was 2-3 weeks ago though when I was scraping it off the glass and it would come back a couple hours later. Now, at least it just stays in one corner of the substrate.

What I found was the neonitrate dosing did not help. Neither did agitating the substrate. The cyano seemed to go away when the nitrates/phosphates were at zero, but that seemed a little dangerous for the tank as a whole so it’s a weird balancing act. What I think helps was adding an air stone in the AIO that I believe adds extra oxygenation. And keeping my lights in the 20000k spectrum (previously 6000K) and eliminating red and green spectrum.

Some new introductions to the tank: a purple brush and an orange rusty gorgonian. Both are beautiful specimens. The orange rusty is more of a pale tan, but it’s really nice nonetheless and looks fantastic in both it’s extended and unextended form. It’s also the only gorgonian of the ones I have that doesn’t deal with algae covering it’s branches.

So far all the gorgonians and Koji wada nepthea are doing well. Only the candelabra purple gorgonian is having some issues. It's finally extending, but at the same time I see spots that are receding. The pink lemonade nepthea is not doing well as it’s never reached it’s original size and form, so I’ve moved it to an area with less flow and less light.

Temporary placements of corals at the front of the tank away from the cyano bed you see in the corner beneath the nozzle.

 

[nano7g]

Other two additions are a juvenile clownfish (either black photon or mocha) I added last monday and a blue porcelain crab I added last week. Also, some really tiny brittlestarfish, at least 5 that hitchhiked on the brush gorgonian but I think one of the CUC is eating them. I saw one hanging on the glass yesterday with just one leg left. I see a couple still on the gorgonian but the others have disappeared.

The porcelain crab is a bit feisty and territorial. I worry of it pinching anything that gets too close to it, but it tends to hang out in a nook in the back of the tank, and hasn’t yet done any damage. Only in the past few days has it ventured out to the front.

The clownfish was a bit of a worry considering the only other fish inhabitant was the yellow clown goby. At the LFS, it wasn’t aggressive, but did show typical female pairing behavior of rushing towards a scared male but not making contact. I think it’s trying to pair with the goby. It’s not aggresive but has no sense of personal space and is just swimming in close proximity to the goby. The goby is surprisingly unbothered, though maybe annoyed. The goby rarely ever gives up space and hasn’t changed it’s behavior or territory. The clownfish gets frenzied around food often snatching food away from the goby or eating whatever the goby regurgitates, so the goby has learned it can’t take it’s time anymore and has to attack the food. This is a benefit as there’s less food waste now with the clownfish.

The yellow clown goby holds its own surprisingly well, because I read they’re supposed to be really shy and docile. Here’s a rare video I luckily caught just at the moment the goby finally got annoyed by the closeness and beats up the clownfish. Recently the clownfish has calmed down after introduction to the tank. They seem to be getting used to each other as the days goes by. I’m hoping the addition of another fish helps stabilize the nutrients levels in the tank, but my nitrates and phosphates have still not moved upward, even as my cyano has improved.

Yellow clown goby fights with clownfish

Also, here’s a photo of the blue porcelain crab hanging beneath the Grube’s gorgonian.