Waterbox AIO 15 Set Up - Beginner

[hoffdawg]

Well, so interesting and sad update. Cheap heater on 5 gallon without INKBIRD backup failed and temperatures got above 92F. So I switched out 8 gallons again from the 15 gallon to get nitrite at 0.5 ppm and moved everything over. I had bought some cheap corals from nearby stores that I had hoped to add to and not completely replace.

Both clowns survived, 2 blue legged hermits and a trochus snail also survived. I’ve dipped and moved all corals over, one coral wasn’t worth seeing if it would recover. Learning 2nd big lesson, not very fun. for some corals to make it. I’m glad I had anticipated making the change to the 15 gallon. Didn’t expect problems with cheap equipment at week 10, but did understand the risk. Feeling disappointed, but also lucky.

 

[hoffdawg]

Update on the tank, I lost the couple of reefs that I was practicing with exception of the candy cane coral. I may have overstressed everything with my reaction to the high temperature in the 5 gal. Next time I think I would simply throw some ice cubes in the 5 gal, instead of rushing things over to the 15 gal tank.

I went to Vivid Aquariums yesterday and bought a few corals to put in the tank. Everything seems to be doing really well. I bought a gsp, birds nest, chalice and one more sps. I should have gotten a toadstool because they had really nice options. But my girlfriend didn’t like them, so she may not be joining me on my next trip there. I went there specifically looking for Zoa’s, but I’m not sure I understand what to look for in zoa’s, so more research and then I’ll look again.

I showed some side view pictures of my tank to the guys at the store. Super helpful but they expressed concerns with vertical (not sloped) areas in the tank. When I went home, I took a top down picture from the location of the light. I am going to plan coral placement from the position of the light (top down view) and then use height to cover dark areas or vertical surfaces. Always appreciate getting good advice!

Vivid also had a frogspawn that I still can’t stop thinking about, but at the price per head. Not sure now is the right time. Given that I don’t think I can have too many corals in my tank, it may be nice to leave room and see what happens.

 

[Katrina71]

Next time tell her you are "saving" the toadstool.

 

[hoffdawg]

I went to LAX Aquarium and bought a Yuma Mushroom. Very cool. Also watched the live sale on Facebook.

Mistake #3: Previously, I had used an aquatic super glue from Petco. This time I decided to go to the hardware store. Unknowingly, I had liquid super glue and not gel super glue. I turned the liquid superglue bottle upside down on the bottom of the GSP frag and the entire bottle emptied in a few seconds. The entire GSP frag was covered in super glue as well as both my hands. I spent the next hour and a half removing glue from the frag. I believe I was able to save about 25% of the GSP frag and my hands. Good tip is that liquid and gel superglues are very different.

Ammonia levels are at zero despite over feeding and nitrite remains at about 0.5ppm. Nitrate levels at 25ppm and phosphate around 0.3ppm. No algea yet, CUC maybe getting hungry. May do a water change to keep nitrogen low.

LAX Aquarium Mushroom picture below. It sparkles but I can’t catch that on camera.

 

[hoffdawg]

Day 14.

Everything is scary stable and there is no algae. Kind of waiting for something bad to happen. Corals look happy except for the 2 SPS. Moved higher in the tank. Not sure why I’ve added SPS this early but we shall see.

Did a full test today just to confirm everything looks good. Trace ammonia and nitrite. Nitrate fell from 25 ppm down to maybe 20 ppm for the first time. Would like to see it continue to fall. Phosphate at 0.03 ppm.

I’ve added a picture of a button coral that I purchased at LAX Aquarium. It’s a bit closed because I had my hand in the tank. Very cool coral that constantly changes and reacts to the environment.

 

[hoffdawg]

Haha next day, came home to this. Also, my power head was off due to error. Nitrates down to 10, should have done a water change yesterday. I didn’t want to overreact and instead let the tank stabilize. Not confident this corner of the tank gets enough flow.

 

[NaCl addict]

Too smart for my own good most of the time. Patience is the hard part right now as I want to start moving into the 15 gallon tank. Sounds like there is no speeding up the tank “maturing” process. Thank you for the feedback.

I’m currently cycling with Dr. Tim’s and following the fishless cycle. I started slightly above 2.0 ppm ammonia. I added more ammonia on Day 6 to get back up to 2.0ish. The nitrite levels spiked at 3.0+ around Day 3 and are now dropping.

The directions are to wait until ammonia (and I am assuming nitrite) get below 0.5 to start adding fish. I’ve also tested for nitrate and noticed that the nitrate level keeps climbing. I would assume that total ammonia into take at 3.0 would put nitrite at a max of 3.0 and a max nitrate at 3.0. I’m just counting the number of Nitrogen and doing simple math because they all have the same amount, 1 nitrogen.

Any guesses on the following:

1) How could Nitrite be at 3.0 and Ammonia at 1.0 when I only added 2.0 Ammonia to begin with. My water has no detection of either. I would think that the max nitrogen in the tank is 2ppm of any chemicals.
2) How can nitrate be at 15 ppm if the total amount of ammonia to the tank was 3.0 ammonia?

Alternative, could be bad tests. Admittedly, I’m still using API ammonia and Nitrite test. Salifert for Nitrate and other stuff.

Still waiting on the cycle, bored…

Reefing will teach you the lesson of patience above all.

 

[hoffdawg]

Cleaned up algae and no issues all day today. But later I identified the issue causing brown algae. Around noon, I added reef roids, just a bit that stuck to my finger. That was enough to cause a bloom about an hour later. I was trying to get a stubborn coral to open, no luck. Won’t be using reef roids for a while.

 

[hoffdawg]

A little bit of an update:

1) Ammonia, Nitrite, Nitrate, and Phosphate all stable. Nitrate below 1 ppm and Phosphate below 0.3 ppm.
2) Magnesium stable at 1380 ppm
3) Calcium around 470 ppm so I bought Redsea test and the first test is around 440ppm. No trend line yet on Redsea.
4) Alkalinity is unstable. Saltwater mix is at 9.8 dKH. The tank is around 8.7 dKH. I started dosing Redsea Part B and trying to keep stable around 9.0 dKH.
5) pH is at 8.2

The main concern is precipitation of calcium. My water has high calcium so I may explore other salt brands.

My uglies have not been as ugly as the 5 galllon holding tank I used prior to this build. That tank was nasty after 2 weeks. Some of the things I saw definitely gave me scar tissue at first. So far I have had minor algae and detritus bloom. Very light dusting on the sand and rock. The trochus snail takes care of the rock and I clean the sand with minor water changes.

I’ve added a Rainbow frogspawn, hammer with green and blue tips and extended polyps, supreme Acro and super bird acro. The named corals are hard to figure out. All four from Vivid Aquariums. Every time I go there I feel like I know nothing about corals.

I just bought a HG indo torch from Harry’s Marine. I’ll pick up on the way home from work.

I want to get a bubble top anemone but there is only one location that I want it to stick. So I’m hesitating on that because I’m guessing he won’t be happy. I’m thinking of making a cage out of some material to keep him in place initially. Still need to figure out a game plan.

I’m mainly focused on testing pH and alk while dosing alkalinity only.

 

[hoffdawg]

Alk drops 0.2 per day. Dosing RedSea Part B 3 mL every other day to stay between 8.7ppm +\- 0.2ppm. Would like to be at 9.0 target, but I ran out of Hanna reagent for 2 days and didn’t want to dose blindly. Going to add 2 mL daily this week to see if I can get a stable climb. I am seeing a small decrease in Calcium to where I may start dosing Calcium if the pH starts to drop.

Anemone wouldn’t go where we wanted him. So we sprayed his foot with water repeatedly. He attacked the Yuma mushroom. Finally, we named him John Wick since we were watching the movie, and terrified that he was going to go on a coral killing rampage.

After about the 3rd or 4th time we put him back where we wanted him, we turned off the lights and prayed for the best. Day 3 and he couldn’t be happier with the ledge we picked out for him. Clowns perch adjacent and sometimes on top of him. I wouldn’t say the clowns are hosting the anemone, but they seem to be friendly.

Water is a bit cloudy. There are so many pods inside the tank. They have been keeping everything very clean. And the clowns snack on them against the glass.

I’ve added Seachem Pristine to the tank and it resulted in no change to the water clarity. I think the cloudiness is bacterial or maybe from the Part B being added too quickly for a small tank. I don’t want to over water change as I am prioritizing stability.

After the copepods ate all the algae, I started using reef roids again. The population of the pods seems to double each time and I enjoy the reaction it has on the corals. I am not going to use it this week, to see if water clarity will improve.