Tank Journal Archive

[ViralEntity]

Well the time finally arrived - along with a new 400lpd RODI unit! At some point we will have to get it setup, but at the moment 25L drums will have to do for RO storage. A bit of DIY plumbing, a garden hose and a bit of luck and we have RODI!

I used a small amount of water to fill the overflow and check for leaks, of which there were none, so it was then time to fill. It took about 12hrs at 80psi to fill the tank which was a lot faster than I expected and meant I had most of the following day to tweak the water volume and get the salt added. Adding the salt was easy, I just added it directly to the display, which gave me the opportunity to run the MP10's up and test out the flow while mixing the salt.

At 100% flow the two MP10's did feel like a bit much and wave motion is a concern with on 2inches to the top of the glass. After a day of mixing I got a call from my Brother-in-Law to say he needed to off load my live rock which he had been babysitting in his old tank, so it was a mad rush to make sure the pH, temp and SG was OK before quickly chucking down some eggcrate and dropping in the rock.

Once in, it finally started looking like a tank and I decided to get the scaping done before fiddling with the Reef Angel and Reef Link as I was planning to do. I picked up some awesome pieces to expand what I had, and cut some small sections of eggcrate to support it. A couple of small pieces of putty and the result was better than planned.

A bit of help from the Wife and the rest of the rockwork fell into shape. I am a fan of the minimal scapes, but I also like to have a diverse range of heights to plan the coral placements and overall, I am really happy with how it has come up. I can envisage SPS across the top with a Torch/Hammer in the lower left, some Zoa's around the base of the outcrops etc and maybe an feature Acan on the sand. The options are endless :D

I went with a larger grain sand after my disastrous attempt to use <1mm last time, and I happy with it already. With both pumps and return running it doesn't puff up into the tank like before. I have one piece of rock to be removed once my friend can take it but here it is so far:

 

[Sam Parker]

Looking sweet as pie, love the scape! Great work.

 

[Ziggy]

That is looking wonderful! Clean, minimalist and artistic. Really looking forward to seeing how it develops.

 

[ViralEntity]

Thanks guys.

2 days in and I have noted a couple of things:

• The Fluval Sea is amazing. It is silent to the point where I couldn't hear it with everything else off. Really, really impressive, although I did need to use a downward facing 90 degree elbow on the intake.
• The Tunze 9410 is a beast and a very quiet beast - except for one thing, the damn lid. It occasionally gets a small vibration going and starts to 'hum'. I think a small piece of rubber under the lid will tighten the seal and get rid of this, but to be honest it is still super quiet. It needs to be adjusted to a better height but at the moment I am really just running it in.
• I am not sure what to do with the Radion's yet. I have them with default Wide Angle TIR's installed but I am thinking maybe the standard TIR's would be better as I am getting plenty of spread.
• I have the MP10's on 50% on Reef Crest for the moment. No sand movement, and I think I could easily go to 75% later on once I decide on a daily pattern.
  
• The difference between the MP10ES and the MP10wQD is ridiculous. I mean crazy different. I swear to god, any one wanting a MP pump, get the QD's no matter how cheap the ES are. I have just placed an order for the RF Module, WetSide and Controller to upgrade the Es to a QD. It is that good.

 

[ViralEntity]

Well it's been a long week and time for an update.

I have been toying with the idea of a 'soft' cycle as I was reusing the rockwork from my RSM130 and the rest is dry rock so I had hoped it would be a slow and gentle cycle and keep any organisms alive at the end. So for the first few days all was well, the skimmer was creating a great head of foam, the socks were showing signs of collecting matter from the water and I had the lighting on a 8hr cycle just to help encourage a bit of algae to help the cycle. And as of Thursday last week, not much was happening, so I topped up the ATO and headed off to the beach for two days in the sun.

This is what I came back to:

I have never ever seen algae grow that fast. I tested the water as soon as I got home and there is 0 ammonia, 0 nitrite and 0 nitrate, as well as 0 phosphate on my Red Sea Pro kits. No diatom bloom for me, - it is full on lawn turf. In some places its an inch long!

I was away from the tank for less than 72hrs, I seeded no ammonia or food into the tank so all I can assume is that my 'live' rock was in a bad way after being in my Brother-in-Laws tank. So I gave the glass a clean, and asked my BoL to grab some ceriths, turbos and a strombus while he was down looking at corals...

... and he returned with 5x Narassius snails and a large predatroy whelk... just what I need

So this weekend is going to be a mad dash to find some CUC that actually eats aglae - anyone for a road trip? :D

 

[Agent M]

I have never ever seen algae grow that fast.

You've gotta admit thats pretty impressive! How warm did the house get on Mon and Tues?

Wondering how long you have had the live rock as well.

 

[ViralEntity]

Being a two story house it takes a week or so for the bottom to get warm enough to heat the tank much. Did go through a bit of top off though ;)

The live rock is nearly 5 yr old and was thoroughly rinsed in salt water before I added it to the tank, but must still have enough stuff to kick the cycle along. Not too concerned as there isn't any other live rock going in so the more the merrier.

 

[Agent M]

So its been warmer than usual, the salinity went up and the live rock is old enough to be leaching phosphates - perfect combo for algae.

Time for a phosphate remover. I've been using and am very impressed with Phosphate RX - super easy to use and no equipment or media involved.

 

[ViralEntity]

So a bit of a delay in updating, but we had a relatively successful weekend of shop crawls. Except it was almost impossible to find snails.

We went to 6 shops last weekend and the struggled to get a good variety of snails between the 3 of us - I ended up with 5 small ceriths, 1 turbo and 5 Nass. I also got a couple glass shrimp thrown in but I am still a bit light on the algae side of the CUC. After my previous experience with trocheus snails, I find they just get caught in everything and get too big so I am really keen to stay with ceriths and turbos this time around, with a Strombus or two on the sand.

I have been tossing up whether to dose vinegar or to get ROWA to combat the phos/nitrates that I agree with @Agent M, although undetectable on the tests must be leaching from the rock work. I made the call and started with vinegar, as it seems like a good time to try it out while there are no inhabitants to stress out and I can better judge the impact.

So I am about 5 days into the below chart and the algae growth seems to have slowed down to the point where there was only a real fine layer of powder on the glass yesterday, versus a cm or so of hair most other days. It could be pure coincidence, but it gives me enough confidence to continue for the moment. The skimmer has settled down, but even on full air the foam is only just reaching a cm or two below the top of the neck. For the moment I will keep cleaning the gunk out of the neck, but hopefully when I get some fish in this weekend the load will be enough for the skimmer to settle in properly.

 

[Agent M]

Where did you get the glass shrimp from? Been looking for some.

I like your approach dealing with the algae before anything else goes in and testing out methods of dealing with nitrate and phosphate. The phosphate I find easy to manage, its nitrate that seems to need a multi-pronged approach.

 

[ViralEntity]

@Agent M they were from Bunarong in Frankston. 10 for $15 if I recall correctly, maybe give them a buzz and make sure they have some (and that they are actually Glass shrimp!)

Not a huge update, but the vinegar really seems to be helping. I am due to move double the dosing this week according to the schedule, but I might slowly increase it over the week as the algae really has slowed to a near complete stop. I left the front glass and haven's scraped it in 3 days and it is still only the finest powder on the glass so I will keep using the glass as an indicator of the algae growth. I am also planning to order some Turbos next week once it's a bit cooler from @NiCd so that will help.

I am heading downtown tomorrow to look for some Strombus snails, if anyone knows of any drop me a line as it might save me a few hours driving. I will probably pick up two small Ocellaris and a Yellow Tang (the kids got to pick can you tell?) if I find a couple healthy looking specimens. I have always wanted a small school of Anthia's but I'm 50/50 if I get them now or wait another week or so, although they may help give the tang confidence to swim openly. The increased load will be good for the skimmer, and I would like to have all the fish in before I get the corals so the tank has time to settle and mature a bit.

Oh and you should see the pods in this tank... at first glance I thought I had a micro bubble issue!