Tank Journal Archive

[DavidS]

Still sounding pretty controlled to me! How come you put the zoas in the gully when you have all that rock?? How are the fish supposed to play cowboys and indians with the zoas in the way?

I need to split the big rock up. It's only about half opening at the moment, so I'd rather leave it all in tact for another week or so to settle properly. Once it's all happy (and I buy a chisel), I'll start splitting it. Using a screwdriver really doesn't split them so well!
There's two types of zoas on that rock, and I'd like to get a couple of colonies of each one when I do it. The green ones are really big, so I want to get them away from the pink ones before they take over.

 

[DavidS]

The elcheapo wave box I bought was just refunded, which has given me enough money to sort myself out some nutrient control I reckon. I haven't got much of a budget, I reckon I can afford:
- phosban reactor 150
- npx reactor screens
- npx bio-pellets 400ml
- cheaper power head to drive the above (maybe 700 l/hr).

The reactor is a little small to run 400ml in from what I've read, but then I've also read that I shouldn't hit it all at once, so it shouldn't matter quite so much.

 

[DavidS]

Time for some pics.
I apologise in advance for the quality - my lenses suck, so I can't focus against the glass causing a lot of variation. Also - my lights are blue saturated to the point I can't white balance them out. Some of the pics are with the whites turned up, some are using the camera flash.

This is part of a large rock Luke sent me recently.

Another part of the same rock above after I split it. Most of these are light pink like the above, but there are some darker orange reds in there. This one is sitting on the sand with a few rocks around it, to see if I can get them to encrust a few rocks for easy fragging.

And yet.. another part of the same rock that the above were attached to. These guys are huge and impressive. Also in the sand with a few bare rocks around them to see if I can get them to encrust them.

I'm assuming that this is some type of monti. It's actually on a piece of live rock - unfortunately at the very bottom of the tank, and attached to a bit of rock I'll never get out without pulling the whole tank apart. Noticed after a few days under the blue LEDs that it started to colour up. There is another bit of coral of some description near it on that rock starting to colour up, but I can't get a clear shot of it. I have to get on an odd angle to get a shot, so hope of even a remotely infocus shot.

This is a piece of acro that Luke sent me. I have no idea about SPS, but I've got it up as far as I can in the highest flow part of the tank...

Monti - see above notes about me keeping SPS lol. Looks like it's OK so far.

More zoas. These ones are attached to one of the vertical rocks.

Acan - this is from the nano. It was getting squeezed in between a split fluffy morph, an increasingly expanding scolly and some zoas, whilst having cyano deciding to sprout around where it was. Other than the odd case of a hermit climbing over it, it's been left alone.

This has been over in the nano, but moved it out as it never really had a home.

Also from the nano

This was on a rock with the above until I split them.

More zoas from Luke These ones are also sitting on one of the vertical rocks.

There are a few other bits of coral in there, but I'm slack :D

Phosban Reactor 150, NPX pellets and a power head on their way so I can get the nutrients under control.

Basic water params looking fine. Spot, my spotted pyjama cardinal has been in the tank all week and has been feeding happily. I was reluctant to put a fish in this tank so soon, but the prior rock preparation seems to have paid off, and I really needed to reduce the load in the nano.

Considering moving my leather and ric over at the weekend. The ric is on the side of the leather, and is huge, so I"m thinking it's time split them up. Might put the leather back in the nano for the time being and move the ric.

 

[DavidS]

Update time:
- Currently running 200ml of NPX Bioplastics. It's less than half what a system this big needs, but not sure I can fit a bigger reactor in the cabinet. Once I get loaded up, I might just either add a second one, or perhaps look at running one as a dedicated phosphate removal. The Phosban 150 is pretty simple. The Otto 700l powerhead is a little too plastic, and is prone to falling apart - the impeller cover falls off easily, and it makes a fair racket for a while after I put it back together if it gets air in it. It was cheap, so I shouldn't be surprised. I'll eventually go for a better built powerhead, but that will do for now.

- Created a frag rack of sorts thats actually attached the back of the tank next to the weir. Moved a couple of the smaller zoa rocks up there with a few empty rocks to see if I can get them to spread. Some I'll hopefully give away once the rocks are covered as I need to pass on some of Lukes good juju. There are two or three polyps of a different zoa in there that I'm hoping will spread as I want to propagate it a lot more.

- Moved a few more zoas from the nano since the last update, and I've moved my scolly over. The nano has been getting a lot of cyano, and the scolly seemed to be getting annoyed by it, so it had to move. Plenty more to move, but it's time for my next point to happen, so everything else in the nano can stay there for another month or two.. or three.

- Hopefully next weekend I'll collect my tang, pair of CBS and other bits of coral from Synodontis place. That should be the biggest test I'll put the tank through as it'll be the most stock in one go.

- Calc has been getting used a lot more than I'm used to. Alk hasn't been too bad, but Randy's recipe has been getting a work out. Really need to do more mag tests and see where I'm sitting with that.

 

[MTG]

updates? :)

 

[DavidS]

Real Soon Now.

 

[MTG]

:poidh

 

[Synodontis]

Bit of an update for DavidS stock down here. Jen thinks Mrs. CBS has a belly full of whiskers & claws again lol :D

 

[MagicJ]

Good food for the coral - saves you having to feed them :p

 

[DavidS]

Bit of an update for DavidS stock down here. Jen thinks Mrs. CBS has a belly full of whiskers & claws again lol :D

Damn little tart, she's always getting knocked up. Going to have a stern word to Mrs CBS :D

 

[DavidS]

Well, everyone is now in their new home with many thanks to Synodontis who have been taking care of my new inhabitants for the past couple of months, and seem to have added a few little bits to the collection.
Will see how everyone is looking tomorrow when the lights come on. The tang has moved into the cave where Spot has been hanging out since he moved into the tank, so it'll be interesting to see exactly how that changes things.
All of the coral is in - not terribly sure most of it is in its final resting place as yet, but it's in the tank. The CBS pretty much seemed to go to work the second they landed on the rock - it looked like they were picking at it.

For tomorrow - the hermits need to be relocated to the sump for the moment. They killed my strombus snail the other day (he was still moving when I first caught sight of this), and they've killed some other snails I've had despite having more than ample variety of spare shells. As handy cleaners as they are, they can't climb glass, but they do climb over all of my corals.

 

[DavidS]

Tank Porn:

As usual, apologies about the clarity - none of my lenses will focus against the glass, and I don't much care for photo editing, so ya know.

This nem was something that Ken & Jen gave me as he was rescued. I'll try my best to nurse him back to health. He's already moved a little from where he was.

FTS - haven't cleaned the back, so it's a bit of a mess. Make shift frag rack up the back - trying to get some zoas to spread so I can frag them. You can't see Spot in there as he's hiding behind the bommy, and my pair of CBS are well hidden. There's a lot going on in the gully that you can't really see in this shot. You also can't see all of the smaller groups of zoas growing down those vertical rocks on the left, but they're there.

Man, I can take photos of V8 supercars going flat knack, but trying to keep up with this fella when he was going hard is just a little too tough with bugger all light :D

 

[Sidd]

HAhah yea panning a fish can be hard at times but very doable. See the pic of my yellow tang.. The hard part is that they are going so slow or they will change directions quickly.

Tanks looking great :)

 

[Sarg]

The tank is looking good David!!

 

[DavidS]

HAhah yea panning a fish can be hard at times but very doable. See the pic of my yellow tang.. The hard part is that they are going so slow or they will change directions quickly.

Tanks looking great :)

Haha, thank you. Really need a macro lens, and maybe something a little faster for the wider stuff. My smallest lens really doesn't want to focus on much against the glass, and the further back I get the more I hit the wall with lack of light. Time for a macro :D

 

[DavidS]

Tank seems to be coping with the new inhabitants well. Inhabitants seem to be coping well too. The bleached anemone that I inherited has hauled its ass around the rock work a bit and seems to have settled. Not sure I can do much for it, but it seems to be hanging in there.

Today I moved over Benny the Blenny from my nano (hah, didn't even need to dismantle the entire tank to catch him). His favourite hidy-hole had a leather on the top, with a large ric that was actually growing on the side of the leather. The ric's foot was sort of on the leather, and on about two pieces of rock. Managed to separate it off the leather and split the rock between them and migrated them across. Been meaning to do this for ages, but never quite been game.

 

[DavidS]

So, at Synodontis request, here's my hammer at the moment:

That was the one that was in a bad state last year - see left corner (from my old nano):

[Broken External Image]:http://www.thereefuge.com/board/attachments/dsc_4111-jpg.476/

 

[MagicJ]

Great recovery - you must be doing something right :)

 

[DavidS]

Great recovery - you must be doing something right :)

Hahaha, has been doing well for a long time. That's my one real success story :D

 

[DavidS]

Changed the LEDs around a little today. Stuck in 4 violets and 2 reds from MagicJ
Also stuck a couple of whites back into the mix along the front row as it was a little too blue.
Sadly, it's now a little too white :D With some forethought, I shoved most of the whites, violets and reds on one channel, so once the light cycle starts this arvo, I might play with winding it back a bit to take the edge off it.

Haven't touched the third row of LEDs yet - they need to loose some whites. Fourth row still hasn't been built. As soon as I can afford another ELN-60-48P and a few more LEDs, I'll get it built, then I might actually get the lighting finished :D