[Custom] Rene

[Rene]

'Cause I'm a lousy photographer!

 

I'm still struggling with the stupid white balance and my 14k bulb. Trust me, purple is better than the BRIGHT BLUE shots that looked all actinic.

[DarkDevil]

very nice looking tank, hope they grow out fast enough for you, good luck!

[sandlot13]

NICE! One of my favorite tanks now (cause of the your mantis!) get that white balance figured out on your camera and you will be golden! keep the pictures coming!

[jeremai]

Have you noticed any localized recession on the Muricea? I'm having half inch portions randomly die off, then the recession stops and seems to regrow. A week later, another random half inch section dies off. Can't figure it out.

 

Great looking tank. Fraggin the Pterogorgia any time soon?

[Rene]

Well, it looks like one of the serpent starts managed to tick off one of the pistol shrimp last night. There was an arm-tip on the sandbed this morning after some furious popping last night It reminds me of my childhood...play nice or we start lopping off appendages!

 

Killed a bunch of tiny aiptasia. I made the mistake of letting them and valonia go uncontrolled too long in my 5.5. I won't make that mistake again. I plan on being a ruthless dictator.

 

I'm expecting a small order from FloridaPets this week, and I plan on adding a few more things from the 5.5. It may be time to play with the white-balance on the camera some more soon.

 

DarkDevil: Thank you, good luck to you as well! I honestly doubt I'm going to see a whole lot of growth from most of these creatures in a 3 month period. Some of the gorgonians have grown for me while in the holding tank, but neither them nor the rics have been fast growers for me. I'm going to have to depend on the few zoantharians in my tank for growth shots, and hope that's enough for the good people at n-r.com

 

(P.S....the public wants more top-down shots of clams!)

 

sandlot13: Thanks! Good to see some love for the mantis I've had N. wennerae before mantis got popular and I missed them so bad after I got rid of them, but I couldn't do without a cleanup crew. P. ciliata seemed just about perfect. I hope she stays yellow like that.

 

jeremai: Huh, no, I've not seen that on my Muricea. Those things have been pretty rock-solid for me, showing some very slight growth and near-continuous polyp extension. I feed the tank, but I haven't seen any real feeding response from them for sure though. But if yours was a lack of food thing, they wouldn't be receeding and then growing back again. How much current do you have them in? I something nearby stinging them maybe?

 

Hah, those Pterogorgia have done better for me than anything else, but it'll be a while before they need trimming Thanks for the compliments!

[Rene]

Deadline Day

 

Coral deadline time, and I’ve added a few new things in the past month. Here’s what the tank has in it as of today, new additions in italics.

 

Plants:

Halimeda

3 shaving brush plants

 

Corals:

1 teal ricordea

1 pale blue/lavender ricordea

1 lime green ricordea

1 bright green ricordea

1 solid orange ricordea

3 pink/salmon ricordea

3 gold/orange ricordea

1 teal Florida mushroom

about 4 red Florida mushrooms

3 hitchhiker sps, maybe porites

1 siderastrea starlet coral

2 bubble mushrooms

solid green Florida zoanthids

green bullseye Florida zoanthids

black center green Florida zoanthids

teal Florida zoanthids

blue with yellow ring Florida zoanthids

white Caribbean encrusting polyps

2 orange sea rods

2 yellow sea whips

1 purple frilly gorgonian

 

Invertebrates:

yellow mantis shrimp

porcelain crabs

feather duster worms

hitchhiker thorny oyster

brittle stars

harlequin serpent star

sponges and tunicates

3 astrea snails

3 cerith snails

4 nassarius snails

1 nerite snail

 

…I think that’s everything.

 

Now, photos!

 

Shrinking Ricordea

Rics on 12-27

Rics on 1-15

The colors haven’t changed, but on all the rics in my tank, I’m seeing much less polyp extension. I think it’s either too much light or too much flow. Looking back, I was seeing good extension until I ramped up the photoperiod and took off one of the screens shading the tank. I’m going to put a screen back on the tank and see if that helps; if not, I may need to look into a less powerful pump. On the bright side, you can clearly see a new mouth on the orange ric!

 

If anyone has any advice on the ric shrinkage, I’m all ears.

 

New ric, this one is a solid pale blue/lavender

Pink ric that looks to be splitting

Chiquita sitting by the gold rics, watching me take pictures

 

Unhappy bubble mushrooms. I just added these, and ripped one in the process.

New teal shroom.

New red shroom. Added today.

And her babies lower on a rock, accidentally fragged

The last baby, by one of the mystery corals. Do you know what it is?

 

 

(contd....)

 

(...contd.)

 

New blue zoanthids with a yellow ring around the mouth. I'm hoping these will color up, they were really reaching for light under old PC lights.

New “bullseye” pattern green zoos

And a shot of the teal zoos. They’re really a different color than the blue ones.

BRIGHT green zoos. No surprise here, but the picture doesn’t do them justice.

 

Siderastrea coral. It was a three-polyp hitchhiker on the base of one of the gorgonians, slowly being killed. I put it on its own rock a few months ago and it is doing much better.

 

 

Drumroll please!

 

…left side!

…right side!

…FTS!

[WarEagleNR88]

Impressive! Clean, concise, striking. Exactly what a reef tank should be. Keep up the great work, Rene.

[KMP]

hat's off to you for the split rock aquascape. that is my idea of the ultimate arangement. i'm planning a 90 - 120 and that's what i intended to do. never seen it before in a small tank. very impressive!

[sandlot13]

great work!!! Im loving those teal zoos with the green ring around the mouth. where did you get those??? Awesome work, that aquascaping is awesome!!!

[instrance]

Very nice

[Rene]

Thanks for the compliments, everyone! I'm really happy with this tank and the aquascape. I do plan to add a few more things after the contest but I love the aquascape as well and don't plan to alter it at all. It should be exciting to see how it grows out and if it maintains that clean look.

 

KMP, thanks, it is an aquascape design I've always liked and I'm happy I went with it. I get great circulation, and I think it makes the tank look larger than a ten. Both of the rock structures sit on egg crate buried in the sand on PVC stilts so burrowing animals can't topple it. Doing something similar in a much larger tank holds the potential to be truly striking.

 

sandlot, those are some of my favorite zoos. I got them from an ebay vendor who moved out of the country, but that color combo can be found from florida collectors. www.sealifeinc.com has some now and then though I haven't ordered this color from them.

[pico1]

WOW! Lookin' good! I really like the 2 island look.

[kinktao]

great tank!

[Rene]

Fine Tuning

 

February has been a month of change for this tank, and I’m seeing some definite progress as the corals settle in.

 

First, I cut the flow down quite a bit in the tank. I never could get my Remora Nano to skim anything, so I finally pulled it out and noticed immediate better expansion of the ricordea in the area closest to it. That did it…the high flow was at least partially responsible for them not expanding like they should have, so I ordered a replacement pump and switched from 450 to 265 gph. The gorgonians have not seemingly been affected and the ricordea are doing better. A few of them dropped off their rocks before I switched pumps, and these are temporarily in a soap dish until I have time to fool with the tank some more. The tank looks more empty so it’s a little depressing, though nothing has actually died. The ones in the soap dish are expanding so well, I’m thinking about toying with the aquascape and giving the ricordea an especially low flow, lower light area all of their own. I probably won’t try anything like that until the contest is over though.

 

It’s not all bad, though. While the expansion on the ricordea hasn’t been terrific, they are growing!

 

My favorite orange one now has three mouths! It had one when I put it in the tank. I showed a photo a while back of it forming a second mouth, and I noticed while taking photos that it has a third one on the backside.

 

While taking pictures of that orange one, I noticed my teal one nearby has also grown another mouth.

 

The yellow circle zoanthids are also growing though I’m not getting much in the way of blue color out of them. They have never shown much blue color in my care, though they supposedly were that color once.

 

I have added one thing to the tank: a large leaf variety of Halimeda algae. I’ve been looking for it for some time now. Compare it to the regular sized plant on the right. You can also see my harlequin serpent star sitting under the heater here.

 

And last but not least, the refugium! With the exit of the remora skimmer, I wanted something to help remove some nutrients from the tank, and a vegetative filter sounded just right, so I made one out of some old Aquaclear filter parts. The chaeto is growing slowly but steadily.

 

Update delayed due to internet problems

[Deleted User 7]

Wow, I think you may have turned me on to gorgonians.... Love this tank! Great job!

[sandlot13]

still loving this tank.... wish i had my other tank set up for a mantis right now too!!!

[Rene]

Daggett: Thanks! They're really neat, and it's nice to have something different in the tank. The only hitch is that even photosynthetic ones require some feeding, and they like quite a bit of flow. But I put them under the HOB output in my last tank and they did just fine there. HTH!

 

Sandlot Aren't mantis shrimp great? I've had them on and off for about five years now. P. ciliata was my ideal since it isn't as hard on a cleanup crew, and I've been happy with that decision. Chiquita is -very- active and bold, and spends a good amount of time sitting in the open. I'll try to get an updated pic of her, but she's also retained that nice yellow/orange color.

 

I'm working on getting tank pictures tonight and tomorrow in preperation for the deadline. I have a new invert which I got about a month ago that I think everyone's going to love, but you'll have to wait and see. Some corals also got moved around a bit. I'll save a recap for my summary post, but I'm really happy with how this tank has turned out so far. Expect pictures soon.

[Rene]

Finishing Touches

 

March showed a lot of small tweaks to the tank, including rearranging some corals. I was able to give the group of three ricordea on the top right a lower-flow area by putting a branch of zoanthids to shield them, and the zoas seem to like it too. This is a color-accurate pic of my teal zoas too. It only took six months!

 

I also moved some of the ones on the right hand side around to give them lower flow, and am already seeing better expansion. The pink ric that was splitting has split fully and the extra ric fell off onto the sandbed, so I have it in a cup until I figure out where to put it.

 

The shaving brush plants have been slowly waning, but they’re sending up new growth. I’ve seen three new stalks and a fourth one today. Unfortunately, my mantis shrimp likes to rip the tops off and use them to reinforce her burrow!

 

And I finally got my hands on something I’ve been looking for for a long time. After having a black feather duster worm for over a year with no problems, I decided to try an Atlantic christmas tree worm. Fingers are crossed, but I’ve already maintained a similar-sized worm for long enough to think I’m doing something right. You can also see the black worm and the starlet coral in this shot.

 

Enjoy

[Rene]

Summary Post

 

A Florida biotope tank has been rattling around in my brain for years now, and this contest came about at the perfect time to set one up. I wanted to concentrate on the beauty of native corals and offer something a little different than the typical nano livestock. Aside from needing a little bit of flow and feeding, this tank and the gorgonians in it have not been hard to maintain. Take another look at our beautiful and hearty “local” corals before deciding that the only interesting stuff comes from overseas!

 

Equipment List

 

Tank

10 gallon standard AGA aquarium

 

Lighting

20” 70 watt Sunpod metal halide system, stock 14 k bulb

 

Circulation and Filtration

Nano Remora with MaxiJet 900 (reason: did not produce skimmate)

Aquaclear 50, filled with LR rubble and chaeto

Closed Loop System with SCWD, powered by another MaxiJet 900 (reason: leaks around SCWD)

Closed loop system powered by Hydor pump (265 gph) with Hydor flo attachment

 

Temperature Control

Jager 50 watt heater

Visi-therm 50 watt heater

 

Livestock List

 

Plants

3 or 4 types of Halimeda algae

Caleurpa hitchhikers

6+ Shaving brush plants

 

Corals

9 Florida ricordea polyps (lime, green, orange, teal, blue, pink, golden orange)

5 Florida zoanthid colonies (solid mint green, mint bullseye, teal, blue with yellow ring, mint black center)

1 White encrusting zoanthid colony

2 Bubble mushrooms

6 Atlantic discosoma mushrooms (one teal, 5 burgundy)

 

Invertebrates

Yellow mantis shrimp, Pseudosquilla ciliate

Atlantic thorny oyster hitchhiker

Pink Christmas tree worm

Black featherduster worm

Sponges

Tunicates

Hitchhiker featherduster worms

Brittle stars

1 Harlequin serpent star

3 Astrea snails

3 Cerith snails

4 Nassarius snails

1 Nerite snail

 

Losses/Removed items

2 porcelain crabs (eaten by mantis shrimp)

1 ricordea polyps (blew off rocks and lost)

3 ricordea polyps (too much current, moved to another system until I get a chance to rework the rockwork)

 

Growth Sequences

 

All corals were added to the tank between December and January.

 

Pink ricordea January 15th

February 28th

March 31st

 

Red mushrooms on the right January 15th

March 31st

 

Yellow and blue zoanthids January 15th

March 31st

These grew from 16 polyps to more than 30

 

Green bullseye zoanthids and teal zoanthids January 15th

March 31st

Bullseyes went from 8 polyps to 15+ and teal zoos went from 6 to 11 polyps.

 

 

 

(...cont.)

 

Halimeda February 28th

March 31st

Also look at the FTS to see general algae growth in the system. No new plants were added after January with the exception of the large-leaf plant pictured above.

 

Shaving brush plants January 15th

March 31st

There are more plants here, but as noted elsewhere, they look scraggly because my mantis shrimp rips the top off and uses them in burrow construction. Sheesh.

 

Some other items that have grown for me that didn’t photograph well enough to show before and after pictures. My orange ricordea went from one to three mouths, and my teal ricordea grew a second mouth. Their most recent pictures are below.

 

My yellow gorgonian has grown as well. Growth on the other gorgonians has been hard to photograph even though I know it's there. Feeding seems to make all the difference with these guys.

December

March

 

(cont...)

 

FTS

 

November

 

December 18th

 

January 15th

 

March 31st

(...contd.)

 

 

Take a look at the plant growth through the tank

 

Other Pretty Pictures

 

In closing I’d like to leave you with a few nice shots that didn’t go anywhere else. This has been really fun competition, and watching what different people are able to create with limited time and similar systems has been fascinating. I've had an absolute blast and I'm happy I got the chance to participate. Thank you to all the nano-reef.com members who have stuck with it and supported the competition with their enthusiasm, and congratulations to all the competitors who made it to the end. Good luck!

 

 

 

[Mr. Grinch]

I can't beleive that no one has replied but you have a great tank and I really like your idea from the start. If you didn't already know those yellow and blue zoanthids are a very desired morph called blue or purple hornets (or at least they look like them). With the success you had I'd say your into some $

[Uhuru]

for some reason most of the pics aren't showing I have to copy and paste the address in a new window...

 

but yeah tank looks great! love the gorgs... sorry if I missed it somewhere but what are you feeding them?

[arwndsh]

Guys this thread is 2 years old. I doubt you'll get a reply.

[Rene]

Guys this thread is 2 years old. I doubt you'll get a reply.

 

LOL. True. I was showing this thread to someone at work today because I couldn't remember where I'd put pictures of this tank, and was shocked to see new posts.

 

The pictures should all work still. I'm not really clear on why some of them are showing up only as URLs.

 

I've moved to a different state and this tank was taken down a while ago. Those yellow and blue zoanthids were gorgeous but I no longer have them. They appeared to be quite hearty and fairly fast growing when I did have them. Ironically, they showed their best colors in systems lit with less intense light. They looked more blue to me under PCs than they ever did under halides.

 

All the gorgonians in that tank were photosynthetic and rather hearty. Two things they liked were fairly strong flow and feeding. I mostly fed them dried cyclopeeze, which they had a visible feeding response to. Several of the gorgonians had semi-transparent polyps so it was possible to see the cyclopeeze in their guts after they'd eaten it. They also had a feeding response to DT's oyster eggs, but I couldn't see those in the gut.

 

For some reason, ricordea did not do well in this tank. I don't know if it was some sort of alleopathy or if they flow was just too strong. They all eventually shrank and detached from the rocks. If I were to do it again, I'd do gorgonians or ricordea but possibly not both...I think it'd allow me to figure out what went wrong. Possibly I could arrange currents in some other tank so the gorgs got enough and the rics weren't overwhelmed, but for that to work a larger tank really might be best.

[opipe73]

Very nice tank. I like the look and the Florida biotope. Keep up the good work.

[johnmaloney]

brushes wane as they spread, and then they grow back once the viability of the new groths is established, very cool that way that they risk sacrificing themselves for the new growths. One way to ease the pain is to trim the needles on the old brush, so they dont drop in your tank, and then wait it out. It will likely regrow the needles and allow the new sprouts to grow on their own.