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Coral Vue Hydros

Solana 34g using TBS


MolokoPlus

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After a few years of having my biocube 14 I decided to upgrade about a month ago to a new solana 34g all in one. After looking at alot of options for liverock/sand I settled upon Tampa Bay Saltwater. I purchased "The Package" for about 435 dollars which included 68lbs of liverock 34lbs of live sand and a CUC consisting of 34 blue hermits, 15 snails, 2 tiger tail sea cucumbers, 1 serpent star and 1 peppermint shrimp. At the end of that week Richard dived for my rock and sand and sent me part 1 of "the package which consists of half the rock and all the sand. I picked it up the same day from the airport and must have drove 80mph all the way home.

 

I set up the tank, let the water clear and started looking around. There was almost no die off as he sends it in water. By the end of the first week I had found more hitchhikers than I could have ever expected. Right off the bat I found 2 baby tiger tail cucumbers that I put into my biocube anticipating them dying during the cycle. Also there were 6 or 7 porcelain crabs, 8 cowries, 2 chicken liver sponges, several cup corals, 100 or so live barnacles, red macro algae, various green macro algae(no ######ty hair algae), 4 blue leg hermit crabs, a 4 inch long spiral snail I still haven't identified, a bright blue Christmas tree worm, 8 feather dusters, 2 red mithrax crabs, a pistol shrimp about 1" long, peanut worms? i think thats what they are, a purple spined sea urchin about the size of a ping pong ball, about a dozen keyhole limpets and 4 or 5 other things I couldn't identify. To be fair I have to list the "bad" hitchhikers. I speared 4 of about 6 gorilla crabs and saw once but never got a half inch long green mantis shrimp. Needless to say I was blown away. This is the best live rock/sand I have ever seen and already felt I had my moneys worth.

 

I did have a slight problem with ammonia I used the powdered bacteria he sent me and it didn't seem to work for me so after 2 days of 15g water changes I went and bought liquid from the LFS and my ammonia was at 0 in 24 hours. My tank completely cycled 4 days after buying the liquid bacteria. Due to layoffs at work I waited 2 weeks to order package #2 today. Since this is a long read so far I will repost under this thread.

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Ok, Tonight I picked up package 2 from the airport I got the second half of my rock and the CUC listed in the package. But wait.....not only is there the listed CUC no no no, there were about 12 other bags of things I'm gonna list. Unfortunately my camera is in Dallas with my mother but rest assured I will be posting pics. 1 Flower anemone, 1 purple tipped condylactis anemone, 4 various colored Florida Ricordia 2 of which are dividing, 1 gorgonia, 1 purple sea fan, 1 8 inch tall red coral I need to identify(its soft with 3 fingers kinda looks like a saguaro cactus, 1 yellow ball sponge, 1 red and 1 orange wrinkly sponge type things i need to identify, 2 corals that look like maidens fans but they aren't a plant, a purple multi bladed coral I have to identify. 1 coral that looks like a gorgonian but much thicker with much larger polyps bright purple I need to identify. I couldn't be happier, would I have gone to my LFS and gotten all of these things it would have ran me over 1000$ id bet. Talk about a generous guy.

 

I know what alot might be thinking. Your tank is too young and your crazy for putting all that live coral in after 1 month.....i know i know. I am however fully prepared. I have 60g of saltwater ready for emergency changes the center chamber is my fuge containing about 40 cubic inches of Matrix rock, 1 full unit of chemi pure elite on top of the rock and about a half pound of chaeto with dual submersible 10w lights cleverly dremel'd through the top drip tray. I wont run my skimmer for at least a week or two and the bacteria I have is so good I don't foresee any problems.

 

I cannot wait to get pics of this and more so I cannot wait till I buy a house so I can get a 100+g tank with Tampa Bay Saltwater rock in it. In about a month I plan on adding maybe 1 fish and long term 4-6 months I will start putting my sps in , montipora, acropora, gonipora and so on.

 

 

I'm so bummed my camera is in Dallas ha ha.

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Sounds like a helluva "package" you got...

 

I look forward to seeing your pictures, and watching this tank progress. I'm in the process of upgrading to the same tank right now!

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Yeah, how can you live without that camera, teasing us like that!

 

I pulled a fast one....went to wall mart tonight since they have a 14 day return no questions asked policy and decided I'd "borrow" one of their cameras...LOL now for some pics...more will follow alot of stuff is hiding like all my porcelain crabs serpent star and sea cucumbers to name a few.

 

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several of these corals are not yet glued in place and placement will change...a few will go in my other tank so alot are just in there to keep alive for now.

 

 

Hmm.....all my pics im taking are like .13-.25MB to large to upload....any suggestions? I'm dont have alot of knowledge of digital cameras.

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I had to cut my megapixels from 10 down to 6.2 its just under limit so theres gonna be alot of posts...im a noob at posting pics so....yeah

 

flower nem, yellow ball sponge, i dont know what kind of sponge the red wrinkly thing is.

 

 

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3 florida ricordia 2 of which are dividing

 

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purple sea fan....one not attached will be moving to another tank.

 

 

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these look like maidens fans but they are a hard coral not a plant ...I cant identify

 

 

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Its purple, you cant tell by the pic but it has BRIGHT neon purple dots on the tips of the blades. also cant identify.

 

 

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gorgonia, orange wrinkly sponge behind it...I dont know what kind.

 

 

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not sure what this is ...it has some spots on it that look like they are dying but it came this way and was free.

 

 

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an attempt at an unhidden pic of that orange wrinkly sponge and some of the sponge growing on the liverock

 

 

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I think another gorgonian but this one is much thicker and has a bright purple skin when the polyps are retracted. a better picture of the sponge growing on the liverock

 

 

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another red sponge with holes in it..pretty neat

 

 

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rock is covered in these feather dusters

 

 

 

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tons of this red macroalgae on rock some caulerpa hardly recognizeable in this pic

 

 

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little condylactis...seemed almost dead on arrival but is reviving and starting to move from this spot

 

 

 

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I will work on getting more pictures but keep in mind none of these pictures were included in the package....hes just that cool of a guy...so generous and that to me is unheard of in this day and age. I cant say enough good things about my experience with Richard and cannot wait till I buy a house so I can get a 100+ tank with his rock in it.

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my purple sea urchin decided to come out of hiding so grabbed a couple shots.

 

 

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Its gonna take some time but there is so much stuff hiding i cant get pics of right now....all good things in all good time. I bought another batch of liquid bacteria anticipating a spike and recycle, water paramaters are all below toxic levels but not all 0 yet as they were before yesterday.

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wont decide that for a while yet..probably a month or more...3-6 months this is gonna be my sps/montipora tank with zoanthids a duncan polyp and lots of ricordia, I have different ricordia pinks and purples and blues in my other tank.

 

On a side note..I really encourage anyone to do business with TBS but If I could do it over I would have had him ship all the rock and sand in the first shipment waited a month then had him send the CUC and goodies. Also I recommend buying liquid bacteria instead of using the dry he sends, for a 34g my LFS charged me 19 dollars for the ammount of bacteria needed for a 34 and it turned my ammonia problem which was sticking a little over 1ppm to 0ppm in about 24-36 hours. Saved me a TON of water changes.

 

unfortunately with the way I had to stack the rock to keep it stable I cant get a pic of the bright blue christmas tree worm on the backside of one of the rocks he sent. =(

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Wow, some pretty awesome stuff! Beautiful tank! What kind of fish will you get?

 

 

We nice set-up, I may have done that Wal-Mart scam before if I remember correctly. I love the tank, make sure you get a powerhead of some kind in there for better flow.

 

 

Bruce

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We nice set-up, I may have done that Wal-Mart scam before if I remember correctly. I love the tank, make sure you get a powerhead of some kind in there for better flow.

 

 

Bruce

 

One of the powerheads are hidden behind rock . It seems like it has pretty good flow, do you think I need to add an extra? Im still blown away at all the free stuff he never mentioned would come with package 2 that he sent. If I were to purchase all that stuff at our LFS it would have ran me probably 50% more than I paid just for the rock sand and CUC. Unbelievable......

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TriggerHappyDude

Wow really nice stuff you got. Hope the water stays stabilized.

I'll be tagging along to see what all grows on you!

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This was one single Ric that just appeared about 8 inches away from the main colony in my other tank, It was too close to one of my Torches so I pulled him off the rock fearing hed die anyway from the torch.....I glued him to a rock and to my surprise not only did he not die he divided. These were about 2x the size in my Biocube 14 but as soon as I put em under the 150w MH they halved in size...In the biocube they would often make a "cup shape" upwards toward the light and were a little bigger than a half dollar coin I guess they are happier? I dunno but heres the pic.

 

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another angle

 

 

 

 

 

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despite the appearance almost the entire sandbed is open, the bottom largest rock is basically one big dome. I dont understand this guy he hangs out on rocks while the other scours the sandbed under the 30lb single baserock.

 

 

 

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3 days in with that final shipment. My levels havent gone beyond .50 ammonia, 20ppm nitrate or .25 nitrite. Doing a 10g water change now and will do another tonight and will probably add another 18$ worth of liquid bacteria after those 2 changes. Had some sponge die off and have gotten some more bad hitchikers out. I underestimated that 32lb baserocks ability to spike that much even with adding fresh bacteria when I put it in. Hindsight is 20/20 next time I order I will definitely get all the rock and sand first then after a month have him send the CUC and goodies.

 

Good news is nothing seems stressed and the pic I posted of that red thing I still havent identified is healing where the bad spots were In previous post.

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Tank update.

 

 

The first 2 stages of my cycle have semi-normalized. I am however having a problem with my nitrates. I have added the 2 activated carbon pouches that came with the kit but am experiencing an end cycle spike that is proving tough to control. Also experiencing a brown algae bloom on walls and parts of sand.

 

I am considering employing a vodka/sugar dosing regiment to bring the nitrates in order, but am in the process of researching said technique. No deaths other than 1 snail quickly removed after not moving for 2 days. Nothing seems stressed except for myself. I forgot what it feels like to have toxic levels of nitrates. I have gone through the 60 gallons of aerated/heated water changes and am on my 2nd bucket of salt.

 

All negative aspects aside, I still have never seen such beautiful liverock/sand. Will still fully support TBS package but would, as I stated before, get all the rock and sand in package 1 and buy liquid bacteria. Wait a month or 2 then get the livestock. He is so generous and I was not prepared for all of the extras. This is my only downfall I suspect in this endeavor.

 

sidenote: I dont think it is a good idea to aerate the waterchanges if you have no fish......this in theory will only feed undesireable bacteria/algae/unknowns. Could be wrong only going by education.

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That Purple plant looking thing I cant Identify has shed its "skin" twice and has grown polyps. Pretty amazing to watch the transformation...I almost yanked it thinking it was dying and polluting...heres a pic. Keep in mind its low res I have to drop to 5megapixels to fit on these forums.

 

 

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On a sad note all of my mexican caulerpa and red macro algae has been devoured by my CUC. I really wanted that red macro to stick around.

 

On a funny note, on my way out the door to work one day while my wife was asking me when we could start putting new things in the tank I didnt notice my devout christian neighbors behind me when I spouted out "I have to get rid of my crabs first" referring to the gorilla crabs......shoulda seen the look on their faces...I knew there was no way to explain so I just walked to my car redfaced.

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I employed the Vodka technique and it stabilized my water parameters. Still dealing with gorilla crabs but have plenty of time to deal with the remaining few. Still 7 porcelain crabs alive and well among the other livestock listed. Lost 1 Florida ricordia but am hopefull that it will re appear later and was just washed away by the current. Have several corals I do not want in this tank and am considering buying a biocube 29 to transfer these to. Saw about a 1inch molt of a pistol shrimp so that eases my mind a bit but am still sure I saw a green mantis. Just an update everything seems to be happy.

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