This tank is going to have a variety of photosynthetic caribbean gorgonians, encrusting porites, macroalgaes, and sponges. It will have my mated pair of Ocellaris Clownfish (not a caribbean species but I thought they could use a larger tank to swim around in), and various caribbean fish species.
I am currently conjuring up ideas for an appropriate sized CUC here's what I'm thinking 25 dwarf cerith snails, 10 nassarius snails, 10 dwarf red tip hermit crabs, 1 pincushion urchin, 1 peppermint shrimp, and 10 porcelain crabs.
My fish list consists of my mated pair of ocellaris clowns, a mated pair of yellowhead jawfish, a few bridled gobies, and a mated pair of rusty gobies. My Inverts list (excluding the CUC inverts) consists of 3 flame scallops, ball sponges, yellow frilly sponges, various kinds of bivalves, 1 lettuce sea slug, featherdusters, and 2 sally lightfoot crabs.
I already have the tank drilled and plumbed in with a 1 1/2'' drain line and a 3/4'' water return, the water return has a 3/4'' SCWD and a 700GPH pump plumbed in it. I plumbed a blow-off valve into the pump return line so I can lessen the water pressure that the pump pushes out if needed. The pump will eventually be upgraded to a Mag-Drive 18 with a prefilter sponge attached to it. My sump is an AGA 10gal. but it will be upgraded to a 20H. My sump when all is done, is going to be a simple design because most of the filtering will be filtered via the gorgonians, sponges, macroalgae's, and deep sandbed etc.
I have already ordered my 36'' Nova Extreme pro with 6 X 39'' T5's. I'm going to replace the 3 actinics with 6000K Giesemann midday bulbs. I will heat the water with an 150W Ebo-Jager heater. I will run the setup without a Skimmer unless i find that there is excessive organic buildup.
It has 80lbs. of CarabSea Aragonite sand, 40lbs. of Caribbean Live Rock and R/O water in it. I spray painted the back of it krylon satin peekaboo blue ( thats the stupidest name for a color of spray paint imo).

All comments and suggestions are greatly welcomed

PICS

Full Tank Shot

Left Water Return

Right Water Return

Top Down Shot

Left Shot

Right Shot

Another Shot

Left Water Return Plumbing

Right Water Return Plumbing

SCWD

Drain Line Plumbing

Pic Showing Pump and Blow-Off Valve

Sump Shot

Tagging along here to watch the progress. I love reef flats and can't wait to see your design.

sounds like a cool project!

Thanks for the compliments on the new setup guys
Here's some pics of the environment I'm hoping to replicate somewhat accurately

Cool! I frequently snorkle that type of environment. Its pretty much just like that off smathers beach in Key West. I even saw a 4-5 foot hammerhead shark in 3 feet of water while snorkleing once in that area. Might be hard to fit a shark in your tank though!

Cool!! I'll have to take a rain check on the hammerhead shark

Could you guys recommend me some sites that sell Caribbean Gorgonians?

http://www.reeftopia.com/index.html

Thanks

Here is another.
http://sealifeinc.net/catalog/index.php?cP...ba433db8981144b

Sweet!

Oh I LOVE it !!! I think this is the first tank I've ever seen that doesn't have the usual pile 'o' rock. I love how you've placed your rocks almost flat with the sand. Very different from what's usually seen. I'm so looking forward to watching your build. Awesome photos too - thanks for sharing.

Thanks! I hope it will turn out at least half as good as some of the awesome tanks I've seen on NR

I found a site that sells a these cool caribbean sea fans
LINK
http://www.dreamaquatic.com/sea-stalk-gorgonia.html

Aquatic Connection seems to sell alot of photosynthetic caribbean gorgonians too
LINK
http://www.aquacon.com/seafan.html

a lil pricey don't ya think?

I just added a few more rocks to the tank, I'll post some more pics when the water clears up a bit

tagging along! sounds like a cool tank

Thanks!

I found a great deal on Tigriopus Copepods on Ebay $60 for 6 bottles of them and every bottle has 1000+ pods in it, so when the cycle is finished and when I get the macroalgae in there I'll take advantage of this deal
LINK

http://cgi.ebay.com/Live-Tigriopus-Copepod...3%3A1|294%3A200

looks good so far, cant wait to see some livestock!

Me too!! I'm practically bursting at the seams!!

looks like a cool idea. love the inspirational photos

Thanks

I just figured out that my 36'' Nova Extreme pro will be coming tomarrow, I'll make sure I take some pics of it when it comes

Could you guys recommend me a site that sells encrusting porites?

The light is up and running and everything looks great
PICS

Pic of The Nova Extreme pro 6X39W T5HO

Top View of The Light

Side view of The Light

I'll post some pics of the tank with the light on once I figure out how to get my camera to stop taking dim pics of it

Today I'm going to buy a heater from Foster & Smith and I'll buy a few pounds of LR from Sealifeinc in a week.

Heres some random pics of my tank (the camera doesn't do it justice)

I just ordered a CUC and some macro algaes from reefcleaners.org, I can't wait till it comes!

I bought 10 dwarf red tip hermit crabs last thursday 3 days after my diatom cycle started, needless to say the diatoms are all gone A couple of days ago I put the macro algae from my NC12 in the 40BR and that seems to be growing already. I just bought a red tree sponge today for $45 and it seems to be settling in nicely. Tomarrow my ReefCleaners.org order should be coming also.

{{{{{{PICS}}}}}}

Tree Sponge with lights on

Tree Sponge with lights off and flash on the camera

FTS with lights off and flash on

Another FTS with lights off and flash on

Left Side View with lights off and flash on

Right Side View with lights off and flash on

Sponge Over View with lights on

Side View with lights on

Sorry for the crappy pics I owe it all to my camera My tank is much brighter than it looks and hopefully someday I'll be able to afford a better camera

That looks great, i might have missed it but what are your stocking plans?

Thanks ,
Here are my stocking plans,
My fish list consists of my mated pair of ocellaris clowns, a mated pair of yellowhead jawfish, a few bridled gobies, and a mated pair of rusty gobies.
My Inverts list (excluding the CUC inverts) consists of 3 flame scallops, ball sponges, yellow frilly sponges, various kinds of bivalves, 1 lettuce sea slug, featherdusters, and 2 sally lightfoot crabs.

That sounds like a solid plan, the fish will look very very cool. Be careful with the flame scallops I think they are hard to keep. Good luck I cant wait to see it stocked.

Thanks I'll probably skip the flame scallops.

My Reefcleaners.org shipment came today and unfortunatly all 12 florida cerith snails were dead (and boy did the bag stink!), it was missing the 2 flame algaes I ordered, my shaving brush macroalgae's tube was badly damaged, the snails were packaged in what looked like a Zip-Loc bag, all the bags were packed loosely in the box with news paper, and the macroalgaes looked pale and small. When I told the mailman (I ordered through USPS) what was in the box he said it should have been marked keep in warm storage. So needless to say I probably won't be ordering from ReefCleaners.org in the future. I apologize if I offend anyone with the reports of my shipment and I hope I can make much with what I got , I'll post pics tomorrow.

Did you contact johhny at reefcleaners? Im sure he will definitely take care of you, I have had nothing but good results from him. Im sure hed be interested in hearing from you.

I'm Emailing him tonight, I just hope he'll refund me for the crap that died and the crap that didn't come

Im sure he will man hes a good guy to deal with.

Johnny ended up refunding me $25 so its all goooooooooooooood!

Great start. Keep those pics coming.

Updates?

UPDATE: My tree sponge unfortunately died probably due to the lack of bacteria and microorganisms in the water column. I moved my Gorgonians from my NC12 to the 40B and so far I have seen 1-2 inches of growth. I bought a large rusty gorgonian colony and a large knobby sea rod colony, both of them are doing fantastic. I brought over my Occelaris clown to the 40B, he seems to love all the swimming room and is doing great. I bought 2 large flame scallops, I have observed 1/2'' of growth on their shells. I've been making sure that the water stays nutrient rich for the scallops, gorgs, and macro algaes by adding in phytoplankton, and crushed flake food. I haven't done a waterchange in 2 months so far so good but I think in a week I'll do a water change to replenish the trace elements. I haven't put any filter material in my sump and have relied on the filter feeding inverts, gorgs, deep sandbed, and CUC for the filtration and I have observed superb results. I'll post some pics tomorrow.

lokking good, i feel you on the camera, i just dont know how to use mine tho

Sorry for the delay on the pics, I wasn't thinking and i put some phytoplankton in there so the water's a little cloudy but I will take some pics tomarrow for sure.

Here are the long awaited pics

FTS

Another FTS

More Pics













I posted a vid of the tank on YouTube and it's processing the upload and it should be done momentarily, so I'll post a link to it once it's finished.

It's a wonderful tank, but the water seems fairly cloudy. What are you running to keep it clear?

The Vid finished the upload process
LINK
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_ee8nv3xoog


It's cloudy cause it has some left over phytoplankton in it, I don't run any filter media of any kind cause the macro algaes, CUC, and Gorgonians filter out everything and because of it they grow much faster.

youre tank is sooooo coool!!!!!!!!!!!!!!



i LOVE the reef flat concept, its freekin awesome! keep it up looks great!




edit: just watched vid....you NEED a wavemaker (cycletimer is cheaper). if you had a cycletimer or wavemaker, your tank would totally pwn....jmo.