RollaJase's 30G Custom Cube - Tank Torn Down

[jack1978]

Congrats on everything man!

[jbb]

Tank is looking awesome !!

 

 

 

 

 

i really need to get my sump in order after seeing this. Thanks for making me work.

[markalot]

Coaxed some more flow out of the sump, tweaked a few other things, now the temp is sitting pretty and the whole thing is quieter then before. Also re-made my return line as I didn't like it originally.

 

Time for a NEW FTS! Gave the tank a good clean over the weekend, put the filter sock through its paces...twice, even cleaned the glass a tad.

 

Zoas going strong:

 

What will be my new LPS island:

 

Blurry Chalice island:

 

 

Went into town with my mother also to pick up some fish food amongst other things. Had to go to the hardware store to pick something up and while there I saw the owner of the local LFS, he said I had to come past and see what he had just gotten in. The LFS was our last stop so on the way home anyway so we stopped by to see what he was so excited to show me. We walk in and I head over to his coral tank to see what they had, as usual my mother gets drawn over to the fish so after taking a quick look at the corals i meet her at the 200G tank they use to house softies and fish (they are in the process of building another huge rack system for fish and SPS). The first thing I notice (after seeing the 20 or so Anthias, numerous fairy wrasses and the huge purple tang) was roughly half a dozen baby blue mandarins. The owner comes over and has a chat as usual and exclaims that he has a surprise for me. He knows that I have been fond of the mandarins for a while now and have always been fascinated by the large one he has in his display tank. After my mother immediately falling in love with 'pretty fishy' I was in the process of explaining to her how specialised their diets are etc. etc. when the owner dumps in a while cup of frozen food he had been thawing in the canopy of the tank. As usual, all the fish go into a frenzy, including the mandarins. I thought they were trying to stay out of the way of the larger fish but as everything started to calm down I could see that they were taking brine shrimp out of the water collumn. I was immediately excited and when I asked the owner how much he wanted for one he came back at $50 and my heart sank. $50 is a fair price for one eating frozen foods, they usually cost around $40 for an untrained fish but with me needing to pay the insurance on my car on top of saving to go away it is too much money for me to spare. I was getting ready to buy the frozen foods I needed when mum pipes up and says we aren't leaving the store without the 'pretty fishy'. Now knowing fully well that it would eat frozen foods and suit my tank she insisted she buy one for me. So here is the newest addition to my little reef .

Don't mind the spots, just some slime with some sand stuck to it.

 

Page quote. Looks fantastic, good luck with the Mandy.

[RollaJase]

Congrats on everything man!

Thanks Jack , I'm really happy with things now. I just need to get some nice acros and I'm set haha.

 

Tank is looking awesome !!

 

 

 

 

 

i really need to get my sump in order after seeing this. Thanks for making me work.

Thank you and any time . Was definitely worth getting the sump in there. I am glad I took the extra time in planning to make sure it all went in with minimal hassles and was able to maximise my water volume.

 

Page quote. Looks fantastic, good luck with the Mandy.

Thanks Mark. I got a nice close look at the mandy this morning before my light cycle started. It is a little on the thin side but showed good energy yesterday and was grazing on some of the rocks. Even took some baby brine when I fed last night, I also got some frozen lobster eggs which it seemed to like.

[D Z]

Awesome on the Mandarin. Now you need to get him eating mysis. Make sure you are soaking the brine in something that will enrich it as brine by itself is not very nutrient rich. I have been thinking about getting one for my 34, just need to find someone with it already trained as I just don't have the time to do that right now.

[Jstn]

Tank is looking great, no surprise!

[RollaJase]

Awesome on the Mandarin. Now you need to get him eating mysis. Make sure you are soaking the brine in something that will enrich it as brine by itself is not very nutrient rich. I have been thinking about getting one for my 34, just need to find someone with it already trained as I just don't have the time to do that right now.

When I feed brine it is only ever the Hikari Spirulina baby brine, my other preffered food is the Ocean Nutritian Marine Mix which have a wide mix of mysis, brine and fleshier fish pieces. I get great feeding response from all fish and even corals using this mixture. I have been wanting to get something to add to this mix though, was thinking of giving a garlic solution or Selcon a try. The issue with the mandy currently is how small it is, literally about 1" long from beak to tail, it has trouble tackling the larger pieces of brine. Last night I fed my tank as a whole and when things started to settle down I directly fed the mandy with some crushed baby brine and some lobster eggs which it loved. I can't comment on ease of care right now but i absolutely love this fish. It is slowly starting to explore the tank a little more and is grazing off pods on the rocks and glass.

 

Tank is looking great, no surprise!

Thanks man, your tank is looking pretty awesome as well. The upgrade is going well I see?

[D Z]

When I feed brine it is only ever the Hikari Spirulina baby brine, my other preffered food is the Ocean Nutritian Marine Mix which have a wide mix of mysis, brine and fleshier fish pieces. I get great feeding response from all fish and even corals using this mixture. I have been wanting to get something to add to this mix though, was thinking of giving a garlic solution or Selcon a try. The issue with the mandy currently is how small it is, literally about 1" long from beak to tail, it has trouble tackling the larger pieces of brine. Last night I fed my tank as a whole and when things started to settle down I directly fed the mandy with some crushed baby brine and some lobster eggs which it loved. I can't comment on ease of care right now but i absolutely love this fish. It is slowly starting to explore the tank a little more and is grazing off pods on the rocks and glass.

 

Thanks man, your tank is looking pretty awesome as well. The upgrade is going well I see?

Cool! Wow, at 1" that is tiny! Good luck, I hope it does well. Can't wait to see more pics.

[RollaJase]

Cool! Wow, at 1" that is tiny! Good luck, I hope it does well. Can't wait to see more pics.

Thanks , I guess I have the advantage of getting it trained on a few other foods as it grows. So far it seems happy on the BBS/Lobster egg mix and grazing on pods throughout the day. When it becomes a little more adventurous I'll snap a few extra pictures.

[RollaJase]

Everything is good in tank land. Alk is stable at 10.0dKH, Cal at 420ppm and Mag is slowly rising up from 1200ppm to 1300ppm (1280ppm at the moment). My prized chalice had started receding, pretty sure due to low Mag so I am hoping bringing it up to 1300-1350ppm will help it out a little.

 

I am loving having a filter sock. I blow off my rocks once during the week and again on the weekend and I catch so much detritus. Even after my skimmer has had its fill (has never performed this well, getting 2 cups of skimmate a week) the sock is still catching a lot of gunk. I'm wanting to get some coral snow in to try to further improve things. Next online order maybe.

[Sk8n Reefer]

Tanks looking good - great color on those orange shrooms!

[RollaJase]

Tanks looking hood - great color on those orange shrooms!

Thanks . Those orange/red schrooms grow like wild fire. They out compete each other and every now and then one will drop off and I attach it to a piece of LR rubble and trade it back to the LFS for more haha.

[Sk8n Reefer]

Thanks . Those orange/red schrooms grow like wild fire. They out compete each other and every now and then one will drop off and I attach it to a piece of LR rubble and trade it back to the LFS for more haha.

Ya- trading in stock for more is awesome- I was doing that with Clavularia . Those are really sharp looking shrooms- your Zoo garden is nice too- good top down shot

[Rehype]

Looks great jase as usual

[Chris!]

Looks great and congrats on the little mandy and having it eating frozen already

[metrokat]

Mandarins are absolutely beautiful, their personalities, their colors, just beautiful. So happy you found ine already trained. See if it will eat NLS pellets for more complete nutrition. OVA is still not available but over by your neck of the woods they have lobster eggs made by ocean nutrition.

[RollaJase]

Ya- trading in stock for more is awesome- I was doing that with Clavularia . Those are really sharp looking shrooms- your Zoo garden is nice too- good top down shot

Yeah I'm really lucky that my local LFS is happy to give me credit for them. I list zoas on Gumtree locally (sorta like craigslist) and sell a few frags that way, get much more out of it doing it that way then taking them back to the LFS. I 'm really happy with how the zoa garden has turned out. Separating everything onto individual rocks has made it so much easier to remove colonies for fragging or to clean the sand bed. Also allows me to rotate them around when I get tired of how it looks haha.

 

Looks great jase as usual

Thanks Eugene, everything is looking great on your end also. When are we going to see some more pics of the tank as a whole ?.

 

Looks great and congrats on the little mandy and having it eating frozen already

Thanks Chris . To be honest, I never would have purchased it if it wasn't already eating frozen, don't want to have to go through the headache and potential heart ache of having to train one to eat foods from scratch. It seems to be a growing trend lately that any mandarins that come in locally eat frozen foods. I know there are only a handful of wholesalers (if that) that reputable stores use for live stock so either someone is breeding them locally for sale or they are taking the effort to make sure they are eating at the wholesalers prior to shipping.

 

Mandarins are absolutely beautiful, their personalities, their colors, just beautiful. So happy you found ine already trained. See if it will eat NLS pellets for more complete nutrition. OVA is still not available but over by your neck of the woods they have lobster eggs made by ocean nutrition.

I absolutely love the little guy Kat , I have admired yours for a long time also. This little guy is still really shy but is getting more adventurous by the day. Even let me get close enough tonight so squirt some baby brine right in front of him with a turkey baster during feeding. I'm lucky enough that my LFS stocks the entire Ocean Nutrition range, I used to have to drive into the big city to get it. Their Marine Mix, Rotifiers and now their Lobster Eggs are pretty much the foundation of my frozen feeding. I use the Hikari Spirulina Brine also and have tried their Rotifiers also (wasn't a fan of the Rotifiers). I have the NLS pellets so I'll try to incorporate them into my next feeding, the rest of my fish go crazy for them. Thanks for the tip Kat .

[RollaJase]

So, as of this afternoon my car is ready for collection .

Downside is I am unable to collect today, they aren't open on weekends and I'm not sending anyone there to pick it up without me seeing it first. So I'll be swinging by around 7am Monday morning to have a look before I fork over the cash.

[Giga]

Lookin good in the neighborhood

[gena]

Everything looks awesome, Jase! Great news about the car!!! I hope they did a nice job for you . Cute new mandy . I wish I could get some lobster eggs around here!

[RollaJase]

Lookin good in the neighborhood

Thanks Giga!

 

Everything looks awesome, Jase! Great news about the car!!! I hope they did a nice job for you . Cute new mandy . I wish I could get some lobster eggs around here!

Thanks Gena , can't wait to pick the car up again, I've felt stranded the last 2 months. I love the little mandy, such a cute little fish. The lobster eggs are a great substitute but this little guy will pretty much eat anything that it can fit in its little beak!

 

Here are a few pics I took on my phone tonight of the little guy hunting for lobster eggs in the zoas .

[4x5]

Looking good man. The Mandarin is cute.

[markalot]

Glad to see the Mandy is doing well. Those rocks look like great hunting grounds. I'm going to add a Mandarin in a few more months, one I confirm my pod population is stable. I'm not sure what my ruby headed wrasse is eating and he may decimate the pod population.

[RollaJase]

Looking good man. The Mandarin is cute.

Thanks dude. Things are starting to look a lot better, I just need to get some more SPS in here .

 

Glad to see the Mandy is doing well. Those rocks look like great hunting grounds. I'm going to add a Mandarin in a few more months, one I confirm my pod population is stable. I'm not sure what my ruby headed wrasse is eating and he may decimate the pod population.

Thanks Mark. Yep this guy just cruises around and demolishes pods all day and then eats like a pig when I feed in the evening. I'm glad I was able to find one trained on frozen and isn't fussy about what it eats haha. I'm getting quite a pod population in the sump now so will be transferring a few chunks of rock from the sump to the display every now and then to transfer some over. My blenny goes after the pods as well but they will pretty much east anything they can.

[gena]

Thanks Gena , can't wait to pick the car up again, I've felt stranded the last 2 months. I love the little mandy, such a cute little fish. The lobster eggs are a great substitute but this little guy will pretty much eat anything that it can fit in its little beak!

Mine seems to be doing ok with the cyclopeeze and live pods. You are lucky yours isn't a picky eater . Awesome hunting photos!