jc2014 Posted March 13, 2014 Author Share Posted March 13, 2014 Looks like alkalinity and pH may be dropping. I only have rocks sand and my CUC.My turbo is showing signs of weakness: clumsy movement, shell seems heavy for it. I've been supplementing his diet with some ocean nutrition seaweed, but the guy is a horrible messy clumsy eater. I definitely overdid it with 2 bigger snails. The tiger trochus is probably all I needed. Hermits seem fine. Nassarius also seems ok. It climbs the glass from time to time and then slides down quickly, kinda weird. An energetic stomatella also comes out at night.Tank is really clean. Not sure how long the snails will last. :-( Link to comment
jc2014 Posted March 15, 2014 Author Share Posted March 15, 2014 Using the hydrometer I bought a month ago or so but never opened until today, I found out that my salinity was way too high. This might have been what was stressing my snails out. Exchanging RO/DI fresh water for ~750mL of tank water I was able to gradually bring it down to 1.025 SG. The hydrometer was reading over 1.030 at first test. Who knows what it really was... I will eventually get a refractometer or that snazzy Milwaukee digital tester, but the hydrometer will have to do for now. In other news, one of my Mexican red tipped hermits molted, and I think my snails look better after the salinity drop. I hope to keep the suckers alive and happy for as long as I can. Link to comment
jc2014 Posted March 19, 2014 Author Share Posted March 19, 2014 This past Sunday 3/16/2014, I went and got my first coral frags and some PE mysis shrimp to provide more diversity in terms of feeding my tank. The corals are currently sitting low in a frag rack and are looking good. Once confirmed as happy and healthy, I'll figure out proper placement. I obtained the following frags: 1 blue actinodiscus/discosoma mushroom 1 orange rhodactis 1 pink zoanthids (pencil eraser size, 1 head) 1 orange zoanthids (small sized, 4 heads) The 2 snails and 4 hermits are still partying it up every night. A yellow stomatella also roams around at night. Funny story, this past Monday, my larger red-tipped hermit (the one who I think molted) was harassing my turbo snail. While the snail was sleeping on the glass near the substrate the hermit would climb on top of the snail, and try to pry him off the glass. I knocked the hermit off and relocated him to the far end of the tank a couple times. The hermit then tried to mess with the snail a third time and got walloped by my turbo's super fast shell retracting defense. The hermit was dazed a bit, and then he hobbled away in defeat. Hopefully he doesn't try that again. Link to comment
jc2014 Posted March 22, 2014 Author Share Posted March 22, 2014 I am preparing to remove the seeding rubble from my tank. In the coming week I'll put the pieces into a makeshift refugium, an AC50 filter. We'll see how it goes. Here's my tank as of 3/21/2014. Other good news is that coralline algae is starting to grow on the back glass. Link to comment
jc2014 Posted March 28, 2014 Author Share Posted March 28, 2014 Got a green psammocora from a fellow reef keeper.Here's an interesting side shot of my tank.Here's a close up of two hitchhikers I've grown to accept as wonderful tenants. These pictures were taken with an iPad. Link to comment
jc2014 Posted April 5, 2014 Author Share Posted April 5, 2014 I procured an Ecotech Marine MP10wes! It is noisier than my Koralia Nano 240, so not sure if I like that. Anybody in the DC area have the latest 2.2 firmware? I would like to upgrade. Mine is on 1.7. Link to comment
jc2014 Posted April 13, 2014 Author Share Posted April 13, 2014 Crap, I had my first loss this morning. My Tiger Trochus climbed into my AC50, and got himself sucked into the impeller chamber. He had done this before without issue, so I thought nothing of it. It looks like he had a gruesome death. I've dropped the shell and what's left of him within the shell into the tank to let my scavengers and hermits have at him... good bye friend... I will not fill the water so high next time so that you crawl into that death trap again, but thanks for cleaning it up before your passing. Your spirit will live on in maybe a replacement Tiger Trochus. Link to comment
jc2014 Posted April 13, 2014 Author Share Posted April 13, 2014 Wait a second... TIGER TROCHUS LIVES!!!! the shell is moving in the tank!!! Wooo hooo no loss! Link to comment
jc2014 Posted May 13, 2014 Author Share Posted May 13, 2014 Tank is healthy, looks like my pink/purple coralline algae growth has slowed, and is being replaced with green coralline (I scrape the glass). I'm thinking it might be due to the MP10 versus the Koralia Nano 240 I had. There is coralline growing on the rocks now, so that is good. I've seen colonista snails on the rocks. They are so tiny. On the bad side, I also have a digitate hydroid outbreak. Hopefully they will just go away with time. I am going to feed the tank less, and possibly do more frequent water changes, to see if that helps. In my AC50 refugium, tunicates and pineapple sponges are multiplying. As far as my corals, the mini zoa frag has grown a couple new polyps, the rhodactis mushroom has grown a bit, the blue discosoma looks the same, and my pink single polyp zoa has not changed one bit. I'm considering upgrading my lights to increase coral growth. Link to comment
jc2014 Posted July 2, 2014 Author Share Posted July 2, 2014 It's been a while since I've posted. Believe it or not, not much has changed. I did end up having to move, and move the tank, which was quite a bit of fun even for a 10 gallon. Everything survived. The water parameters are looking good and stable, and corallline algae continues to grow on my rocks, Collonista snails are popping up here and there, and I did see a baby bristleworm climbing the glass the other day. Unfortunately I still have digitate hydroids, but they look to be diminishing in numbers. As for my livestock: my two red-tipped hermits are molting my SPS psammocora has had significant growth and is taking over the shell I attached it to the orange micro zoas have grown 3 new polyps the blue discosoma and orange rhodactis haven't grown too much the medium pink zoa is still just one polyp stomatella hitchhiker has tripled in size! turbo and tiger trochus are growing (their shells have grown) I am going to upgrade my lighting, as I suspect that it could be the reason I haven't seen much growth. Hopefully I don't kill anything in the process. Light acclimation here I come! Link to comment
jc2014 Posted August 7, 2014 Author Share Posted August 7, 2014 So I splurged on a Tunze 9001 DOC Comline Protein Skimmer. It is too big for my tank. Stupid me. I may go the mame glass or gnome-glass route... I should have measured, the excitement of new equipment bit me good... Anyone interested in it? I have posted it for sale in the Hardware Classifieds... I could eat the restocking fee with a return or resell it to a fellow reef aquarist. Link to comment
jc2014 Posted August 16, 2014 Author Share Posted August 16, 2014 I've upgraded my lighting with an Ocean Revive T247. This thing is bright! It's definitely a big step up compared to the Finnex FugeRay fixture I have been using since I started the tank. Right now I only have it set to 3% intensity on both Channel 1 (Blue) and Channel 2 (White+Others). I'll step it up slowly, but I'm not sure how high I really need to go. I'm hoping that this will improve coral growth, Other updates: the little blue discosoma propogated itself through budding the largest red-tip hermit crab has died. I think my other hermits ganged up on him while he was molting. Is it possible that he grew too large for his shell and he didn't have a rightly sized shell to make a new home? psammocora continues to thrive and grow. no growth on the zoas. hoping the new light fixture will promote growth. Link to comment
jc2014 Posted August 19, 2014 Author Share Posted August 19, 2014 I bought more coral this past weekend. Here's the list of new specimens. green duncan - 1 head red-orange montipora metallic green-blue discosoma mushroom pink clove polys - 2 polyps I fed the duncan some mysis shrimp last night... It's fun to watch it eat. I'll try to post some pics tonight. Link to comment
jc2014 Posted August 21, 2014 Author Share Posted August 21, 2014 Here are a couple FTSs to showcase my new setup and light fixture. It's been a while since I took one. I've got some work ahead of me in terms of figuring out where to place all the coral on the rock. Here is the monti I got. It has a vermetid snail living with it that I am trying to kill... the little bugger is persistent and has been able to chew through the glue prison I made for it. There is also a small 1 inch orange bristleworm that lives in between the frag plug and the coral itself. kinda freaky... Here are the pink clove polyps. The green duncan This electric blue-green mushroom blows up when the lights turn on, it shrinks quite a bit when the lights go out. To show the growth of the psammocora, here is what it looks like now. Compare this with the post from March 27. Link to comment
jc2014 Posted November 18, 2014 Author Share Posted November 18, 2014 Wow I haven't posted in a while. Recent news, I have a fish! It's a royal dottyback. He will be the only fish in the tank due to my tank capacity and his aggressiveness. He is a bit of a terror in the tank, and I notice that the hermit crabs stay put during the daytime. The nassarius snail also stays buried more these days. All of the isopods I used to see are hiding. Before adding the fish, the sand was crawling with them. I'll post pictures when I have a chance. Link to comment
jc2014 Posted November 22, 2014 Author Share Posted November 22, 2014 Meet Mckenzie the Royal Dottyback. He has a nervous energy and is a voracious eater. I feed him PE mysis and Hikari Marine S pellets. A couple times I fed him so much I thought his belly would explode... I have dialed down the amount that I feed now... Here is a wide-angled FTS... it's more of an artsy fartsy shot. Lastly, my green duncan, that I bought as a single head, has sprouted a new head! This coral is a hog as well. It's fun watching it feed on mysis shrimp. It's like little shop of horrors! Link to comment
jc2014 Posted February 16, 2015 Author Share Posted February 16, 2015 I've had another lapse in posting . Not much to update though. I've added a few astrea snails, a few blue leg hermits, and a few tiny cerith snails. A while ago, I added a red bumpy mushroom, and it has had babies. More recently I added some GSP, non-flourescent pink briareum, a tuft of dragons breath macro, and some yellow polyps (also non-flourescent). Everything seems to be doing ok. I'm battling some kind of stringy algae, likely dinos. Coral growth is a bit stunted (still figuring that out with regular water testing, altering photoperiods and intensity, as well as altering water change parameters- volume and frequency). My royal dottyback, Mckenzie, is still always darting around and loves to eat. When the lights go out he hides in one of his caves. That's when my snails and crabs go to work. If Mckenzie catches smaller members of the clean up crew moving in the day, they usually get harassed and end up turned over on their backs. This dottyback is an a-hole. I'll try to post some photos soon. Link to comment
jc2014 Posted February 19, 2015 Author Share Posted February 19, 2015 Yay, I've surpassed the one year mark... new goal, let's see if I can make it to 2 years... Ok so here are my latest additions to the tank. Please excuse the dirty glass, photobombing dottyback, collonista snails, and bubble algae. Some dragons breath, halymenia. It's doing ok so far... i guess it's kind of growing. It has a really nice glow under blue light, and has those fiery tips. A couple sprigs of GSP. Some plain non-flourescing briarium. Some refer to them as Pinks Star Polyps. Yellow Polyps. These are taking off and are growing babies. Link to comment
jc2014 Posted April 15, 2015 Author Share Posted April 15, 2015 Time flies. Tank is still doing it's thang. Will provide an update and some photos tonight. Ah hell... I can't help myself... here are some updates... Two of my Astrea snails died, I believe it was either from starvation or from dinos. Not too long ago I did a 69 hour blackout of the tank to battle the issue, and ta-dah no more stringy crap growing or floating around. A water change was completed shortly after the blackout, and I prepared to run carbon, but I ended up not doing it. Also my light cycle and intensity have been reduced to levels much lower than prior to the blackout. I'm slowly (week by week) ramping it up again, but things are looking actually better than I can ever remember. This past weekend I picked up a frag of a purple/mint green blastomussa merletti. So far it's opened, and I'm looking forward to feeding it. Link to comment
jc2014 Posted November 19, 2015 Author Share Posted November 19, 2015 fts update? Huge gap in coverage I know. I'll try to get some updated photos up soon. The Red/Pink Monti has grown quite a bit. Red mushrooms have budded a lot. GSP and Pink Briareum are slowly taking over. My fish, McKenzie the Dottyback, is still an a-hole. Link to comment
jc2014 Posted February 4, 2016 Author Share Posted February 4, 2016 April 2015 FTS Also was the start of the dinoflagellate plague that led me to 2 cycles of 72 hour blackouts . I think it also killed my snails. On the plus side, the Red Monti started to show signs of growth. June 2015 FTS Blasto and Duncan become BFFs McKenzie the dottyback makes a mess and covers my corals with sand... bastard... Got a couple new cool Zoa frags from SaltCritters. Link to comment
jc2014 Posted February 4, 2016 Author Share Posted February 4, 2016 Ok fast-forward to today... the GSP is starting to take over the rocks... So at some point I'm going to have to do something about that. FTS My mushrooms are not as big anymore but there are more of them now. The duncan and blasto are still buddies and they have spawned more heads. I picked up a splatter hammer coral frag, its slowly growing. The montipora has plated out quite a bit... I may have to start fragging that soon as well. Link to comment
Droy008 Posted February 4, 2016 Share Posted February 4, 2016 if you frag out that monti let me know, I love that red color. Link to comment
jc2014 Posted February 4, 2016 Author Share Posted February 4, 2016 if you frag out that monti let me know, I love that red color. Sure, I'll let you know. I've never done fragging before though. I'm thinking I can just break off pieces. Nice Fusion 10 tank! It's looking awesome. I really like that Pom Pom crab. Link to comment
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