New to reefs. Coral selction help?

[nikkifro8994]

Sebastian chilling on the back of the arch rock

 

New baby blue leg that came on the zoas! He needs a Disney name.

 

And I found Flotsam!

[nikkifro8994]

How do I make my pictures not turn out so blue?

[Slowtwitch]

The nudis can be very small and the eggs will be hidden amongst the individual zoa polyps. Coral Rx may or may not kill the eggs. Probably not. Keep a close eye on things for the next few weeks. You'll likely find more.

[nikkifro8994]

Will do. I'll let you know if I find another one. Closed polyps could mean nudis, right? And open polyps with good colors are fine?

[Slowtwitch]

Typically, yes. You may see a nudi just hanging out or zipping across an open polyp or on a stalk. When they are closed up it is often because they are being eaten or at least chewed on.

[nikkifro8994]

More pics!

Took this zoa off its rock and glued it to my LR

Before moving

 

After moving

 

Also glues this one down

 

And my hammer has already started growing 2 tiny heads!

It didn't have these when I got it on Friday.

[nikkifro8994]

One of my crabs has decided to become a bully and attack the other three. He's now in what my aunt calls the "time-out tank" I'll try to reintroduce him in a week. If he's still being a bully, I'll trade him for a small zoa colony at the LFS.

 

[Jbrock183]

You are very smart to spend time planning your set up. I've lost hundreds of dollars by being overly anxious, so I admire your self-discipline. How is the tank coming along? Do you have more pics?

[nikkifro8994]

I had a bad nitrate spike because brilliant me forgot to take out the uneaten food on Saturday. I did a 25% water change to remove the nitrates. The zoas didn't mind it, but the hammer coral was mad. Started secreting this brown stupidly stuff. It's not looking too good right now. Hopefully it will recover. I hate to loose a coral I just bought because of my mistake. I'm going to let the pumps run overnight and test the water again in the morning. If the nitrates are still high, I'll change another 25%.

[nikkifro8994]

Nitrates are below 10 this morning. I have to leave right now, but I'll do a coralrx dip on the hammer when I get home. I researched brown jelly disease and believe that's what I have. The hammer doesn't have any more brown slime on it, but it's turning white and getting hard, like its dying.

[Slowtwitch]

Doesn't sound good. Probably not from a simple mistake like that though. More likely it was infected when you purchased it if it's only been in the tank a couple of days.

[nikkifro8994]

It looked perfectly fine until Sunday night. It's possible that it was infected already. I didn't have any coralrx to dip it in when I got it on Friday. It's only been in the tank for 4 days now. I just bought some coralrx this morning. I'll move it to a qt tank and try to save it. Here's hoping.

 

I saw 2 crabs picking at it just before I left the house. Hopefully they don't do more damage.

[nikkifro8994]

I did a 10 minute dip with revive on the hammer and both zoas. The baby heads in the hammer look decent, but the 2 big heads are in really bad shape. They're white and purplish brown. It was a green and purple hammer. All the corals are closed up. When the lights come on I'll post a new picture.

[Slowtwitch]

If you have brown jelly on those heads you'll be much farther ahead to cut them off and discard them before the rest of the coral becomes infected.

[nikkifro8994]

Hammer is gone. I've put it in its own tank. Maybe it'll turn around? In the meantime, I got 3 new corals to add. They're sitting in revive right now. QT tank for a week before they go into the display. I think I've learned my lesson from dealing with the infected hammer and the zoanthid eating Nudi problem.

[nikkifro8994]

Corals are all dipped and acclimated and in their QT. I'll post some pics tonight after the lights turn back on. I got 2 more zoa colonies and a button polyp.

 

Also, I got some extra shells for my hermit crabs and the LFS accidentally gave me two more crabs. Now I'm up to six, and I only wanted three. Will four blue legs, one Scarlett, and one unknown hermit all be okay in a 5 gallon tank?

[Han Solo]

I like your aquascape man.

 

Wanted to ask how what your opinion is about coral dripping? I've never done it for my corals in my 20g.

[nikkifro8994]

I don't drip mine. I just dip them in revive and make sure the temps are the same. But I only have zoas.

[nikkifro8994]

The hammer is officially gone. I want to replace it in a few weeks, but the LFS says since it's cold out, the divers aren't going deep enough to get good hammer corals. He suggested waiting until mid March to April when they'll get some nicer ones. The other (much bigger) LFS frags his own corals so he's almost always got the more popular ones.

 

New coral update: I found the names of the Zoa colonies. I have 4 polyps of cats eye zoas and about 8 polyps of goblins fire Zoas. Also, a single grandis button polyp. I'll try to post pics in the morning when they're open and happy. One of the free unintentional hermits (they're in the QT tank with the corals) loves to sit on top of the grandis polyp. The polyp doesn't like that so much. I moved it off the rock and onto the sand bed where, hopefully, the crab can't climb onto it. I'd hate to have a hermit that I really didn't want kill a coral that I really did.

[nikkifro8994]

I was moving some of the rock around in my tank this afternoon an found an enormous bristle worm! Ewwwwww!!!!!! I've seen a few little ones, about an inch long. But this one was easily 5 inches. And fat. And wiggly. And disgusting. I hate bristle worms, but I leave them in the tank because they're a great part of the CUC. I guess this guy his inside this rock when I downsized from my 29 gallon.

 

Tank update: The new corals are looking great still. No signs of bugs or diseases. Think I can move them over tomorrow?

The hermit crab is still knocking down and climbing all over the button polyp, no matter where I put it. It definitely needs to be glued down. The polyp doesn't seem to mind as much anymore. It stays partially open while the crab climbs on it. Do you think the crab can damage the polyp by climbing on it?

One of the new crabs is extremely fickle about which shell he wants to call home. He keeps changing his mind. He went between three different shells for almost an hour this evening before he stopped to eat. Then went back to switching shells.

Baby crab really wants to move into the biggest shell in the tank, even though the hole is bigger than his current shell.

The bully crab in the time out tank is molting, which is probably why he was being such a bully. I should have figured that. He's molted 4 times since I've had him and each time he will attack the other crabs if they look at him or get within a few inches. I put some bigger shells in his tank and he is contemplating which one he wants. Once he switches, I'll let him settle for a couple more days before I put him back in the main tank.

 

I never realized how much personality hermit crabs really have. Each one acts a little bit differently than the rest. I would expect that a little from species to species, but all 4 of my blue leg hermits are so different from eachother as well. And watching them change shells is probably my favorite part.

[nikkifro8994]

All the new corals are in the main tank and glued down. I had them in the spots I wanted them for 3 days before I glued them. I'm going out of town for the weekend but I promise to post pics by Monday night.