Teenyreef's IM40 Not-So-Teeny Tank - August FTS

[teenyreef]

Zoa archipelagos! Should look super nice. Man, i wish I had better luck with zoas. I always wanted some of the Tubbs Blues.

I've got some in the 10g tank, but right now they're mostly closed up and getting smaller Hoping for an upswing soon, or I may try moving them into this tank just to see if they like it better here.

The wrasse looks more vibrant red than I thought they were. He's a pretty boy.

I'm looking forward to getting a real picture of him someday. Today I saw him out for whole seconds at a time in a five minute period. So I think he's gradually getting braver

[teenyreef]

I've been dosing MB 7 daily and it's helping a bit with the nitrate levels - down to 3, from 5 earlier this week. But PO4 has continued to rise:

7/15: .06

7/23: .13

7/26: .27 (eek)

 

And this is after I added GFO for the first time on the 23rd. I don't have a reactor, so the effectiveness of the GFO is probably limited just hanging in a bag in the media basket, but clearly it's not doing much.

 

As an experiment, I'm going to try the Brightwell Xport products for NO3 and PO4. They don't require a reactor and don't have to be replaced often. I know Kat has used these in her tank and really liked them so we'll see what happens

[thilankasp]

The fish looks fantastic.. Too bad my 26G is too small for a dwarf angel.. Everything looks great..

[1.0reef]

once you get that deep blue 80g, you can have a bunch of dwarf angels! I saw a juvi Gold Flake angel today at the LFS. It's amazing. $350. On sale. lol.

On sale? Damn that's way over priced lol.

[metrokat]

I've been dosing MB 7 daily and it's helping a bit with the nitrate levels - down to 3, from 5 earlier this week. But PO4 has continued to rise:

7/15: .06

7/23: .13

7/26: .27 (eek)

 

And this is after I added GFO for the first time on the 23rd. I don't have a reactor, so the effectiveness of the GFO is probably limited just hanging in a bag in the media basket, but clearly it's not doing much.

 

As an experiment, I'm going to try the Brightwell Xport products for NO3 and PO4. They don't require a reactor and don't have to be replaced often. I know Kat has used these in her tank and really liked them so we'll see what happens

This is such a young tank Teeny, I wonder why phosphates are so high.

Yeah try the Xport stuff, I highly recommend it. IT doesn't require a reactor so that is a bonus IMO. The nitrate cubes have to be used upstream of the Phosphate cubes. So I put the nitrate cubes in my skimmer chamber and the phosphate cubes in my return pump chamber.

[teenyreef]

This is such a young tank Teeny, I wonder why phosphates are so high.

Yeah try the Xport stuff, I highly recommend it. IT doesn't require a reactor so that is a bonus IMO. The nitrate cubes have to be used upstream of the Phosphate cubes. So I put the nitrate cubes in my skimmer chamber and the phosphate cubes in my return pump chamber.

Thanks, Kat! I agree, I've been wondering the same thing about the PO4. Until two weeks ago it was rock solid at .06 for weeks and weeks. I think it's either too much feeding because I want to make sure the new fish didn't starve, or possibly my RODI water. I noticed a few weeks ago that TDS had crept up from 0 to 3, and I know I did at least a couple water changes with that water. I guess it's possible that's caused it, but I wouldn't have though just a couple water changes would make that much difference.

 

Or it could jbe too many new fish in two or three weeks, and the biological filter is still just catching up. Or probably a combination of all three. I've tried hard to go slow with this tank but I've definitely gone a little faster than I should in adding three fish over the last three weeks.

 

I really like the fact it doesn't need a reactor. I have a huge inTank media basket, and it's probably big enough for both sets of cubes in the two bottom chambers. Otherwise I'll put the nitrate cubes in the basket, and the PO4 cubes in the second chamber, which is empty right now.

On sale? Damn that's way over priced lol.

I have a hard time paying for anything that expensive, much less something that could die three days after I get it

The fish looks fantastic.. Too bad my 26G is too small for a dwarf angel.. Everything looks great..

Thanks! To me, with my experience with 4g and 10g tanks, he looks HUGE

[metrokat]

Do you gravel vac?

The wrasse will take a while to come out, when he is confident you will see him out and about mostly. My yellow banded possum was quite bold as soon as he became comfortable. He lives with NYFishies now and is not overly shy.

[teenyreef]

Do you gravel vac?

The wrasse will take a while to come out, when he is confident you will see him out and about mostly. My yellow banded possum was quite bold as soon as he became comfortable. He lives with NYFishies now and is not overly shy.

I do, at least once a week when I do my water change. I'll be checking PO4 again this weekend - I'm really curious to see if it's headed back down or still increasing.

 

The wrasse is definitely getting more comfortable every day, little by little. Yesterday he came out and swam a whole lap around the rocks before disappearing again

[teenyreef]

Today I was at the LFS looking at corals, and I thought "You know, I haven't seen the pistol shrimp once since I put it in over a month ago. And the YWG has never found it either, I'm afraid it must have died by now.". And lo and behold, they had another Randalli's Pistol Shrimp there for only $20. So I bought him and brought him home. Here he is in the acclimation box:

 

Pistol Shrimp by TeenyReef, on Flickr

 

And as I was acclimating him, I noticed the YWG was not in his usual place in front of his little cave under the montis on the right hand side. Instead, he was all the way over on the left side of the tank, between the rocks and the glass. And then he started getting a little agitated and swimming up and down the glass. The end of his tail started to get sucked into the MP40, and when he swam away from it he ended up with the end of his tail sucked into the intake!

I thought he was a goner, but I turned off the pumps and helped him get unstuck. But now, a few hours later, he seems to be fine, and he's found a new home in a little cave/tunnel under the rocks on the left side.

 

So now I'm wondering if the old pistol is under that rock. That's where I heard clicks about three weeks ago, although I haven't heard any since. But I don't know of any other reason for the goby to change his residence when he'd gotten really settled in at his old place.

 

I've left the new pistol in the acclimation box for the night, and I'll see how the goby is doing tomorrow. I hope the MP40 incident isn't an indication of a health problem. Sometimes this hobby can be so frustrating

[spectra]

What are you using to check PO4? I have heard test kits out there stink and the only really good one is the big expensive one.

I think if the old pistol is still kicking the yashi will find it. I had one in a small rock and put it in my tank and my yashi found the shrimp within a day.

[konsgoli]

i've been following your thread since you started ! I really like you work i ordered the same aquarium about 40 days ago and received it today. Cant wait to start

[teenyreef]

i've been following your thread since you started ! I really like you work i ordered the same aquarium about 40 days ago and received it today. Cant wait to start

Thanks and good luck! Please let me know when you start your build thread so I can follow along

[teenyreef]

What are you using to check PO4? I have heard test kits out there stink and the only really good one is the big expensive one.

I think if the old pistol is still kicking the yashi will find it. I had one in a small rock and put it in my tank and my yashi found the shrimp within a day.

I use the Hanna low range phosphate checker. It's very reliable and consistent. The only knock on them was that they had a batch of bad reagents a few years ago. Every other phosphate test I've tried was pretty unreliable because of the tiny differences between the colors. I also have the calibration fluid so I can check it periodically to verify the reagent is good.

 

I'm hoping the shrimp is still in there too. The goby has settled down into a new little cave on the left side of the rocks, and the only reason I can think of for him to move house is that he discovered the shrimp in there. But I'm still not sure because I don't see any obvious evidence of bulldozing in the sand there.

 

20160729-untitled-021.jpg by TeenyReef, on Flickr

 

Just to be on the safe side, I put the other shrimp in the tank too. He started out in the left side of the tank, but I spotted him a few minutes later on the right side of the tank. I haven't seen him since, of course

 

I also spotted some bubble algae in the rocks. They must have come in on the live rock, because they are on the rocks and I don't have any on the corals or frags. I pulled them off carefully with tweezers, but I expect they will return. When they do, I'll drain enough water to expose them, and put some peroxide on the rocks after I remove them.

 

20160729-untitled-045.jpg by TeenyReef, on Flickr

[StinkyBunny]

I wish you were closer, I have 11 pistol shrimps and 8 different pairs of watchman gobies here right now. When it's getting ready to rain the house sounds like a bowl of rice crispies, lol.

 

Folks, don't worry about seeing either a pistol shrimp or goby for a week or so after you've introduced them, it's normal for them to wander off and set up house. Once the shrimp's got his tunnel system set up you'll see them a lot more. I have a mated pair of Yellow Watchman gobies in the 50 cube, hadn't seen hide nor hair of either for the better part of a month and last night they were all out begging for chow. I'm gonna try to get a pair of the oddball pistols out of Sri Lanka when they weather cools some. There's a yellow one and red one there, but they are quite pricey, $40 ea.

[teenyreef]

It would be so cool to see pictures of those!

 

I'm sure the shrimp are fine. I left the one guy in the breeder box overnight and he was full of energy when I let him out, so I think conditions are good. It just bugged me that I've had the first guy for a month and still no sign of him. The goby, on the other hand, is happy as can be and comes out all the time.

[StinkyBunny]

I rarely see the Randalls shrimp, I see the Tigers just about every day. I'm in the process of cleaning up the QT systems so I'll try to get some shots tonight. I need to sell a few so I can get a few different ones in.

[StinkyBunny]

In my experience, Coral Beauties are fairly reef safe. I've had one from The Philippines now for a year and Queeny has been a model citizen. The one you have is an Indian Ocean colour morph, they're in between mine and the super orange ones out of Fiji.

 

Queeny:

 

[teenyreef]

I rarely see the Randalls shrimp, I see the Tigers just about every day. I'm in the process of cleaning up the QT systems so I'll try to get some shots tonight. I need to sell a few so I can get a few different ones in.

Mine are randallis so that makes sense. They're supposed to be much less aggressive than the tigers.

[Elizabeth94]

Good thing you got a shot of that pistol before you dumped him in! It may be a little while before you can get another shot like that, with him hiding and stuff.

[thilankasp]

How's the YWG now.. The Randalls Shrimp looks great. Hope he comes out more often. I was reluctant to add a pistol to my tank thinking it will start bulldozing everything and mess it up.. but looks like they won't do much of a damage..

[StinkyBunny]

How's the YWG now.. The Randalls Shrimp looks great. Hope he comes out more often. I was reluctant to add a pistol to my tank thinking it will start bulldozing everything and mess it up.. but looks like they won't do much of a damage..

The biggest concern with pistol shrimp are them causing rock work to collapse and either kill themselves or break the tank. Make sure the rocks are on the bottom of the tank or supported so they can't get under them and mine the gravel out. They WILL bulldoze, it's what they do and they arrange gravel to suit their liking. You'll need to move any corals you have on the bottom up some as they could be buried, I lost a bubble coral that way. They can move a metric shittonne of sand and gravel in a very short time. I never have to vacuum the gravel, they turn it over every few days.

[teenyreef]

Last night, I saw pistol shrimp #2 go under the sand right next to the duncans. By this afternoon he had dug a nice big hole in between the duncans and the zoa rock. While I couldn't see him, there was no doubt he was there

 

So now I'm not sure if pistol shrimp #1 really is still kicking and digging or not...

 

I had planned for a pistol shrimp, and made sure all the rocks are actually sitting on the bottom, not on the sand. But the freestanding duncans and the little zoa rocks may need larger bases in the long run.

 

In the meantime, Freckles, the YWG, is doing just fine in his little tunnel over on the left side, he comes out all the time but never goes more than a couple inches away from the tunnel.

In my experience, Coral Beauties are fairly reef safe. I've had one from The Philippines now for a year and Queeny has been a model citizen. The one you have is an Indian Ocean colour morph, they're in between mine and the super orange ones out of Fiji.

 

Queeny:

 

So pretty

Here's another picture of Sunset:

 

20160729-untitled-048-Edit.jpg by TeenyReef, on Flickr

 

And an artsy-fartsy zoa pic

 

20160729-untitled-037.jpg by TeenyReef, on Flickr

[YaBoyLaj]

Eye candy is just...wow

[thilankasp]

Sunset is so colorful..

 

Love the Zoa rock.. I'm gonna try something like that in my tank as well..

[teenyreef]

Sunset is so colorful..

 

Love the Zoa rock.. I'm gonna try something like that in my tank as well..

This is the first tank in which I deliberately put the zoas on separate rocks. I wish I'd known to do it this way to begin with, although I guess there's no way I could have done it in the 4g tank.

 

Not only does this keep the more invasive types in their place, it seems like sooner or later zoas need to be dipped. Having them on little rocks that aren't attached to anything else makes it so much easier

Eye candy is just...wow

Thanks