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Innovative Marine Aquariums

Long Term Stability for SPS Nano Tank


HelenofTroy

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Hi all, I'm looking to get more into SPS and having an SPS dominant tank. I am wondering if any of you have had long(er) term success with growing SPS in a nano tank that can provide some guidance.

 

My tank right now:

  • Tank: 25G shallow (IM Lagoon)
  • Main Equipment:
    • Kessil AP700
    • Tunze 9004 skimmer
    • Smart ATO Micro
    • MP10
    • Sicce 1.5 return pump + stock return pump
    • GFO and Activated Carbon mixed together in media bags
  • Livestock
    • 2 clowns
    • 1 Lubbock's Fairy Wrasse (may add one more fish later on)
    • Assorted LPS and zoas

I am manually dosing 2 part right now but will eventually get a dosing pump.

 

Tank is only 4 months old at this point so I will wait a bit longer for things to become more stable. But I hear lots of stories of people having alk swings that cause destruction on all their SPS, and I want to avoid this.

 

What advice would you give to have long term success? What dosing pumps would you recommend that can dose precise amounts and are good for nano tanks?

 

Feel free to direct to existing threads on this topic.

 

Thanks in advance.

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My 20 gallon SPS reef did quite well on weekly 5 gal water changes, no skimmer, triple doser managing Cal, Alk, Mag, and a Radion Pro LED. Also had a pair of MP10's on that system. Tank was running on a 2217 Eheim Classic canister filter which is generally a no-no to most. I did use a surface extractor though to keep the oily film at bay.

As long as you monitor your key levels, keep up with water changes, and dosing, it really isn't too hard at all!

IMG_3721.jpg

 

IMG_3715-225x300.jpgIMG_3740-225x300.jpgIMG_3403-300x225.jpg

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Wow nice tank TJ_Burton! Is that system still running? How long did you have it up?

 

What doser did you use? And what is a surface extractor? Never heard of that!

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Wow nice tank TJ_Burton! Is that system still running? How long did you have it up?

 

What doser did you use? And what is a surface extractor? Never heard of that!

Thanks!

Tank ran for a little under 2 years, slowly transitioned from soft corals to SPS dominant. Ran with all SPS for about 8 months before I amalgamated two aquariums into one. In the end I ended up tankless, but that is another story entirely.

 

I used an SWC triple doser which is basically a rebranded Bubble Magus.

 

Surface extractor/skimmer:

https://www.bigalspets.com/ista-surface-skimmer.html

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It really depends on the dedication of the owner.

 

I dose manually and have sps. Regardless of dosers or manual dosing the important aspect is dosing the correct amount and according to the tanks usage.

 

any major swings or continuous swings in parameters will effect sps. Water quality, stability, and lighting is important.

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Thanks all for the responses. Clown79 what are the details of your system?

 

And are there any dosing pumps that are controllable down to 0.25 mL? or 0.5mL?

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Thanks all for the responses. Clown79 what are the details of your system?

 

And are there any dosing pumps that are controllable down to 0.25 mL? or 0.5mL?

Yep, most can do that. The Kore 5th can go down to 0.01ml. :)

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I have 2 tanks.

 

15g standard with hob, Ai Prime, mixed reef. Frogspawn, hammers, zoas, rics, acans, blasto, stylophora and birdsnest.

 

 

10g Aio with aquamaxx light: hammers, acan, favia, zoas, duncans, birdsnest, monti, and pocillopora

 

I tested my water after waterchange, then the next day, i kept testing until i saw a change.

 

I have had to redo this test as my tank advanced because i use to dose 1 time a week and now its every other day.

 

I manually dose 2 part esv bionic

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If you want to do less work, stock less or even no fish... You will need some nutrients for the tank, but could feed coral food once you get enough coral in there. Honestly, fish make it significantly harder to have a very successful tank than fish-less especially a SPS tank. 3 fish in a 25 gallon tank is a moderate load on it. Of course most of us want to keep fish as it's one of the primary reason's we're in the hobby, but reducing stocking can solve a lot of our problems or prevent them from happening in the first place.

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My advise would be to do weekly water changes of 15% and invest in a reliable and accurate dosing pump. Stability is key, salinity, temp, alk, ca and mag. I don't run a skimmer, nor do I use carbon. I've recently swapped out chaeto for a diy ats. I have a pair of clowns, neon goby, Tanaka possum wrasse and a yasha goby with a Randall's pistol shrimp. Of course, there are so many ways to keep a sps tank, but above all else, stability, stability, stability is the key to success. Did I mention stability?

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Good to see that you are concerned with the corals' long term health.

 

Keeping small polyp stony corals in nano tanks for many years is certainly possible.

 

I have a mixed 12g with ~1/3 SPS (an acro, a number of Stylophora, Montipora, Pavona) and most have been in the tank 6 or 7 years. I like to keep things simple and stable, have backup equipment and check/adjust salinity and alkalinity every few days (check everything else every two weeks or so).

 

I'd suggest keeping the less aggressive SPS. Pavona, Hydnophora and some types of Acros in such a small space over such a long time can start to annihilate each other.

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Tank is over 8-1/2 years now and looking back I can some of the SPS frags were added after just a few months time.

 

Have fun building up your SPS colonies :)

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81/2 years, is that all, LOL? Mine has been 10 years now.

 

But it didn't start out all sps, it just evolved over the years. It is a mixed reef now with mostly acros. I have a 29 gallon BioCube (the original Oceanic). I have the same MP10 and skimmer as you do. My lighting is a NanoBox retro in the BC's hood. My doser is a Chinese made one from Jebao and it has 4 heads. I think you can buy these for around $80 bucks or so. The drawback is that it won't dose the tiny amount you want, it will do down to 1ml. But it has been very reliable and no problems. As far as what I'm using, I just started on the Aquaforest line of products using their Probiotic salt, and dosing their Components 1-2-3. I dose every day to keep up with Alk demand. I do not feed as the fish provides the nutrients they need. I also do water changes every other week and have been know to go a month between water changes. IMO, less water changes helps with stability.

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81/2 years, is that all, LOL? Mine has been 10 years now.

 

Yeah, but you have nearly 3x the volume ;)

 

Seriously, great achievement and just shows what is possible with SPS in these relatively small bodies of water.

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