wtfe's aquapod of doom.

[wtfe]

yet another aquapod 12g thread. now with more doom!

 

well... not a whole lot of doom. but some, so keep reading. my wife got me an aquapod 12 for christmas, clearly with no idea how things would turn out. this is my first foray into saltwater reefkeeping, and it has been an adventure. since it looks like i only have about 3 sets of pics, i'll break the story into a few separate posts.

 

for starters, we have the stock aquapod & lighting, aragonite sand and about 8 lbs of live rock. Add 1.5 lbs of salt to 12 gallons of tap water (which we'll come back to later), and voila!

 

 

 

Dora's Talking Cash Register says: "Oh no! A new reef tank! We're doomed!"

 

[wtfe]

Tank setup was in January, and I let it cycle for about 3 weeks, checking water params and waiting for the algae bloom. And bloom it did. Diatoms all over the place for awhile, only to be subsumed by cyano. There was cyano everywhere which had to be siphoned off every other day. I started using "RO" water from the local Kroger, but the cyano would not be defeated.

 

Eventually, I figured out that the Kroger water was a bunch of sh*t and ponied up for an RO/DI unit. During this time, I introduced my CUC of a bunch of lazy blue leg hermits, some astreas, and cerith snails.

 

Next came an ocellaris clown and later a six-line wrasse. The clown decided to disappear one day and it wasn't until I was trying to find his replacement that I was able to determine his doom. The 4th chamber on the AP goes under the middle two and apparently makes for a good hiding place until you run out of food and die. Clown #2 was found in time and is still a current resident of the tank.

 

There was (before going out of business), an LFS about 1 mile from my house which had a decent selection of corals and saltwater stuff, so I added some green buttons, a heliofungia, and some xenia before they "went under" (sorry).

 

My current LFS is Phishy Business, which has a decent online storefront, but it's awesome to go over there and pick out coral in person. With the profits from a yard sale, I added a beautiful lobophylia and an incredible hammer coral.

 

Here are some pics from this stage, wherein you can still see the cyano battle raging. These were taken at the end of March, I just couldn't stomach taking pictures of algae ridden tank any earlier.

 

FTS:

 

Pulsing Red Sea Xenia:

 

Hammer Coral, feeling a little supressed.

 

Lobo, Xenia, replacement Nemo, and Helio tips

 

 

everybody under actinics:

 

under daylights: (notice the boo-boo on the helio... doom!)

[wtfe]

This is the part of the story where the heliofungia got really sick about 4 weeks after i nicked it with the mag float while cleaning. I fed it every 2-3 days with mysis, and tried to nurture it back to health, but it got pretty ugly one day and he had to be removed from the tank. He is now in heliofungia heaven (aka, a landfill).

 

My daughter had named the six-line "hundred-dollar". I have no idea where this came from. She's two and a half, so we kept the name. Last weekend we went to the fish store to go get a bunch of coral, so I had the top off during acclimation.

Hundred-dollar decided to make a jump for it, but was unsuccessful at landing outside the glidepath of an office chair. To my daughter: Mommy killed hundred-dollar. No, he's not coming back. I won't tell you that I flushed him down the toilet because that will give you a complex with toilet training. I'm sorry.

 

I also trained Lobo how to roar on command:

 

[MDeth]

I'm not sure the plate woudl have done well with the stock lighting long term anyway

 

They seem to like quite a bit of light. Mine was unhappy with my 48W (biocube 14) but now under 72W hes happy as can be

[wtfe]

Last post for now, which will bring us up to date in May.

 

I decided that the LPS just wasn't looking as nice as it was in the store, so I ended up replacing the stock lighting with a 70W MH Sunpod and did the MJ900 pump upgrade + hydor-flo for some better circulation. There was a good sale at the LFS (20% off), so I cleaned up with a bunch of new coral. Also added to the tank are a new fire shrimp (who declined to be photographed) as well as a new clown to be friends with the old one. He is unnamed as of yet.

 

Here's the current livestock rundown:

 

2 clownfish (1 ocellaris, 1 unknown)

1 fire shrimp

5 (but maybe 7) blue-leg hermits

4 astrea snails

3 cerith snails

1 turbo snail (clumsy m.f.)

 

Button Polyps

Pulsing Xenia

Calaustrea

Blue Zoos

Lobophylia Brain

Hammer Coral

Orange Dot Zoos (id anyone?)

Ricordea

Acropora

Unknown SPS (id?)

Red Gonipora

Favites

Orange fungia (cousin itt)

 

Current FTS:

 

Red Gonipora

 

Orange Fungia

 

Zoos

 

Calaustrea + unknown SPS

 

Hammer, Xenia, Favites

 

Acro, Buttons, Ricordea

 

Lobo

 

Hammer+Favites

[MDeth]

smart move w/ the MH

 

nice tank. keep us posted on the goni's health. They can be really fussy (i hope your LFS told you this)

[TR3XX]

looking good. nice coraline growth

[AresDoggy]

Very nice coralline! This is a sweet tank!

[wtfe]

smart move w/ the MH

 

nice tank. keep us posted on the goni's health. They can be really fussy (i hope your LFS told you this)

 

Yeah, I know that they can be fussy, but I've seen them at the LFS for a few months and they seem hardy enough. They're eating oyster eggs, and it seems to be one of the more healthy corals in the tank... (knock on wood)

 

I was told that the red one's are easier to keep than the green, is there any truth to this?

[wtfe]

It's been a couple of months since the last update, so I thought I'd post some newer pictures.

 

In the latest round of clownfish vs. MJ-900, the score is:

 

MJ-900: 1

clownfish: 0

 

I think the bigger clown chased the little one and he jumped back into the fourth chamber of doom. After an hour of trying to get him out, I let him be overnight so I could go get a smaller net in the morning. Apparently he could not resist the siren song of the pump inlet. The latest additions have been a fire shrimp and a royal gramma. The gramma is still pretty shy, but it's only been 3 days. No new corals in the last two months.

 

Coral health has been pretty good, I've had some minor bleaching with the favites and some little holes appear. I think it's doing better now with some eggcrate for light diffusion and I've been target feeding it. I hardly ever see feeder tentacles appear (even when it was healthy/new).

 

My blue zoos have had some weird infection (not zoa pox), so they've been getting lugol's dips every so often. The last time really surprised me how much crap was on the live rock. Lots of amphipods and a couple of bristleworms and stars.

 

The biggest downer was when my hammer coral freaked on me and I lost a big chunk of it. I removed the dead tissue and it's been fine ever since. Here are some pics:

 

FTS:

 

goniopora is doing well:

 

monti, acro, and caulastrea are doing well:

 

softies:

 

pyramid of fungia plates:

 

feedus interruptus:

 

hammer:

 

lobophyllia robusta:

[Maco]

Dora's Talking Cash Register says: "Oh no! A new reef tank! We're doomed!"

And the LFS says whats in your wallet

[ILM75Dodge]

Lookin good welcome to reefing!

[Toomin]

this tank is really doomed to be nice.

[adinsxq]

I've removed off-topic posts from this thread. If any party wishes to discuss it, feel free to either PM me or create a thread in the Feedback & Questions Forum. Thank you.

[joel sandoman]

at first i thought it said 'wife's aquapod of doom'. lol

[pudge1515]

The colors in your tank are amazing! Great job

[niccas9]

Tank looks really nice! I liked going through the thread and seeing the progression. Nice job.

[wtfe]

The colors in your tank are amazing! Great job

Thanks! I've been lucky with an LFS that has beautiful pieces. They aren't cheap, from what I can tell reading other people's posts.

Tank looks really nice! I liked going through the thread and seeing the progression. Nice job.

Thanks for reading. I'll keep up the posting. Maybe someday this thread will even spill onto page 2!

(which I'm sure anybody on dialup will appreciate)

at first i thought it said 'wife's aquapod of doom'. lol

Indeed. I'm sure she's had thoughts of aquapod doom given how much of my time and our money it consumes...

[wtfe]

So, I've made some changes lately. Not big ones, but the tank is fairly stable now and I think I'd probably have to re-aquascape in order to fit any more corals. I'm not sure when I'll be insane enough to sh*t around with all the live rock and wobbly corals to make more room, so it stays mostly as is for now. I could probably add a couple of extra frags, but that's about it. Awhile ago (and another thread), I had some problems with my favites (bleaching, minor tissue loss), hammer (major tissue loss), and my blue zoos (white non-zoa pox nastiness). In short, everybody is fine now. The hammer lost about 1/3 of it's head, but it is doing great, and looks very healthy. The favites has finally decided to acclimate (after about 3 months), and I'm glad to say seems very happy. The zoas took a few baths in lugols and freshwater, i have no idea what finally cheered them up. I really thought the favites was a slow but sure goner, my faith in reefing is restored.

 

Things have been going really great with the tank. I did the fuge mod on chamber 2. I cut away the vinyl on the back of the tank and stuck a great big gob of chaeto in. I did it impulsively when I found out that a LFS was selling chaeto for about $.40/oz. (I got 1 baseball sized ounce). MarineDepot provided the Coralife freshwater light for a nominal fee. They have _great_ customer service, and get a lot of my online goods biz.

 

I also added a small frag of salmon/peach-ish (dare I say "coral"?) zoos, which are doing well. My acro millepora has growth points like crazy and lets me know that my water husbandry doesn't totally suck. The montipora confusa is growing crazy too. I also have added a basic, plain jane firefish (fish count: 3). I know the tank is overstocked a bit now, but I'm pretty religious about my weekly 20% WC. The clown, gramma, and firefish all have very different personalities and get along really well. Everybody has there own territory and I finally have a peaceful tank. I cut out some eggcrate to put over the rear chambers to minimize the risk from jumpers. So far, so good.

 

Here is a sampling of the ridiculous amount of pics taken of the current setup. I wish there was a way to make a page break on the thread so that the initial page load didn't take 15 minutes. Sorry. Glad you're here.

 

fuge lighting mod

 

eggcrate jumper guard

 

healthy (blurry) favites

 

peach zoos (pre acro move)

 

royal gramma "sallie"

 

firefish "naz" (my 3 year old does all naming)

 

the favorite coral

[BJK2]

Amazing!! I love this tank, it is really growing in and coloring up!

[saleaqua]

Great work mate. an AWESOME tank!

i love the way you have set it all out, and nice choice of livestock and coral. what a shame about the three fish you have lost along the way.

 

well you know things come in threes (they say) so your all smooth sailing from here on.

 

keep up the great work, and keep us posted

 

SaleAqua

[wtfe]

Just picked up a lobo frag from Six during her recent downsizing. As a fellow OSU student, she was kind enough to drop by my office and make a trade. Here's a pic of my new green lobo, next to its big brother...

 

I'll post another FTS soon, but people are still a little cranky from the water change right now.

 

[JustReef]

FTS!

[Choadmeyer]

Ya my question was gonna be where does the doom come into play?

[wtfe]

Ya my question was gonna be where does the doom come into play?

 

The doom comes from the early days. Originally, I had a few fish that had a propensity for jumping to their death (2 clowns and a 6-line wrasse). Also, the heliofungia that is so hot in the early pics got a tiny cut while shaving and eventually ended up crossing the river Styx as well... (BTW, if you've arrived in this thread by searching for "Styx" on N-R, you will be disappointed and I am disturbed)

 

Also, the sweet firefish that is featured a few posts up has also gone on to the great porcelain aquarium. He was pretty happy, but wasn't aggressive enough at feeding time. He would always hide in his little cave and was always last to the food party. Since he didn't eat, he got lethargic and less likely to go get more food. When I took him out of the tank he was pretty thin and sickly.

 

I'm much happier with only two fish (a clown and a gramma). The three fish were getting along fine, but the SPS has been pretty brown, presumably due to elevated nitrate levels. I have a few more zoo frags and a blue tort that's still getting comfortable. I've also added a Koralia Nano because it's so in vogue.

 

As for the FTS, my digital camera is brokee, but will still (barely) take pictures. I need to charge the battery and will get a couple tomorrow. Christmas time is around the corner, as is the family's new Nikon D80... I already have a 105mm Nikkor Macro lens, so expect some killer shots in the next month or so.

 

I've also setup a 3g Pico zoo garden over the last month and will probably start a thread soon. (See: camera issues...)