Chyendra's 30 Hex

[Chyendra]

I'm back!!! for anyone who's been around a while, I was here back in 2004-2005 with my 5 gallon flat-back hexagon mixed nano reef and then upgraded to a 7 gal minibow. I had to take that tank down after it crashed while I was on spring break, (and I haven't had a permanent home for longer than 5 months)...

 

So... Now I'm starting a 4 year vet school program, and don't plan on moving any time soon. Therefore, it's reef time again! Yay (once and addict always an addict, right?) This time around I'm doing mostly fish and some softies in a larger tank in hopes of having a lower maintenance system.

 

I just finished aquascaping.... Here's the specs

 

30 gallon glass hexagon w/ glass lid

Penguin 150 HOB filter (w/out biowheel or cartridge... just had laying around)

Aquaclear 50 powerhead (just had laying around)

Stealth 100w heater

 

150 watt Viper HQI metal halide

14,000K bulb

 

25lbs LR (mostly figi, some tonga, & some coral skeletons from my LFS)

Barebottom

LR is stuck together w/ epoxy & superglue (StevieT style) (I know this is a little risky, but it seems stable... I hope it works because the alternative seemed to be some drilling craziness suggested by the reef central folks)

 

Thinking about future Livestock:

astreas, zebra hermits ect...

peppermint shrimp

skunk cleaner (if compatible with peppermint)

 

Fish that seem cool, so I'll pick 4ish fish from this list depending on size

Royal Gramma (must have)

Cinnamon Clownfish (really really want, so maybe I need to pick other fish that could stand their own against one, or add it last....)

Firefish goby

Yellowheaded jawfish (but I don't have sand so that might not work)

neon goby (I loved the one I used to have)

Yellow clown goby (Dito)

Flasher wrasse

4-6 line wrasse

blue assessor

fat head sunburst anthia

yellow watchman goby

sunrise dottyback

 

So... fish is up in the air, it might depend on what my LFS gets in that’s healthy & eating well

 

As far as corals, definetly blue metallic shrooms, red shrooms, & toadstool leather. Maybe some zoos & Rics

 

Here's picks of the tank so far (w/ stock florescent lighting, I don't have my MH yet)

 

 

Left Side (your left) this is the view you can see from the nearby couch

 

Right side (as you come in the room)

[JerseyChick]

I LOVE hexagon tanks! So far I love your rock set up! If you want a few button polyps for in there I have more than enough to share.

 

What a great start you got going on in there!

[Chyendra]

Top View

 

JersyChick I love your blue shrooms, those are exactly like the ones I used to have, Those things grew like crazy, I loved them. I might take you up on those button polyps but the tank needs to cycle still.

[JerseyChick]

Top View

 

JersyChick I love your blue shrooms, those are exactly like the ones I used to have, Those things grew like crazy, I loved them. I might take you up on those button polyps but the tank needs to cycle still.

 

Take your time, I ain't going anywhere

 

If my mushrooms start to triple split again, maybe I can manage to get you one or two, to start. LOL It is so refreshing to hear LOGIC (that you will wait till the cycle is over)

[lakshwadeep]

Avoid the anthias (needs more room) or the sunrise dottyback (aggressive).

[J-Bass]

Hey welcome back Cheyendra.

[JerseyChick]

Oh yeah (sorry)

 

[Chyendra]

hmmm what about a

Royal Gramma

Cinnamon Clown

Pygmy Cherub Angel.... period

 

all semi-aggressive sometimes, so hopefully able to stand their own right?

[squirrelieygrrrl]

hi Chyendra,

 

welcome back!

 

im so glad some one is doing a larger hex so i can watch,

 

i have a 35ish gal hex that is a fw tank atm, but i have been eyeballing it for a reef. so im very interested in what you do with it!

[Chyendra]

New pics with 175 watt & 14k metal halide pendant (this light is HUGE I didn't expect it to be so big... the bulb is huge!)

[J-Bass]

Is the light hanging over the tank or sitting on a glass top?

[lilredneckman]

Wow it sure is nice and bright!

[Chyendra]

Yah, its really bright, I'm not sure my roomates like how bright it is...

 

The pendant is sitting on a glass top. Is this ok? I'm concerned about this pendant because the bulb mounts vertically, and I though they were supposed to lay horizontally. Does anyone know if this is true? Its a 175 watt mogal 14k Hamilton bulb, and I'm pretty sure its a magnetic ballast (175 watt also).

 

What I don't like about this light, is that it washes out all of the pretty pink & purpleness of my coraline algea. The tank actually looked nicer under florescent lighting, but obviously, I can't grown any corals with my florescent light... hmmm

[clownfish1124]

awesome! i have 4 nice tanks sitting around at hope waiting to be setup: a 20 hex, a 65 hex, a 58 oceanic, and a 36 bow. i want to do the 20 hex with 150 mh. why don't you hang the pendant??? or make a lamptree of some sort???

[Chyendra]

So... I traded in the pendant for store credit at my LFS for a number of reasons.

 

1. if I set it on the glass hood, it made the glass rediculously hot, and I was afraid it might shatter and the MH would fall into the tank... not so good. ( we have really high celings so hanging it isn't an option, plus we rent)

 

2. The ballast burned Super hot even after only 1 hour and I didn't think this was very good thing to have on wood floors in an old apartment, for several hours while I'm gone all day.

 

3. the roomates didn't really care for how bright it made the room (they might have to get over that) AND I wasn't crazy about the color.

 

so, the MH is gone, and I'm back to the drawing board for a simple, light thats 18" x 6" or less.

 

I found an 18" 55w PC for only $49 at this website, but I'm not sure its any good... for $49 I might just get it and see.

 

http://www.dtpetsupplies.com/catalog/produ...roducts_id=7638

 

what do you guys think? any experience with Jalli lights?

[Chyendra]

I got my new light today!! It's a JBJ K-2 150w HQI Viper clamp on pendant.... and so far I really like it! It's smaller than I thought it would be (which is great!) The HQI bulbs are smaller than the mogual ones apparently (also nice), the ballast box is kinda big, but it doesn't get scorching hot like the other MH ballast did. The fixture head does get really hot, but after running it 4 hours my glass lid wasn't too hot, only a little warm, so I can keep my lid, yay! It has 3 pivot points, so I had no trouble adjusting the height and angle. I like the color ok (it's a 14k bulb) but I'm sure it will be better after it burns in a bit (a little too blue for me right now).

 

Current Stock:

1 Blue/green Reef Chromis (name: Neville because he's a little shy and awkward... but he'll be a hero some day!)

1 peppermint shrimp

5 astreas

2 tiny hermits (probably get a few more once I see my algea situation)

1 emerald crab

1 green striped mushrooms (the other two didn't want to attach )

3" sad toadstool leather (he's still recovering from fraging

2" GSP

 

here's pics!

 

 

 

front view

 

 

left view (from the couch)

 

 

Right view (when you walk into the room)

 

[Chyendra]

NEW CORALS!!!

 

I just got my shipment from coral morphologic (great guys over there!!)

 

I ordered the 11 ricordea pack and partially split it with a friend. Coralmorphic threw in an extra polyp, so here's my 9!

 

orange

lime green with hot pink mouth

turquoise

and i'm going to call the big one... sea lettuce green

 

 

Rainbow?

and look at the wee baby!! (not included in count) blue and pink I hope

 

 

bright green with 3 Mouths

teal

green w/blue edge

 

and another orange

 

I also got one of the Discosoma Rhodactis, but it's not fully opened in this pic

[J-Bass]

Do you plan on keeping the glass lid on or does your water evaporate too fast without it on?

[Chyendra]

The water doesn't evaporate too fast, but I'm thinking about keeping the lid on so that I don't have to worry about my fish jumping out (I'm thinking about gettting a firefish goby)

[Chyendra]

So my tank is just shy of 2 months old, and things are going really well, Except a few of my ricordea still haven't attached to the rocks

 

Once they're all attached and I get the wedding mesh out of the tank, I'll post an updated FTS. But here's a sneak preview!

 

Ricordea & Sanctithomae

 

Neville the Chromis!

 

Pulsing Xenia & GSP

 

more rics

 

Current stocking:

2 hermit crabs

5 astreas

1 blue-green reef chromis

1 peppermint shrimp

Cheato

GSP

Xenia

Ricordea

Toadstool leather

Green Striped mushrooms

Sanctithomae mushroom

sometime of bleached shroom I hope recovers

very sad openbrain (or Cynaria) I rescued from the LFS that is recovering well

 

Future stocking:

Royal Gramma (hopefully next week!)

Firefish

Banggai Cardinal

Skunk cleaner

blue shrooms

red or pink zoos

 

The fish eats mysis and cyclopeeze and my Sanctithomae and recovering open brain also get cyclopeeze

[Chyendra]

Firefish! Thinking of names.... maybe Felix. feel free to suggest any.

 

[tinyreef]

funny, i've always felt Oscar was a good name for them.

 

Smokey

Zuko (Avatar: Last Air-bender reference)

Torpedo

Torch

Fred

[lakshwadeep]

Dante

[Chyendra]

funny, i've always felt Oscar was a good name for them.

 

Smokey

Zuko (Avatar: Last Air-bender reference)

Torpedo

Torch

Fred

 

Thanks for the suggestions, but I can't help but think of those brown and orange poop factories when I see the name Oscar in association with fish

 

 

Dante

 

eek, that would remind me too much of my exboyfriend.

[Chyendra]

3 month update:

 

FTS

Top

Right side

 

Current stocking:

Royal Gramma, Firefish, peppermint shrimp, skunk cleaner shrimp, hermits, astreas.

 

GSP, Green-striped shrooms, rics (blue, teal, lime green, green, orange) Red lobo, amazingly bright yellow polyps, pink birdsnest, orange monticap, xenia, kenya tree, toadstool leather, cheato.

 

future additions: Neon goby, Blue & red shrooms, green hydro, christmas favia, pink zoos.

 

 

Issues I've dealt with so far... persistently high phosphate, after 2 weeks of using chemipure elite it seems to have gone down, but not completely 0 yet. After adding some sad looking fuzzy shrooms, my rics and rhodactis took a turn for the worse. I lost 3 rics, and my rhodactis, and of course, the shrooms. A few rics are still recovering. My green chromis randomly died, not sure if it was old age, sickness or stress from the new firefish... no major issues the last 3 weeks.

 

Maintenance. Lately I've been slacking on water changes, but it's been about 5gal a week or 10gal every 2 weeks. Blow off rock and under rocks with turkey baster, siphon junk off barebottom once it's settled. IO salt, but I'm going to switch to Reef crystals, and see if I get better growth. Dose seachem reef complete (Cal) and kent marine pro-buffer (alk) as needed in top off water. just started dosing kent marine reef essentials once a week, about a month ago and everything seems... perkier, so I will continue with that.

 

My goal is to really just watch the pretty frags I've collected so far thrive, grow, and fill the tank, so I can donate frags to other beginner reefers, like some of the local folks have done for me. I would also love to see my purple coralline grow like crazy (hence the cal/alk dosing). Some of my recovering rics have actually attached themselves to the glass bottem (apparently they prefer that to the top of the rock where they kept detaching themselves) so I hope they spread and cover the bottom

 

let me know what you think