Sunlight Clam Pico II (1.25g)

[lakshwadeep]

In the first picture of post #23 it looks like some red on the right side. Is it just a reflection? Looking good.

 

It's the reddish brown thing (planter?) that is behind the tank's stand. You can see the object is brightly lit and touching the right edge of the tank.

[tinyreef]

It's the reddish brown thing (planter?) that is behind the tank's stand. You can see the object is brightly lit and touching the right edge of the tank.

yes, it's planter/table. sorry, the window and layout doesn't really give me tha many options in taking my pictures. add to that there's a bunch of houseplants all around the room (which i don't like but can't bring myself to tossing out...yet).

 

the glare and reflections add to my annoyance. i'll probably clear out the room soon though. i've been bumping into the plants and almost oppled one or two. frankly, i don't even like them (they're not mine). meh.

 

thanks for the comments and tagging along though!

[tinyreef]

more corals and more pests!

 

added a bunch of new coral frags. keeping in the tradition of the previous sunlight pico, i'm going to try and only use tiny aquacultured frags (one or two polyps). partly because of the tiny tank involved and partly to judge growth rates more easily from the sunlight. added: caulastrea (candy cane-stony), tubipora (pipe organ-stony), and a mutt of a palythoa. some tiny sponges also hitched along as well.

 

the gsp frag's adjusted fine but i've noticed two issues that i didn't have in the previous sunlit pico: significant amounts of microbubbles (the last one hardly had any) and flatworms (center left of the pic)! the flatworms hitched a ride from the display tank where i thought i had eradicated them. dammit.

 

just a bubble shot, showing the turbulence, microbubbles, and chaotic flow involved with the bubbler. the asterina's just hanging around.

[travisurfer]

looks great. i really need to start stocking.

[tinyreef]

looks great. i really need to start stocking.

thanks, trav!

 

c'mon, chop-chop! cycling's just for noobs and the french! git 'er done!

[travisurfer]

thanks, trav!

 

c'mon, chop-chop! cycling's just for noobs and the french! git 'er done!

at this point is more laziness than cycling. i'm going to transfer over some more stuff when i get the chance. still looking for the "centerpiece." lgreen's guide says the tank is big enough for a neon goby but i really think that's pushing it. it's a shame that the local lfs are really lacking around here

 

EDIT: DON'T EVER ASSOCIATE ME WITH THE FRENCH AGAIN!!!

[adinsxq]

YOUR BACKYARD LOOKS HUGE

[dtfleming]

OMG adin exists.

[tinyreef]

YOUR BACKYARD LOOKS HUGE

just doing my part for global warming. y'know, trees eat CO2.

 

OMG adin exists.

what happened to the robot tank? did skynet finally take over?

 

nothing to update lately really (i.e. too busy lately). the usual diatom bloom came and went. i'm in the middle of a HA bloom, more fugly than anything else.

 

i've had a spell of cool weather lately, the tank would drop to 72F at night and creep up to about 79F~80F during the day (that's not a recommended range btw).

 

i just checked the salinity/sg and it was a nice balmy 1.031. >.< fixed that and cleaned up the glss a bit. finally transferred one of cjerome's smaller nimbles so i can clean the glass. the tank's so small that the nimble's attraction actually moves the tank if i go too fast.

 

added a baby sarco elegans, blasto merli, more baby ceriths, baby capnella, and some of those un-Id'd pink stoloniferans i've had for ages. coral weeds. meh.

 

the level of worm poop is getting a bit pukey. and these gawddam flatworms will-not-fuggin-die! reefroaches. grrr.

 

maybe i'll post an updated pic next week. i'm trying to spur the coralline to establish first though. hmph.

[travisurfer]

lol, sounds like fun tiny.

[tinyreef]

lol, sounds like fun tiny.

meh, i think i really should do a waterchange to kick myself out of a rut. but i'm so lazy/busy. i'm testing the envelope of tank tolerance, i guess.

 

altho, i did try taking some real moonlight shots last night. not sure if it took really well though. my photo skillz are the sux. >.<

 

but in-person, the effect was pretty sweet!

 

i'll probably post them up later...if they're halfway decent.

[travisurfer]

sounds neat

[squirrelieygrrrl]

im anticipating new pics!

[tinyreef]

im anticipating new pics!

meh. taking pictures at nighttime wasn't as easy as it sounds. >.<

 

Moonlight Pico!

^^^looks like filtered pic but that's the full moon shining at night. the glow in the horizon is actually nyc. i wish i could've taken a better picture but that's the extent of my crappy photog abilities.

 

Moonlight Pico (supplemented with living room 1800K lighting )

[AcroporaLokani]

Nice.

[tinyreef]

it's ok, i know the pics look crappy so far.

 

i'll try and clean things up to get a viewing pic (most of these are merely tank shots). most of the frags are still loose though (haven't grown attached yet), although they're all growing and feeding well.

 

it is a little slower growing than the last sun-pico but i think that's more to do with me not doing any waterchanges yet and not very regular with the maintenance versus that last tank.

 

at least for that tank there was the impetus of the contest egging me on. whereas this tank it's like most of my past tanks, i.e. "meh, i can do that tomorrow."

[Professor]

Update?

[tinyreef]

coinky-dink, i just cleaned up the tank this weekend. my airtube got clogged back last tuesday. i think it's salt creep/solids (i can't see underneath). it happens occasionally with airtubes in salt systems, e.g. air-driven protein skmmers often have this issue. so throughout the week i had little to no waterflow. >.<

 

i'd come home and it's clogged. zero flow.

 

i'd suck water up the airtube to re-immerse the tip (which is likely blocked with a salt solid) for a few hours and then re-start.

 

i did that daily ritual from tuesday onwards until late yesterday when i finally had the time to start futzing with it and re-establish regular waterflow.

 

so today i took the time to clean up the aftermath. really just more slime algae and hairy crap i had to blow and pluck clean from the stagnant water conditions.

 

but i did another water exchange with my display tank though, about 16-oz this time. (still haven't done a real waterchange yet though )

 

frankly, i haven't done a waterchange on the display in about 6-months either. but the display is still fine actually. it's a mature tank versus this newbie pico.

 

don't misunderstand my inactions though, it'd be better off with a waterchange now and then. in fact, both tanks would fare better imo but i'm really lazy. simple explanation, nothing fancy to it.

 

i'll try to take a pic soon but everything's pretty ticked off at the moment so it'd just be a couple of rock pics at the moment.

 

the corals are okayyy. nothing to rave about. i saw some growth from the pipe organ and gsp but nothing substantial.

 

i'm still battling temperature variations though, even on temperate days i see variations from 70F (early morning) to 83F+ around midday. so basically not the best of conditions. i ordered one of those heat pads for betta tanks in preparation for the winter but heat is still my main problem.

 

i'm thinking about switching to a small azoo power filter instead of the bubbler (or supplementing it) and paring down the overall rockwork. i've already cut back on a couple of recent coral additions as room was simply running out and actually affecting waterflow.

 

but i'll post some update pics next week though.

[Professor]

Can't wait to see pics. I just picked this tank up myself since I just broke my 2.5 gallon experiment and have been struggling with how I want to move water. I can't decide whether to go HOB or internal. I don't like equipment showing so I have been playing around with some sort of false wall, AIO deal too. I have a small 40gph HOB and a Marineland Duetto Mini I am contemplating. Do you have any suggestions or perhaps advice on what you would do different now that your tank is set up?

 

-Prof

[dshnarw]

Can't wait to see pics.

 

^^

[tinyreef]

Do you have any suggestions or perhaps advice on what you would do different now that your tank is set up?

i'll try to get some pics soon, just too busy lately (hence the lack of attention to the tank and thread ).

 

i was contemplating the duetto too but passed on it because it's simply too big for the tank imho. i like the air bubbling because of the chaoticness and simplicity but this clogging issue is a real pita (it happened again yesterday ). it simply might just have to be a regular maintenance thing in the end. yech.

 

i ordered another Azoo airlifter (used for overflows actually) but i think that might be too little flow rate but i got it as a backup anyways.

 

the azoo mini hob is ok but not reliable in the long-run. it's acceptable though and more "standard". the issue i've found on a lot of these picos is the lack of a good lid/cover. even the hack-job i'm using needs to be cleaned up a bit.

[tinyreef]

ok, i finally ditched the bubbler tube. i made the mistake of tee'ing it off at the end (to better anchor it down in the belly of the rockwork). but the tee's tiny apertures eventually got clogged with salt (confirmed upon retrieval). on a typical airtube diameter, you'd get clogging eventually as well but ime, that's months to a year down the road. this one clogged (because of the smaller opening) within a couple of months. >.<

 

i still like the bubbler's action/waterflow but it was simply getting to be too much work and stress on me and the corals. the tank would have zero flow for most of the day. and as experiments turned out, most of the night too! >.< x2

 

so as you would expect the corals were plenty po'd and the tank looked a mess in recent weeks (clogging issue/no flow for the past two weeks). i've got some scummy pics but they're mostly brown algae covered rocks and coral. bleh.

 

anyhow, i broke down and added the Azoo HOB, removed one of the two rocks, cleaned up the algae growth, removed a couple of corals (too crowded), and added a Poly-Filter and heater (fall/winter's already upon me, but ironically daytime heat's still an issue - e.g. it hit 84F today around 10:30AM).

 

new tank layout, cleaned up (you can still see some of the scum algae, in brown, on the rockwork). these are all taken around 9:30~10AM morning sunlight.

 

pullback shot to see the tank (angle view). you can see the new Azoo HOB and heater. not happy with the equipment so visible but i'm still working on a hidden sump concept.

 

other side angle view, showing the bare essentials for reefing: kalk, thermometer, pen (keeping logs), and coffee. ignore the lid for the moment. it's the same old lid that i tried heat bending to fit the new layout. i'll probably monkey with it again today.

 

so far, so okay. the corals are still a little po'd from all the manhandling lately. closeup of one of the litophytons and main gsp colonies. the gsp just re-opened today (closed for two days). the pipe organs are still po'd but everyone else seems to be recovering nicely.

 

but imo, it's still this damnable heat issue that's the root cause of difficulty (yes, no flow isn't good either but can be dealt with like the above).

 

i'm (was) still going from <70F to 85F everyday, late night to 11AM (high lighting period). the heater pad seems to have balanced out the night cool shifts and i've got it on a short timer (about 5-hrs) to kill it far before "heat up" time. i just re-added the fan on a conversely short timed period to counter the "heat up" period (about 4-hrs).

 

thanks for reading!

[Lalani]

Sorry you're having so much trouble with the heat and flow, but it's still a sweet little tank.

[Needreefunds]

What she said Tiny!

 

 

No control on those lil' heating pads huh?

Just on or off?

 

Thanks for the update Tiny. Really enjoy following this little tank.

[Lalani]

Yeah, I had trouble with that type of heater overheating my 2.5gal.