ihatesears18 Posted April 6, 2009 Author Share Posted April 6, 2009 Amazingly I was able to use my super-long tongs to create a swirling effect to get the polyps to come to me! I'm having a small diatom bloom right now, I think it's because I left the window next to the tank open. I think the sunlight hitting the tank for a few hours was enough to cause the bloom. Link to comment
Rinehart77 Posted April 6, 2009 Share Posted April 6, 2009 Diatoms are normal, your tank will go through some funky stages for a few months. Different alga will come and go. Main thing is to keep your 'trates under control, and make sure you keep up your WCs and don't overfeed to prevent the real pain in the arse alga from . Sunlight by itself is not a bad thing. It won't just cause algae to bloom, unless there is an excess of nutrients there. Which unfortunately, most of our tanks do have. The diatoms, as I said previously and are normal, they are actually a reliable indicator that your tank is beginning to stabilize, and once they use up the available silicate food source they should go away. Be sure to place that monti up as high as you can, no guarantees with the bulbs in the 8. Other than that it sounds like you're getting there. Congrats! Link to comment
ihatesears18 Posted April 6, 2009 Author Share Posted April 6, 2009 Diatoms are normal, your tank will go through some funky stages for a few months. Different alga will come and go. Main thing is to keep your 'trates under control, and make sure you keep up your WCs and don't overfeed to prevent the real pain in the arse alga from . Sunlight by itself is not a bad thing. It won't just cause algae to bloom, unless there is an excess of nutrients there. Which unfortunately, most of our tanks do have. The diatoms, as I said previously and are normal, they are actually a reliable indicator that your tank is beginning to stabilize, and once they use up the available silicate food source they should go away. Be sure to place that monti up as high as you can, no guarantees with the bulbs in the 8. Other than that it sounds like you're getting there. Congrats! Yeah the monti is about 3" from the surface and getting as much light as it can from the power compacts. Eventually I might like to get a MH and yank the hood, but if I do that I might as well use the 20gal tank that I have sitting in my garage to start something a little bigger Link to comment
ihatesears18 Posted April 8, 2009 Author Share Posted April 8, 2009 Fighting cyano, originally thought it was diatoms but quickly turned green, slimy, and started trapping air bubbles. Added some polyfil to the top of the 2nd chamber, will change out every other day. Cheato is doing well, i'll do another water change of 1 gallon tonight. I really want to get my nitrates at 0 soon, i'm hoping within the next 2 weeks. I am willing to religiously change my water, so I will not let a stupid 3.5 billion year old bacteria get the better of me! I know i'm not overfeeding and the most that could have died was one small zoo polyp. Anything else that has kicked I've removed almost immediately. The firefish is doing fine and so is everything else. I have 6 mushrooms now from the original 4. Link to comment
ihatesears18 Posted April 9, 2009 Author Share Posted April 9, 2009 cyano is a dirty, dirty #####! Luckily there is only a tiny bit on my rocks. I suppose next week I'll try getting a couple of hermits, as I hear they love cyano. I'm just afraid of getting them again because of how quickly both of them died! I'll talk to the guy that owns the LFS and see if anybody else has complained about that batch of hermits. He just got them in when I walked in, these were still in the bag that he bought them in. Any ideas? Link to comment
Psychosis Posted April 9, 2009 Share Posted April 9, 2009 I think you'd be hard pressed to find a faulty batch of hermits. Unless shipping was extraordinarily rough, they should be fine. Very hardy little critters. I guess it's still a possibility though. Link to comment
ihatesears18 Posted April 10, 2009 Author Share Posted April 10, 2009 I think you'd be hard pressed to find a faulty batch of hermits. Unless shipping was extraordinarily rough, they should be fine. Very hardy little critters. I guess it's still a possibility though. I bought 2 more scarlet hermits to help take care of the cyano, and these guys hit the ground running! They were not sluggish at all and are already munching away on the carpet I put the shells from the dead herms in the tank in case these guys decide on moving. I'll post some pics soon. I'm thinking about trading in the montipora for some ricordia, as i've changed my mind about what I want to stock in this tank. Also I am seriously considering picking up a 24" T5 from my LFS for $80. It would go so nicely over my 20 gallon in my garage Link to comment
ihatesears18 Posted April 11, 2009 Author Share Posted April 11, 2009 Firefish jumped in the night, don't know how. I leave my tank lid open about 2" for ventilation, and he must have somehow made it through the gap. I'm pretty bummed right now. Link to comment
ihatesears18 Posted April 12, 2009 Author Share Posted April 12, 2009 Glad to see you guys care! j/k anyways the cyano is getting way out of control. I'm getting very discouraged. I'll do another water change tomorrow and keep siphoning the nasty #### up. I wish I had a friend in this hobby, as I would really love to take all livestock out of my tank and start fresh. Link to comment
adolfo425 Posted April 12, 2009 Share Posted April 12, 2009 Cyano sucks big time. I had it bad at one time. Its part of a cycle. I won the battle with water changes and siphoning out the stuff. You have to double check your water parameters anything changing or out of wack will cause it to flourish. Sucks that your firefish jumped they quick too. If you want to leave the top open for ventilation best thing to do is make a screen cover so the fish doesn't make it out but bounce back into the water. Link to comment
ihatesears18 Posted April 12, 2009 Author Share Posted April 12, 2009 Cyano sucks big time. I had it bad at one time. Its part of a cycle. I won the battle with water changes and siphoning out the stuff. You have to double check your water parameters anything changing or out of wack will cause it to flourish. Sucks that your firefish jumped they quick too. If you want to leave the top open for ventilation best thing to do is make a screen cover so the fish doesn't make it out but bounce back into the water. Yeah I got a turkey baster today and will siphon this crap out and do water changes like crazy. I'm thinkin starting tomorrow i'll replace a gallon twice a week until this problem is under control. The cheato is growing well and I change out the polyfil daily to make sure absolutely nothing sits stagnant. I am seriously considering swapping out the stock pump for added flow and replacing the koralia 1 with 2 koralia nanos for more opposing currents. I just really don't want to get discouraged, as I was having so much fun! Oh well I guess anything worth having you have to work hard at. I see someone in gainesville is selling a complete 10gal setup for $300. That's a heck of a deal! I'm pretty sure I've seen the tank on here before.... Link to comment
Nanobuds Posted April 12, 2009 Share Posted April 12, 2009 get chemie-clean. worked 4 me Link to comment
ihatesears18 Posted April 13, 2009 Author Share Posted April 13, 2009 Siphoned the nasty stuff out with a turkey baster and changed out 1 gallon. I'll do this every 3 or 4 days until this problem is over. By the way, are hermits supposed to be really lazy? Mine just seem to sit in one place and do a whole lot of nothing. When I wake up in the morning they've moved, but never when I'm looking. Are they nocturnal? Link to comment
ihatesears18 Posted April 13, 2009 Author Share Posted April 13, 2009 Would the addition of an emerald crab be wise? Also is it safe to add coral while battling cyano? Right now it's only on the sandbed with the exception of a few tiny spots here and there on the rocks. Link to comment
ihatesears18 Posted April 13, 2009 Author Share Posted April 13, 2009 I switched out the position of the actinic and 10000k lights and MAN does it make a difference! I highly recommend that anyone with a similar setup should try this to see if it suits them. Link to comment
ihatesears18 Posted April 14, 2009 Author Share Posted April 14, 2009 Picked up some Aquamend and some Loctite gel, finally glued my frags down. I also picked up a tiny mag-float so that I can stop sticking my hands in the tank to clean the glass! Link to comment
Ron99 Posted April 14, 2009 Share Posted April 14, 2009 The Biocube 8 is great. We have one in my daughter's room (although it looks like we may be upgrading that to a 34 gallon cube and combining the 8 gallon with another 10 gallon nano we have). I had a similar problem with a fire fish. Jumped into the middle chamber and got stuck on top of the drip plate and died :-( I ended up screening across the back as well so the replacement couldn't jump into the back so you may want to look at that too. As for lighting, I also changed to one 50/50 bulb in front and an actinic in the back. It is slightly less bright but I find the colours more pleasing. Probably closer to 16,000k or 18,000k than 14,000k with the 50/50 arrangement. Oh, and I also changed out the noisy stock fans for some slightly better ones I bought from an electronics supplier. They are better than stock and cheaper too. Link to comment
ihatesears18 Posted April 14, 2009 Author Share Posted April 14, 2009 I'll be swapping the fans out soon, I would really like the fans to help keep the tank cool without having the lid open. The tank looks so much better with no lid at all or completely closed. The cyano seems to be growing much slower now, but i'll still do bi-weekly water changes until the problem is clear. So guys, what's the verdict on emerald crabs? Will it work in an 8 gallon tank? Has anyone had any experience with these crabs in a tiny tank? Also what kind of fish would go nicely in an 8 gallon, and also isn't likely to jump? Thanks in advance for any input! I'll post some new pics soon, the tank looks a bit different now. Link to comment
ihatesears18 Posted April 16, 2009 Author Share Posted April 16, 2009 Any comments on the new setup? Any ideas for a fish? Edit: Picked up a false percula. Named him Homey! Also picked up what were supposed to be both blue legged hermit crabs, but one is a red-legged (not scarlet). My other hermits do nothing all day long and these were super active in the tank at the new LFS that I found today. The new store had lots of neat stuff, including a saltwater "pond" with 2 nurse sharks. They also had an awesome red-mushroom rock with 8 or 9 shrooms for $45 which doesn't sound bad. I'll probably pick it up soon if they don't sell it Link to comment
ihatesears18 Posted April 17, 2009 Author Share Posted April 17, 2009 Well here are some pics of some new stuff I picked up today. Sorry for any blurry pics. I'm a crappy photographer and also have no idea how to get my camera to "see" more light... any suggestions? It's a sony digital... Link to comment
ihatesears18 Posted April 17, 2009 Author Share Posted April 17, 2009 Wow! I discovered lots of little hitchikers on my new mushroom rock. There are at least 6 TINY feather duster worms, 2 tiny things that look like xenia (definitely not aiptasia but could be a feather duster) and 5 or six tentacles coming out of the rock, almost too minute to see. They look like a brittle star leg, but I can't be sure. They have black stripes and are really neat to watch! Link to comment
ihatesears18 Posted April 17, 2009 Author Share Posted April 17, 2009 new shroom pic, they've expanded quite a bit Link to comment
ihatesears18 Posted April 20, 2009 Author Share Posted April 20, 2009 Picked up a 4" frag of GSP for $20 today, this stuff is super neon green. I'll post some pics once it's opened up a bit. The next thing on the list is a striped mushroom and 2 sexy shrimp if the LFS will get them back in stock some time soon! Link to comment
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