Newman's Picotope

[.Newman.]

thank you guys

 

I'm going to leave everything where it is for at least a week to acclimate, and then I'm going to move that chalice up to its intended spot...I will also probably move that monti frag into better view and brighter light xD

[friar1]

Really Nice Additions newman, look great under your lights!

 

Friar

[Cheetos]

Dude your tank is looking great with the new additions and the LEDs. I especially like the new chalice!

[.Newman.]

Thanks!

Do you guys know what this tank needs?

 

Green Bird's nest SPS; right on that top left plateau rock. I bet that would look awesome

deffo going to save up for a frag of that stuff someday.

I have to focus on getting familiar with my future RO/DI system and getting pure water into this tank before I try more SPS tho (I can never forget how badly bryopsis took over my Porites colony before :'( )

 

EDIT: upon research, I find that many say the green birds nest SPS is a difficult coral to keep...maybe I should not get it then =/

[racechase]

You can try some other birdsnest, those are the easiest SPS I ever kept

 

and i totally agree, you need a nest

[.Newman.]

you know, I'm going to take the risk and get the green, I just love it too much. but not anytime soon lol. I need to get everything in my tank off on a good start hehe.

[.Newman.]

sorry to say but no movie will be made

 

my camera's video option is not very customizable and therefore I cannot tune the settings to accept the colors of the LEDs, so everything just looks blue on screen. theres also little to no shimmer being registered as a result.

 

o well, I shall have to settle for pictures.

[.Newman.]

Ricordea update:

 

it looks a little better. I'm pretty sure it grew its 3rd mouth over the last 3 days. maybe it's not going to die?

[Mr. Microscope]

Ricordea update:

 

it looks a little better. I'm pretty sure it grew its 3rd mouth over the last 3 days. maybe it's not going to die?

Glad to hear it.

 

I agree with you about the green birds nest. Those things are stunning in person.

 

BTW, what would you say is you favorite thing/things in your tank right now?

[.Newman.]

favorite thing? THING would be my green striped shrom. My favorite shrom out of all shroms hands down.

[Wendy]

Your tank is looking great & I love all of your new frags!

[.Newman.]

Thank you Wendy

[.Newman.]

Did a few things today:

affixed that chalice frag to its permanent position, it was a real pain for the epoxy and the superglue gel to work together but it looks stable now =S

 

Also did the weekly water change and trimmed down the bryopsis algae beforehand. idk if it helped more than it harmed by spreading fragments of algae around the tank >_<

 

My RO/DI system finally arrived today and I made some pure water for the top-off and a gallon for the next water change happening very soon.

I hope there will be less issues with phosphate and/or nitrate coming from my water source..

[Mr. Microscope]

Congrats on finding a spot for you chalice. I've been trying to get my corals in more perminent spots too so that I can stop pestering them. It seems like one of the hardest things about this hobby is leaving stuff alone.

 

BTW, what kind of RODI system did you get? Can you just hook it up to a sink? Been thinking about getting one of these so that I can have a tank at home.

[andrewkw]

Looks good.

[.Newman.]

thanks andrew

 

@Microscope: I got something for $145 on sale, it was a 90 gpd one and yea you prolly can hook it up to a sink, but the adapter it comes with is more suited for a garden hose type of water outlet lol. so i just make RO/DI water outside

[badfish816]

awesome man. i am definately gonna get one of these once i move. no more buying water for me

[.Newman.]

Yes, idk what it was about distilled water, I just didnt trust it especially after I saw a whole bunch of bryopsis growing exactly where my top-off was dripping water into the tank =/

 

So here is the new position of the chalice, it may look weird at first but I bet all it needs to do is grow out and it will look much better

 

Also I bought the these two kinds of Palys just last week and the one on the right is already growing a new head I didnt know they could grow this fast! My old palys that I removed never grew a single head over the course of a few months =/ they were pretty shabby.

and yes thats the "crawling Bryopsis forest" AKA my Astrea snail >_>

[badfish816]

paly on the right looks like a green implosion. lefts look like nuclear greens.

[.Newman.]

thanks for the IDs

I was sure the ones on the left were nuclear greens cuz the seller told me so, but he threw in the one on the right for free w/o mentioning it so I didnt know its name, thanks! Its doing terrifically well for some polyp that didnt come attached to anything (i had to glue it in that place when i got it)

[andrewkw]

You should try and take your pics at a slower shutter speed and or faster iso.

[.Newman.]

shudder speed is the slowest it can go and there is seriously no ISO option on my camera

its not parishilton's SLR camera lol.

[andrewkw]

shudder speed is the slowest it can go and there is seriously no ISO option on my camera

its not parishilton's SLR camera lol.

 

 

are you sure? you may have to play with the settings on manual.

 

Or maybe just adjust the brightness and contrast after taking the pics see

 

I wouldn't have known you have those mushrooms if I didn't play with your photo.

[.Newman.]

ah lol, i'd get better visibility like thel on you posted if I adjusted the brightness of my camera into the positive range, but I find that usually washes my corals out way beyond what i would see with my eye, and thats why I dont like to do that

for example my green shrom looks way more green in real life than in that photo that was edited lol.

 

Would you say it would be much better if I took brighter pics? I would then lol.

 

but back to my regular picture-shooting....

[.Newman.]

Swapped my powerhead today for a K Nano. wondering how that would improve random flow in my tank...

 

Here is something I've been talking about lately: "Hydroids" or what i'd like to call them, "colonial tubeworms" I have these mutant aqua-colored ones that glow green under actinics o_o

I know i cant really get a good shot of them cuz theyre so small and because of their position in the live rock but here you can see them halfway between the two zoa colonies:

You can see that at least one of them is open and the one in front is closed with just the brown tube sticking out:

 

Here are my regular brown ones (their crowns would be rown but i took this shot at night so they have white transparent crowns;they havent colored up yet):

 

My first fragging attempt lol. I found this guy in my AC70 so i figured I could glue him down on a rock piece and call it a frag:

 

And some pics of the newest zoas in their altered colors, since they end to morph under LEDs, i bet they came from a T-5 tank or something other than LEDs:

 

I think these new ones are pretty cool too, they didnt open for a while cuz they were 3 days in shipping but here they are:

Macro of the day(w/o a macro lens lol):