Steely185's rimless 75 edge

[keydiver]

All montiporas are gone, tricolor colony is gone, slimer is gone, pearlberry is going, green birdsnest looks like it may be going, red planet is showing signs of death, and both tenuis pieces are likely to be gone by end of the weekend.

 

I may be lucky to come away with 3 or 4 SPS pieces by the time everything is done. I did a large water change last night, added a large bag of carbon and plenty Prime (seachem bacterial additive).

 

Looking like I may be starting from the ground up again.

 

 

NOOOO!!!! I'm so sorry to hear that. This tank really is an inspiration, and I hate to see it go this way. You seem persistent though, I'm sure you'll turn it into something even better

[Genj]

aww man, I hate to hear this. I know I'm going to move sometime in the future, and because of this I honestly think I'm going to rent myself an air conditioned storage unit and setup a temporary tank. I've heard too many stories like this that make me feel the pain, empatheticaly (is that a word?)

[revaltion131]

Oh no I'm so sorry to hear about the losses! Wishing you the best of luck with what's left!

[steely185]

Thanks Guys

 

It's not looking so hot. Capped the 1st week in the house off by coming home to a dead AC. Glad we made the owners buy a home warranty but nobody will come until Monday. I figure the weather should kill off what's left over the weekend but hopefully not the fish.

 

Bright side is I have been working on the rock. I'm going to digest a bit on what I have. I really want to keep it simple.

[animalmaster6]

Dangit. Best of luck with the fish. I think they'll do better.

[steely185]

Here's what's left of my reef, even the coralline algae died.

 

 

Here's the new scape

 

 

 

 

 

 

[jam77]

I know in no time at all your tank will be even better than it was. Are you still considering switching to LEDs

[steely185]

Thanks. I am still considering it but not anytime soon. I've got my hands full of other things I need to spend money on right now.

 

I got a coral sitter for the handful of acans and 3 or 4 remaining acros (no telling whether they will make it).

 

I also placed one of the new rocks in the tank. I still need to add one shelf to one island before adding it to the tank. I will probably cement that tonight. Overall I'm very happy with the rocks.

[revaltion131]

I would be happy with the rocks too. They look great!

 

I hope your corals can pull through! I know what it's like to lose the whole stock, and mine weren't full colonies like yours were. It really sucks.

[keydiver]

Please don't tell me you lost all those gorgeous acans?! I'm not gonna lie, that picture made me cry a little bit inside.

 

Edit: on a happier note, the new scape is really well done

[steely185]

I didn't lose all the Acans at least I hope. I probably lost about half but they were the smaller ones.

 

I can't say enough about the E marco 400 reef cement. The stuff is strong. The rocks are all very solid now. I used it again last night to put the small platform on the one island. I will file some of the excess away and put it in the tank tongiht. The fish really seem to like the other rock that I placed in the tank. Plenty of swimming room above and below the rocks.

[Soleil SW]

The rock you had pictured looks awesome! Is that macro rock or did you DIY those flat shelf pieces?

[steely185]

Thank you. It was bulk reef supply shelf, tonga, and pukani rock mixed with some old rock I had. I used the emarco stuff to help bond it together in the shapes I wanted. I'm pretty happy with it. It will definitely open it up some and leave plenty of space for mounting new corals.

[steely185]

So this is how the tank looks now. The rocks in the center will be removed a little later to open things a bit. I may add some other rock somewhere but want to wait and see how I like this first.

 

It will look a lot better with coral and coralline algae.

 

 

 

 

 

 

[steely185]

The fish seem to like the new scape. The tang has plenty of swimming room now. Can't wait to get some corals back in there.

[steely185]

Looking for some feedback on the new scape. Let me know if it needs more or less. Keep in mind the center pile of rocks will be gone soon.

[Arkayology]

I like the amount of space that you have now. I just wonder what will be going on the middle after the rocks are gone? Seems like there should be something there unless you are looking for a very open feel to the tank.

[animalmaster6]

I love the scape. Once those middle rocks are gone it will look fantastic. It has some great caves for fish as well.

[steely185]

I will probably do something similar with the overflow like I did before so it should occupy some of the center. This will allow the sandbed to be opened up and room to swim under corals as opposed to around rocks. If do something in the middle it won't be much other than a small branch or shelf. The nice thing is that the center leaves everything open to change. I also have a lot of rock that I removed that is drying out. Out with the pests and free to cycle again minus algae and majano.

[revaltion131]

I love the scape but I feel like the left island might need one more, small tier. But, if you plan on doing branching SPS colonies all the way up the overflow, that may help balance it out.

[steely185]

Here is what I was thinking of doing.

 

I'm thinking of doing a couple stags(blue or torquoise and a lavender or green) possibly on the left side upper tier back with a humilis, gemmifera, or samoensis near the front. Hopefully I still have my hulk tort. I may do a hawkins echinata and phils granulosa on the lower tier. The right side I may reserve for tabling and bushy corals like red planet and some millipora. The overflow will have my blue milli if it pulls through and a smaller tricolor. I will try and mix in something like a pink lemonade and ORA purple stylo on the right side. I have the blue iris to bring back and my bird of paradise. Maybe a green or bright pink birdsnest in the mix.

 

If I do a small rock in the center I may replant my two favias and find some room for my remaining acans. I have my purple and green lobo still. The legs of the rock work may be reserved for a couple of montis (undata, tuberculosa, or setosa). Maybe a meteor shower. That will probably fill it all out. I would love to add a nice acropora desalwii somewhere.

[steely185]

I picked up a 3/4" thick piece of 24"x24" plywood today. I took a look at some of the plastic panels and they were just too thin. I have two options.

 

1)Paint it black and mount it between two supports in the stand between an opening in the back.

2)Paint it white and leave the board outside of the stand behind the stand.

 

I'm leaning towards mounting it inside the stand just to keep it clean looking outside. I also picked up a bunch of velcro cable ties to clean the electrical cables up quite a bit. The board she be enough to mount both EB8 strips, the control module, wxm module, and probably both vortech drivers. The only thing that should be external will be two power supplies for the vortechs and my display for my Apex. I want to clean the clutter up quite a bit.

 

Now if only my wife would believe me when I say it's not a fire hazard. I keep telling her that each power strip is rated for 15 amps and that they are better than what we use on our computers or tvs. It's a never ending battle.

[steely185]

What's in the tank appears healthy and the tank seems like it's back to a normal pattern. The glass is starting to grow algae which tells me things are settling in again.

 

I had no time to work on the tank so I didn't get to paint the plywood going in the stand for the control/outlet center. I will try and work on that this week. I will have to drain the sump and move it in order to place the board in the stand. It will give me a chance to siphon any detritus in the sump so this should be a good thing. Maybe if all goes well I can move some of my corals (I should say the bucket of what's left) back to the tank.

 

I've been thinking about if I can get enough money together that I may order a box of java or bali cultured coral from livestockusa.org

 

I'm really interested to check them out and could always sell or frag what I don't like.

[d'Espresso]

Awesome job on the open scape! I'm a big fan of unique scape then a just one cluster plied rocks.

[steely185]

Thank you.

 

I finally got around to painting the plywood used for mounting my outets and controllers. I plan on mounting things in the morning. I will have to drain the sump and move it to get the board in there.

 

I'm also thinking of treating myself and picking up a Reef Octopus Extreme 8 Inch XS200 protein skimmer. They are rated for 200 gallons and use the sicce pumps. All the reviews seem to be good. I want to step it up a notch with my skimmer and get away from the pumps used on the NWB models and the bubble blaster pumps. It should be an improvement over the NWB-110 currently running the system.