GR's 12g Long Macro Reef

[grmoore]

Man, seeing all those macros makes me so envious! I wish I lived in Florida!!!!!!!! ARRRRRRG.

 

Great tank btw, nicely kept. How are you keeping up with demands on the nutrients? Or since you're so close to many options for macros do you just replace them when they die?

 

I'm located in Ohio, but would trade for Florida any day! I'm dosing 2.5ml of Seachem Flourish Nitrogen daily and 15 drops of Kent Iron and Maganese every other day. My dosing regimen is noted in my first post of this thread. It seems to work for me as everything looks to be healthy and thriving, and I have had only one macro frag that came in healthy from Gulf Coast Ecosystems that didn't make it.

[RESONANCE]

DOH! MY BAD! I tend to just skim over posts and look at the purdiy pichars... LOL...

 

Ohio eh? Still, at least you've the option of getting stuff shipped to you from Florida. Those of us here in the soon to be frozen north have a hard time getting stuff from there.

[calvin]

The bright green macro.. I would have said a caulerpa, but it appears to have no runner.

 

Did you ever figure out what this is? How is it doing? If it's not caulerpa I'd love to get some myself.

[grmoore]

Did you ever figure out what this is? How is it doing? If it's not caulerpa I'd love to get some myself.

 

It has no runner and has grown a ton of sprouts off the main body of the plant. I have absolutely no idea what it is yet, but it's the brightest green macro I've ever seen. I've not been able to find anything like it through references on the web.

[calvin]

Did you get it from GCE? If so, have you asked them?

 

I just got a shipment from them today. Lots of great stuff. This eucheuma is huge!

 

[grmoore]

Did you get it from GCE? If so, have you asked them?

 

I just got a shipment from them today. Lots of great stuff. This eucheuma is huge!

 

 

Nope, didn't ask them yet. Let me know how your Eucheuma does. The snipping I got didn't fair very well - it was the only piece I lost that I got from them. I put it in moderate flow and shaded light, but it just went south.

[calvin]

Shaded light may have been your problem. When they come in yellow that means they're used to bright light.

[grmoore]

Nope, didn't ask them yet. Let me know how your Eucheuma does. The snipping I got didn't fair very well - it was the only piece I lost that I got from them. I put it in moderate flow and shaded light, but it just went south.

 

I asked Russ at Gulf Coast Ecosystems and he ID'd it as a green variant of Laurencia Papillosa. He says that it's normally brownish-red, but it sometimes has the bright green instead.

 

Shaded light may have been your problem. When they come in yellow that means they're used to bright light.

 

Quite possibly that or it needed more flow. I'll buy a bunch from GCE when they get more yellow in stock and try various spots in the tank.

[calvin]

I really need to learn about dosing a macro tank. Any suggestions? I'm doing weekly water changes but I wonder if that will be sufficient long term.

[drunkenmonk21]

I really need to learn about dosing a macro tank. Any suggestions? I'm doing weekly water changes but I wonder if that will be sufficient long term.

 

You need to test and see, in a macro tank water changes alone may not do the job if you have a large amount. I would just keep testing and see when your nutrients are getting to low for growth. When you dose I would start off small and test to see how long it takes for them to be used up and you may need to raise the amount or lower it. Trial and error basically

[NinjaBum]

Water changes for what? I don't see you getting limited on anything but Iron really which is easily dosed. I don't plan on changing the water but once or twice a year.

 

I dose trace elements, coral-vite, and iron. Besides the usual NO3 and PO4 anyway.

[drunkenmonk21]

Water changes for what? I don't see you getting limited on anything but Iron really which is easily dosed. I don't plan on changing the water but once or twice a year.

 

I dose trace elements, coral-vite, and iron. Besides the usual NO3 and PO4 anyway.

 

 

It also depends on what all is in his tank, if he has alot of calcified coral or plants he may need to dose calcium, and also make sure your alkalinity doesn't get low. Does coral-vite cover the calcium? Im not familiar with it.

[grmoore]

I really need to learn about dosing a macro tank. Any suggestions? I'm doing weekly water changes but I wonder if that will be sufficient long term.

 

You need to test and see, in a macro tank water changes alone may not do the job if you have a large amount. I would just keep testing and see when your nutrients are getting to low for growth. When you dose I would start off small and test to see how long it takes for them to be used up and you may need to raise the amount or lower it. Trial and error basically

 

Just as Josh says, it's all about testing your water to see what is needed to keep the parameters where you need them to be. I test the basics every week - calcium, alkalinity, pH and Nitrates. I never test nitrites, ammonia or phosphates. I test salinity every day or every other day, as that is the one parameter that scares me in small tanks - it just doesn't take much to push it out of range.

 

I have a lot of calcareous plants like Cymopolia barbata, Halimeda sp. and Flame Algae, so I'm having to dose calcium and alk buffer to keep them happy and promote coralline growth. To keep the green algae greener, I'm dosing a bit of iron every couple days. For overall plant growth, I dose nitrogen daily. I dose a drop of Lugols every other day for the Zoas, and I've also read that iodine (Lugols) helps the red macros.

 

It also depends on what all is in his tank, if he has alot of calcified coral or plants he may need to dose calcium, and also make sure your alkalinity doesn't get low. Does coral-vite cover the calcium? Im not familiar with it.

 

I dose Seachem vitamins and amino acids for the fish, coral and inverts. To be honest, I've not seen any difference using it or not. It's cheap and I trust that Seachem isn't going to sell snake oil, so if there is the potential that it will keep my animals healthy and happy for years to come (Chromis are supposed to live up to 15 years), then it's worth it to me.

[grmoore]

Water changes for what? I don't see you getting limited on anything but Iron really which is easily dosed. I don't plan on changing the water but once or twice a year.

 

I dose trace elements, coral-vite, and iron. Besides the usual NO3 and PO4 anyway.

 

I've not done a water change on this tank since I set it up (2 months), and my other tank had one 10% water change over 10 months. I run a protein skimmer on this tank every night as I use no mechanical filtration to catch particulates (I also run it for oxygenation at night to help stabilize pH during the night time hours), but the other tank has no skimmer. I've yet to see any reason for a water change other than to ease my own mind that I'm somehow doing something wrong.

 

There are so many macros in my current tank that I would have to do something seriously wrong to require a water change in it. I replenish the tank with regular dosing, and I get the parameters I personally want for my water. With the small bio-load that I have in the tank, and the large number of healthy macro algaes, i don't see any reason to do a water change as long as I continue to keep the water parameters and trace elements stable.

 

I will, however, probably be doing a gradual change of water over the coming months as I want to switch from the ESV B-Ionic Seawater System salt to Red Sea Coral Pro salt for better calcium/alkalinity buffering. The ESV salt is a bit weak in that regard.

[NinjaBum]

It also depends on what all is in his tank, if he has alot of calcified coral or plants he may need to dose calcium, and also make sure your alkalinity doesn't get low. Does coral-vite cover the calcium? Im not familiar with it.

 

Well obviously Calc and Alk goes down but water changes won't help that much anyway if there is a high demand.

 

Coral vite just has different vitamins and amino acids. Like grmoore mentioned, I don't notice when I dose or don't dose, but it doesn't get used up quickly and it's cheap so why not?

[drunkenmonk21]

Sorry for hi-jacking your thread GR

 

Ninja I think we got our wires crossed, I was telling calvin that water changes arent going to be enough to refuel for a macro tank. Because he asked if water changes would be sufficient for long term.

 

I wasn't trying to argue with you

 

 

 

You need to test and see, in a macro tank water changes alone may not do the job if you have a large amount. I would just keep testing and see when your nutrients are getting to low for growth. When you dose I would start off small and test to see how long it takes for them to be used up and you may need to raise the amount or lower it. Trial and error basically

 

 

Well obviously Calc and Alk goes down but water changes won't help that much anyway if there is a high demand.

 

Coral vite just has different vitamins and amino acids. Like grmoore mentioned, I don't notice when I dose or don't dose, but it doesn't get used up quickly and it's cheap so why not?

[grmoore]

Sorry for hi-jacking your thread GR

 

I don't consider it hi-jacked at all.

[calvin]

I don't consider it hi-jacked at all.

darn, I guess I'm gonna have to try harder.

[grmoore]

Thought I would put up a couple of shots tonight after doing water tests.

 

The first one is of a clump of Cymopolia barbata. I have 5 large clusters of these in the tank, and they really are quite nice looking plants.

 

 

The second shot is of Halimeda opuntia that encrusts rock. After a few weeks, these have already started to attach to the rockfaces and spread out. The neat thing about this cluster is the lime green tunicate attached to the lower center of the plant. i don't think I've ever seen a green one before.

 

[grmoore]

Sorry it's been a while since I last updated this thread. I've been letting things grow out in the tank, and have only added a couple of new macro clippings. I did have my first loss in almost a year - my purple rod gorgonian died on me. I have no idea why, as water parameters are solid, flow is very good and everything looks happy and healthy. The only thing i can think of is light intensity. I currently have 6W per gallon of T5HO lighting, but hope to add a stunner strip soon.

 

First, a current full tank shot, then a series of panoramic shots.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This is a shot of one of the new macros. I got this from LAReefs, and they called it Red Palm. Anyone have an idea what it really is?

 

 

This is a shot of the other new macro. I also got this from LAReefs, and they called it a Red Flower. Anyone have an idea what it really is?

 

 

The next series of shots are just miscellaneous images showing some growth.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This last image is of a macro that has been growing under my flamingo feather algae. It took about 6 months for the 3 fronds to grow to about 5 inches in length. I thought it may be Caulerpa mexicana, but it grows extremely slow and is completely translucent. It doesn't have a solid, well defined midrib at all. An ideas on what this might be?

 

[RESONANCE]

NR needs a "drools" smiley... cuz that's what I'm doin... lookin at your tank and all your macros.

[calvin]

looks great!

 

what's this green one?

 

[grmoore]

looks great!

 

what's this green one?

 

 

It's a green variant of Laurencia Papillosa. There's some red pigmentation on the top edges facing the light, so I'm probably going to see if I can move it a bit more under the rock overhang behind the plant. There's a closeup of the plant on page 3 of this thread.

[grmoore]

NR needs a "drools" smiley... cuz that's what I'm doin... lookin at your tank and all your macros.

 

Thanks.

 

I'd only call it nice, not droolable. I still have a lot of work to do to get it even close to the quality many of you already have.

[grmoore]

As I've not kept macro algaes for a terribly long time, I was wondering if they exhibit the same seasonal die-offs and regrowths that freshwater plants have. For instance, a few of my algaes have died back quite a bit during the last 2 weeks, while others have had a growth explosion. It was almost the exact opposite growth pattern last spring - those plants that are growing wildly now had troubles during that time. My water parameters have always been the same, as has the temperature. I also dose trace elements, so that shouldn't be an issue. Does anyone else see this trend in their tanks?