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My Walmart Paint-by-Numbers Pico


pbjelly

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surgicalsense

Thank you. That is my cat, Ella. She was 7 weeks old in that pictures. She was falling off of my back, I was passed out on the couch.

 

pbj .... When are you adding coral?

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It's going to be a while for coral I think.

The sand is new, and so is some of that coral/rock, so the pico will probably cycle. I did stick the dirty filter floss from my other tank in there, so hopefully that will help things along.

 

Also, I am plotting my world dominating hob/fuge/idk what to call it, extra box of water - I have got to get that heater out of the tank - it kills me every time I see it.

 

Right now I'm thinking of building a small plexi box that will sit behind the tank. I'm hoping I can stick a small pump in it attached to an old filter intake, drill a hole for a bulkhead and attach an elbow and some locline for the return. Sounds simple, but I've never built anything out of plexi so we'll see. If I fail, I'll probably end up hanging an AC70 on the back. :P

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  • 2 weeks later...

Lots of changes today.

Went from this: new clove and daisy polyp rock with hitchhiker crab hidden indside

 

35me43d.jpg

 

to this:

 

25ui739.jpg

 

Look Ma, No Ugly Heater! (Please excuse the dirty front, I've been letting it grow so that the CUC has something to eat when I put them in the tank.

 

I stuck an AC70 on the back so I can finally get that heater out of the tank. I didn't really mod it - just cut a piece of black plastic canvas to fit across the spout, and ground the tab down a bit to lower the flow.

 

I don't have any macros back there yet. I have a nano-glo that I'm going to try. Even though the plastic of the AC 70 is smoked, I think the light is strong enough to grow chaeto, plus I've already got the light so I might as well give it a shot.

I also got a tiny gsp frag and a teeny-tiny kenya treee frag. We'll see how they do. There's not too much I can do about changing the flow in the tank with this set up - it is what it is.

 

Has anyone ever tried to attach coral to plastic canvas? I think it might be a cool way to control the growth of things like the gsp.

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Wow, that looks soo much cleaner without the heater in the tank. I think its funny how small these tanks are. I was lookin at your thermometer and wondering where you got one that big, then i remembered the tank is tiny

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This tank is tiny to the point of ridiculous - but fun!

 

I will be moving the thermometer at some point, but I wanted to make sure that the temperature was stable after I added the AC70 - and I've learned my lesson with digital thermometers - so until I get better acquainted with the ebb and flow of the pico - the mercury thermometer stays on the front.

 

I got the top cut down to fit the AC70, so now that that's on, I've added a CUC and my tank has got:

 

  • One Unidentified HitchHiker Crab
  • One Micro Hermit Crab
  • One Strombus Snail
  • One Cerith Snail
  • One Nickel Sized frag of GSP
  • One very sad looking frag of Kenya Tree Coral
  • One lovely rock covered in Blue Clove and Daisy Polyps
  • A small ball of Chaeto

 

There's an unintended side effect of the nano-glo fuge light on the back of the AC70, which is after lights out,

the tank looks like this: :D

 

dy9ml4.jpg

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This tank is tiny to the point of ridiculous - but fun!

 

PB,

Maintaining a pico is not as easy as one might think, I know!! I've got a little bit of a head start and I'm starting to see some of the difficulties. Hang in there!!!!!

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This tank is tiny to the point of ridiculous - but fun!

 

I will be moving the thermometer at some point, but I wanted to make sure that the temperature was stable after I added the AC70 - and I've learned my lesson with digital thermometers - so until I get better acquainted with the ebb and flow of the pico - the mercury thermometer stays on the front.

 

I got the top cut down to fit the AC70, so now that that's on, I've added a CUC and my tank has got:

 

  • One Unidentified HitchHiker Crab
  • One Micro Hermit Crab
  • One Strombus Snail
  • One Cerith Snail
  • One Nickel Sized frag of GSP
  • One very sad looking frag of Kenya Tree Coral
  • One lovely rock covered in Blue Clove and Daisy Polyps
  • A small ball of Chaeto

 

There's an unintended side effect of the nano-glo fuge light on the back of the AC70, which is after lights out,

the tank looks like this: :D

 

dy9ml4.jpg

That looks sweet with the fuge light shining through. Great start!

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That looks sweet with the fuge light shining through. Great start!

It does look cool, but i would do somethimg to stop it before any corals are added. They need to sleep too, ya know.

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  • 3 weeks later...

34zk4cx.jpg

 

New additions to the Bob Ross Pico.

 

I went in on a Live Aquaria order with some friendly NYC reefers and picked up what is supposed to be a white pom-pom xenia, and a taylor's purple tree coral. Well, the purple tree might be that - or it might just be another kenya tree. The white pom pom xenia looks awfully purple to me though. Argh...

 

14k8y2h.jpg

 

It's really hard to take good pictures through the plastic of these tanks, but you can see the mass of purple/brown back in the corner.

 

It looks like I did have one frag swap failure though. This is supposed to be Sympodium, but so far it hasn't opened. I don't know how long the guy I got it from had it bagged - it could just be that it didn't make it, or maybe it doesn't like where it is in the pico. According to Live Aquaria, these like good flow and medium light.

I guess I'll give it a bit more time, but I was so looking forward to having some of this.

 

dbocjk.jpg

 

The crab is still a mystery although I see the claw come out every once in a while. I did chop the clove rock in half - everything is gigantic in this tank and I need the rel-estate. I have to get rid of those LA frag blocks ASAP - I feel like they take up half the tank.

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  • 2 weeks later...

2vvvzhd.jpg

 

So I headed on up to the Bronx yesterday to pick up a frag of xenia that a very nice NY reefer was giving away for free. It turns out it is pumping xenia - which is quite cool to watch.

I've moved the Sympodium to the nano - I think it was DOA - I never once saw it open, but who knows, maybe in the stronger light of the nano it will re-animate.

 

Every single thing left in here (barring the taylor's purple tree coral) comes with a warning - that it's a pest, that it will take over my tank; GSP, Kenya Tree, Clove Polyps, Pom Pom Xenia, Pumping Xenia - so I've decided to rename my pico 'The Island of Castaway Coral - an homage to the great Bob Ross'.

 

I have some ideas that I think will give this baby a little extra Bam! - but what it really needs now is some time to grow. Let's see how fast this stuff really does spread.

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MYSTERY CRAB REVEALED!!!!

 

64jvc9.jpg

 

AHA! Finally - I know what the mystery crab looks like, and surprise, surprise - he's teeny!

I damaged the molted shell a bit trying to remove it from the tank, but you can basically see what he (or she) must look like. So far, he hasn't left his little cave once that I know of.

 

If anyone can ID this little guy, I'd appreciate the help.

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Snails are cannon fodder for my hermit crabs.

 

I've got two different kinds of snails - the white/greenish kind I think are stomatellas - the others are 'snack food'.

 

I'm not sure how many I started off with, but all of the gray/blue snails have been murdered for food/shells by the hermits in my nano. They are also suicidal escape artists. I'm always finding these guys making a break for it outside the tank (possibly because of the genocide inside the tank) - that's how this one ended up in the pico. He made a break for it and I found him drying up on the floor. I figured 'what the hey', the pico could use another snail, so I tossed him in. He did ok for a couple of days - only found his way out once - and then this...

 

1252xok.jpg

 

Maybe the other ones just aren't tasty...

 

Current FTS - Next step - painting clouds. I've got some stuff coming, and then the clouds are going in :)

 

d8uh2.jpg

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Sympodium can take months to open, I've had mine for about 2 and barely see one polyp some times.

Don't throw it out unless it stinks.

 

The crab might be a gorilla, did it have black tips?

 

New spectrum crustacean pellets in 1mm size would keep those hermits bellies full. Other than that get empty shells.

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The crab might be a gorilla, did it have black tips?

 

Yup - Black tips... I guess I'll have to change the name to 'Gorilla Crab Pico' :)

 

The sympodium was definitely DOA - I think they bagged it the night before the frag swap. I moved it to the nano in case light was the issue but it never opened, and then started peeling off the plug - I kept it for three weeks and then gave it up for dead.

 

I actually hand (tweezer) feed the crabs so they don't go hungry. The (gorilla) crab in the pico starts poking his claws out of his little hole when he hears the tweezers knocking against the plastic of the tank top.

I think the hermits just like molesting the snails. They have lots of extra shells and enough food - they're just homicidal...crustacianicidal?...mean little mo-fo's.

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Sympodium can take months to open, I've had mine for about 2 and barely see one polyp some times.

Don't throw it out unless it stinks.

 

Thanks for this tip. I was just about to give up on mine!

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Oy. Issues.

 

So I've started seeing Aiptasia in the tank. It's a not a surprise - I got some of the rocks out of the sump at my LFS. It's not a huge problem, but still annoying, and in an impossible to reach location. I'd love to take out the rock and disinfect it somehow, but then I guess it would need to re-cure...

 

Last night, I saw something new. Long white fuzzy streamers that retracted as soon as I shined a light on them coming from three different places in the tank. I did a search here and think they may be DIGITATE HYDROIDS. Whoa. Crazy things.

What I really want is one of the bristle worms from my nano. Those suckers keep the place nice and clean from any detritus that might get stuck under a rock. I seem to be battling a light build up of 'gunk' that my hermit shows no interest in eating at every water change.

 

The big problem I'm having in both tanks is the calcium level. It's low - around 330 and dropping before a water change. I've ordered the neccessary test kits and may start test driving some careful dosing. I was hoping to avoid it, but with my work schedule, it would be difficult to do water changes more often than the once a week I'm doing them now, so better living through chemistry here I come...

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surgicalsense
MYSTERY CRAB REVEALED!!!!

 

64jvc9.jpg

 

AHA! Finally - I know what the mystery crab looks like, and surprise, surprise - he's teeny!

I damaged the molted shell a bit trying to remove it from the tank, but you can basically see what he (or she) must look like. So far, he hasn't left his little cave once that I know of.

 

If anyone can ID this little guy, I'd appreciate the help.

 

So cute .. so tiny

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  • 2 weeks later...
Are you thinking of dosing for Calcium?

Yes - trying to decide between dosing two part, or just adding Calcium. It's tough because with my new work schedule, I haven't managed one full week of testing at the same time every day, so I'm holding off on adding anything because I can't reliably test right now.

 

Any suggestions are appreciated.

 

I'm also having a detritus problem in this tank. I think I need to add some filter floss to the AC70. Right now the only filtration is coming from the Tom's filter and I'm seeing a build up of black 'gunk' in the tank. It's sort of amazing, the water flow in this tank is really strong, but it builds up crap really quickly.

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