Hey! Summer Summer! Smedric Shmiggory's - an ADA 60-F - reef ledge style!

[milk]

I've decided against upgrading anytime soon (thank gaaawd) and instead did a little updating recently - recscaped my tank slightly ( now 7 months old! ) - sold the GIANT pagoda cup that was taking up a cloud size area of my tank. Somebody convinced me to sell this beloved, 8 year old coral.. but I had to because, well I bought a coral I've been thinking off dropping in the tank since the original plans on post #1 of the tank thread -

 

the mighty torch coral! - it was stinging the sin out of the pagoda cup on a part of its lip and justice had to be served.. but it was awesome because since the cup took up so much room, removing it freed up a lot of space that I will keep open for the new scape. The torch sits in front as kind of a magical, hippy bead entry way to the cove beyond! Yay!

 

here's some photos of the new upgrade .. also picked up some new friends, a really cool slow pulsing xenia with long floppy polyps ... several peppermint shrimp to hopefully drain the aiptasia of their demon spawn and a burgundy linckia star that a wonderful man who I assemble in my head as the willy wonka of coral absolutely insisted that I purchase. Apparently they are terribly difficult to acclimate when he gets them shipped, and out of a batch of 25, only a few survived the travel, which he stated as rare.

 

Needless to say, the star is wiping out my astrea star population, and growing new arms. I find it cool that the area where they grow new parts of their arms are white at the tip very similar to some SPS growth points! - I've fed the star a few pieces of clam that it seemed to gobble down (well, as fast as a starfish can "gobble")

 

Here are some new shots - oh yeah - one of my par38s burned out - I purchased this as used from a reefer here - but not his fault - he was selling as is at a good price. I've since purchased a replacement Rapid par38.. the extreme blue from the all blue par30 I have on the left to the par38 i have on the right looks really cool for now though! the coral don't seem to mind the reduced light that much.

 

 

 

 

 

area where the cup used to be

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Deleted User 4]

Dude nice update man!! And that is one sweet looking star...tasty. Btw, what do you feed it? I heard those linkia stars are hard to maintain and tend to die off easily.

Your tank has grown quite a lot since the last update it seems. Maybe it's because you've gotten rid of that pagoda cup ahah. Love that derasa clam..so classy with its colors.

[milk]

Dude nice update man!! And that is one sweet looking star...tasty. Btw, what do you feed it? I heard those linkia stars are hard to maintain and tend to die off easily.

Your tank has grown quite a lot since the last update it seems. Maybe it's because you've gotten rid of that pagoda cup ahah. Love that derasa clam..so classy with its colors.

 

 

dude! nice classy colors bomb! - whale whale whale, i've only had the star for a few days, and i've seen it eating a few astrea stars which have become abundant in my tank which is koo, but i've also dropped bits of clam underneath it when I turn off the pumps to feed, and its also eaten some larger pieces of rod's food that have fallen near it, or squirted close to it. Its always foraging though, so I'm just going to keep feeding it this way a few times a day. I over feed my tank as it is, so we'll see how it goes, his arms are surely growing though!

 

but yeah - things like the zoas and encrusting gorgonian seem to have grown quite a bit around the tank - these photos don't show how big the duncan or the frogspawn have gotten though because the light usually over them burned out... replacement on its way!

[Deleted User 4]

I see. Wait!!! Linkia stars eat astrea stars???? No wayyy, I had no idea they eat their own kind. Also, if you feed it clam, wouldn't it be able to take a bite out of your derasa clam as well??

[jedimasterben]

sorry to hear about the ich - i wonder how common ich is on the real reef in the wild

Its probably not very common, but the wild will sort it out much more quickly than it would in our tanks. Such is the circle of life.

 

*cue lion king*

 

 

 

Also, those appear to be a type of clove polyp, not pulsing xenia. Xenia pulses quickly.

[milk]

I see. Wait!!! Linkia stars eat astrea stars???? No wayyy, I had no idea they eat their own kind. Also, if you feed it clam, wouldn't it be able to take a bite out of your derasa clam as well??

 

Haha - yeah I was surprised when I saw it too - it was like a mother ship beaming up an exploratory pod.. it all happened.. very.. slowly. Then I saw it take down another one. I think it follows the rule of nature that whatever it can catch and can fit in its mouth, game on.

 

Not too worried about it munching the derasa. I think they're pretty much reef safe - I think dead clam flesh has a different taste/chemical that activates feeding with things like starfish. I've seen it feel around the derasa already, go all over the shell (the derasa closed up tight while this was going down), but I'm sure like most cases of people seeing this kind of behavior in supposed "reef safe" animals, that the thing being fed on is sick/dying/dead.

[Deleted User 4]

Ohh ok. Good to know ahah.

[milk]

Oh, and closing nights thoughts.. Suckas dont know about the foot pillow @ the end of the bed.

[milk]

I ordered an all white par38 from rapid - I haven't seen anyone using this over their reef - sump maybe.. but the idea was to get a gradient from the all blue bulb on the left to the middle which is half and half to the all white on the right.. see how it goes, should get here tomorrow!

[milk]

Its probably not very common, but the wild will sort it out much more quickly than it would in our tanks. Such is the circle of life.

 

*cue lion king*

 

 

 

Also, those appear to be a type of clove polyp, not pulsing xenia. Xenia pulses quickly.

 

lol - its especially common among german reefs .. *ich!*

 

hmm, they could be, but I thought clove polyps do not pulse at all? These pulse, but its like 1 pulse every 5 seconds, and the the whole "hand" closes quickly and opens a little bit slower.. its actually pretty cool to watch compared to the faster pulsing xenia - I think it may just be a different type of xenia - although I understand pulse rates are dependent on a few different factors. - they were pulsing at the same rate in the store though.

[milk]

i think this fall I'm going to setup a new tank for a sea apple in my studio/office. I want it to be the smallest feasible tank (maybe like a 4-5g cube) with a 20 gallon or so sump.. Just a sea apple, and macroalgae, a sump, LR and an algae scrubber..

[Reef Casa]

i think this fall I'm going to setup a new tank for a sea apple in my studio/office. I want it to be the smallest feasible tank (maybe like a 4-5g cube) with a 20 gallon or so sump.. Just a sea apple, and macroalgae, a sump, LR and an algae scrubber..

 

sounds cool to me

[jedimasterben]

lol - its especially common among german reefs .. *ich!*

 

hmm, they could be, but I thought clove polyps do not pulse at all? These pulse, but its like 1 pulse every 5 seconds, and the the whole "hand" closes quickly and opens a little bit slower.. its actually pretty cool to watch compared to the faster pulsing xenia - I think it may just be a different type of xenia - although I understand pulse rates are dependent on a few different factors. - they were pulsing at the same rate in the store though.

Clove polyps do indeed "pulse" but it's much less often than xenia, and cloves typically are much larger, as well.

 

 

I want clove polyps.

[milk]

Clove polyps do indeed "pulse" but it's much less often than xenia, and cloves typically are much larger, as well.

 

 

I want clove polyps.

 

well I did a search to see if clove polyps pulse, and it brought me to this thread, LOL. Jedi, if you can correctly ID them I will send you some once the frags grows out a little bit!

[milk]

can't believe the peps ate ALL of the aiptasia in a single night in my display.. even the huge aiptasia twice their size.. wow.. i thought I was feeding them well, but apparently they dislike aiptasia as much as the next gal.

[jedimasterben]

well I did a search to see if clove polyps pulse, and it brought me to this thread, LOL. Jedi, if you can correctly ID them I will send you some once the frags grows out a little bit!

Can you possibly get a video of them?

[littlelactose]

I love you, milk.

[milk]

Can you possibly get a video of them?

 

yup yah - i'll try to get one on here this when my new light gets here monday - i'll make a mini tank update vid! and maybe a short tutorial on how to make meatloaf just like mom did! SPOILER ALERT

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I love you, milk.

 

yup yah! maybe you should make a video too, little one

[milk]

stay true to the game, keep it g

 

[milk]

whale whale whale - looks to be a xenia frag after all.. these things are pulsing like cwazy! i'll still upload a vid once the new lights get here though

 

they must have just had to acclimate to the tank and flow for a few days before they started doing their thing.

[jedimasterben]

whale whale whale

[littlelactose]

I'll show you a video!

[milk]

I'll show you a video!

 

I hope its not a hot dog eating contest,

 

 

i always picture that muppet in your avatar saying all your words in your posts with that expression on its face.. pwnd!

[littlelactose]

can you add an updated photo so I can put it on our wall at work?

[jedimasterben]

i always picture that muppet in your avatar saying all your words in your posts with that expression on its face.. pwnd!

:lol: :lol: :lol: