castiel Posted March 14, 2012 Share Posted March 14, 2012 Ooh any ideas for the new NPS? Link to comment
lljdma06 Posted March 14, 2012 Author Share Posted March 14, 2012 Ooh any ideas for the new NPS? I'd like a dendro, but I'm also curious to try terrazoanthus. They are very hard to keep. May also look into a tube worm of some kind. Chili coral & gorgs have crossed my mind too. I don't really know. I've got a credit in PayPal, so I don't mind experimenting as much as would if I didn't have a PayPal credit. L Link to comment
lljdma06 Posted March 18, 2012 Author Share Posted March 18, 2012 Diodogorgia is starting to open everyday again. I just think he was shedding. L Link to comment
lljdma06 Posted March 29, 2012 Author Share Posted March 29, 2012 Massively huge, gigantonormous update... So I went to my lfs cause the owner just got these crazy bright pink stylos and thought of my tank (the biocube). Great, so I go to check it out, put it on hold, it purty, but can't take it home yet anyway, payday must come, but I needed some liquid food. She's had a blueberry gorgonian since last year, talking around September I think or October at the latest. One sold very quickly, but the one that wasn't as open has stuck around in the lfs. She doesn't have the time to feed it. It was open and she asked me if I wanted it? I said,"like buy it?". She was like, "no, take it, I can't sell it as it is anyway, and I can't feed it like it needs to be fed, no time." So... she gave it to me. Not a small piece either. Guys, this is a tough, tough coral to keep alive for an extended period of time. Even experts struggle and I'm no expert, not by a long shot. I'm not optimistic. If I can keep it alive for a few months, that's achievement enough. But, I'm the only one she knows that has an nps tank and she knows I'll at least feed it. I'll do my best. Here it is acclimating. Wish me luck. Thanks for looking, otherwise, not much has gone on in this tank. Corals are still doing well, Diodogorgia is still being stupid stubborn though it opens on occasion, which is silly because the Echino opens all the time and the echino is supposed to be harder. Lemmiwinks is doing great. L Link to comment
castiel Posted March 29, 2012 Share Posted March 29, 2012 Wow, that is going to be quite a challenge, but also hugely rewarding if it does well! Good luck with it! Link to comment
lljdma06 Posted March 29, 2012 Author Share Posted March 29, 2012 Wow, that is going to be quite a challenge, but also hugely rewarding if it does well! Good luck with it! Thanks, Peter. I'll give it my best shot. I was rewarded this morning with polyp extension! So... Pictures, because I know you are all picture whores. It's very hard to photograph. It opened at night and I have pretty dim lights in this aquarium anyway. I'll give it an HD treatment this weekend after a nice fat water change. I took one with flash so you could see the branching and where the polyps were attached. This is right after I put it in the tank, wasn't open yet. You can see that the tissue is actually pretty healthy. This gorg was in the LFS since about October of last year, I think, cause I remember seeing it when I was getting my first suns and steering clear of it. So it's already survived 5 months in an aquarium without being fed extensively in lighting designed to hold sps corals so Yikes!. Excuse my diodogorgia. He's still be a pain. Now, my echino opens all the time. Why the harder coral is opening more than the silly easy one is beyond me! I woke up at 4am, yes I get up at 4am, and found that it had indeed opened some. The light that you see is a bedroom light and the tank at this point is only lit with my refugium light. Details of the polyps, what a shade of blue, huh! More shots of the gorg. I also tried for a video. I'll be doing one of my heavy night feedings today and of course, there's the morning feeding of plankton. Thanks for looking. Wish me luck! If this thing survives a few months, I'll be super satisfied. L Link to comment
lljdma06 Posted March 29, 2012 Author Share Posted March 29, 2012 Wow that is stunning! It is stunning and it needs me. I'll do my best for it. L Link to comment
lljdma06 Posted April 1, 2012 Author Share Posted April 1, 2012 I moved the pecten scallop from my Biocube to this nps tank. He was doing ok there, but had to move around a lot because of the jawfish. He was easy enough to catch with no damage to his delicate foot. Here he is below. I love this scallop. Sort of the poor man's flame scallop, but IMO easier and just as pretty. Link to comment
lljdma06 Posted May 3, 2012 Author Share Posted May 3, 2012 Been a while since I've updated this journals... Bad news... Gorgonians are hard, one heavy grading schedule and boom! Not good. So I backed off gorgonians and have focused my attention on the suns and their relatives. Much easier to feed and care for. I'll go back to gorgs when I put together a method for automated feeding. But sun corals really don't need me to go that far. Good news... 1. The pecten it seems, isn't really a pecten at all, but a very small Lima lima. Bad right? No, it's in an nps tank, it gets plenty of food and it's very young. Many limas are harvested when full grown and they don't have long lifespans. 2. Lemmiwinks is alive and kicking. He's a quiet little fish and twice I've been tempted to get him a buddy. My neon gobies almost went in here, but I resisted, and my Tanaka almost went in here too. But... Lemmiwinks is still on his own. Still eating whatever it is that he eats in this tank. I still have no idea. 3. All crabs and shrimp are doing great. Armand still has one sexy set of nems. Some additions... I got more sun corals for this tank and my first Dendros... Dendros acclimating. I had another one from earlier, but I didn't take a picture of it acclimating. Good price, my lfs gave them to me for $22 a head. And these very nice sun coral colonies... Of course they opened up. I have to feed them more, they'll get mysis today and a nice water change. The dendros are very beautiful and looky, a little frag of a very interesting sun coral. Bright yellow. Under LEDs, he glows blueish, I'll snap pictures of that later. And of course, what update would be complete without a shot of my balano. A stunning coral. Thanks for looking. I have to mount the dendros on the tonga branch and clean out the refugium, it's kind of dirty. I'd like to get a feather duster of some type. I've abandoned the terrazoanthus idea and the idea of more gorgonians. I really just like sun corals and their relatives. Still makes for a very pretty tank and they are so much easier to care for. Another black sun would be great as would a Tubastrea coccinea. L Link to comment
castiel Posted May 3, 2012 Share Posted May 3, 2012 Those are soem awesome additions! So the blueberry didn't make it? Link to comment
lljdma06 Posted May 3, 2012 Author Share Posted May 3, 2012 Those are soem awesome additions! So the blueberry didn't make it? Thank you. They are great. No, the blueberry didn't make it. In all fairness, I was dealing with a specimen that was already in decline. Link to comment
Builder Anthony Posted May 4, 2012 Share Posted May 4, 2012 Well things look pretty colorful over there i would like to get something like that someday but my tanks are on cruise control so im just relaxing for a bit.Not sure how long that will last but hopefully for a long time. Link to comment
Jacob042426 Posted May 22, 2012 Share Posted May 22, 2012 where do you get all of this sun coral? Link to comment
mini_matt Posted May 25, 2012 Share Posted May 25, 2012 Hey Llj!! took me a while to get around to reading your thread but wow you've been a bit unlucky with tanks leaking! kinda nervous now :/ I know how you feel about the curved front corners thy are super sexy and what made me want/get another tank! now i have 2 those are some crazy looking corals I haven't heard of or seen before, seems like they enjoy the low light your goby is so cute, I had a clown goby when i started my tank but he never ate 3days and no comments, updates!! I'll be following! Link to comment
lljdma06 Posted August 11, 2012 Author Share Posted August 11, 2012 Hey guys, sorry I haven't updated in a long while. Tank was going very well and I was keeping up with the target feedings despite no longer living at my house, long story. But one day, I forgot to turn the pumps back on while I target fed and then I didn't visit for 2 days. Mistakes happen, I had a lot on my plate. Meh! Came back to dead livestock. Lost Armand, the sexies, a gorilla hitch hiker crab, the porcelain anemone crabs, and Lemmiwinks (though I suspect Lemmiwinks was already dead, as I hadn't seen him for weeks). Corals, however, are fine, as are the CUC for this tank. I moved the nps to my 36g and they are doing very well. The CUC is in my quarantine tank. The tank itself recovered very quickly and is now a glorified LR holder, TEAMING with pods and growing lovely coralline. Nice rock actually. Has a stunning blood red macro growing on it now that I really want to cultivate. I could set it up again, but I don't want to. I NEVER liked the 5.5g from an aesthetic standpoint. Was always very ugly to me. Very versatile, but very ugly. So... I'll be tearing this tank down and using its components (LR, sand, filter, powerheads) for other projects. So I'm retiring this tank. I'm not done with nps. In fact, my mom just got me a Fluval Spec, so I'm excited to take what I've learned from this system and apply it to the Spec. Thanks for following me on this nps journal. L Link to comment
castiel Posted August 12, 2012 Share Posted August 12, 2012 Sad .. but understandable. Glad the corals survived and have new homes. Have to agree the tank was ugly though Link to comment
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