jedimaster1138's 50g mixed reef

[jedimaster1138]

I'll probably edit this post 47 times. But I figured I'd start with something, because you have to start at the beginning, right?

 

Currently, I have 2 tanks. One is a 10g glass that I've had for literally, 25 years+ I got it when I was a kid. It was a 10th birthday present from my grandfather. We used to go to the LFS together as I was fortunate enough to share a house with my grandparents along with my parents. He used to keep fresh water fish as a young man after he kicked the nazi's collective asses, and got me into it as a kid with the aforementioned AGA tank. My aquarium obsession was started by him and dedicated to him. I will never, ever not keep fish in that tank he got me, even if all I can afford is a guppy and a plastic tree.

 

Right now the 10g tank holds a few pounds of LR, some sand, a scarlet skunk cleaner shrimp, a whole pile of snails of various species, and 2 clownfish - a bonded pair. Mama is a very plump ORA Domino (she's 100% black except a small white dot forward of her gills) Pops is a b/w ocellaris (also an ORA, iirc). Anyway, they should be spawning within 6 - 8 months, I think. Hopefully I can learn enough about how to raise the offspring to make some $.

 

The 10g is filtered by a Fluval C3 HOB and lit by a RapidLED kit I built last spring. It's 12 each CREE cool white and royal blues driven by two Meanwells controlled by the variable voltage ports on my Neptune APEX in the next room (more on that in a bit)

 

Sometimes I also keep frags in there. I'd like to fill it up with zoa's and stuff for color. I should work on that.

 

I'll post pictures here when the lights are on and I nuke off the algae off the glass. lol

 

The main tank is a 50g, 3 footer, non drilled tank with a standard berlin sump. It's a "Clear-for-Life" acrylic by Advanced Aquatics. It looks great, but it's the last acrylic tank I'll get, unless someone figures how out to make acrylic harder. This tank is a year old and has a ton of scratches. In contrast, the 10g glass tank that's 25 years old? One minor scratch that I can see (I also re-sealed it last year, but whatever).

 

I'm hoping to upgrade the 50g to something larger...but I need to work out my living situation first. I'm also getting hitched next year, so I have to uh... dodge the future wife and see if there is anything in my wallet but cobwebs. LOL

 

Here's a very poor FTS. Forgive the bad photography.

 

 

Yes that's a baby blue hippo in a 50g - quiet tang police! - the upgrade is coming

 

 

 

Equipment!

 

The whole kit and kaboodle is run by a Neptune Apex. Modules including 2 EB8s, a BoB, and a WXM along with the brain and the display.

 

Tank isn't drilled, so water drains via a LifeReef HOB overflow.

ATO by autotopoff.com, soon to be rebuilt and wired into the Apex

2x Vortech MP10w ES (reefcrest mostly)

Return - Sicce 2.0

Skimmer - Reef Octopus NWB-110

BRS Reactor with ROX carbon and HC GFO that I run with a separate Cobalt 1200.

1/4 ish of the sump is a refugium holding a hunk of rock, about 10 mangroves and a ball of chaeto. I think there's some gracilia in there too. Lit with a CFL spot...6500k IIRC

Coralife TurboTwist UV Sterilizer to keep the baddies at bay

 

Lighting is all Ecoxotic LED. I have 9 Panorama Pro modules of various colors and 2 stunner strips. I built a custom frame for them out of 1x1 wood. It's basically just a rectangle that the modules screw into. 100% of the heat sinks are open to the air above, so pretty much 0 heat enters the tank and there's no need for fans. It's probably a 20k look if you are into that sorta of thing.

 

BRS RO/DI Kit with the 150 gpd upgrade and a 2nd DI stage.

 

 

Live stock!

 

Fish:

 

4x green/blue chromis

2x tank bred occelaris clownfish. Had them since they were half an inch. I think they are bonded now.

1x firefish (he hides a lot)

1x royal gramma

1x yellow eye kole tang

1x teenie blue hippo tang (shhhh don't tell the tang police)

 

All my fish, except 2 of the chromis are from LiveAquaria. The Kole is from LA Diver's Den.

 

 

Inverts:

 

Lots and lots and lots of nertite, nassarius, turbo, trochus, cerith snails. Probably more than 200 total.

3 peppermint shrimp

1 scarlet skunk cleaner

2 fighting conchs

1 crocea clam (stay healthy baby)

 

Corals

 

SPS:

 

ORA Purple Nana acropora

ORA Green Montipora digitata

Orange Montipora digitata

ORA Purple Stylophora

ORA Purple Plasma acropora

ORA Red Planet

Ice and Fire Echinata (aussie version, I think)

Poker star or superman montipora

Green montipora cap

Crayola Acropora plana

Acropora Nasuta (diver's den called this a "purple mint")

Ponape Birdnest

Pink acropora milliepora

Bird of Paradise

 

LPS:

 

ORA Purple Hammer Coral

Aussie neon green tipped frogspawn

Miami Hurricane chalice

Red + gold eye chalice

"Aussie rainbow" Acan

Orange plate coral ( i call this the sarlacc)

Aussie blastomussa wellsi

 

Zoanthids:

 

Eagle eyes

Ring of Fire

Radioactive Dragon eyes (2 different color morphs of slightly different shade)

Reverse gorilla nipples

Blue Abyss

Spiderman

Pink...somethings (i dunno, they are cool though)

some other's i can't name and ought to take pictures of to get names for

 

Palythoas:

 

Sour Apples

Red People eaters

 

Others:

Peach colt leather tree

lots of red mushrooms

yellow ricordea florida x 2 or 3

a few other mushrooms of random colors. one is a pretty green with blue specs.

 

 

Maintenance and Parameters

 

Nitrate and Phosphate are near 0, or close to it. I had nitrate issues last spring before I rebuilt my refugium (had a lot of rubble that was trapping detritus, now I just have 1 big rock that I blast with flow.

 

Try to keep Alk around 8 1/2 to 9. I auto dose Alk with a BRS doser and the Apex every 3 hours, just a few ml. I'm still dialing that in. I'd like to also dose Ca, as I'm having a hard time keeping it up, but I literally do not have room inside my stand for another container, or even a doser. Magnesium I never have to dose, assuming I don't take a month between water changes.

 

Speaking of, I change roughly 10g, so 20%, in the big tank every 2 weeks ish. The small tank I just scoop out 1.5 to 2" of water and replace it with new mix that's always ready to go.

 

I use Instant Ocean Reef Crystals Exclusively. One of the reasons I use this is because Live Aquaria / Diver's Den also uses this brand and so much of my stuff comes from them... it makes sense to match salts.

[jedimaster1138]

So I bought this anemone from LA DD on Tuesday night...

 

 

Problem... they sent me this one.

 

 

That's uh, more than a slight difference.

 

I email them twice on Thursday and call them twice. They say they will get to it. During one of the phone calls they tell me to email them a picture of the "wrong anemone". I do. OK fine. Still nothing on Thursday.

 

Friday. I get an email from customer service, we apologize etc, can you email us a picture of the wrong anemone. Uh................ sigh. I did that yesterday peckerheads. Check your folders. So I send it again. Fine. Then I call them "hey did you guys actually GET the picture?" Finally I get connected to someone at LA support (as opposed to just DFS support), and they confirm that they received the photo and have to review it, but it won't be for 24 hours.

 

Saturday afternoon they email me to say that the picture still hasn't been reviewed by the actual coral farm people, but they are crediting me for the anemone that I purchased. yay! mostly. I still want the hot sauce metallic rose. Supposedly they are looking for it, or something similar. I guess we'll see.

 

So their customer service I suppose isn't bad. They DID refund me ...it just took them a while to get organized. They must just get a lot of requests, so I feel for their CS department, especially with me chewing them out.

 

I'm basically going to say "yeah if you find the metallic rbta, or one similiar, send it over and ps - i'm not paying shipping for it".

 

Funny part of this...someone must have ordered the white tip. It's 89$. But they must have recieved the metallic rose - which is 170$. Go for them winning the lottery!

 

PS - the white tip is walking all over my tank. Currently it's curled up in the corner not looking like it likes me. My clown fish won't go near it.

[1.0reef]

Nice tank, but both the tangs will get far too active/large.

Sucks about the nem, I thought their service was better?

[jedimaster1138]

Nice tank, but both the tangs will get far too active/large.

 

Yeah. The Kole has pretty much stopped growing, which is good. I don't think I've seen her expand much in the last 8 months. 4" or so seems to be their limit. She's happy with no signs of aggression so I'm not too worried about her. The blue tang is another story. He's gone from 1" to 3" (and hippo belly wide) in just a few months. He used to be afraid of my firefish, now he is in a vastly different weight class and the FF bolts when he sees blue, not that blue is aggressive, but he's growing. He's a little hoover when I feed. Not afraid of any food, even the meaty stuff. CHOMP CHOMP CHOMP

 

If the upgrade doesn't happen early next year I'm going to have to give him away which would be very sad, but I'll do what's best for the fish. I need the time/money to get this upgrade done. Why didn't I win the powerball last week?

 

Sucks about the nem, I thought their service was better?

 

I guess they are just busy on the customer service end, which is to be expected. And I mean it's an honest mistake on the shipping end, I can understand it, but I'm still ticked because I took a morning off to wait for the delivery. I don't particularly want to do that again. I guess we'll see what they come back with Monday. I ought to make them hold it and ship it for Saturday delivery and they can eat the surcharge.

[jedimasterben]

I've never seen a kole tang over 4-5". LA has them listed at 7" max, but that must have been something like a supermale, which won't happen in a normal tank.

[Looselyhuman]

I actually like that white tip. Clowns are as likely to touch that as the other imo - could take awhile. So, sounds like you may end up with two nems?

[jedimaster1138]

WE HAVE HOSTING!

 

The female was nosing around it a little, then the male. Not 2 minutes later the male dove in. He's wriggling around in the white tip like it's his job. The female is mostly on the other side of the tank all "where is he now, sigh" but occasionally comes over.

 

Hilarious to watch. Weeee

[metrokat]

How did I miss your thread?

[jedimaster1138]

How did I miss your thread?

 

Probably because I created it on October 5th and haven't updated it since until uh, yesterday

 

Slacker JediJoe is a slacker.

[ZephNYC]

Probably because I created it on October 5th and haven't updated it since until uh, yesterday

 

Slacker JediJoe is a slacker.

 

 

 

HEY!!!!!!!!!!! Whats going on in this joint ??!!?????!!!?????

 

ANd why is there not a picture of your CLAM HERE????

[jedimaster1138]

HEY!!!!!!!!!!! Whats going on in this joint ??!!?????!!!?????

 

ANd why is there not a picture of your CLAM HERE????

 

Lol. Yeah. I have to make a better attempt at getting a picture both of the clam and the hosting going on in the nano.

 

Speaking of the nano...my order was completely refunded. Of course the anemone that I tried to buy is now gone. They have a teenie light red BTA in stock now, but meh. I think maybe I'll wait for DD and if a better RBTA shows up, possibly jump on that. I think that tank will have no issues supporting 2 nems.

 

Enjoyable watching pops host the white tip though. He doesn't like it when the nem closes up for the night. lol

[metrokat]

MA might have the nem, you'll have to call them, maybe they can get you one. Also, I'm looking for a rainbow mille if you ever see one speed dial me.

[jedimaster1138]

MA might have the nem, you'll have to call them, maybe they can get you one. Also, I'm looking for a rainbow mille if you ever see one speed dial me.

 

Put me down for a frag of that

 

MA has a bad batting average with me I'm sad to say. 2 pieces have flourished and look gorgeous (they are also ORA, hmmmm) but I've lost 2 fish, a bunch of snails, 1 peppermint, the Forest Fire Digi, a big crocea clam, and think I'm in the process of losing the Ice and Fire Echinata (which was bloody expensive). Not trying to throw them under the bus, but their batting average is a little bit lacking. If they had some kind of guarantee...

[jedimaster1138]

OK Red Sea Nitrate kit on the way from our friends at BRS.

 

20% water change tonight + skimmer clean out + sump clean up.

 

Additional LED's on the way to fix up the spectrum in the nano tank too.

[metrokat]

Put me down for a frag of that

 

MA has a bad batting average with me I'm sad to say. 2 pieces have flourished and look gorgeous (they are also ORA, hmmmm) but I've lost 2 fish, a bunch of snails, 1 peppermint, the Forest Fire Digi, a big crocea clam, and think I'm in the process of losing the Ice and Fire Echinata (which was bloody expensive). Not trying to throw them under the bus, but their batting average is a little bit lacking. If they had some kind of guarantee...

Hmm. I've had the opposite average, none of the stuff I bought from them has had issues. Zeph also has had things die from MA, mostly CLAMS.

[ZephNYC]

Hmm. I've had the opposite average, none of the stuff I bought from them has had issues. Zeph also has had things die from MA, mostly CLAMS.

 

Yea, but it was my fault. I like MA.

 

Yea, but it was my fault. I like MA.

 

Edit: Now that I think about it, ALL the sps i have ever purchased from MA is still thriving, except for the monti that fell on my goniopora. Clam loss was my fault for running zero nitrates back then. Ive actually never purchased a fish from them, but fish always come sick as far as im concerned, so its QT city.

[jedimasterben]

but fish always come sick as far as im concerned, so its QT city.

this. People never seem to understand this.

[jedimaster1138]

this. People never seem to understand this.

 

Agree 100% QT-ing fish is pretty much required at this point, especially if you buy from a LFS with a big tank full of 25 other fish fighting for territory. I remember the last time being at MA and looking at some of their clown fish in the back corner? They just didn't look healthy at all. Maybe it was just the batch, I dunno. But really my biggest issue with them is the lack of any sort of guarantee. Things die, unfortunately. I love Javier though, he's my buddy. Best time to go there is Wednesday or Thursday when they get new stuff.

 

Anyway, that's why I like DD for fish...they take a lot of precautions for you proactively, which I appreciate. I got my Kole from them ... couldn't QT her. She just couldn't take it. Laid in a corner under a rock for 2 days. I wasn't trying to medicate or anything...just keeping her isolated for a while. But it didn't work. Didn't eat flakes, frozen, didn't even go near a sheet of seaweed. So I said f it, she's from DD, I accept the risk, and put her in the main tank. 30 seconds later she was buzzing around grazing off rocks. Now she's chubby and happy and will pretty much eat seaweed from my hands. I guess maybe if I had a big QT with rock work covered in algae it might have been different, but that's my story. Maybe I got lucky (knocks on fake wood desk)

 

At least some of the coral/clam death was my fault. I was still learning. After 18 months doing this, I think I finally might have a clue...he says.

[metrokat]

I haven't ever QTd a fish and I know that is playing with fire. I had 3 separate cases of square fish pimples (no other name can be found for it) and they're all still healthy and alive. Just pure luck. I acclimate them in the dark, with all lights off, when I put them in the tank I had lights off and let them settle in a good long while before turning on the lights.

[jedimaster1138]

Someone asked for more pictures...

 

Brain coral from the swap...bought this from Kenconnect. Real nice guy.

 

Orange plate coral. Got this from this past spring swap from Cherry Corals.

 

Nuclear green palythoas with red shrooms in the background. Got these from a Kat I know...

 

This is the single head acan I got from Dr. Mac at the fall swap. This thing is going to be awesome. Cheap too! Radioactive Dragon Eye zoas behind.

 

Top left to bottom right... ORA Peach Hammer (DD)...Tyree Miami Hurricane chalice (Javier)...big fat turbo snail....Aussie Rainbow Acan (Aquatic Life Direct)...Open Brain again...Aquacultured Coco Maxima Clam (DD)health TBA.

 

In my nano, the male black and white occellaris hosting in the white tip BTA.

[jedimasterben]

With $350-400 in fish down the drain, I'm done playing with fire. Everything gets treated like it's covered in parasites, internal and external.

[jedimaster1138]

More coral pictures

 

Here's my big eagle eye rock. It's about the size of a small football. When I got it from LA, it was less than half covered.

 

Next to the big eagle eye rock I dropped this frag of some zoanthids I can't name. If anyone knows... they are basically deep orange/red and uh, red, which is cool.

 

Another zoa frag that I don't know the name of...

 

Sour Apple Palythoas, Ring of fires and some rastas

 

Tight Rasta shot

 

Here's the clam for you Zeph. He's hard to photograph because he's turned sideways.

 

Radioactive Dragon eyes and their friends the read mushrooms who are trying to push them out.

 

Front right corner. Red shrooms, nuclear greens in the back, green/blue speckled mushroom, orange plate, and some zoas that I'm not sure of the name. Wolverines?

 

Tight shot of the above zoanthids.

[metrokat]

Nice pictures Jedi, are those my nuclear greens?

[jedimasterben]

Eagle eyes are one of my favorite zoas. How kat knew I have no idea.

 

I like rastas, too, hopefully they'll grow for me.

[jedimaster1138]

Thanks!

 

Nice pictures Jedi, are those my nuclear greens?

 

Yup! I've definitely seen some new polyps since I got them from you.They apparently like my tank and the spot i shoved em. Almost-Wife pointed out the other day how awesome they are. They really do glow.

 

Eagle eyes are one of my favorite zoas. How kat knew I have no idea.

 

I like rastas, too, hopefully they'll grow for me.

 

That eagle eye rock is one of the first corals I got. I was going to just keep softies...but then...well you know. Speaking of, I haven't been able to get decent pictures of my SPS. I need to get the real camera out for those.

 

Where do you keep your rastas? I just got those at the MR swap...they are currently on my sand bed... higher? Or keep em there? So far they look happy...