Veng's 20L - Black Friday Madness!

[metrokat]

You have an acan echinata mixed in there. The one with the orange mouths. That guy will kill anything.

[jedimasterben]

You have an acan echinata mixed in there. The one with the orange mouths. That guy will kill anything.

Acanthastrea echinata are particularly nasty, but don't dismiss Acanthastrea lordhowensis. They are also very aggressive corals.

[Sunstar]

The waterweld was more of a pain than I thought it would be. When you get it real thin, it tears holes as you're trying to put it down. I thought I could roll it into sheets between a piece of wood and a piece of PVC pipe kinda like dough and a rolling pin. Not so much, it stuck to both. Also, don't try to kneed a whole stick at once, it's really tiring on the hands if you have too big of a batch. Sore hands and bitching aside, it seems to be working good so far.

I often sculpt with putty.

 

What you could try doing is take the putty, and put it between some plastic sheets. I'd suggest wetting both sides with water then rolling. this will allow it to spread and perhaps let go easier. You could also possibly place the putty plastic side up onto the rock, let it set then gently peel the plastic off.

[Veng]

I often sculpt with putty.

 

What you could try doing is take the putty, and put it between some plastic sheets. I'd suggest wetting both sides with water then rolling. this will allow it to spread and perhaps let go easier. You could also possibly place the putty plastic side up onto the rock, let it set then gently peel the plastic off.

That's a neat trick. I may have to give it a shot if I do this again.

[Sunstar]

I am going to suggest hat after a while, pull that stuff off to expose the rock again..

[Veng]

I am going to suggest hat after a while, pull that stuff off to expose the rock again..

I think there will be section that will come off quite easily. I'm thinking there are some other sections that will never come off.

[markalot]

How did the epoxy work?

[Reefer69]

Acans have sweepers at night. Pretty much the only reasons I don't have more of them on my sandbed. They're nearly close enough to sting each other now. Occasionally I do find one trying to munch on another.

 

Aren't lords ok to put next to each other. i have a "garden" of them at the bottom of my tank. They all touch each other with no ill effects so far.

[Veng]

How did the epoxy work?

So far it's been holding on, so it seems to be working pretty well. I'm not sure if I'll try to pull it off in a week or two or if I'll just wait for coraline to cover it.

[Veng]

Here's a dirty glass FTS of the progress and a random pic from the other day.

 

 

[Veng]

Is there a better solution to aptasia than peppermint shrimp? AptasiaX seems to stun them, but not kill them. It seems difficult to procure a 3W laser in the US these days to go that route, so what else is there? I'm seriously considering buying 5~10 or maybe 250$ worth to free ship from live aquaria. Surely there's a better option?

[Mirya]

 

Aren't lords ok to put next to each other. i have a "garden" of them at the bottom of my tank. They all touch each other with no ill effects so far.

 

I've not had a problem snuggling Acan lords up with each other as you have said, but I did have one Acan lord attack and win against a favia/favites.

 

Veng - Berghia nudis?

[Veng]

I've never had much luck finding those locally. Looks like I could get (4) "high flow" from saltyunderground.com for under 100$ shipped. Is that reasonable? Will they really remove the aptasisa that has been slowly marching around my tank for the past two years?

[metrokat]

Filefish.

[markalot]

I say big no to the filefish, too many horror stories.

 

I've used the berghia, they can take a few months but get rid of most of them as long as no wrasses. Put then in a safe area together so they can reproduce and then crawl the tank. I bought them tiny, did not see any advantage to paying for the big ones.

 

I like the fact that the epoxy is right up against a war coral, spongodes, and another brain without any signs of harm. This "reef" fancy colored epoxy I used harmed most things it touched, I *think* because it gets really hot when curing.

[Veng]

Anyone know where to get berghia in DFW?

[jedimasterben]

Well, if I had any aiptasia I'd let you know if the ORA pygmy filefish would eat it. Unfortunately the LFS I go to almost never has any aiptasia anywhere or else I'd go today and grab a little rock or something that had some and put it in as a test.

[metrokat]

Love those pygmy filefish!! I'm going to get one eventually.

[Veng]

Hrmm, seems like I'm not very good at updating the first page. The FTS is almost a year and a half out of date

[Sunar357]

Well your tank looked great a year and a half ago at least? lol

[Veng]

Ok, so I need new bulbs. I just looked at how old my bulbs are and it seems I bought them April 2014. Probably why my PAR numbers are so horrible right now. So while I toyed with the idea of a new light, I think I'm just going to replace the bulbs. So I'm thinking ATI bulbs, either (2) coral and (2) blue+, (1) coral (2) blue+ and (1) true actnic, or (2) coral (1) blue+ and (1) true actnic. Thoughts?

[metrokat]

2C+ 2B+

[Veng]

I realized after typing that all up that all three of those combinations can be had with buying 5 bulbs instead of 4. So I bought 2 c+ 2 b+ 1 actinic so we'll try them out when they get here!

 

I am leaning towards 2c+ and 2b+ from everything I've read.

[Sunar357]

I did 2 B+, 1 C+ and 1 Actinic and like it. But with buying them all you get to mix and match to decide.

[Veng]

Another 30% water change today. I'm actually getting fairly decent at doing them once a month again. The water weld seems to be working pretty well. There's a couple of spots that the GSP has tried to come out from under it, but not many. Im starting to lust after SPS again, so maybe that'll help me get this tank back into shape.