Pico's 50 gallon, new corals, not enough space!

[picoreef78]

I was looking at the NOAA threatened list and noticed Montipora australiensis. Look a lot like "Mystic Sunset" montipora. Any thoughts on identification?

[picoreef78]

Did it again. The seratiopira sos. Looking talkie they have slow tissue necrosis. The pit of good Favia pale, the Echinopora llameosa after getting color back re-bleach

 

Temp 77.6 pH 7.91 hydrometer 1.025 allk 3.3, ca 450, mg 1280, NO3 0 and PO4 0 I got strontium to check 0 (not sure what to do with that one. Aside from a 18% water change and replacing phosguard and purigen no changes. Stopped dosing acropower a while ago.

 

Wondering if my water is too clean with replacing phosguard and purigen.

 

Stopped GFO media reactor ( when I started this last time, same reaction).

 

Things seamed to go better in my RSM, stock lighting and less checking.

[picoreef78]

Corals with deaths included

Corals:

Stylophora sps:
Stylophora pisillata (Cotton Candy Stylophora)
Stylophora pisillata (Lava Pink Stylophora)

Stylophora pisillata (Milka stylo) (died)

 

Seratiopora sps: (died)

Seriatopora hystrix (Magenta birdsnest)

Seriatopora hystrix ( Tubbs blue poly birdsnest)

Seriatopora guttatus (ORA green birdsnest)

 

Acropora sps:

Acropora millipora (Candy Apples)
Acropora nana (GARF Bonsai Acropora)
Acropora sp (Paletta Pink Tip Acropora)
Acropora sp (Tyree Pink Lemonade) X 2

Acropora walindii? (Red Dragon) (died)

Acropora prostrata? (ORA Red Planet)

Acropora sps (Red Robin Stag)

Acropora desalwii? (ORA Pearlberry acropora) (died)

 

Montipora sps:

Montipora sp (Mystic sunset montipora) (died)

Montipora capricornis (Reeftech Starburst Montipora) (died)

Montipora sps (Reverse Sunset Montipora)

Montipora sps (Tropical Rainbow montipora) (died)

 

 

Mycedium robokhaki

 

Echinopora llameosa

 

Favia sps (Pot of Gold Favia)

Favites sps (Raptors Peace Favia)

 

 

Palythpoa sp

 

Zoanthid sp

[picoreef78]

So far two weeks post move, corals looking healthy, nice night time polyp extension, encrusting and coloring up again.

 

Rechecked values, alk high at 4.10, down 3.99 mEq/l after 24 hour, Ca 400 up to 470 mg/l, Mg 1180 up to 1320 mg/l (after replacement) strontium at 4 mg/l)

 

I bought strontium liquid, plan to slowly replace, not sure really what to make of low strontium.

[picoreef78]

FTS

 

 

Discoma's, Stylo's, new Euphyllia, Gonipora, Acan, Mia Pot of gold favia,

 

 

Mystery Acro (very nice light green/blue color) GARF bonsai

 

 

Goni, Mia Pot of Gold Favia, Raptors peace Favia and Acan

 

Mycedenium and Echinopora llameosa

 

New Sunset montipora

 

Reverse sunset montipora tipped over, two Tyree Pink lemonade across together, right side with ORA Red Planet, very Back is Paletta Pink tip

 

At the back Red Robin stag

[picoreef78]

1 x ORA Cali Tortuosa

1 x ORA Rose Millepora

1 x Mystic Sunset Montipora

1 x ORA Miami Orchid Stag

1 x Rare ORA Hawkins Echinata

1 x Tyree Sunset Montipora

1 x Sweet ORA Red Planet Acropora

1 x Pink Blue Fuzzy Millepora

1 x Big Tropical Rainbow Montipora

 

[picoreef78]

New corals, if everything goes well should be the last batch. Mini-cycle has cleared.

 

Rainbow montipora= montipora tuberculosa?

 

Montipora australiensis= Sunset monipora or mystic sunset montipora?

[picoreef78]

Acropora sps "ORA Miami orchd". Acropora walindii? "ORA red planet", Tyree sunset montipora X 2, Acropora millipora X 2 "Pink Blue Fuzzy" and "Rose millipora", "Tyree mystic sunset montipora"

 

 

 

Acropora echinata, Acropora tortuosa "Cali tor" and "Rainbow montipora" are the newbies

 

Two Acropora spa (Tyree pink lemonade), back is a Acropora spa (Paletta pink tip) STN in the beginging now slowly encrusting, front is Acropora millepora "Apple Acropora milli", Acropora walindii "ORA red planet" Acropora spa "red robin stag" behind

 

 

Close up of the Acropora tortuosa

 

 

Close up of the Acropora echinata (Pink lemonaid and palette photobomb)

 

[picoreef78]

Ridiculous growth on one of the Acropora spa. (Tyree pink lemonade) When I transferred it to a place I broke a piece of the encrusting edge and then stuck it on the glue neck to the frag. Over the past week have gotten about 4mm encrusting growth, vs the other corals with 1-2mm/ 2 weeks

 

Pre transfer

 

Recent transfer

2 weeks post transfer

4 weeks post transfer

The other one with 2 mm encrusting over the past week is the Montipora sps (Reverse sunset), the only survivor of the left semi-tank crash

The Acropora echinata RTN'ed came with half the water out of his bag)

[picoreef78]

Messing around with my numbers finally, converting everything to metric to make dosing easier.

 

Tank is a CAD lights 50g artisan II (24X24X20) which is 49 gallons, sump is 18 gallons, sans 8 gallons in the overflow and return chamber. With rock and sand, will estimate 50 gallons of fluid volume.

 

190 liters total volume.

 

Got the BRS 2 part kit Soda Ash and calcium chloride and magnesium kit (MgSulfate and Mg Chloride)

 

1 gallon is 3.8 l

 

For the soda ash (NaCO3), 2 cups= 500ml , concentration will be 500 g/3.8l or 13,180 mg/l

For calcium (CaCl) 2.5 cups 750ml= 750g/3.8l or 19,937 mg/l

Pending making the Mg jug.

 

will assume 1ppm= 1 mg/l

 

alkalinity is in mEg/l, dKA refers to carbonate alkalinity, not total alkalinity and is not a standard use metric (test kits test total alkalinity anyway), will assume mEq/l=dKH/2.8

 

Mr. Microscope seems to have a good metric for calculating dosing needs. Going to emulate.

 

Goals:

Alkalinity of 3.0 mEq/l

Calcium of 420 mg/l

Magnesium 1350 mg/l

Specific Gravity of 1.026

Salinity of 35 ppt

 

 

Strontium ? has been consistently low at 0 and for the past three test 4 mg/l, dosing Brightwell's Strontium has not increased level.

Not sure what to do about it, since I am getting pretty good encrusting corals despite level.

[picoreef78]

Without additional dosing, my testing seems stable. Worries me that the corals are not going (some encrusting seen on the montipora species).

 

I had an initial encrusting boom, that has slowed down signnificantly.

 

Date

10/5/2014

10/9/2014

10/13/2014

10/18/2014

10/22/2014

10/26/2014

10/30/2014

Tempurature

78

78.8

77.6

79.3

79.1

80.8

78.6

Magnesium (mg/l)

1320

1350

1320

1290

1290

1380

1410

Calcium (mg/l)

470

470

450

450

430

430

460

Strontium (mg/l)

 

4

4

4

16

 

 

pH

8.11

7.98

8.18

7.95

8.14

8.05

8.09

Alkalinity (mEq/l)

3.99

3.65

3.42

3.3

3.19

3.19

3.19

Conductivity (mS/cm)

31.5

32.2

29.6

29.9

29.8

30.3

30.5

 

Date

10/5/2014

10/26/2014

NO3 (mg/l)

0.0

0.75

PO4 (mg/l)

0.02

0.0

[picoreef78]

One fun thing, I put a new Ora Red planet frag next to an older stressed frag. Both from Reef Gardener so I am assuming from same mother colony. I am hoping they will encrust and start forming a small colony. But The older frag now has awesome poly extension. The older frag is on the left.

 

 

 

Also from two polyps to 8 polyps, Actinodiscus sps.

 

[ninjamyst]

following along! great looking tank. are you still having trouble with turf algae??

[picoreef78]

yeah, disappeared for a while when I moved the tank, now sneaking back. Really has crept back over the past 6 days, of course when I am on 24/7 call for two weeks.

 

I bought a CAD lights reactor, but I am afraid to run media, last time I ran 50 g Phosban, sent my system into shock. So I am super hesitant to restart.

 

I have two large bags of chemipure elite and 1 bag 25 g Phsoban sitting passively in my sump.

[picoreef78]

Still ponding my next course of action for the algae without killing the corals.

 

I did not upgrade my return pump. It is the stock 500 gph TIA Cacdlights pump.

 

Any thoughts on going up in GPH, hopefully sucking detritus out of the tank and into my filter system.

 

How much for 50-55 gallon system?

[picoreef78]

Just bought All in One Biopellets. Hopefully this will help reduce my algae growth.

 

I recently put in 20 g of TLF Phosban and changed out two 11 oz bags of chemo pure elite.

Skimming a good amount of dark brown waste every 3-4 days.

 

Levels are still 0 ppm for NO2 and 0.02-0.04 for PO4.

 

Corals look awesome except for one green mystery acropora, RTN over passed two days. Was busy with work and did not see it happen

 

The other corals are doing great, Monitpora spa encrusting like mad. The ORA red planet has encrusted over the plugs and is now branching out

 

Pink Lemonade also starting to branch out.

 

The other corals are status quo.

 

Algae is a type of turf algae I think. Maybe will need to get a couple of Tuxedo Urchins to help clean up.

[picoreef78]

Bought Jebao 6000. Wow. Have it running at 33%. I think I can crank it up after a basting of the rocks or scrapping the glass to get detritus out of the water column and into the filter sock.

 

Still waiting for the All in one pellets. No idea how to start them up without stripping too much phosphate and sending the system into shock.

[ninjamyst]

are you dosing anything for your SPS? my montis are not growing at all...

[picoreef78]

I am. I give 1ml of Acropower a day. I don't think that is helping much though. I also give ReefRoids, ReefChili and Oysterfeast (2ml) once a week each for a total of three feedings.

 

My Montipora's are the encrusting kind instead of the plating kind, I don't know if it makes a difference. They also really started to go after about 3 weeks of just hanging out, except for the big tropical rainbow monitipora that just kept on encrusting.

 

The rest of my SPS are just status quo for now except for the red planet which is starting to branch.

[picoreef78]

Here is the Mystic Sunset Montipora sps at delivery 10/10/2014

 

 

Here is the Mystic Sunset Montipora sps on 11/18/2014

 

The Tropical Rainbow Montipora sps on delivery 10/10/2014

 

The Tropical Rainbow Montipora sps on 11/18/2014

 

The Tyree Sunset Montipora sps on 11/18/2014 (least amount of encrusting) Smaller frags+ less robust growth.

[ninjamyst]

wow! that's a lot of growth in a month!!

[picoreef78]

Thanks. The rest of the corals are not doing the same.

[picoreef78]

Saw stunted encrusting edge of the coral. I left them on the original plugs without clipping the peg. So I decided to clip the pegs and use more epoxy to allow for better encrusting of the corals and more access to light.

 

 

Just looking at the monitpora sps. The are next to each other, less and 2cm difference in height and at different angles. They both are encrusting pretty well, but big color difference.

 

 

 

Clipped some of the leading edge of the Pink Lemonade Acro. Was at an angle and there is a midline color difference.

 

Hopefully the Red Planet acros will start encrusting onto the epoxy. The older top one has three newer branches coming out.

 

I have a feeling the LED to LED/T5 revolution on Indy's page has validity.

[picoreef78]

I have soaked the All in One Biopellets for 24 hours. Recommended dose 50-100ml per 100 liters, for 200 liters, it would be 100-200 ml. Will start with a lower than recommended 70 ml.

 

Now need the transition to wean of carbon dosing as this starts to kick in.

 

Cross my fingers I don't kill my corals along with the algae.

[picoreef78]

The Cadlights BR-1 reactor running with 60 ml of All in One reef pellets, so far no melt down (only day 2).

 

Need to figure out out to wean off 6 ml/day RedSea NOXPO as might measured NO3 is consistently 0 and PO4 <0.04 (currently 0).

 

I guess seeing what the algae does.

 

hopefully dosing acropower and feeds can keep up with the nutrient requirements. The Red planet acro's are pretty light. The older one is a light red and the new one is a yellow with red polyps.

 

Forgot about the leaky reactor. Leaks from the top. Anyone have a good fix, just need to tighten.