FamousDan's 30 Gallon JBJ RL- NEW VIDEO

[famousdan314]

Is that aquatic warehouses rock in there? The purple kind?

I have two natural reef rocks that are almost entirely purple and green with algae and the rest of my rock is the "real reef rock" which is artificial reef rock that my LFS cycles in their humongous system. It's entirely purple and has lots of cool caves and nooks for the fish to pop in and out of. Here's a cell pic of the new scape , I really like it, it also leaves a lot more swimming room.

[dpoltsdsu]

That stuff is fantastic, I have a lot of it in my tank as well. It looks great under good lighting!

[famousdan314]

That stuff is fantastic, I have a lot of it in my tank as well. It looks great under good lighting!

Yeah I love the way it looks under the actinic lighting, and it helps the colors of the corals pop. Also the shapes of the individual pieces actually make the scape look more realistic, creating cool overhangs and such.

[spazizz]

Looks really good.

[famousdan314]

Looks really good.

 

Thank you for the compliment spazizz, im diggin your 5.5g reef build.

[famousdan314]

So I haven't updated recently. I suppose I should start with the recent bad news, however I think good news overall. Last week I noticed my Potters Angel flashing, not necessarily scratching on rocks but more of a twitch and appeared to be increasing picky during feeding time, as well as a decrease in coloration. I've heard these fish are extremely picky eaters in general let alone when they aren't feeling good. After a ton of research and speaking to one of my lfs owners I narrowed down the cause.

 

I believe my fish has the parasites called flukes or gill flukes, which I have read is very common especially in angelfish. I am also assuming since potters angelfish are wild caught species they are more vulnerable to having these. My lfs owner gave me some good advice in which I wanted to pass along to anyone following along. Apparently, flukes and other small parasitic species do not like the intense light and tend to either burrow in the fish' scales and gills in the day and tend to come out at night time. A good way to spot these is by using a flash light and inspecting the fishes fins and body for tiny white specs. So two nights ago I caught my potters angelfish, at night with the lights out and placed her in a small hang on breeder box. I shined the light on her and sure enough white spots all over. She was covered head to tail, no wonder I had caught her visiting my cleaner shrimp more frequently. I performed a 3 minute freshwater dip on her after having floated freshwater in a plastic pitcher cup in the tank to match temp and then I matched the ph. I could literally see the spots falling off of her and the water was sprinkled with dandruff like parasites. After the dip i placed her back in the HOB breeder box and allowed her time to rest. In the morning, the next day she was still doing very well. She was quiet alert and active during her first dip so on her second dip I extended it to four minutes while carefully watching her for signs of stress. She did very well, again I allowed her time to rest in the breeder box for half the day and let her back in the main display tank. She appears a lot less stressed and eating back to her normal self again. Her coloration has not recovered 100% and I an almost certain it due to diet. I think I am going to have to experiment with other foods to entice her to eat more.

 

On an additional note, I have read these flukes are like worms for dogs. You can never really cure your entire tank once its been introduced, but you can be preventative and treat accordingly. I purchased some prazipro and am keeping it handy in case multiple other fish begin to show signs then I will most likely treat the tank to attempt to kill off a majority of the parasite population.

 

If anyone else has experience with this and would like to add or given further guidence, please do.

[Alex B]

So I haven't updated recently. I suppose I should start with the recent bad news, however I think good news overall. Last week I noticed my Potters Angel flashing, not necessarily scratching on rocks but more of a twitch and appeared to be increasing picky during feeding time, as well as a decrease in coloration. I've heard these fish are extremely picky eaters in general let alone when they aren't feeling good. After a ton of research and speaking to one of my lfs owners I narrowed down the cause.

 

I believe my fish has the parasites called flukes or gill flukes, which I have read is very common especially in angelfish. I am also assuming since potters angelfish are wild caught species they are more vulnerable to having these. My lfs owner gave me some good advice in which I wanted to pass along to anyone following along. Apparently, flukes and other small parasitic species do not like the intense light and tend to either burrow in the fish' scales and gills in the day and tend to come out at night time. A good way to spot these is by using a flash light and inspecting the fishes fins and body for tiny white specs. So two nights ago I caught my potters angelfish, at night with the lights out and placed her in a small hang on breeder box. I shined the light on her and sure enough white spots all over. She was covered head to tail, no wonder I had caught her visiting my cleaner shrimp more frequently. I performed a 3 minute freshwater dip on her after having floated freshwater in a plastic pitcher cup in the tank to match temp and then I matched the ph. I could literally see the spots falling off of her and the water was sprinkled with dandruff like parasites. After the dip i placed her back in the HOB breeder box and allowed her time to rest. In the morning, the next day she was still doing very well. She was quiet alert and active during her first dip so on her second dip I extended it to four minutes while carefully watching her for signs of stress. She did very well, again I allowed her time to rest in the breeder box for half the day and let her back in the main display tank. She appears a lot less stressed and eating back to her normal self again. Her coloration has not recovered 100% and I an almost certain it due to diet. I think I am going to have to experiment with other foods to entice her to eat more.

 

On an additional note, I have read these flukes are like worms for dogs. You can never really cure your entire tank once its been introduced, but you can be preventative and treat accordingly. I purchased some prazipro and am keeping it handy in case multiple other fish begin to show signs then I will most likely treat the tank to attempt to kill off a majority of the parasite population.

 

If anyone else has experience with this and would like to add or given further guidence, please do.

 

Man I'm in the same boat. I don't know if to treat the whole tank or try to quarantine all the fish. I already have some really nice sps and other pieces in the tank. If you decide to treat the dt with prazi let me know how it goes. Good luck!

[famousdan314]

Man I'm in the same boat. I don't know if to treat the whole tank or try to quarantine all the fish. I already have some really nice sps and other pieces in the tank. If you decide to treat the dt with prazi let me know how it goes. Good luck!

Hey how's it going Alex, so far so good. Prazipro appears to be reef safe. I have mainly LPs and some softies and haven't seen any I'll effects. Only bad thing is I may have missed diagnosed. As I started to see small white spots on the dorsal fins and body which is indicative of marine ich and not flukes. The good news is they won't have worms and other parasites. Crossing my fingers everyone makes it.

 

Also, through some reading I've heard of people having great success soaking food in garlic as a natural remedy enforcing the fishes immune system which can in turn help the fish fight off the parasites or illness on its own. I'll let you know how it turns out.

[dpoltsdsu]

How are the fish doing? Did it turn out to be ich?

[famousdan314]

How are the fish doing? Did it turn out to be ich?

 

It was Ich, unfortunately since the signs of the ich didn't show until later I mis diagnosed and was treating for Flukes, then realized it was Ich and began treating with Kordon Ich Attck instead of prazipro. By this time my Angel and dotty back were to far gone. I attempted a copper treatment on both of them in a QT tank and they both ended up passing. My three other fish were still in early stages and all recovered quickly. My remaining fish are a black and white clown and occ. Clown and a sixline wrasse. I fed them garlic mysis regularly to boost their immune system, raised the tank temp to 82 and treated with Ich Attack by Kordon, I also kept my blue lights off and lowered lights to about 50%. It's been a month and I haven't spotted anything on any of my fish and haven't seen any flashing or twitching. I stopped treatment about two weeks ago and began skimming again after a large water change. All of my corals survived the treatment with Prazipro, however I have all LPS , softies and mushrooms. I'm a little bummed about losing my Potters Angel but I learned a lot.

[dpoltsdsu]

It happens to the best of us, at least you didn't lose everything. Hopefully its gone now that you haven't seen it now that it has been a month

[famousdan314]

It happens to the best of us, at least you didn't lose everything. Hopefully its gone now that you haven't seen it now that it has been a month

 

Yeah, im just glad that I was able to figure out what it was before it took all my fish. Im still saddened by losing my Potters as it was a birthday gift and she was a little pricey. I made a typo above and fixed it, didnt want to hand out wrong info, I treated the Ich outbreak with Ich Attack by Kordon. It states its an all natural remedey, but it takes a little longer, I didn't loose any inverts or corals though. I honestly believe that the copper treatment was too strong or evasive for my infected fish who already had weakened immune systems. If i had to do it over again, i would have done a couple more fresh water dips followed by good feedings using garlic and treated them in tank with the others.

[famousdan314]

A short video clip of my tank from just the other day.

 

 

Also, I recieved this awesome hitch hiker, a pom pom crab the other day on a piece of live rock. I shared this on the addictive reef keeping group on facebook.

 

 

http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10154280559905517&set=gm.586137588170464&type=1

[famousdan314]

So I tackled another DIY project and built a screen top for this tank. I had one incident with my sixline jumping into the sump early on and now that I have a purple firefish I dont want to chance any jumpers. I tried the stock glass tops but I couldn't stand the condensation build up on the lids and the pain of water dripping everywhere every time I removed the top to do maintenance or clean the glass.

 

I followed the same steps as many others utilitziing a bronze colored aluminum screen kit. It was on sale at Home Depot for $10 and then I purchased some 1/4" clear mesh screen online and also some fish tank cover clips for 8mm glass. The clips are essential for this tank so the top sits just below the edge giving the tank a nice clean look and not taking away from the rimless style.

[bthomas]

love this build i have the same tank

 

one quick question..

have u had any problems with the mounting rails on that light causing it to sag?

Ive been looking into lighting options for my tank and have read reviews of this one saying that the rails being so thin causes the light to sag a little

have u experienced this at all?

Thanks
Beth

[famousdan314]

love this build i have the same tank

 

one quick question..

have u had any problems with the mounting rails on that light causing it to sag?

Ive been looking into lighting options for my tank and have read reviews of this one saying that the rails being so thin causes the light to sag a little

have u experienced this at all?

Thanks

Beth

 

Hey Beth thanks for the compliments! I did notice a sag on the light initially but the rods for the bracket are pliable enough to bend them a little to counteract the sagging.

 

Do you have a thread going for your JBJ 30 I like following people with the same tank for ideas. I haven't had a chance to post recently but I'm working on setting up a refugium in one of the rear chambers. I'll update on the progress soon.

[bthomas]

Cool. I do think thatll be the light ill get for mine.

 

I did start a thread on here for my tank but i have not been keeping it updated.. maybe ill get back on that. Tank is still in cycle right now tho so not much going on lol

I think ill be stealing alot of my ideas from your thread tho

 

~Beth

[HOTWATER]

Hey Dan. Tanks looking good. Are the 8mm clips you used for the screen top the supplied jbj clips? Since mine was a used tank, I didn't recieve the lid or clips.

[famousdan314]

Hey Dan. Tanks looking good. Are the 8mm clips you used for the screen top the supplied jbj clips? Since mine was a used tank, I didn't recieve the lid or clips.

 

No actually it's not the stock clips, my tank did come with the glass top and clips tho. The stock clips slide into the tanks side glass and then clips into the glass top which is very thin so I had to get separate clips. I ordered them from eBay for super cheap from Hong Kong. They came in just shy of a week. Just search aquarium cover clips 8mm. I payed an extra dollar for expedited shipping, came out to $5. Here's a pic.

[famousdan314]

Yesterday, I put together a mini fuge with chaeto inside the bottom basket of my custom media rack. I cut out the black backing on my right overflow chamber and then used my old innovative marine skkye light to light it up. I had to straighten the arm bracket on the light to slide it back there. Here's another crappy cell pic...lol.

[HOTWATER]

Very cool! This build is pretty inspiring, done right without cutting corners.

[famousdan314]

Very cool! This build is pretty inspiring, done right without cutting corners.

 

Thanks HOTWATER, its still a work in progress. I picked a few awesome coral fags today I'll try and take some good photos tomorrow.

[famousdan314]

Cool. I do think thatll be the light ill get for mine.

 

I did start a thread on here for my tank but i have not been keeping it updated.. maybe ill get back on that. Tank is still in cycle right now tho so not much going on lol

I think ill be stealing alot of my ideas from your thread tho

 

~Beth

 

Awesome, yeah please update so I can follow along. Steal all the ideas you want, most of mine were ideas from other awesome builds I found here on nano reef. Best of luck with the new tank, the hardest part is waiting.

[famousdan314]

Picture time!

 

New Mushroom colony, still need to find a cool place to place it permanent

 

 

Pink Birdsnest

 

 

Blue Acro Sps

 

[famousdan314]

A quick FTS on my cell phone, moved over the mushroom colony near my rovkwork next to the other mushrooms so they would eventually meet in the middle.