Spec V Office Tank: Wet it and Forget it

[lecroj]

Thinking of dosing with AcroPower from Two Little Fishies. Anyone have any experience with it?

[jestep]

Great tank.

 

I've used acro power and didn't notice any difference. I did notice a ton of difference with the korralen zucht amino acids, (http://www.korallen-zucht.de/en/shop/products--technology/elements/48_amino-acid-high-concentrate.html) but they're crazy expensive. In either case, I wouldn't use them in this size tank. Just too little volume to add anything IMO.

 

Keep a close eye on your NO3 and PO4. I ended up having to go back to fishless in this tank. 1 small springers damsel was too much load for the tank.

[lecroj]

Thanks jetstep. I need to get a phos test, but am running CPE to reduce phos just in case. I can always do more volume on the water changes. Currently doing 40% every other week. Only feeding a small amount of flake Monday through Friday.

[lecroj]

7/25/14 FTS Day 39

Added a purple ORA monti and an acan

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

GSP starting to grow over the top

[lecroj]

Was hoping not to have to spend $30 on a stream spin but starting to notice the sps in direct flow near the nozzle are getting stripped of flesh.

Twisted the nozzle to try and get the flow off them. Hopefully they will be ok on Monday.

[lecroj]

Day 46 and have been having a few issues.

Think it may be PH related because I have a cover over the hole in the lid, which may be dropping the PH due to not enough air flow.

I didn't want to get into a lot of testing but realized that if I am going to keep SPS in this thing, I need to follow the carbonate, calcium, PH and phosphate. I also ordered a refractometer because I never measured the salt levels, so who knows how off the salt is.

The main issue is that I have RTN on one of the SPS frags. Looks like it may have stopped, but half of the frag is white now. Don't know if this is flow related or chemistry related.

Also, the acan frag I have looks pretty rough. Not fluffy at all.

Finally, growth seems to have slowed for everything except the GSP, orange monti and blue cloves.

 

On another note, Torch and frogspawn look fine but are getting pretty crushed with flow. Frogspawn has a bubble on the mouth which I read meand it is splitting. I was glad to read that because I was worried it was because of too much flow.

I still don't want to shell out $30 for the spin stream nozzle.

 

Any suggestions?

Will post my weekly pics in a minute.

[lecroj]

FTS Day 46

[lecroj]

Acan Frag not looking too good, blue cloves starting to grow out.

 

 

Orange montis growing like a weed.

 

 

RTN on SPS Frag

 

Other SPS frags look OK

[lecroj]

FTS Day 53 8/8/14



GSP growing over the top of the rock

Montis are still the fastest growers in the tank. Orange has tripled and the greenish/brown one has doubled

Good polyp extension on this acro. Seeing a bit of growth

RTN has stopped on this acro. Seems to have been due to too much direct flow. Parts in the flow died but the parts facing away from the flow are still ok.

The acan looks the worst in the tank. The clown fish picks at it sometimes. Clown fish is always hungry. The lobo on the right is doing better and has re-covered its skeleton.

Brain coral and the favites are growing very slowly, but still doing well.

Blue star polyps are starting to spread and the zoas in the back are spreading as well.

Orange spot goby took a huge dump today. I think he is part elephant.

[lecroj]

So the tank seems to be doing better this with a few changes. Because it is an office tank I was trying to run it with no parameter testing. Some of the corals were not looking as good as I wanted so I figured I better test a few things and see if some things were off.

 

Bought a refractometer and the salt is fine at 1.026. Ca was at 340 and the KH was at 8 so I started doubling the dose of Kent Nano Reef. I will test again next week to see if doubling is enough or too much. Since I started doubling the Nano Reef on Monday (five days) thinks are already perking up.

 

Phos and nitrates read zero and I have no algae.

 

The fish (orange spot goby and mocha clown) are doing great and are always hungry. Still feeding daily tues-thurs and twice daily mon and fri. No feeds on the weekend since I am not here.

 

Tank runs steady at 79-80 degrees and I only get about 2-3oz of evaporation per day because I have an acrylic cover over the big hole in the lid.

 

Still using the stock sponge in the fuge area but I cut the top sponge piece off so I can remove it and wash it when I do a water change every other week.

 

I seem to be the only one who posts here so would love some feedback.

[NanoClown]

Your tank looks great so far. I would continue to watch parameters before adding any new corals to your system. Give your tank some more time to get accustomed to your new dosing method. Other than that I love your montis!

[lecroj]

Thanks NC. I am not planning on adding anything else, partly because I am running out of space, but mostly because my LFSs rarely have anything colorful. I don't feel like paying $35 shipping for two frags. I think i will just let it grow for a while and re-assess in the fall.

 

Flow seems to be my biggest problem. The return nozzle really blasts anything in direct flow.

[ninjamyst]

have you tried turning return nozzle up to reduce flow and create some water surface movement? i actually took off the return nozzle today cuz it restricts flow.... LPS do not like direct flow...

[Angel<3Nanos]

Your fluval looks good man! Hope things get better tho!

[lecroj]

FTS Day 70

 

LPS

 

Montis

 

Acros

 

 

[lecroj]

So things are running pretty well 70 days in.

Just got back from a week vacation and everything survived. Popped by twice to feed the fish.

Flow problems have subsided. The one acro that showed RTN from the flow is recovering its flesh and all three acros are showing some growth.

My orange monti continues to grow fast and was overgrowing the brown monti so I moved the brown monti out further.

My frogspawn appears to have split into two smaller heads after having a bubble on the mouth for a month.

I do have some bleaching on my lobo and one of the brain corals after switching two of my bulbs from white/blue to all blue. The lobo is recovering as the orange monti growth is now shading it.

The acan also appears to be doing better.

Will continue boosting the Ca levels, last reading was 340. So I am going to triple the dose of the Nano Reef.

[ETucc]

For your flow issue, I bought a Hydor Rotating Deflector and just attached it to the little piece of tubing, which I cut to fit the Marineland 606 into the sump area. I don't have corals get, but the stock nozzle combined with the 606 is like a fire hose in the Spec V. The deflector is like $7 on Amazon... Well worth it. I could definitely mess with some beginner SPS. Check out some pics in my thread! Best purchase I've made for the tank. Its perfect.

[lecroj]

Etucc I had the rotating deflector on my tank a few years ago and didn't like it because it sprayed water out of the tank. Does it rotate 360 degrees? I can't remember.

[Kijho]

Ah man this thing looks so good...

Wish I started with dried rock

[lecroj]

Funny. Wishing i started with live rock. I have no coralline.

 

 

[--Mark--]

Take a small piece of rock from someone else's tank that's covered in coralline and put it in yours . Nice tank by the way. Always loved black clowns!

[lecroj]

Got the mocha clown because I liked Kijho's. Luckily mine hasn't gotten sick like his did.

I think I see an aptasia at the base of one of my zoa frags. Hopefully its not an aptasia but I will probably just watch it.

One weird thing, the acro that got RTN and then recovered now has RTN again on the areas that weren't affected before. Hopefully those areas will recover as well.

Also, losing one brain coral frag. It was getting too much light so I moved it to a shady area but I think it is a goner. Losing one frag aver 80 days isn't too bad though.

Everything else is running fine.

Will post pics again on Friday.

[cswan19]

Your tank is looking good Love the clean look you have going on. Also really love your acan!

[lecroj]

Thanks cswan,

Wasn't necessarily looking for a clean look but that's what I got because I started with dry rock. Didn't want to deal with too many hitch hikers but the rock is taking forever to color up.

In theory, I am going for color and movement. The frog, torch, GSP and blue cloves are giving good movement but color is the problem.

My LFSs don't offer much in the way of color unless I want to shell out the big bucks and I don't want to order stuff because I don't have room left.

I would love some bright SPS frags, rainbow acans and a bright green monti but have enough $ in the tank already.

[lecroj]

New photos day 88. FTS

 

montis. Orange monti taking over. I also fragged the blue cloves and GSP and added some to both sides.

 

Softies and a goby.