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Cultivated Reef

TeenyReef's 4g PicoParadise


teenyreef

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Oh i see, I may have to try out the skimmer, but the point of this tank was to keep it low key, and low maintenance... it doesn't come into the display, only in the back chambers...

 

Should i drop a crab or snail back in there??

 

Also, that seems to be the ratio... I set mine to 140/225... or about that anyways...

Sorry, I was confused...you said you had GHA in the sump, and I forgot you had a 4g CADLights like mine.I get some in the back of mine too, mostly in spots where the light shines. It's not bad because the skimmer and other equipment provides a lot of shade. I just scrape the algae from the walls every two or three months. And yeah, you certainly could stick a snail or crab back there and let them go to town. My little dwarf ceriths find their way back there on their own every couple weeks anyway :)

 

I wouldn't put in a skimmer just for that, especially if everything else is doing OK in the first place.

 

I want to get the light levels higher. I've been bumping it up by 10/5 every week. I just don't want to go to fast and make something start bleaching or receding.

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A little over a week ago, I noticed something was causing my blue acan to recede, but only in one spot:

16151736787_4dd90c3ae3_b.jpgAcan Top Down by TeenyReef, on Flickr

 

It's gotten worse since then, and now the whole back side of both the blue and red acan have been wiped clean of babies. When it first started, I wondered if it was the favites that are just behind it.

 

Now, I think I've definitely found the problem :(

16219557980_279484aab5_b.jpgEvil Favites Stingers by TeenyReef, on Flickr

 

Those stingers are getting seriously long and evil! Any ideas as to how to handle this? The acans are on the same rock so I can't easily relocate them without breaking them off the rock. And the favites are encrusted all over the rock so there's no way I can move them. Can they be trimmed back a little, kind of like GSP?

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Its only a max of 30w... you should be ok...

Yep, I know it could go much higher. I'm just so paranoid about increasing it too fast and freaking out the corals :)

 

I need to get it going higher, though. I'm pretty sure the colors of the acans and red mille could use some increased light. And I looked at an old picture of my green monti, and it used be a lot more rainbow-ish with lots of blue mixed in with the green. That was back when I had the PAR30 bulb, and the intensity was actually too high, though. So I need to get to the sweet spot :D

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oh wow, those favias are aggressive! probably easiest to relocate the acans?

 

Yeah, I think so, too. My first thought was to just let the back side of them die off and let the babies in front spread out away from the favites. But I think the favites are going to take over that whole rock. So here's what I'm thinking - take a look at the last FTS for reference:

16350104931_10c5ba0b64_b.jpgCADLights 4G FTS - 01/23/2015 by TeenyReef, on Flickr

 

I was thinking of moving the acans down to the sand where the GSP is now. They'd go right against the rock behind the GSP, like I have the red acans on the left.

 

The question is what to do with the GSP. There's really no place else to put it unless I glue it to the back wall.

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Yeah, you're kind of inspiring me. Since I drilled the new hole for the pump return, I do need to somehow cover up the old hole...maybe some GSP would work there :D

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Eventually you will have only a tank full of favites :).

 

I think I'd be proactive and remove the favites now....that's just me though. I had to remove a chalice yesterday because it was putting out sweepers and trying to kill, and successfully irritating, anything near it.

 

I don't know why everyone can't just get along :lol:.

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Yeah, I'm holding onto a couple of those Hollywood stunner chalice frags for a friend right now and noticed its massive sweepers at night haha can't wait until his tank is moved so I can get these things outta here.

 

 

Teeny I'm thinking of gluing my star polyps to the back wall also. Might as well keep it from being a pest and growing out on the rocks at least

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jedimasterben

Any ideas as to how to handle this?

Unfortunately Favia are not really meant for small tanks. They need around 6-8" radius around them or they'll eventually destroy anything in that range. I'd go ahead and remove the favia.

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Thanks all the helpful advice everyone! Today I moved the GSP to the back wall and the acans down to the bottom of the middle rock right in the sand. I think they'll grow better there anyway. The huge red acans on the left are actually several months younger than the ones I just moved and they are three times as big now.

 

As of now, the favites are the only thing on their rock. It's a foundation rock with other rocks on top of it, so it won't be easily moved. I'm going to leave them alone for now and let them continue to spread. When they get big enough to start irritating the next closest corals, out they go. I'll probably cut up the rock and make frags out of it, as it will be too big graduate to the 10g tank. Or maybe by the time it gets that big, it will be time to upgrade to another tank :)

 

No pictures of the new layout yet. I got a surprise call on Friday to go out of town for work...starting Saturday night. So the tanks are on their own for the next few days.

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Just finished going back through your thread. Tank looks awesome. I like your idea of relocating the acans and giving everybody more room to grow. That is the problem with our tiny tanks; precious little real estate.

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wow, john. my one favia never extended anything

other than teeny little hairs at night. then it receded

and likely dead soon. but i still have it in tank.

 

due to my size, probably better that they did not flourish

in my 8g. good luck!

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Thanks, everyone! Work is super busy but I'll try to stay caught up :)

 

Cindy, I have a little favia right in the front that just has one tiny feeding tentacle. It's never really grown at all. But the favites are a totally different story :o

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Thanks, everyone! Work is super busy but I'll try to stay caught up :)

 

Cindy, I have a little favia right in the front that just has one tiny feeding tentacle. It's never really grown at all. But the favites are a totally different story :o

 

is there a difference between favia and favites? i assumed

favites were plural? haha! i don't know.

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is there a difference between favia and favites? i assumed

favites were plural? haha! i don't know.

Shared walls = favites, separate = favias B)

 

Had to google it myself bwahahaha

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Got back from my trip last night. Everything did ok while I was gone but Rock Star II got into the back chamber again! I have no idea how he did it. When I got him back out I carefully checked for any other openings but there are none. And t he screen covering the overflow is still in place. Hmmmmm...

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Got back from my trip last night. Everything did ok while I was gone but Rock Star II got into the back chamber again! I have no idea how he did it. When I got him back out I carefully checked for any other openings but there are none. And t he screen covering the overflow is still in place. Hmmmmm...

Maybe you should rename him Houdini.
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Maybe you should rename him Houdini.

I had the same thought. "Houdini" is now swimming happily right in the front of the display, none the worse for his third trip into the back chamber :)

Sucks that the goby jumped

Thanks - I assume you mean Emerald, the one that jumped a couple weeks ago? Houdini (formerly known as Rock Star II) somehow sneaks into the back chamber. I don't know how, since the overflow is covered with fiberglass window screen and there's no other way to get in there. Unless maybe he somehow jumps out through the 1/4" gap between the screen and the back chamber wall, and end up going over the back wall into the chamber. I guess it's possible, and honestly I can't think of how else he could get back there.

 

I took the overflow screen off since it didn't seem to do any good, and it keeps trapping debris.

Shared walls = favites, separate = favias B)

 

Had to google it myself bwahahaha

Yeah, I still get them confused and have to look it up :P

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Houdini must like it there, ha ha. I have seen fish jump up through screened or grated tops, flop around a bit and go back down through the screen at the lfs I worked at. I read in another thread that covering the tank at night calms the fish?

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