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Coral Vue Hydros

Kayman's 29 Gallon Reef


Kayman

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On 11/24/2019 at 9:50 AM, DutchNanoReefer88 said:

That's a great looking tank, wonderfull to see everything growing in for the last years!

 

When one day a tank of me only looks half as good as this one, I would be very satisfied. 😄

Thanks! Yeah it has been fun to watch. Just keep at it and one day I'm sure you'll have a tank looking way nicer than mine! 

 

On 11/24/2019 at 9:54 AM, Sharbuckle said:

Your tank looks fantastic. Looks bigger than 29g! Definitely keep up the updates. 

Thanks! Really appreciate it, been a big fan of your tanks, looking forward to seeing how the new one goes!

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On 11/24/2019 at 10:50 AM, DutchNanoReefer88 said:

That's a great looking tank, wonderfull to see everything growing in for the last years!

 

When one day a tank of me only looks half as good as this one, I would be very satisfied. 😄

Haha! We are never satisfied!

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So my female clown Alice who I have had for almost 5 years hasn't eaten for 4 or 5 days. The last two she has been acting a bit odd too. First she was just swimming in the corner on the far end that she never goes on and now she's been hiding in a cave. She showed some interest in flakes and pellets but wouldn't actually eat them. She ignored the frozen last night. I've had the other clown for almost 2 years too and he's acting find as is the clown goby.

 

She kind of did this same thing when I added him (no QT) but isn't showing any physical signs of illness besides maaaybe heavier breathing. Parameters all check out fine: 79degrees, 1.026, less than 5 nitrate. Any ideas? Just a fish cold? 

 

Here is a video from the last night.

 

 

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Well she still hasn't really eaten. The only thing I've seen her eat is a tiny tiny bit of flake that happens to float right by her. No interest in frozen or pellets. She just spends all of her time in hiding really and avoids me when I approach the tank. Starting to get pretty worried.

 

In other news, during my last WC I took out my return pump to clean, a cheap Rio 1400 I believe. Got it all cleaned up but couldn't get it to stop rattling or work when I put it back in. Replaced it with a spare MJ1200 I got a few months ago. It's putting out more flow than the Rio and is a good bit quieter, so I guess I have a new return now.

 

Edit* she did eat some more flakes today and showed interest but still won't leave her cave.  Almost looks like she is having trouble catching the food too. I guess I forgot that about 2 months ago she had what I would call "popeye" in one eye for about 3 days and then it was back to normal, not sure if it's all related.

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Just popping in to say hello as a soon to be 29-er. I'm not sure how reefy my tank will be in the future or how long it will take, but I'm hoping to get there eventually.  Right now is going to be pretty plain FOWLR featuring Clowns (with the LR happening from scratch).

 

Sorry to see the troubles with Alice, but from going through here, your tank looks like a pretty solid setup.

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Hey, welcome to the club! I look forward to seeing your tank come along, we will see how long you stay FOWLR though!😄

 

Thanks! Yeah she is going through something for sure, just still can't figure out what it is so not sure how to treat her or all three fish for that matter.

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11 minutes ago, AKay3600 said:

we will see how long you stay FOWLR though!😄

True... It's the wife I'll need to convince as I'll all for a REEF! Going to take it slow, let her enjoy her Clowns and if nothing else, I'm already plotting, er planning a possible EVO 13.5 reef setup for myself.

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Well she's still hiding a lot and not really eating much. Still no physical signs of disease though. Seems as though this cave I accidentally made with my new scape is her new home as she will chase the shrimp and other clown out of it. Overall everything else is going good. My montiporas are looking extra fluffy and quickly becoming a favorite of mine.

 

Here are some bad pictures of her hiding in her cave like a troll.

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Can't catch a break. Get home from work (and the LFS with a new prize) and one of my frogspawns had fallen onto my candy cane. It looks "okay" only half really got stung thankfully. I'll see how it is tomorrow and might do an iodine dip if it's not looking better. 

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At the LFS picked up a neon green/yellow rock nem, was yellow at the store. Crappy pic below. My little garden is coming together. 

 

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Really struggling to catch a break haha so the new yellowish rock nem I got would never stay put. It's foot looked fine but it would never attach and I kept finding it upside down. I put a little water bottle top over it with holes to try and limit the flow from flipping it in hope that it might grab on to something. After a few days of that still nothing. So I tried feeding it a little reef roids hoping that would make it happy. Not really sure it ever ate but I came home to find a little hermit inside the little cover and the rock nem ripped in half and very much dead. All the drama of that also triggered one of my month old rock nems to walk a few inches right up to the front glass and now it faces the wrong way. Ugh. 

 

On the Alice front I just started trying to feed her some metroplex with focus and garlic but she wouldn't eat much. She seems to really only eat stuff that settles on the sand in her cave now. We will see how the med attempts go over the next few days I guess.

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Welp last update for the year 2019! Last week I dosed Prazi in the tank and after 3 days I moved Alice to QT. Before going into QT I gave her a 30min bath in Formalin and then a 45min bath in Methylene Blue. She's now getting meds for bacterial infections. After 24 hours in QT her skin is looking much better and so is her eye. She is swimming but seems to just be going in circles and still won't eat. Don't think she's eaten anything for 3 days or so.

 

Everything in the display is doing well. The one rock nem that moved, walked himself back to where I had him before so that was nice ha. Tomorrow the 1st is I think the 5th anniversary of the tank getting wet with saltwater so that's exciting! Would have liked to get something for it but all that money went to a QT and meds for Alice, her pulling through would be worth it though! 

 

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Reflection shot

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Top Downs

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Alice in QT

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  • 3 weeks later...

Welp. When it rains it pours! This has not been the best 5 year tank anniversary. Sadly I put Alice down on the 10th with clove oil. She was just looking worse and worse and couldn't see how she could possibly recover. She was about 5 years old 😞

 

Then to add to my problems last week I noticed what looked to be dinos in the tank. I've never had an issue with them but decided to try and stay ahead of it and did a 48 hour black out and skipped my water change. Welp today I get back from work and it's everywhere, all over the corals. Not as bad as some I've seen but the ugliest gunk I've ever seen in my tank.

 

Checked my nitrates and they are maybe .02, so I know I gotta try and bump that up. I've never really had nitrates above even 2 so maybe it's catching up to me or losing the tanks biggest fish dropped them even further. Don't ever check for phosphates but when I did (years ago) could never get a reading. 

 

My plan was to get another clown and maybe another fish (undecided) into QT this weekend but now I'm not sure if it's a good idea, though getting them into the tank could raise the nutrients up which could help.

 

Should I try using vibrant or another type of bacteria mix while also raising nutrients? Anyone had success knocking dinos out relatively quickly? 

 

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Sorry to hear about Alice 😪.

Are you sure it's Dinos? Could be Cyano. Either way black out should help. I've used vibrant in the past to help with  algae issues, and I've read that it can help with Dinos. But, I've also read that it can cause a cyano outbreak or make existing Cyano worse. Good luck

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6 minutes ago, Pjanssen said:

Sorry to hear about Alice 😪.

Are you sure it's Dinos? Could be Cyano. Either way black out should help. I've used vibrant in the past to help with  algae issues, and I've read that it can help with Dinos. But, I've also read that it can cause a cyano outbreak or make existing Cyano worse. Good luck

Pretty sure, I don't have a microscope though. I did try running some cyano rx when it first popped up before I did the lights out and it didn't have any impact. It is very stringing and not as much of a mat as cyano generally is, I think. I ended up picking up some Microbacter 7 instead of Vibrant just based on the cost of Vibrant. I've seen it's helped some people fight it. I also started bubble scrubbing yesterday, ran it for an hour last night and another half hour this morning before work. Sure looked to pull up a lot of gunk into the water column so hopefully that can help. 

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So yesterday I started what's going to be a 72 hour "blackout" not a total blackout, just some cardboard around the sides and I also turned off the light over my algae scrubber. I went back to using a filter sock and am changing my filter fiber in the baffle daily. I also started dosing 2.5ml of hydrogen peroxide twice a day. The dinos are really covering my birdsnest and it is not happy at all. I think after lights out I may cut my lights back a bit and go more blue and less white for a bit. I did also add some Microbacter 7 yesterday.

I'm wondering if I should pick up a UV sterilizer or not. I would rather not spend a lot and was curious if anyone thought something cheap like these two below could help at least with the dinos. Might depend on what strain it is though I guess.

 

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01824RDNC?creativeASIN=B01824RDNC&imprToken=wgGm1A0rX-3.cFtY5lfVQQ&slotNum=8&tag=aquaawp-20&linkCode=ogi&th=1&psc=1

 

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B001KP9B2W?creativeASIN=B001KP9B2W&imprToken=wgGm1A0rX-3.cFtY5lfVQQ&slotNum=17&tag=aquaawp-20&linkCode=ogi&th=1&psc=1

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Well after 72 hours of a blackout, dosing hydrogen peroxide twice a day and micro bubble scrubbing twice a day for an hour each it may be gone...maybe. I've also dimmed the lights down a bit and cut back 2 hours on the total light time. So far it's been 2 days since the lights have been back on and no sign of them yet in the display...but maybe a little on my algae scrubber. I've got my nitrates up to about 2 (salifert) with heavy feeding so that's good I think. Most of the corals are fine but some birdsnest took a hit from the dinos, couple dead spots. Hopefully they come back.

 

I also did a thing and got a new little clownfish (Appa) and a captive-bred orchid dottyback (Korra) which might help with some aggression issues. I've had them in QT since sunday. I gave them a bath in Formalin and methylene green before adding them. So far they look great and have been eating like little pigs! Thinking about doing a run of prazipro but not sure it's necessary after the Formalin bath. I plan on watching them for about 3 or 4 weeks before adding them. The remaining fish in the display, Krusty and Sarge are still doing great with no signs of anything.

 

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1 hour ago, TatorTaco said:

That picture with the YCG hiding in the birdsnest is my favorite!  Does it cause much coral irritation? 

Thanks! Yeah he always love to pose for me. It doesn't seem like it, but when it was still one big colony it did suffer some STN a few months ago but I think that was more related to it falling over into the frogspawn. I think the clown gobies generally become a problem for SPS when they are a breading pair and use them for nests.

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Welp time for my yearly updates. 😄 I did beat the dinos I was dealing with before, raising the temp up to around 81 seemed to do the trick. For some reason I can't stop adjusting the scape so it's different yet again. All my fish are doing great still and getting along swimmingly!

 

I haven't done much coral wise until this last weekend when I traded in a big chunk of frogspawn and picked up an elegance coral. Sadly it didn't go as well as I was hoping. It was the last one they had and was looking a little closed up but he said it might have been from feeding. So because it was the last one they had I went for it. Welllll it's in rough shape and seems to have the old elegance coral syndrome. Thankfully my LFS is awesome and he said he would take care of me. Seems like they only get in Indo elegance though so I may go a different direction. In the FTS below the frogspawn in the sand is now gone and that's where I'll be looking to put something. Thinking maybe a scoly at this point but open to suggestions!

 

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Here is the poor elegance20201023_112443.thumb.jpg.4fe8c899529770233499ea874485cf4c.jpg

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What did you do with that beautiful frogspawn? Still hope for the elegance. Scolys are beautiful. A trachy would also be nice. If you go with either of those, keep an eye on your clowns. Mine decided a trachy was a good substitute for an anemone and ended up killing it.

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1 hour ago, Pjanssen said:

What did you do with that beautiful frogspawn? Still hope for the elegance. Scolys are beautiful. A trachy would also be nice. If you go with either of those, keep an eye on your clowns. Mine decided a trachy was a good substitute for an anemone and ended up killing it.

Well technically the frogspawn that's in the sand is now where the frogspawn above it was and I traded that piece in for the elegance. Which yeah there might be some hope for it but not much I don't think. 

 

Thanks for the tip on the clowns. I think I would be okay though as the duncan hosts them and they never really leave that corner of the tank ha. I wish I could get a nem for them to save the duncan the abuse but it seems to be doing fine. And a nem would probably be a bit dangerous with how stocked I am.

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17 hours ago, Kayman said:

Welp time for my yearly updates. 😄 I did beat the dinos I was dealing with before, raising the temp up to around 81 seemed to do the trick. For some reason I can't stop adjusting the scape so it's different yet again. All my fish are doing great still and getting along swimmingly!

 

I haven't done much coral wise until this last weekend when I traded in a big chunk of frogspawn and picked up an elegance coral. Sadly it didn't go as well as I was hoping. It was the last one they had and was looking a little closed up but he said it might have been from feeding. So because it was the last one they had I went for it. Welllll it's in rough shape and seems to have the old elegance coral syndrome. Thankfully my LFS is awesome and he said he would take care of me. Seems like they only get in Indo elegance though so I may go a different direction. In the FTS below the frogspawn in the sand is now gone and that's where I'll be looking to put something. Thinking maybe a scoly at this point but open to suggestions!

 

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Here is the poor elegance20201023_112443.thumb.jpg.4fe8c899529770233499ea874485cf4c.jpg

The tank looks fantastic. Sorry to hear about the elegance. Probably on it’s way out to begin with it seems. 

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8 hours ago, Sharbuckle said:

The tank looks fantastic. Sorry to hear about the elegance. Probably on it’s way out to begin with it seems. 

Thanks! Yeah once I got it back and a real good look at it I could tell it was in trouble. Oh well I guess. 

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Well I did a 10min freshwater bath with the elegance. It was rotating between being bloated looking and closed up with white stringy stuff coming off the sides. We'll see if this helped at all. 🤞

 

These pics are from before the dip. Will now leave it for a week or so and go real low with any light.

 

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8 minutes ago, Kayman said:

Well I did a 10min freshwater bath with the elegance. It was rotating between being bloated looking and closed up with white stringy stuff coming off the sides. We'll see if this helped at all. 🤞

 

These pics are from before the dip. Will now leave it for a week or so and go real low with any light.

 

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Fingers crossed for you 

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