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another 0.7 pico


Roland-Berlin

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Hi,

First of all, thanks for a great topic. The tank is awesome.

I would like to ask what kind of pump and heater are you using?

Cause everytime when I am considering such a small pico reefs (less than 5 litres) I always have a doubts that available on market filters or pumps will do the whirlpool in it :)

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Roland-Berlin

 

 

Hi,

First of all, thanks for a great topic. The tank is awesome.

I would like to ask what kind of pump and heater are you using?

Cause everytime when I am considering such a small pico reefs (less than 5 litres) I always have a doubts that available on market filters or pumps will do the whirlpool in it :)

Hi,

I do not know, whether my pump is available outside of Germany. I use a pump of a "Dennerle Nano filter" without the filter unit. The pump can stepless be adjusted. The pump does not cause a whirlpool at all, and it is absolutely quiet, so it is an efficient nano one. The heater is a Fluval edge one. It has a default temperature of 26°C and I am surprised, that this heater works so precisely. The heater is a bit too long for the pico, so it has to be placed transversly on the back. I guess, temperature will be a big issue during summer time, but this will be another topic.

 

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Oh, thanks to the last picture - now I clearly see it triangle design (I saw this kind of filter before).

Yes, Dennerle is good known outside of Germany. And this is quite good news for me that this filter fits so well into 3L tank.

I wish you good luck!

P.S.: maybe you will find my thoughts as useful (in case if you are planning to keep the pico for a long time). Since tank is so small then I believe that there are 2 general approaches for cooling it:

1st) Using fan from, for example, CPU cooler. Pros - cheap and probably it does not need the controller. Cons - it will increase evaporation significantly.

2d) Using Peltier Plate Module just outside the tank's side. Pros - no influence on evaporation process; "hidden" installation. Cons - it will need the controller and temperature sensor in order to not overcool tank (hmm... however if your heater has a bigger power than peltier plate, then no controller will need ;) ).

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Agreed, if you simply disallow it through one or more means and simply rob algae of biomass expansion it will get easier in time. Its that first ramp/challenge that many tanks don't make it past.

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Roland-Berlin

About some time ago, I added an feather duster worm to the reef (I guess it is sabellastarte magn. ). I was not sure, whether the nutrition supply would be sufficient. I have read and believed, that these animals have to stand in a sufficient amount of nutrients almost all the time, since as a filter feeder, it is not able to incorporate nutrients during a short feeding time. What I have seen during the past days does not support this idea of a necessity of permanent feeding. When I give some dissolved food directly to the worm, using a syringe, I can see the worm "eating" the food. The feathers transport the food into the middle of the feather circle, where it is absorbed by the worm. And - of course- the worm is discharging the food after some time (hours) through a very small tube beside the feather crown. Although I do a waterchange after the feeding I guess, that these excrements strain the water quality furhter.

 

Something else to write about the feather duster worm? It is said, that these animals shoud never be withdrawed of the water, since air in the tube would kill the worm. My worm is withdrawed twice a week, and it is able to press some air out of his dugout with largest self evidence. I believe, that a healthy, strong worm can get along with some air in the tube without any harm.

 

Besides this, I have read about -I guess an old- trick of feeding powdered food to the dwellers by using a syringe: usually, the powderd food does not slump directly to the animals, so the result is a cloud of food, straining the water. But if you produce a vacuum in the syringe, the powder food will absorb the water at once and will become heavier than water. So it will slump directly in a thread shaped form into the water. At the end you can precisely feed and save food and water load. At least to me, this simple approach was new.

 

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Roland-Berlin

Today I added a frag of a tubastraea, which I knocked of from the one in my bigger tank. Indeed, the fragging was a brutal business, and sadly, two of the bigger polyps crunched. After putting the frag into the pico, I shadowed the place of the tubastraea and blastomussa, which seems to suffer from the intense light as well. After some ours, at least the small polyps of tubastraea opened a littlebit. To my suprise, even the broken polyp looks quite well- at least the rest of it. Is there a chance of recovering from such a big damage? Time will show. The frag is not firmly fixed in the reef, so it can be taken out for feeding, in order to avoid high water load.

 

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The other new arrival is a mini carpet anemone. I placed the anemone in the front of the reef, where it should cover the algea, overgrowing parts of the rocks. But during the first night, it moved across the tank and settled next to xenia. And of course xenia is fighting bravely, but the anemone seems not to be impressed at all. I know, that the mini carpet can become bigger, and probably, I have to replace it in the future. Currently, I do not want to stress/hurt it once more.

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The rest of the dwellers seem to be fine. Above all, I am glad, that tridacna -enthroned over all- seems to be happy.

 

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seamonkeychar

what is the direct action chosen for the algae, this is the part im most interested in all build threads lol

 

100% of all algae loss tanks on the internet from half to 380 gallon sps reefs had two things in common: a predicted start of algae usually having nothing to do with high nutrients and an ineffective action plan. not one of them deviated from this course, and we saved some of them retroactively.

 

 

Andrewk's reef here is small and weathered the first algae test, I believe his main angle was phosphate management. His tank is the smallest tank using gfo I know of

 

I could not use that in my tank, no hang on back filter fits mine.

 

I have not always been a believer in your straight edge attitude towards algae, but I'll be damned if I didn't start a 5 gallon recently with algae problems. Every time I do a water test my ammonia, nitrites, and nitrates are fine. But the algae is totally taking over. It makes no sense to everything I have ever believed about algae in tanks. You speak the truth here.

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Roland-Berlin

 

I have not always been a believer in your straight edge attitude towards algae, but I'll be damned if I didn't start a 5 gallon recently with algae problems. Every time I do a water test my ammonia, nitrites, and nitrates are fine. But the algae is totally taking over. It makes no sense to everything I have ever believed about algae in tanks. You speak the truth here.

 

I think that measuring ammonia, nitres and nitrates - an all the other elements- is only one small part of the universe in our tanks. The theories of low water load being an insurance against algea problems seems to be too simple to be true. The discussion of silicates found in high dosis even in ro water shows the complexity of the algea theme, in which we can disuss only a very small part. To my mind, a moderate algea grow belongs to a running tank, fulfilling an importang function in water chemistry. In a pico an excessive algea grow can be done by handwork. And - I hope- that healthy and growing corals have some secret weapons against their arch enemies. Let´s face it: we know so little what is happening in our tanks, and we think, that measuring 5, or 15 (..) different water parameters gives us an overview about what is going on. In this regard, the picos have a real advantage over their big brohters: waterchanges do make the thinking of water chemistry redundant. Enough trace elements in the reef? Enough calcium? Too much nutients?- Waterchanges is the answere of all these questions.

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Roland-Berlin

I am supprised about the regeneration-ability of tubatraea. Even the broken polyps seem to recover. Some pics, showing them in the reef and during feeding time.

 

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Roland-Berlin

Until now, I got all my animals in local stores. Although these stores offer a large variety of corals, it is often a problem to find something that is tiny enough to fit in a small pico. During the last days, I was looking for some nice and very small peaces of acanthastrea, and after looking around I tested an online shop. I am deeply contended with service and quality. Although temperatures range around the freezing point, all animals were in a good condition. They where warmed up by special heating pacs, and the company did everything to shorten the shipping time.

Besides two colourful peaces of acanthastrea, I bought two ricordea florida, one small rock overgrown with zooanthus and a mushroom polyp/discosoma.

 


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After I had fixed all animals, the pico looked like a place of devastation. The best thing to do in such situation: turn of the light, and leave the reef alone.

 

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After some hours, it looked better, and today I am happy again (although, I am afraid, that the pico will be soon overcrowded)

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I am all for the insta quick stock look, getting a bunch of things in the mail and putting them in a sub gallon tank because biology can be used to force it to work. is it fun, or not fun to break the rules? its fun.

 

it used to be back in the day you stocked slowly, prevented corals from emitting war chemicals, and you changed water in tiny partials to avoid overall disturbance.

 

from that line of thought, we get the driving force for giant problem algae threads across major forums. it works decent for large tanks, not so well for nanos. they need decisive action imo

 

 

still skeptical about the clam tho there's a high bar set for that, break it.

 

if you are doing CPR tank changes and excptional feeding of it in some way I think it can win. To truly break ground Roland we need 18 mos w that clam.

 

if you do that, or even keep until until it outgrows the tank, that can be listed as a first in the realm of pico reef work. The main driving force behind that claim is the lack of alternative proof online.

 

the rule about keeping tridacnids in tiny picos can be broken. whatever phyto feed Paul J (pjreefs) was feeding to sun corals in his nr.com TOTM would surely have worked the same for clams, it was amazing. live phyto cultures made on site and delivered to bivalves is exceptional planning.

 

just the same, aquatic-eco.com sells phyto culutures quick shipped that cost sixty bucks a quart used for lab production of oysters etc, any aspect of above natural feeding support I think w be key in breaking the boundary. currently, they do not live w average reef care methods even though that works for most corals.

 

So far we're seeing better than average planning and execution for a sub gal

this tank here R is totm material. hit the 18 mos w the clam, make totm history man.

B

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That's soo true. I really hope for the advancement of the hobby the clam lives. It will be interesting to watch. You may be forced to upgrade before you even see the clam successfully thrive.

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Roland-Berlin

I am all for the insta quick stock look, getting a bunch of things in the mail and putting them in a sub gallon tank because biology can be used to force it to work. is it fun, or not fun to break the rules? its fun.

 

it used to be back in the day you stocked slowly, prevented corals from emitting war chemicals, and you changed water in tiny partials to avoid overall disturbance.

 

from that line of thought, we get the driving force for giant problem algae threads across major forums. it works decent for large tanks, not so well for nanos. they need decisive action imo

 

 

still skeptical about the clam tho there's a high bar set for that, break it.

 

if you are doing CPR tank changes and excptional feeding of it in some way I think it can win. To truly break ground Roland we need 18 mos w that clam.

 

if you do that, or even keep until until it outgrows the tank, that can be listed as a first in the realm of pico reef work. The main driving force behind that claim is the lack of alternative proof online.

 

the rule about keeping tridacnids in tiny picos can be broken. whatever phyto feed Paul J (pjreefs) was feeding to sun corals in his nr.com TOTM would surely have worked the same for clams, it was amazing. live phyto cultures made on site and delivered to bivalves is exceptional planning.

 

just the same, aquatic-eco.com sells phyto culutures quick shipped that cost sixty bucks a quart used for lab production of oysters etc, any aspect of above natural feeding support I think w be key in breaking the boundary. currently, they do not live w average reef care methods even though that works for most corals.

 

So far we're seeing better than average planning and execution for a sub gal

this tank here R is totm material. hit the 18 mos w the clam, make totm history man.

B

I will do my best. 18 month: a real high bar for a pico. When I look around in this forum, it seems, that many picos have their zenit after about 6 month... after that time many of them start to look overmatured (exceptions confirm the rule). Since it is my first pico, I can not oversee, how it could look like in about one year or so. Maybe an upgrade (volume or technique, or both) will be necessary in future. Best thing to do: go ahead step by step -first month is over, I hope many will follow.

I am thinking of feeding the clam with living phyto plancton. Until now, I use a conserved extract (Premium Phytoplankton from Microbe -Lift) and Reef Pepper from Nyos. I do not have a clue whether it is good food or just something to silence the conscience.

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It is true, the lifespan of gallon and less tanks tend to run six mos but not due to biology, due to taking it down. The two oldest pico reefs on this site are four years old at two gallons, and 9 yrs on a one gallon.

 

What pico reefs do on month 3 is what they do on month 70 if the export has been well enough

 

The ones that crash with algae issues are not doing full water changes and not using phosphate controls

 

If one or the other can be used, and we can find some hardware luck, no power outages, no knocking it over lol, we can expect a long life for this tank. Time will tell if the feeding works for the clam...it'll work for the rest of the tank anyway and there's a chance he just might Iike it

 

My near loss experiences were caused by

 

Twice forgetting to plug back in heater after water change, ran 68 degrees for three days till I noticed

 

Power outages, but I installed battery pump backup and the one last week didnt harm

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http://www.saltwaterfish.com/product-penn-plax-silent-air-battery-operated-air-pump-b10?gclid=CJji-O6ZssMCFQ6paQodoyUAWw

I bought the auto on version of this one, my vase only uses air for current



if Rolands ever gets a power outage I think it w be ok being still a long time, just keep water change handy

 

regarding the physicality of the tiny square top tank, it is terrible at salinity control but excellent at aeration. even still, his animals could mostly go days without movement in a preservation state where feeding is stopped and water changes are upped.

 

the saves reaction for any malady in a sub gallon pico reef is a full water change. the pep up action to revitalize as the years go on is doing ten of them in a row sometimes, true export, the upwelling of bedded nutrients briefly spike feeds the system and its also totally exportive at the same time.

 

when these age, if one isnt using a phosphate binder, they need flushing water changes from time to time to truly dislodge detritus from the sand and the rock structure. mine get it once a year. they can be skipped, as long as there is an action plan for the resulting algae.

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  • 2 weeks later...
Roland-Berlin

During the past few days, nothing worth mentioning has happend. Perhaps this phase is dangerous for pico reefs because the reef seems to be completed and the owner wants to devolope the tank. And developing means: more space. Covertly I am thinking of an upgrade.

 

As always I do the water change twice a week and feed the corals with phyto and animal plancton. Because of algea growing, I tested the phosphat concentration once, and it was on a very low and hardly detectable level. I removed some algea with a pincette, but the result is not satisfying. And of course I do not want any hermit crab clattering about my corals. Probably I will borrow a hermit crab just for one or a few days? Somewhere I read, that hermit crabs can attack clams and I think for now, I will do the algea battle with my own hands.

 

The question whether the food is a good one or not is answered by the clam, since it shows signs of growth. Comparing the first pic I made from the clam weeks ago with the one I made a few days ago, you can see the growing edge of the clamshell. Since it is my first clam, I can not match whether it is a high or modest rate of growth, but ultimately I value this as a sign of health and good condition.

 

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december 2014 february 2015

 

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Roland-Berlin

During the last weeks, I havent lost an animal in my pico, but during the past days, I got worried about my actinia. I had collected this actina at the northsea side of GB, so it is used to cold or at least moderate temperatures. Although these animals accept a large variation of temperatures, I guess the permanence of high temperatures -especially in wintertime- does not contribute to its wellbeing. So it started to move around, hided in the reef, and began to shrink. Yesterday I decided to put it in an unheated tank, where it met another actinia (from the seaside of the Netherlands-- its the big and grey one). I hope that these two will get on well togehter in this small habitat. Although the unheated tank is not the issue of this topic, there are some attached pic of the two nice anemones in their low tech-about 1-liter- tank.

 

(2nd pico... obsession? addicton? Do I have to worry? )

 

 

 

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Roland-Berlin

It looks great! I hadn't even heard of actinia nice call.

 

Actinia equina- very common at european areas of intertidal zones. So it is used to high changes in temperature and fluctuation in density because of desalination in the result of rain filling the seaside-puddels. It is one of the hardened sea dewellers I know- besides aptasia :-)

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(2nd pico... obsession? addicton? Do I have to worry? )

Yes. Yes. No! Embrace the madness!

 

I'm thinking it is not wise to mix cold water Actiniidae in a topical reef. Last time I was in the North Sea it was damn cold!

 

I am in the planning stage of a tide-pool one gallon pico tank. My idea is to have the rock work set up in a way that it can be lifted out of the tank all in one piece and have all the livestock attached to it. This way I can lift everything out of the tank for ease of maintenance. I am thinking I could then pull out everything and dunk it into a 5g bucket to be able to swish it around to clean it. I could then easily clean the 1g tank. Slide the rock work back in, fill up with fresh water, and you would have a very clean tank! For a heater I am going to try a small under tank reptile heater. I have yet to think about water movement although I may go with a small closed-loop pump.

 

Oh, and a few weeks back in the thread there was some advice to watch out for air in the clam. This is a different concern from bubbles in the water. When a calm is exposed to the air (like during your water changes or moving from tank to tank) they can get air trapped inside them. It is recommended to "burp" a clam when so exposed when being placed back in the water. You basically submerge the clam and then move it around it's axis several times under the water freeing any trapped air bubbles. Air trapped this way can cause the death of the clam.

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Roland-Berlin

Yes. Yes. No! Embrace the madness!

 

I'm thinking it is not wise to mix cold water Actiniidae in a topical reef. Last time I was in the North Sea it was damn cold!

 

I am in the planning stage of a tide-pool one gallon pico tank. My idea is to have the rock work set up in a way that it can be lifted out of the tank all in one piece and have all the livestock attached to it. This way I can lift everything out of the tank for ease of maintenance. I am thinking I could then pull out everything and dunk it into a 5g bucket to be able to swish it around to clean it. I could then easily clean the 1g tank. Slide the rock work back in, fill up with fresh water, and you would have a very clean tank! For a heater I am going to try a small under tank reptile heater. I have yet to think about water movement although I may go with a small closed-loop pump.

 

Oh, and a few weeks back in the thread there was some advice to watch out for air in the clam. This is a different concern from bubbles in the water. When a calm is exposed to the air (like during your water changes or moving from tank to tank) they can get air trapped inside them. It is recommended to "burp" a clam when so exposed when being placed back in the water. You basically submerge the clam and then move it around it's axis several times under the water freeing any trapped air bubbles. Air trapped this way can cause the death of the clam.

 

You are totaly right in criticizing that an cold water anemone should not be forced to live in a tropical reef. Although actinia equina is also found in the warmer regions of the mediteranean, I think that the flexiblitity of species should not be mixed up with te flexibility of an individual animal.

 

Please let me know, when you start your 1-gallon tide pool. I made good experiences with my "one rock reef", that can be easily lift out the water to clean the rock and the tank. Cleaning the rock means to rinse out the detrius, which accumulate very fast. I think, that this flush is important to maintain water quality although many of us seem to be afraid of stressing the animals through flooding the rock and its dwellers. To my mind, this stress is nothing versus bad water parameters.

 

As related to the clam: the clam is sessile on the rock. So I can not move it around to help it to get rid of "swallowed" air. And when its get back in the water, it is the first animal, that opens up- a sign that everything is fine? There where no problems at all during the last weeks, and even the feather duster worm, which is told to be tender concerning to any air contact shows no sings of harm. But of course.. that does not mean, that there will be no air accident in the future. I will do my best, but up to this point, I can not preserve my animals from air contact. Besides this: when I enter "tridacna" and "intertidal" in a search engine, I find a lot of pictures, showing that tridacna sometimes settles in the intertidal zone. An animals, that is dependent on high solar radiation, equivalent to a living space close under the water surface should be able to cope with some air contact ... (?)... Lets hope, that I will not regret the last sentence some day.

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Yes, I realize the difficulty with your particular clam, just something to be aware of. As it has been mentioned, clams can look perfectly healthy and two hours later be gone--and I mean bare shell gone. What you are attempting with the clam is mostly thought impossible, so you really need to aware of all potential issues.

 

Looking forward to watching your progress with this one!

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Roland-Berlin

Nothing spectacular happend during the last days. I try to control algea, and I found out, that a toothbrush does a competent job in this context. Besides this, I extended the supply of food with artemia, which seems to be accepted by lps and sps. The feeding of tubastrea with mysis twice a week is going on, and the crushed polyps seem to recover.

 

Just some more pics.

 

 

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Looking great. Within another month or so the algae will become quite the scrub challenge, the toothbrush is like a grazer that rasps the outside off and leaves the inner holdfasts on the rock to grow back. It also casts bits of algae to regrow elsewhere, we use peroxide in sub gallon tanks for a reason its not to challenge reef rules

 

We use it because nothing works better for true long term control, and nothing works in its place in tanks this small. Andrew k was able to avoid it in his 4 yr old pico by using gfo and actively starving algae before it developed holdfasts. Once developed, its just 4-8 weeks before nothing else other than peroxide can save the tank. A thousand sub gallon picos came to this same fork in the road which is why 18 mos is a great goal, they are taken down due to algae at month 8 usually. Only those who use peroxide or gfo will make that mark.

 

 

The first test in sub gallon reefing was getting coral to grow, sps

 

Now its longevity. Mostly nobody gets to or past 18 without a thick green forest around their prized corals

 

Mostly :)

 

 

Try hard to continue using no cheats, but right when you can see it coming back every single day and overtaking corals shoot me a pm and within about two days we can turn the around 100% like the big threads show. We do not dump it in the tank,we use a dropper and hit a small patch one at a time with a follow up 100% water change to export it back out. It needs a specific plan then nothing in your tank will be harmed.

 

The action signal is when the algae starts growing on the clam shell and around new corals, signifying its mark around the tank. Its easy to beat at that point with a little targeted action.

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