KevinM Posted September 18, 2015 Share Posted September 18, 2015 Update 29 Mar 17 reef by Kevin McRae, on Flickr Update. Just a new photo of the reef, nothing new. Snowflake clownfish has been MIA for a month now. 29 Feb 2016 Update. More SPS! Dec 15 2015 Update. SPS addiction has began. I've been lurking on this forum for around a year and finally signed up. I've kept small reefs on and off for the past 6-7 years. About 6 months ago I purchased a used nano/biocube (I don't know what it is). It has a light mod, now with ebay chinese 60 watt LED which is actually pretty great. I got the nano running with a few zoas/LPS however I've since added many frags which are doing quite well. Here are a few photos. Equipment 6 Gallon Cube 60 Watt LED - Here is the light http://www.ebay.com/itm/2015-Full-spectrum-Dimmable-20x3W-Led-Aquarium-light-REEF-AND-SPS-/331500565974. Koralia nano Coral list GSP Candy Cane Favia Acans Yellow Polyps Bunch of different zoas Octospawn Hammer Torch Frogspawn Kenya Tree (I think) Ricordeas and other shrooms Alveopora The only SPS....green encrusiting montipora.... Livestock 2x Ocellaris - Black and Snowflake 7 x Astrea 2 x Sexy Shrimp A few random unknown snails... Couple blue legged hermits. Lots of local reefers in my area with plenty of inexpensive frags. I was thinking of trying some birdsnest or perhaps some acropora. Thoughts? I conduct water changes every 1-2 weeks, the LPS and zoas seem to look much better when I do less water changes. I occasionally dose calcium/alk/mag as well however with reef crystals I've been having to do it less frequently. Euphyllia is doing amazing in the cube, growing a new head every 1/1.5 months. Anyways, do you think birdsnest would do okay? Do you think it'll get bleached? Thanks! Link to comment
Jack harle Posted September 18, 2015 Share Posted September 18, 2015 You probably can do any of the sps in this video if your Params are in check and stable. www.youtube.com/watch?v=k3OISdJ6zMk Link to comment
KevinM Posted September 18, 2015 Author Share Posted September 18, 2015 Thanks for the reply, great video...very informative and great picture. Oh yes, I should have mentioned params... Salinity - 1.026 Cal - 460 Alk - 9 Dkh Mag - about 1400 I feed brine/mysis/bottled phytoplankton twice a week. I have been using the phytoplankton for about two months and no algae bloom, alvepora seems to respond well to it. There is a tiny bit of bubble algae thanks to a new frag, may introduce a emerald crab. Link to comment
HarryPotter Posted September 18, 2015 Share Posted September 18, 2015 I'd start with a montipora and see how it does. Pretty easy too keep but does require a nice amount of light Link to comment
righttirefire Posted September 18, 2015 Share Posted September 18, 2015 Birdsnest can be "forgiving" also. Link to comment
Paleoreef103 Posted September 18, 2015 Share Posted September 18, 2015 Keeping parameters stable in a small tank is pretty challenging. I'd try a Montipora capicornis as your first test SPS. They're probably the easiest SPS. Link to comment
Nano sapiens Posted September 18, 2015 Share Posted September 18, 2015 Many of the Montipora should do fine (Setosa and Sunset Monti come to mind). Leptoseris are excellent, too, and don't require much light. Pavonas adapt easily to many intensities of light, but tend to be aggressive (1-2" sweepers). Link to comment
land shark Posted September 25, 2015 Share Posted September 25, 2015 Got an acro in my 3g picotope. It's very healthy. Just keep everything stable. Link to comment
KevinM Posted October 2, 2015 Author Share Posted October 2, 2015 So this happened.... Was offered this colony along with a little symbiotic crab at a price I couldn't refuse. I added the colony last night, so far tons of polyp extension. A bit nervous as this is my first time with acro but this little nano keeps its parameters pretty stable. Added a purple monti cap as well, and possbily some nice size birdsnest next week. Link to comment
Milkeeway Posted October 3, 2015 Share Posted October 3, 2015 So this happened.... Was offered this colony along with a little symbiotic crab at a price I couldn't refuse. I added the colony last night, so far tons of polyp extension. A bit nervous as this is my first time with acro but this little nano keeps its parameters pretty stable. Added a purple monti cap as well, and possbily some nice size birdsnest next week. Awesome! Judging by how everything else looks in your tank and how long you've been doing it I'm sure you'll do fine with Acro! I think what separates the guys who are godly at keeping hard coral vs. the plebes is consistency. A quick Google search tells you just about everything you need to know now a days. I don't mean to sound like they don't know their shit because it's the opposite, I just mean it's pretty black and white what you need to do to keep certain corals alive. Personally I can't remember all that stuff at any given time so I just write out where my tank needs to be and then test against the baseline and make sure everything I add fits within the parameters. The guys who keep logs, religiously test their water, and keep up with routine maintenance seem to have the nicest tanks. Smaller tanks are just hard because if something goes wrong it might only take an hour for it all to go south but no one tests and monitors their tanks that often lol. The larger the tank the more time you have to respond in a way. In the past I've never set myself up for success. Always had relatively small tanks, spent way too much on coral but never a home RODI and ATO. Always ended up getting sick of lugging jugs, topping off daily, spilling water, cleaning up water...lol this time around I did the opposite and hoping to get a nice looking tank like yours. Looking forward to following this and seeing the growth! Oh also I seem to read a lot of posts about Zoas and Palys liking a little dirtier water where as hard corals are the opposite. Let us know how it works for you, I'm interested to see. Link to comment
Milkeeway Posted October 12, 2015 Share Posted October 12, 2015 Update! Gorgeous! Congratulations. That tank looks great. Link to comment
ajmckay Posted October 12, 2015 Share Posted October 12, 2015 I'm diggin' this tank. Looks really sharp and I'm a fan of the coral selection. Link to comment
PieMan2k Posted October 12, 2015 Share Posted October 12, 2015 You make this little 6g look bigger than it is I LOVE IT. Link to comment
KevinM Posted October 15, 2015 Author Share Posted October 15, 2015 Thanks guys! It's a lot of fun! Can't wait to see it all grow! Only problem is I'm running out of space. Link to comment
HarryPotter Posted October 15, 2015 Share Posted October 15, 2015 I thought this was a 28g until the comment above!!! Amazing job, and I love how the background is black in all the photos Link to comment
KevinM Posted October 27, 2015 Author Share Posted October 27, 2015 So, I've added a wack more SPS frags. I also added a emerald crab to take care of a tiny bit of bubble algae. Which was a HUGE mistake. He was knocking everything over, including recently mounted frags. Nano is packed pretty tight so when one item falls it usually falls onto another coral which in turn isn't very impressed. So after spending a few hours of my afternoon using epoxy on everything I was happy. Well, wake up the next morning and he somehow knocked frags over again (apparently my epoxy skills are lacking). So I decide, screw this crab, he's outta here. Off course, he knew this was coming and made it incredibly difficult to catch him so I had to rip out all the rocks again. While I wish I never got him in the first place and I do feel bad for the rough week I put my nano through. As well, though about the crab eating bubble algae. It is spread via the bubbles being poped the spores spread throughout the tank. When the crab eats the bubbles, spores will spread thus a never ending cycle. Not exactly what I want. However, all the coral is fine and the crab did give me credit towards some new SPS.... Added some small frags of: Crayola plana acro Bonsai acro Purple chronic tort acro Fire and ice millepora - Love milles.....had to finally get one. Red digi - Freebie, never cared for them much but the polyps look pretty neat actually! Purple stylophora - Bleaching in my nano, too much light perhaps? I moved it to the shade for now. And a few little odds and ends 'scraps' that weren't in the best shape (which are already recovering great in my nano) Here are some photos. Purple chronic tort...hopefully the polyps will start to open up. Euphyllia corner.... This birdsnest was 100% white less than a week ago, greening up already. Not bad for a freebie. Crayola plana... FTS - Bit of a mess since the crab left but I don't want to touch it again until the new year. I find it incredibly frustrating rescaping....I just want the corals to be open and grow. So no more touching and no more frags for awhile (I hope, hahaha). Also, here is a reason why it's nice to live North of the USA. Took this photo last week! Link to comment
phillyclownfish Posted October 27, 2015 Share Posted October 27, 2015 Nice looking tank. Link to comment
KevinM Posted December 15, 2015 Author Share Posted December 15, 2015 Thank you! A few photo updates. Struggling keeping the alkalinity up, drops like crazy everyday. I really need to make a automated doser. Have noticed much better colour since I've started to dose alk though. RTN is very frusturating though. Purchase a few frags at a time, some do fantastic and others from the same tank start to recede within hours. So far I've lost a bonsai and millepora to RTN. Purchased a small frag of bird of paradise birdsnest which got RTN within hours, I fragged it and so far I'm hopeful it will improve (fragged it about two weeks ago, polyps extension, just bleached now). Purchased a few frags locally and they got RTN overnight which seemed to have affected some of my long term SPS. All seems well now, STN seems to be receding in those that were affected. Wouldn't be as fun if it were easy I suppose. Playing around with the white balance, birdsnest colour is a bit off but still represents the tank well. Rainbow montipora is spreading like wildfire. Happy to see, it is one of my favourites. Can't capture the colour as well as I'd like. Pink millepora Freebie digitata - Can't believe it was free, love the polyps. New acro This was also a freebie - seems to be colouring up quite well. Excited to see what it turns into. Link to comment
HarryPotter Posted December 15, 2015 Share Posted December 15, 2015 Look into a Jebao doser- $80 for 4 heads of dosing. I use mine and its really nice. Link to comment
wow.such.chris Posted December 15, 2015 Share Posted December 15, 2015 I like the dark photos, really cool look. Nice work! Link to comment
KevinM Posted February 29, 2016 Author Share Posted February 29, 2016 Update - Haven't added anything new since mid December. I'd love to get some new frags but I'm at the peak of the school year and am lacking coral funds. Link to comment
KevinM Posted October 22, 2016 Author Share Posted October 22, 2016 Little update - I think I need to setup a larger reef. Look at maybe a 30g cube. I also added a crocea clam. Link to comment
krusing93 Posted October 22, 2016 Share Posted October 22, 2016 Little update - I think I need to setup a larger reef. Look at maybe a 30g cube. I also added a crocea clam. Your progress looks amazing! I am growing SPS in my 5 Gallon! its such a great feeling seeming them happy and healthy... have any advise? what is your husbandry schedule look like? are you dosing or just water changes? THANKS!!! Link to comment
KevinM Posted October 22, 2016 Author Share Posted October 22, 2016 Thank you. My biggest challenges so far has been finding the right balance of water changes and dosing. I've had the best results with a 25% water change once per week and dosing 1-2ml of Alk/Mag/Cal every 3 days. Perhaps I'd have better result doing it daily in small increments? I tried doing 2 x 25% water changes a week and I didn't notice a difference for my SPS but my Euphyllia weren't as happy. I should mention I added a Tunze 9002 skimmer. It doesn't really skim all that much - I probably need to clean it actually. I think this may be why I've had better acro colour and encrusting. It took me about 8 months before my SPS started encrusting - I have one acro frag in there that grew 1 or 2mm and it has been 12 months. I add my red planet acro frags last and they have better growth than the acro frags I placed in 12 months ago. While zoas look really cool and it sucks having a bare tank at the start I think if I went back I'd avoid them. I have some pretty green zoas that have made a carpet of about 200 polyps. They are quickly approaching my red planet and I'm worried who will will the encrusting war. Another issue I had was poor feeding. I was using phyto and brine and later switched to primarily reef roids and the very occasional mysis. Colour and polyps extension is great. Link to comment
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