Teenyreef's IM40 Not-So-Teeny Tank - August FTS

[fishfreak0114]

I have to pick my jaw up off the floor every time you post pictures!  Everything looks beautiful!   And the pictures are so clear I feel like I'm standing in front of the tank in person!

[Nola Bear]

BEEn offline for a bit, but it is good to catch up on your tanks. Looking good teeny. Now it is about time for me to get back to my own thread with a photo dump~

[RollaJase]

Really nice work on the zoa island, it has all come together really well. All the tank pics look amazing my friend.

[teenyreef]

On 8/28/2017 at 0:19 AM, fishfreak0114 said:

I have to pick my jaw up off the floor every time you post pictures!  Everything looks beautiful!   And the pictures are so clear I feel like I'm standing in front of the tank in person!

Awww, thanks!

On 8/30/2017 at 8:18 AM, Nola Bear said:

BEEn offline for a bit, but it is good to catch up on your tanks. Looking good teeny. Now it is about time for me to get back to my own thread with a photo dump~

Ooooo, I need to go catch up on your thread! But tomorrow, I've got to go to bed...

On 9/3/2017 at 10:24 PM, RollaJase said:

Really nice work on the zoa island, it has all come together really well. All the tank pics look amazing my friend.

Thanks, I'm pretty happy with it for now, although I really don't think it will look really good until they spread out more and fill in.

[teenyreef]

I finally got a few new pictures edited:

Acan garden 

 

Freckles and friend:

 

These Evil Favites (tm) have grown from a tiny frag. Now it's about an inch across. I love seeing all the feeding polyps! I've carefully placed this in one of the back corners of the tank, well away from any other corals.

 

[Lynton]

Hey tiny, great tank, great pics, just stunning.. does your coral beauty pick at any of your corals? I've got one 3 weeks ago and noticed it picking at my RTN birdsnest Last few days.

[debbeach13]

I just caught up on your thread. Outstanding! The colors really POP. Your photo's are so beautiful. I do not know how you find the time to have multiple tanks that look great. 

[YaBoyLaj]

That acan garden tho 

[teenyreef]

16 hours ago, Lynton said:

Hey tiny, great tank, great pics, just stunning.. does your coral beauty pick at any of your corals? I've got one 3 weeks ago and noticed it picking at my RTN birdsnest Last few days.

Thanks! The coral beauty leaves the corals alone, other than to pick out food from the acans when I target feed them. But I just put a ton of food on top of the acans so that they still get some.

 

I've heard that most coral beauties leave corals alone but that some do not. I don't know if it's the size, or how much they are fed, or just plain bad luck that they figure out that corals are tasty.

[teenyreef]

15 hours ago, debbeach13 said:

I just caught up on your thread. Outstanding! The colors really POP. Your photo's are so beautiful. I do not know how you find the time to have multiple tanks that look great. 

Thanks! I do spend a lot of time on tank maintenance but it's so much of a routine that it doesn't really bother me most of the time. And I couldn't possibly do it without having Apex and dosers and ATOs on every tank.

But I do think sometimes about reducing the number of tanks just to make life easier. But then I start thinking about which tank to eliminate...I love having this tank in the family room where we spend so much time, so it stays no matter what. And I also spend a lot of time working at my desk in the study, so the 10g tank on the desk has to stay. And the whole reason I got the 30g frag tank was so I wouldn't have to keep frags in either of the other two tanks, plus I just love the look and ease of maintenance of the shallow tank. So I can't image giving it up either.

But someday one of these tanks will have to go if I'm going to start a bigger tank, which I definitely want to do eventually when I can afford it. There's no way I would be able to keep up with four tanks, especially if one of them as a big tank.

12 hours ago, ThePaontedFrogfish said:

That acan garden tho 

 I do love acans!

[teenyreef]

I'm working through my backlog of picture from the last couple weeks...I like this picture of the red dragon acro, both because of the pretty color of the acro, and because there's so much else going on in the picture. You can see a red digitata on the left, the blue kenya tree in the upper left corner, the elkhorn stag below/behind the red dragon, and a recovering tri color valida (which is just green right now) in the lower right. And of course there's Boris the yellow coris wrasse hanging out in the back.

 

Not a great picture, but the Hawkins Echinata is doing fine.

 

This is the "blueberry" shortcake I picked up at the local coral show last fall. It looks more like a regular strawberry shortcake to me, but it does seem to have a deeper purple color to it. This coral has gone through some significant color morphs since I got it, so I am reserving judgement as it gets bigger and grows up into the light more. 

 

Tubbs Stellata montipora. This is one of the hardest corals to photograph in all my tanks. In real life, it has very bright green polyps with a purple skin. In this picture the colors are about right, but when I adjust the exposure to look as bright as it should, everything gets blown out. The coral in the lower right is a german blue digitata, which grows like a weed.

 

I love this group shot with the Katropora in the middle. So many corals in a small area. I'm going to have to pretty much break this rock apart when these frags turn into colonies, there isn't nearly enough room for all of them to grow out.

 

[YaBoyLaj]

Thats so sick, starting to get the itch to start getting some sps... but I'm still super wishy washy about it 

[teenyreef]

5 hours ago, ThePaontedFrogfish said:

Thats so sick, starting to get the itch to start getting some sps... but I'm still super wishy washy about it 

Doooo itttt! Your tank is plenty mature and seems to be stable. Why not just try a few easy ones and see how they do?

[teenyreef]

I've been experimenting with different salts, and different trace element dosing approaches lately. I've tried both Aquaforest and Fritz, and liked them both, except they both tested unusually high in magnesium, like close to 1600. I'd be inclined to blame the test kit, but I've tried multiple kits from multiple brands, and my Triton test results for this tank matched my magnesium levels as measured by the test kit, so I think it's accurate. Also, when the mag levels were high in my tanks, the snails were affected, getting very sluggish, which John from Reefcleaners has said will happen with magnesium at or over 1500.

 

I even tried multiple batches of Aquaforest, before seeing online that other people have reported the same thing. For the Fritz, I recently met Shawn Hale from Fritz, when he was at an LFS giving a seminar on their products. We had a nice talk, and he gave me some encouraging feedback that they are really looking to provide a salt mix that comes as close as possible to natural sea water, and that he thinks they are going to reduce their magnesium level to be closer to NSW. But he said my magnesium shouldn't be so high, and he asked me to send him the batch number so he could check to see what the levels were for that batch. Unfortunately, I haven't heard back from him

 

At the same time, I've been dosing a somewhat haphazard combination of trace elements, including those already present in Reef Fusion 1 & 2, Red Sea Colors, and a few other miscellaneous bottles of stuff. Based on my Triton test results, it seems to be working pretty well, other than my consistently way high iron levels. But it's a daily pain in the butt and I'd really rather take a simpler approach that is easier to maintain in the long run.

 

So, I've switched back to Red Sea Blue Bucket, which I was always pretty happy with. The main reason I stopped using it was because none of my LFS's carry it any more. But since I can't find any other salt that has consistently mixed up the way I want, I'm willing to pay a bit of a premium to get it shipped.

 

I'm also going to try the new ATI essentials program. It's similar to the Triton method, in that you send your water off for analysis, and you dose using their three part stuff which includes all the trace elements. For me the difference is that ATI method isn't based around running a refugium, and it's a lot cheaper. But before I send off for my first sample analysis, I'm going to do several largish water changes using the RSBB salt, and continue running my Polyfilter for a few more weeks. The idea is to get all the trace element levels, especially the iron, to a baseline level that reflects the ATI dosing program, then the test results will show what I need to adjust.

 

If this works as advertised, then I won't have to do separate dosing of trace elements any more. I'd like that

 

 

[KJoFan]

I'm curious what your goal is for using the ATI or any supplements? If doing water changes is meant to replenish/balance the trace elements as you mentioned, is then, the goal to decrease water changes and rely on the dosing? Just thinking that the easier/cheaper route is just to do a decent weekly water change to keep elements balanced and be done with it, but maybe that's just me. 

[teenyreef]

50 minutes ago, KJoFan said:

I'm curious what your goal is for using the ATI or any supplements? If doing water changes is meant to replenish/balance the trace elements as you mentioned, is then, the goal to decrease water changes and rely on the dosing? Just thinking that the easier/cheaper route is just to do a decent weekly water change to keep elements balanced and be done with it, but maybe that's just me. 

That's a good question - the water changes I'm talking about are just to get my tank's parameters at a baseline level in case any of them have risen to high with my ad hos dosing regimen. The goal of both the Triton and ATI methods is to minimize or eliminate water changes. 

 

It's a popular misconception that you can maintain element levels with nothing but water changes, but that's only possible by using salt water mixes that have levels significantly higher than what you want to maintain in the tank. That's why salt mixes like Reef Crystals and Red Sea Coral Pro exist, for folks that don't want to dose. But if you're keeping SPS, especially acros and other finicky characters, the swings in parameter levels this introduces is really bad. That's why Red Sea recommends RSCP for non-sps tanks, and recommend RSBB for SPS. 

 

Think of it this way: if my target alkalinity is 7.5, and it falls to 7.0 in a week, and I do a 20% water change with a salt mix that mixes at 8.0, then my alkalinity will go from 7.0 to 7.2 after that water change (20% of the difference between the two levels). So in that imaginary scenario, the only way to maintain my alkalinity at 7.5 would be to do 50% water changes every week, or switch to a salt with higher alkalinity. And of course all the other parameters would change at the same rates and proportions.

[KJoFan]

23 minutes ago, teenyreef said:

That's a good question - the water changes I'm talking about are just to get my tank's parameters at a baseline level in case any of them have risen to high with my ad hos dosing regimen. The goal of both the Triton and ATI methods is to minimize or eliminate water changes. 

 

It's a popular misconception that you can maintain element levels with nothing but water changes, but that's only possible by using salt water mixes that have levels significantly higher than what you want to maintain in the tank. That's why salt mixes like Reef Crystals and Red Sea Coral Pro exist, for folks that don't want to dose. But if you're keeping SPS, especially acros and other finicky characters, the swings in parameter levels this introduces is really bad. That's why Red Sea recommends RSCP for non-sps tanks, and recommend RSBB for SPS. 

 

Think of it this way: if my target alkalinity is 7.5, and it falls to 7.0 in a week, and I do a 20% water change with a salt mix that mixes at 8.0, then my alkalinity will go from 7.0 to 7.2 after that water change (20% of the difference between the two levels). So in that imaginary scenario, the only way to maintain my alkalinity at 7.5 would be to do 50% water changes every week, or switch to a salt with higher alkalinity. And of course all the other parameters would change at the same rates and proportions.

Perhaps I should have specified trace elements. I get that with heavy coral stocking and/or a good amount of sps you won't be able to maintain alk and cal through water changes alone, unless you're doing continuous automated...maybe. 

 

So I guess I wonder if a 20% weekly water change with a reputable salt wouldn't replenish those trace elements? I don't really know how fast they are used in a full on packed reef.

 

I also understand the goal of Triton and ATI is to eliminate/reduce water changes and that's an attractive thing to be sure. I think since I obviously have lazy reefer syndrome I know I'd forget to dose this, that or the other thing at some point and fubar the whole works. lol

 

Both of my main tanks are still babies so water changes alone pretty well keep things in line, especially in the IM40. My larger, sps dominant tank is also an infant and is just now starting to consume more alk than my water changes can provide. So, maybe as things progress I too will be looking at these magic potions to add something to my tanks.

 

I keep following and see if you sell me on these magic potions.

[WV Reefer]

On 8/27/2017 at 10:55 PM, teenyreef said:

Things have mostly opened back up now, so I took some pictures. I ended up making a peninsula of rocks that curls back around itself, to make kind of a zoa lagoon. There are actually three big rocks built up out of little rocks. One for the zoas, one for the bigger zoa/palys that I really like, and once for the nuclear green and blue palys, which are true palys and tend to spread like crazy. Keeping separate rocks will help keep the fast growing palys from taking over the zoas. I hope...

 

Front view of the zoas:

 

I took a different approach to gluing up these rocks, using Reef Welder.

 

You heat a little bit of water in the microwave, and pour in some of the beads. They turn clear in a minute or two, at which point they form a soft, easily shaped plastic.

 

This is the first time I tried it, and although I like it, it's not perfect. The working time is very short, about a minute, maybe two minutes tops. If you wait longer, the plastic is still moldable, but it doesn't stick to the rocks.

After it sits for a few minutes, it hardens up and everything is stuck together.

Due to the short working time, I had to heat up my little cup of water probably 15 times before I was done. It only takes a minute to heat up the water, and another minute to heat up the beads, so it's quick work, but still kind of a pain.

A nice benefit is that it doesn't make the skimmer go crazy, like super glue does.

Here's the zoa rock all glued up:

 

And the "desirable palys" rock:

 

I used a mix of the existing rocks and a few new rock chunks. So overall the zoas are up on rocks now, instead of being down in the sand bed. Here's a front view of the zoa rock:

 

 

I was just using Reef Welder the other night for the first time and I didn't care for it.  I feel like I had 30 seconds to work with it and as soon as it hit the tank water it instantly turned into a rock.  I finally gave up.  

[teenyreef]

22 minutes ago, WV Reefer said:

I was just using Reef Welder the other night for the first time and I didn't care for it.  I feel like I had 30 seconds to work with it and as soon as it hit the tank water it instantly turned into a rock.  I finally gave up.  

I agree, that was exactly what I thought the first time I used it. I would not recommend it for attaching things to rocks still in the tank. I did use it for one little frag that came loose while I was working in the tank and it took me about five tries to get it to work. The problem is that as soon as it hits the water it cools a lot faster so you have to be really fast.

 

But for gluing things up outside the tank, where I needed to glue whole rocks together, it was better than using pints of superglue. I still prefer Emarco mortar when I have to do major rock scaping, but for a small project like the zoa rock, I'd use it again. Maybe...

[WV Reefer]

3 minutes ago, teenyreef said:

I agree, that was exactly what I thought the first time I used it. I would not recommend it for attaching things to rocks still in the tank. I did use it for one little frag that came loose while I was working in the tank and it took me about five tries to get it to work. The problem is that as soon as it hits the water it cools a lot faster so you have to be really fast.

 

But for gluing things up outside the tank, where I needed to glue whole rocks together, it was better than using pints of superglue. I still prefer Emarco mortar when I have to do major rock scaping, but for a small project like the zoa rock, I'd use it again. Maybe...

I will try it on my next "dry" project.  I really liked the idea of it though. 

[spectra]

Tank looks good Teeny! and that sand is so white...........................

[teenyreef]

40 minutes ago, KJoFan said:

Perhaps I should have specified trace elements. I get that with heavy coral stocking and/or a good amount of sps you won't be able to maintain alk and cal through water changes alone, unless you're doing continuous automated...maybe. 

 

So I guess I wonder if a 20% weekly water change with a reputable salt wouldn't replenish those trace elements? I don't really know how fast they are used in a full on packed reef.

 

I also understand the goal of Triton and ATI is to eliminate/reduce water changes and that's an attractive thing to be sure. I think since I obviously have lazy reefer syndrome I know I'd forget to dose this, that or the other thing at some point and fubar the whole works. lol

 

Both of my main tanks are still babies so water changes alone pretty well keep things in line, especially in the IM40. My larger, sps dominant tank is also an infant and is just now starting to consume more alk than my water changes can provide. So, maybe as things progress I too will be looking at these magic potions to add something to my tanks.

 

I keep following and see if you sell me on these magic potions.

Yep, you've got the right idea, as long as your alk and calcium uptake doesn't significantly exceed what is replenished in water changes, the decline is very gradual and easy to manage with hand dosing every few weeks or months, or even longer. But once sps get going and really start sucking things down, you have to dose to keep it stable. 

 

As far as the trace elements go, the idea is that many of the trace elements get consumed by the corals at about the same rate as the calcium consumption. Of course, that's according to the research done by, you guessed it, the vendors that sell the trace element supplements . However, many reefers believe this is true, and it's definitely true that some things that we know we need to supplement, like iodine, get sucked up even more rapidly.

 

There are plenty of very successful coral growers that don't bother with it. Jason Fox, for example, uses plain old Instant Ocean, and manually doses his new water to raise alk and calcium to make up for the loss in his tanks, so he doesn't dose anything, not even two part. But he also does 25% water changes, I think every two weeks, which means he literally buys salt by the pallet and has a pretty sophisticated salt mixing/changing setup. But I'll be the first to acknowledge that Jason grows some amazing sps, I've seen them in person at a coral show, and they really do look like they do in the pictures.

 

For me, the appeal is just in knowing that by doing the dosing I'm already doing, I can pretty much automatically keep all those other elements at the right level. Of course it's not perfect, that's why you pay for the testing and then do spot dosing of specific elements as needed to keep things on track.

1 minute ago, spectra said:

Tank looks good Teeny! and that sand is so white...........................

Thanks! When I have the turkey baster out to blow off the rocks, I stir up the sand too. Every once in a while I get a little cyano but that seems to keep it in check.

[teenyreef]

Edit: I should note that I'm not necessarily expecting magic to happen with the ATI method, it could turn out to be snake oil. But I have to dose two part anyway, and it was only $20 for the three part elements kit, which will make enough to last me for months. And since I'm already paying for Triton testing in this tank while I try to figure out the high iron, I don't see that testing as costing me anything extra. 

 

So this is basically a $20 experiment. It may not make any difference at all, but I think the likelihood of it actually hurting anything in the worst case is pretty low.

[spectra]

Hell I cant keep the sand in check................the M1 just puts it where it wants to
 

I move it around so often as I cant stand no sand in spots..............

 

[teenyreef]

Just now, spectra said:

Hell I cant keep the sand in check................the M1 just puts it where it wants to
 

I move it around so often as I cant stand no sand in spots..............

 

Yeah, I'm always fighting the battle between more flow to keep the corals happy, and too much flow that moves the sand around. And then the goby and pistol shrimp move it all around anyway. 

 

Which reminds me, the coral growth has kind of slowed down the flow, I need to increase the flow from both MP-10's...