Mitten_reef’s IM30L

[mitten_reef]

Check in on the new addition this morning 

 

[mitten_reef]

Today is a good day on my mindless stroll thru instagram...I finally found the owner of this tank on instagram!  I've saved this pic on my laptop forever.  yeah, I know the tank is pretty amazing, and I may be that idiot who doesn't know the owner/origin of this pic.  The sad news is that this one was recently taken down.  But he has started a 4ft x 4ft x 1 ft lagoon (recent featured shot of R2R feed), that's even more drool worthy.   

 

 

On a diff note, the red planet has been growing gangbuster the last two weeks. Can't wait to see a month-to-month progress shots!  going away for 5 days this wknd 🤞🏼

[ninjamyst]

I need a tank that big one day....

 

where you going??

[mitten_reef]

12 minutes ago, ninjamyst said:

I need a tank that big one day....

 

where you going??

rented a house on grand traverse bay for a friend's wedding wknd.  still planning on some RV-camping this summer?   

[ninjamyst]

1 hour ago, mitten_reef said:

rented a house on grand traverse bay for a friend's wedding wknd.  still planning on some RV-camping this summer?   

nice!  I haven't been to that far north in Michigan during the summer but loved Saugatuck a few years back.  We almost booked a RV for Banff in August but decided to just get a hotel instead.  

[mitten_reef]

 

[ninjamyst]

what's the chunky acro middle right?

[mitten_reef]

38 minutes ago, ninjamyst said:

what's the chunky acro middle right?

It's this one (photo from august '18), a wild frag picked up at a swap few years ago - it was pink with bright yellow tips then - but even much better now.  Somebody suggested a while back that it looks like pink floyd acro. The color had faded a bit during the tank roller coaster late last year, but it since has been brightening up like crazy the past month (been bumping up the light intensity).  And growth has been pretty ridiculous as well.  there's a separate ~2-in frag that I mounted on the rock work already.  Want a cut?  ready to jump back into acros/SPS game on the 350? 

 

[Tigahboy]

On 6/10/2019 at 6:49 AM, mitten_reef said:

Today is a good day on my mindless stroll thru instagram...I finally found the owner of this tank on instagram!  I've saved this pic on my laptop forever.  yeah, I know the tank is pretty amazing, and I may be that idiot who doesn't know the owner/origin of this pic.  The sad news is that this one was recently taken down.  But he has started a 4ft x 4ft x 1 ft lagoon (recent featured shot of R2R feed), that's even more drool worthy.   

 

One of my favs as well.  He should have like WAY WAY more followers on IG.  

 

19 minutes ago, mitten_reef said:

It's this one (photo from august '18), a wild frag picked up at a swap few years ago - it was pink with bright yellow tips then - but even much better now.  Somebody suggested a while back that it looks like pink floyd acro. The color had faded a bit during the tank roller coaster late last year, but it since has been brightening up like crazy the past month (been bumping up the light intensity).  And growth has been pretty ridiculous as well.  there's a separate ~2-in frag that I mounted on the rock work already.  Want a cut?  ready to jump back into acros/SPS game on the 350? 

 

This is a real beauty!  Love the color on it.

[ninjamyst]

1 hour ago, mitten_reef said:

It's this one (photo from august '18), a wild frag picked up at a swap few years ago - it was pink with bright yellow tips then - but even much better now.  Somebody suggested a while back that it looks like pink floyd acro. The color had faded a bit during the tank roller coaster late last year, but it since has been brightening up like crazy the past month (been bumping up the light intensity).  And growth has been pretty ridiculous as well.  there's a separate ~2-in frag that I mounted on the rock work already.  Want a cut?  ready to jump back into acros/SPS game on the 350? 

 

nice!  acros are always a surprise.  bad or good.  hahah.  my pink lemonade just started to STN so I think I will keep acros to a minimum for now =(.  

[mitten_reef]

1 hour ago, Tigahboy said:

One of my favs as well.  He should have like WAY WAY more followers on IG.  

 

This is a real beauty!  Love the color on it.

Agreed! and Thank you!

18 minutes ago, ninjamyst said:

nice!  acros are always a surprise.  bad or good.  hahah.  my pink lemonade just started to STN so I think I will keep acros to a minimum for now =(.  

they sure are!  ....when they decide to survive that is 🤪

[pokerdobe]

4 hours ago, mitten_reef said:

It's this one (photo from august '18), a wild frag picked up at a swap few years ago - it was pink with bright yellow tips then - but even much better now.  Somebody suggested a while back that it looks like pink floyd acro. The color had faded a bit during the tank roller coaster late last year, but it since has been brightening up like crazy the past month (been bumping up the light intensity).  And growth has been pretty ridiculous as well.  there's a separate ~2-in frag that I mounted on the rock work already.  Want a cut?  ready to jump back into acros/SPS game on the 350? 

 

Fantastic job getting coloration out of a wild piece!

 

I tried that once with a wild piece... it remained a brownish turd. Maybe a brownish turd with a light blue tint to it.. like it drank too much kool aid.

 

[thecoralbeauty]

I know you on IG but just now found your thread on here. Where is the owner of that tank on IG? I remember that photo from a while ago too!

 

The coloration you got off of that wild piece is really cool, what a fun surprise, and compliment to your reefing skills! 🙂 

[mitten_reef]

7 minutes ago, thecoralbeauty said:

I know you on IG but just now found your thread on here. Where is the owner of that tank on IG? I remember that photo from a while ago too!

 

The coloration you got off of that wild piece is really cool, what a fun surprise, and compliment to your reefing skills! 🙂 

Christopherkriens is the owner of that beautiful tank, great photography on his IG feed.  

 

And thank you for stopping by.  I'm really just here preventing major tank disaster one week at a time. 😅  

 

That wild piece has to be one of my biggest - and luckiest - accomplishment in reefing.  So, I decided to go back and search for what it looked like when I first got it.  Here it was in the back-center, showing glimpse of bright yellow tips with pink base and reddish polyps.  The ssc in the foreground is still alive and encrusting the rock like mad, but not much has happened beyond that in over 2 years.  the purplish/blue, well, that one didn't last long at all, along with another blue variety from the same purchase.  saddened by that experience, I was on the hunt for a blue acro that I can't kill for quite a while.  In the game of acros, you win some (actually, rarely), you lose some (a lot and often, really), and best case, you just hope you keep it alive long enough to see something happens with it.  

 

 

    

[mitten_reef]

Did I just say I’m only here preventing tank disaster one week at a time earlier today? 

 

Welp, another alk spike. This time, it’s not looking very good, it got up to 12dKH. The tank had some stringy slime when I checked it after dinner, that’s when I knew something was off. The sucky part was that the tank looked a little off Sunday night when I did water change. But cuz the tank has been soooo dirty, I didn’t even bother checking. Ever since removing those big monti’s I still haven’t found the dosing sweet spot. 🤬🤯😩😭

 

Red planet, with all the nice growth I’ve been enjoying this past month, lost ~30% of the flesh so far. BoP is not looking good. The big center colony also showing some sign of damage. The rest of the frag rack is hopefully spared from damage, but never know. 

 

Mixed up 5 gallon of blue bucket and did emergency water change. Unplugged doser. Will have to grab more RO water at LFS tomorrow.  Or should I run to get jugs of distilled water from the store?

[spectra]

WTF happened ? Do you dose or ?

 

What salt are you using ? I switched to blue bucket.............got tired of the high alk in the other stuff..............

[pokerdobe]

6 minutes ago, mitten_reef said:

Did I just say I’m only here preventing tank disaster one week at a time earlier today? 

 

Welp, another alk spike. This time, it’s not looking very good, it got up to 12dKH. The tank had some stringy slime when I checked it after dinner, that’s when I knew something was off. The sucky part was that the tank looked a little off Sunday night when I did water change. But cuz the tank has been soooo dirty, I didn’t even bother checking. Ever since removing those big monti’s I still haven’t found the dosing sweet spot. 🤬🤯😩😭

 

Red planet, with all the nice growth I’ve been enjoying this past month, lost ~30% of the flesh so far. BoP is not looking good. The big center colony also showing some sign of damage. The rest of the frag rack is hopefully spared from damage, but never know. 

 

Mixed up 5 gallon of blue bucket and did emergency water change. Unplugged doser. Will have to grab more RO water at LFS tomorrow.  Or should I run to get jugs of distilled water from the store?

Did the spike happen over time or all at once?

[mitten_reef]

3 minutes ago, spectra said:

WTF happened ? Do you dose or ?

 

What salt are you using ? I switched to blue bucket.............got tired of the high alk in the other stuff..............

Dosing, I just haven’t been paying enough attention the past couple weekends due to being away and other house stuff.  I’m using blue bucket now

1 minute ago, pokerdobe said:

Did the spike happen over time or all at once?

It’s been a slow rise. But I think the timed dose this afternoon must have pushed it over the brink. Not sure if this is worse or better than instantaneous spike?

[pokerdobe]

1 minute ago, mitten_reef said:

Dosing, I just haven’t been paying enough attention the past couple weekends due to being away and other house stuff.  I’m using blue bucket now

It’s been a slow rise. But I think the timed dose this afternoon must have pushed it over the brink. Not sure if this is worse or better than instantaneous spike?

Ah got it - I've always kind of been under the impression that an instantaneous spike is actually less damaging, since it's like buying a frag from a 7dkh tank and plopping it into a 10 dkh tank. 

 

Back to the main topic at hand - I'd just stop dosing for now and let the tank settle back down and consume until it's back down to the level you want. Another quick change is more instability and another swing it has to deal with. 

 

What's the rest of your parameters relative to the high dKH?

[FISHnChix]

####!!!! Sorry to hear that  buddy.. hope everything pulls through for ya. I have no advice but will be following along hoping for the best... oh and no pressure but you better not crash one of my favorite tanks😅

[DSFIRSTSLTWATER]

Oh man that sucks 😧 hope everything pulls through for you. I wonder if Harry would have any suggestions cause he went through that over the winter I think.

[ninjamyst]

Dang, this sucks!  What's the alk at now after the water change?  I had the opposite issue.  My alk dropped to 4.5 for a loooong time because I stopped testing.  Alk is so annoying to get right as the consumption rate changes as livestock changes / grow.  Hope the acros pull through!!

[mitten_reef]

35 minutes ago, pokerdobe said:

Ah got it - I've always kind of been under the impression that an instantaneous spike is actually less damaging, since it's like buying a frag from a 7dkh tank and plopping it into a 10 dkh tank. 

 

Back to the main topic at hand - I'd just stop dosing for now and let the tank settle back down and consume until it's back down to the level you want. Another quick change is more instability and another swing it has to deal with. 

 

What's the rest of your parameters relative to the high dKH?

So I’m gathering from your comment that 5 gallon tonight is enough water change, try not to cause a big drop?  Unplugged the BRS doser, check! 

dKH is at 10.1-10.4 right now after the wc

cal is surprisingly low around 300-310 ppm - although on a second thought that’s not too surprising. I was away for 4 nights and I usually dose about 8ml manually every night.

Mag is 1350. 

19 minutes ago, DSFIRSTSLTWATER said:

Oh man that sucks 😧 hope everything pulls through for you. I wonder if Harry would have any suggestions cause he went through that over the winter I think.

Thanks, I got a few notes from him in pm. 

 

1 minute ago, ninjamyst said:

Dang, this sucks!  What's the alk at now after the water change?  I had the opposite issue.  My alk dropped to 4.5 for a loooong time because I stopped testing.  Alk is so annoying to get right as the consumption rate changes as livestock changes / grow.  Hope the acros pull through!!

Thanks man. I hope so too. See current alk above ^

 

44 minutes ago, FISHnChix said:

####!!!! Sorry to hear that  buddy.. hope everything pulls through for ya. I have no advice but will be following along hoping for the best... oh and no pressure but you better not crash one of my favorite tanks😅

No pressure 😅. 

 

No more sliming from the sps. Threw in the skimmer to catch any leftover slime that’s coming off. 

 

 

[pokerdobe]

12 minutes ago, mitten_reef said:

So I’m gathering from your comment that 5 gallon tonight is enough water change, try not to cause a big drop?  Unplugged the BRS doser, check! 

dKH is at 10.1-10.4 right now after the wc

cal is surprisingly low around 300-310 ppm - although on a second thought that’s not too surprising. I was away for 4 nights and I usually dose about 8ml manually every night.

Mag is 1350. 

Thanks, I got a few notes from him in pm. 

 

Thanks man. I hope so too. See current alk above ^

 

No pressure 😅. 

 

No more sliming from the sps. Threw in the skimmer to catch any leftover slime that’s coming off. 

 

 

That is what I would do - slow is pretty much my modus operandi when it comes to doing anything for the tank. Alot of the damage is already done and trying to rush the acros back into an ideal number might cause more damage. 

 

Take it with a grain of salt though - I'm not exactly the expert when it comes reefs, especially anything regarding chemistry. I do hope they pull through though. If you can stabilize the tank, I think you can mitigate the damage to the flesh. 

[mitten_reef]

3 minutes ago, pokerdobe said:

That is what I would do - slow is pretty much my modus operandi when it comes to doing anything for the tank. Alot of the damage is already done and trying to rush the acros back into an ideal number might cause more damage. 

 

Take it with a grain of salt though - I'm not exactly the expert when it comes reefs, especially anything regarding chemistry. I do hope they pull through though. If you can stabilize the tank, I think you can mitigate the damage to the flesh. 

Thanks. Really appreciate your thoughts. Your frags have not shown any signs of stress yet. I’m hoping they’re ok. 

 

Unless things look bad/worse tomorrow morning, I probably won’t do another water change until after work tomorrow.