LbulletM's Foray into Fish - WWC Contest Corals Are Here!!

[LbulletM]

Soooooooo, a lot has happened since I last posted.... *checks* around the holidays... woops.

 

My biggest accomplishment in the three weeks was probably leaving for 7 days and coming back to no losses! This was following a 4 day trip the week before. I was pretty nervous both times.

 

Tank is chugging right along though! Algae problems are practically non existent with no intervention aside from manual removal and a cleanup crew. Still a lot of diatoms, but also some new coraline growth! Also still have some nitrate issues (~25ppm tonight), but I'm 90% sure it's because of my AC110 that still has the sponge in it. I was originally going to do the fuge mod, but I ordered an Intank insert tonight so that I won't have to deal with taking the filter off line, drying, then waiting. Paid the extra 2 bucks it costs from Amazon to get it in two days.

 

But enough about the drab updates. Here are the pictures everyone wants.

 

My new rainbow acan from Whitlyn Aquatics. I won this on a Facebook contest. It's gorgeous!

 

 

 

Since I had free shipping with the win, I went ahead and picked up an octospawn and torch. The torch bleached a little while I was on my long trip, but I moved it to a lower flow area and it seems happy and is coloring up again. Has an awesome neon green mouth.

 

When I first got them:

 

 

 

And now:

 

 

 

 

 

 

And finally, just yesterday I picked up some new zoa frags!

 

Purple People Eaters (3 polyps) I think they were $30.

 

 

Some Rastas (4 main polyps plus whatever is growing over the side) They were $20. This was the brightest frag of them in the tank.

 

 

And last, but certainly not least! Utter Chaos! (5 polyps). They were $15 a head, but I got the "4 head" frag for $50. Ended up having another baby coming out and maybe even a second baby starting.

 

 

They are RIDICULOUSLY bright in person. I'll have to get the DSLR out one day and hopefully get a picture that reflects how bright they are. They make my original zoa frag (I have no idea what the name is) look lame in comparison.

 

 

BUT, I already have 3 new heads popping up on the original zoa frag! You can see them during feeding. The biggest is on the right in the front, the other two are around back.

 

 

And finally, a FTS:

 

 

 

 

With all of that out of the way. I'll leave you with this.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

NINJA FISH!!!

 

 

[Groot]

Looking good. beautiful fish.

[LbulletM]

Looking good. beautiful fish.

 

Thanks! I was prepared for the worst when I got him (I'm assuming it's a him due to his vibrant colors) considering he's an angel, but he's been a model citizen. No nipping at anything besides algae that I've seen and all of my corals looking happy seems to support that. He was pretty shy for the first few weeks, but now comes right to the front of the tank for me.

 

[LbulletM]

So, another week, another new addition and some more improvements!

 

First off, I added the InTank basket to my AC110 on Wednesday so that I could get rid of my sponge filter and algae ridden carbon that I'm sure were functioning as a nitrate factory.

 

 

I have PolyFil as filter floss in the first 1-1/4" section, I added the 5.5oz ChemiPure Blue satchet in the bottom 2-1/2 x 2-3/4 inch section, the one above that is empty, and I removed the shelf from the large section and added a bunch of Chaeto last night. Before that, I cut up the AC110 sponge after cleaning it REALLY well, so that it would seed bacteria for my new QT where I'm going to acclimate a few guppies to saltwater before it goes online as a true QT.

 

 

 

 

As a result (I'm guessing it's related), my Torch is looking better than ever! Hopefully it starts coloring up now! It hasn't bleached anymore since I moved it to lower flow after my week long vacation, but it hasn't gotten noticeably better. I still need to pick up a phosphate test... I know, I know, I'm horrible.

 

 

Now the fun part! My new addition.

 

 

 

Long fin clown! I know it's a contentious issue with some people in the community, but I thought she (or at least will be she) was gorgeous! She's not tooooo long finned, and I think she looks pretty good compared to some of them where all of the fins are freakishly long. She seems to be swimming fine and I don't think the long tail causes any issues. Acclimated over a couple hours last night and she ate like a champ today(!) after buying some Omega mini pellets, the 1mm NLS were too large. I want to find a black snowflake/phantom/blacker ice to pair her with. I'll be finding a very small one to make sure at least one is the male in case the longfin has already changed. May have to order, we'll see.

 

When I was setting up my tank, I said I would never spend this much on a fish. Woops.

[LbulletM]

Well, a few more additions!

 

First was last Monday. I went to the LFS by work (still like an hour and fifteen minutes from home, but only ~20-25 from work) to look for a female guppy for my living QT. Turns out they were out of female guppies, but they did have some Sunny D zoas! $10 for 2 huge polyps!

 

 

 

Well, that didn't solve my guppy issue, so I happened to be in Nashville again this weekend because my wife had a hair appointment. Picked up this little "guy" (probably still a juvy).

 

 

My wife really liked the Wyoming Whites, but didn't notice a difference when I picked up a Blacker Ice. (I'm doing really poorly with my "I would never spend that much on a fish!" delusion that I had while reading up on reefs before setting up.) I really wanted a regular black and white ocellaris or phantom, but happy wife, happy life (and stocked tank!), right? I think it was a good compromise. Hopefully she doesn't find this thread! I had to make sure I got a juvenile since my longtail had been alone for weeks in a tank and I was worried that she might have already turned into a she. I got the smallest of the 4 clowns in the tank. The REALLY pretty one (had more defined black) was the obvious biggest and most aggressive, so no go there. Hopefully this one gets a little more black with time.

 

Oh, I did get a guppy. Beautiful for a female. Black and yellow tail mimicking the black and orange of the males from the previous post. I didn't grab a picture yet, but honestly, it's just a guppy

Here are the future mister and misses!

 

 

 

That's it for additions and real updates for now except for the purchase of a Copepod mix that should be here tomorrow. I'm still waiting on my order from Rare Reef. I know they moved, and I know they say there might be 14-21 day delays when ordering RFAs, but it's 7 weeks today. If they don't ship on Thursday for Friday delivery, I'm probably doing a charge back on my card. I really wanted the nems and hammers I ordered, but I can get some really nice corals for $200. Hopefully they come through.

 

Aaaaaand just some eye candy. Can't get over these Utter Chaos!

 

 

Or these Rastas.

 

 

Or these Orange Rainbows and PPEs.

 

 

 

Nice start to the garden.

 

 

Orrrrr the green mouth on this Torch.

 

 

And look how big this guy has gotten!

 

 

And last, but not least. Look at the babies on my Rainbow Acan!!

 

 

Hope everyone is having great success with their tanks! I'm pretty much stuck on euphyllia and zoas right now. Any input on what direction I should go from here? Or advice on my next corals? My wife likes the brain corals, and I think I want a nice dragon soul Favia, but I'm worried about fighting. The top right rock is going to be for SPS once I'm a little more mature and I still really want a BTA. If I do get the RFAs, they'll hopefully stay put near the glass on the sandbed near the front of the tank, so I have a good bit of sandbed and the whole right pile to work with. What could go on the rock with the rose corals? Also, what's my next fish?!?! I looked at a Diamond Goby, but I'm worried about it flipping anything I put on the bed.

 

[LbulletM]

Give me some suggestions, guys and gals!

[HarryPotter]

Looks nice!! Let things have time to grow in a bit!

[LbulletM]

Looks nice!! Let things have time to grow in a bit!

 

Mostly looking for fish suggestions for now. :-)

 

Thinking maybe a goby shrimp pair? Maybe a Royal Gramma for a splash of color? Lots of orange right now with a Potters and 2 clowns haha.

[LbulletM]

Sad day. Came home from a long day at work, excited to add my Copepods that came in the mail today, to find this.

 

 

Rip [insert name here]. He was with me 4 days before I was too insufferable to live with ;-)

Ironically, I was looking at getting a mesh lid for the tank today because he tended to stay towards the surface. I think he couldn't handle the female clown picking on him.

 

I think the worst part is losing an $80 fish! But, if this is the worst thing that's going to happen to my tank for a while, I can live with that. Gonna go order that lid now!

[LbulletM]

Made a lid over the last couple of nights. Picked up aluminum screening for it, but it's so rigid that it's near impossible to get flush in my crazy lid with a cutout for my AC110. I have saran wrap on it until I order some clear 1/4" plastic netting.

 

But, I couldn't let my long fin clown be all alone after her soon to be hubby took a carpet surfing vacation without her. Let's try this again. Here's her new beau.

 

 

Went with a SA black snowflake (phantom) this time. The snowflake came from a tank with just two clowns, so he seems to want to bond with the long fin (looking pissed off in the top right corner) immediately.

 

In other news, my beautiful, wonderful, amazing wife went a little overboard on my Valentine's Day present during Aqua SD's live sale (to the tune of $380 according to my calculations). I have a few of them up on the ID forum because I'm not sure about them and want to be ready to care for everything when it arrives. I cancelled my order with RareReef after 7.5+ weeks of waiting. Not impressed. Sad that I won't be getting my RFAs, but I'll grab some from VIP someday. Without further ado.

 

Rainbow Mille

 

Grape bubble coral

 

Peachy Cream Zoas

 

This one was just listed as Double Dragon. Blasto?

 

Listed as Dragon Eye. I think they're Dragon Soul Favias? Been wanting this one for a while.

 

Jack 'O Lantern Lepto

 

Listed as "Super Ric". Pretty good looking mushroom.

 

Super Red Trachy

 

Just listed as "Sweet Chalice Colony". Not sure if it's named.

 

Listed as Time Splitter. Acan? Favia?

 

Just listed as Toxic Space Jam. Another chalice?

 

"Toxic Tenius". So I'm guessing Acro Tenius.

 

Yellow Hammer. I got a single head.

 

Did I mention my wife is amazing?

[Rehype]

Sorry to hear about the clown but your tank looks great so far!Love the scape

[LbulletM]

Sorry to hear about the clown but your tank looks great so far!Love the scape

 

Thanks! Few issues with it, but a learning experience for when I upgrade! (Don't tell the wife ) I'm happy with it considering the rocks I had. I didn't do too much breaking of the live rocks. Just the dry rocks. That front right side in the middle of the rocks is kinda shadowed, but I don't really want to go in breaking up rock now. I'd have to tear out epoxy. There are some feather dusters and cucumbers in there, but wish I could put photosynthetic coral there... Maybe something requiring VERY low light.

[LbulletM]

Here are the stock photos from my WWC order:

 

Kryptonite Candy Cane. This one was on my list when I first started planning a tank.

 

Teal hammer

 

Peach frogspawn

 

Splatter hammer

 

Neon hammer

 

And a Blondie zoa that they accidentally listed as a WYSIWYG GSP so I won the auction at only $15.50.

 

This is the update that I WOULD HAVE MADE IF NANO-REEF WEREN'T TEASING ME WITH BEING OFFLINE FOR A NIGHT.

[LbulletM]

Corals arrived yesterday (Thursday)! My wife was able to get home to grab them and put them in the tank. Well, apparently, WWC fills their bags completely with water. So when I told her to just throw the bags in the tank until I got home.... she did just that. Put the first bag in, it immediately sunk and crushed my zoa garden. Fortunately she's smart enough that she stopped at that point. She's still squeamish about putting her hands in the tank after I told her about palytoxin, so she grabbed some kitchen tongs (after I made her promise they were clean and had no soap residue on them either) and pulled out the bag. In the end, I had her throw all of the bags in the low salinity guppy QT. I just needed temperature acclimation at this point.

 

WWC frags arrived around noon via FedEx. I kind of live in the sticks haha. They all looked great!

 

 

 

Hermits have been harassing my zoas removing any trace of algae, so I don't have a picture of the Blondie. The only frag that doesn't look like it's doing great is the splatter hammer. I really hope it pulls through since it's the one I really really wanted. If not, I hope it at least dies within the 10 day guarantee period. I don't think it's a tank issue considering I have 5 other Euphyllia loving life and it's placed right in front of these. You can see the skeleton on the left side of the picture. Polyps look to have good color, they're just super retracted wayyyyy down into the head.

 

My AquaSD frags didn't arrive until almost 3:30 via UPS. Like I said, kinda in the sticks. Most of them were pretty rough looking, but none of them were technically DOA. Hoping they pull through.

 

Peachy Blues zoas

 

Rainbow Mille

 

Toxic Tenuis

 

My poor, poor Super Red Trachy

 

"Sweet Chalice Colony" looking a little bleachy.

 

Toxic Space Jam Chalice looking bleached.

 

Time Splitter Favia looking ok.

 

Jack o Lantern looking great, actually!

 

Then I got three freebies in my order! No idea what they are.

 

Some kind of brain?

 

Cyphastrea?

 

And absolutely no idea. Maybe a chalice? It has a REALLY cool dot pattern on it.

 

Don't have a picture of the ricordia because it has an embarrassing amount of hair algae on it. No picture of the Bubble Coral because it's looking pretty rough. No picture of the Double Dragon blasto because it's in the back. Same for the Dragon Soul favia. And yellow hammer was in with the WWC picture on the right side. You can still see the bubble and blasto in a lot of the below pictures and the Dragon Soul and ric in the top down shots. My tank definitely looks like a frag tank right now while they acclimate!

 

 

 

Still better than before!

 

And just some other random shots from the tank.

 

 

Looking better than ever!

 

[LbulletM]

A lot going on tonight! 

 

Did my first water change in 2 weeks and 2 days. My torch looked a lot happier at a week without a water change, so I decided to try going two weeks between changes. Everything looks happy with the change so far. 

 

Most of my corals that arrived last Thursday from World Wide Corals and Aqua SD are looking better. I'm still worried about a Trachy and the Bubble Coral. The Splatter Hammer never opened up and ended up brown jellying. It's being replaced on my next order through WWC's 10 day guarantee. 

 

 

 

Picked up FIVE bottles of Loc-Tite gel today during lunch and when I got home, I went to town with two of the bottles. It's a start!

 

Before:

 

 

After:

 

It's definitely just a start, but I'm getting there! Glued down the Neon Hammer, Double Dragon Blastos, Jack O Lantern Lepto, Radioactive Candy Cane, Ricordia, Dragon Soul Favia, and moved my Rainbow Acan Lord (7 frags). Still need to glue down my Space Jam Chalice, Teal Hammer, Yellow Hammer, Peach Frogspawn, Time Splitter Favia, freebie Cyphastrea, freebie... I don't know what it is, maybe Pachy?, Toxic Tenius, Rainbow Mille, and I need to figure out where to put my Trachy and freebie Lobo. My Bubble Coral and Torch will probably stay in the corners where they are. 

 

Candy Cane and Jack O Lantern Lepto

 

Blasto on left and Acan Lord on right

 

Frogspawn moved slightly and Neon Hammer in back

 

Ricordia

 

Dragon Soul Favia

 

This was my first time removing corals from their plugs, and I definitely man handled the first few and pissed them off. They look to be recovering just fine in the 30 minutes I was in the tank after gluing, though.

 

Here's the current set up:

 

Thin lines (left to right):

Brown - Purple Torch

Grey - some chalice... It's kinda ugly. My wife liked it during the live sale though...

Orange - Neon Hammer

Yellow - my original Frogspawn frag

Pink - Double Dragon Blasto

Mint green - Rose Corals

Teal - Radioactive Candy Cane

Red - Ricordia

Green - Oculina Robusta

Dark Pink - the Rainbow Mille is hiding back there

White - Toxic Tenius

Black - poor, poor Bubble Coral

 

Thick lines (left to right):

Pink - Space Jam Chalice

Green - The possibly Pachy freebie

Orange - remaining Euphyllia garden (Teal Hammer, Yellow Hammer, Peach Frogspawn)

Grey - Time Splitter Favia

Brown - Poor, poor Trachy

Red - Cyphatrea freebie

Dark Pink - freebie Lobo

Black - Jack O Lantern Lepto

White - Rainbow Acan

Yellow - Zoa garden (Blondie, Utter Chaos, Purple People Eater, Sunny Ds, Tyree Orange Rainbows, Rastas)

Purple - Dragon Soul Favia

 

Here's the possible plan. Not sure. Same color codes. 

 

Typing out that list, I realized how many corals I actually already have! 1 per gallon! Probably too much, too fast, but who am I to turn down a Valentine's Day gift  ;-)

 

And I'll sign off with my current "I'M NOT LOSING ANOTHER FISH" lid before I get the frame squared up, glued, and meshed.

[LbulletM]

Got eyes on the tank this morning for about 10 seconds with just the room lights turned on and everything looks to have survived. May go for round two of gluing tonight depending on when I get home. 

[LbulletM]

Man, I suck. 3 weeks since my last update! I'm going to keep it short and sweet with lots of eye candy. 

 

I have lost 4 corals total. The bubble that came in looking pretty sad and was too far gone to recover, a neon hammer that brown jellied within a couple days of being in the tank, a splatter hammer from my last post that brown jellied within a couple days of being in the tank, and a replacement splatter hammer that brown jellied within a couple days of being in the tank. Not sure what's going on with the hammers since all of my other Euphyllia look super happy including other hammers. It seems at this point that it's just the brightly colored hammers that I'm having trouble with. Realized my NO3 was around 40ppm and quickly fixed that, so maybe that had something to do with it?

 

Anyways, everything else in the tank is looking great and growing quickly!

 

Naturally, I needed to get my replacement splatter hammer from WWC (so that I could kill it again.... ) so I picked up a few things from their live sale, ebay, and post sale!

 

I guess I never uploaded pictures of all of them. Here are the stock photos.

 

Blastomussa Merletti

 

Hawaiian Ding Dang Zoas

 

Superman Chalice (my wife has wanted this one ever since we saw it at the World Wide Corals store in Orlando)

 

WWC Infrareds Zoas

 

And what someone affectionately referred to as my cancer shroom during the live sale.

 

So I picked out all of these corals very specifically figuring I'd be pretty stocked and could move on to saving money, pristine husbandry, and a nice grow out phase.

 

BUT then I won a $500 box of corals from the World Wide Corals giveaway contest. THEY SENT ME 18 CORALS. 

 

1) Peach Frogspawn (already had one of these from them, unfortunately. It was the only duplicate they sent.)

2) Green Frogspawn

3) Purple Torch (Have one, but my existing one has a green mouth.)

 

(You can see the cancer shroom still acclimating in this picture)

 

4) Lakers Zoa

5) Some dark red zoa with a dark blue skirt?

6) Marley Zoa

7) Mambo Jambo Zoa

8) Cat Eye Zoa

9) Purple Monster Zoa

10) Rainbow Platygyra?

11) Bubble Gum Cyphastrea?

 

 

12) Ultra Micromussa (Acan Lord)

13) Ultra Micromussa (Acan Lord)

14) Ultra Micromussa (Acan Lord)

15) Ultra Micromussa (Acan Lord)

 

 

16) Ahhmazing Acan Echinata (Scared to death of this thing, but it's gorgeous, so I'll have to figure out a spot for it where it won't DESTROY everything.)

 

 

17) Some Favia?

 

 

18) Duncan

 

 

Anddddd here's a photo dump of some other random pictures of everything.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This is only my second attempt ever at editing pictures, so I may be over representing some of these, but I don't think by much. I tried to get them as close to real life as possible and didn't even touch saturation on most of them. Here are a couple of unedited pictures straight from my camera phone.

 

 

 

Once again, WWC brought the fire. 

 

I had to pick up a frag rack in the mean time since I didn't think I'd have enough sand bed for everything. There will be a lot of super glue in my future....

[teenyreef]

Wow, congratulations on winning the contest, you got some serious new candy! 

 

I agree you have too many corals now, but I'm here to help, just send the extras to me 

[LbulletM]

7 minutes ago, teenyreef said:

Wow, congratulations on winning the contest, you got some serious new candy! 

 

I agree you have too many corals now, but I'm here to help, just send the extras to me 

 

Hahaha definitely too many. Already planning out my 150g build!

 

Fortunately everything is pretty non-aggressive..... except that fear-instilling Echinata....

[LbulletM]

My Potter's also seemed to have taken a liking to what I think is the Platygyra. I'll sacrifice the single coral from him, but if he starts going after others it might be bye bye Potter's.