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OldManSea's Red Sea Max E-170 February Full Tank Shot, Random Images


OldManSea

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Display:  170 liter (45 gallon) – 37 gallon tank, 8 gallon rear sump compartment, basically a 24 inch cube

In-cabinet Sump: Red Sea Max E-170 add-on - holds just over 20 gallons, about 10 gallons of water as run, so the entire system volume is about 55 gallons

Lighting:  AI Hydra 26 HD (90 watt)

Filtration:  GAC and GFO in sump, in bags, not reactors – will upgrade

Skimmer: stock Red Sea Max E-170 skimmer, 240 gph;  return pump from sump 250 gph

Heater:  200 Watt on self-built controller

Circulation:  Stock Red Sea Max E-170 570 gph; sump return 250 gph

ATO:  Stock Red Sea Max E-170 gravity unit;  reservoir holds 2 gallons, need to upgrade to at least 5 gallon

Controller:  none at present

Dosing:  manual at present

Substrate:   about 20 lb CaribSea Aragalive

Live rock:  approximately 18 lbs  ‘Jakarta’

Salt:  Instant Ocean

Additives:  Maintain calcium and alkalinity

Fish:  10 ORA Amphiprion ocellaris

Corals:

LPS

-    2 Acan’s

Other Invertebrates

-    2 Bubble Tip Anemones

-    9 Rock Flower Anemones

-    A variety of live rock hitchhikers including one Aiptasia that is no longer part of the living world

Current water parameters:

Temperature     78F

pH   8.2

Specific gravity  1.026

Alkalinity  9 – 9.5 dKH    

Calcium   420-440 ppm

Magnesium  1450-1500  ppm

Nitrate    0.5 - 1 ppm

Phosphate  0.02-0.05 ppm

 

The purpose of this build started out with the intention to establish a Bubble Tip Anemone (BTA) habitat with Amphiprion ocellaris.  Along the way I have become very fond of rock flower anemones (RFA) and have added several to the mix.  I also have a new red maxi mini anemone but at about 1 inch, it is far too small for this tank now.  See it in my Marineland 5.6 gallon tank build thread.

I set up the RSM E-170 on January 17, 2017 using live sand and semi-cured live rock.  My wife thought that a “Nemo tank” would be interesting to our grandson and I have always liked anemones.  I used to keep a variety of them.  In looking at the web, the Sea Sea Max series, in particular the 170 liter, looked perfect.  I visited the LFS and near the entrance is a Red Sea Max E-170 with two red BTA’s that are each about 10 inches across, which has been set up a bit over a year.  The owner has had them for 6 years, beginning as a single small specimen, which every year or so divides.  He always keeps two and sells the others.  He believes that the original anemone has become 12 since he has had it plus additional ones that are formed in their new homes.  His display is magnificient, the BTAs are the lords and there are a few corals and other invertebrates, and a few fish, including a pair of clowns that inhabit one of the anemones.  A large anemone crab owns the other one.  I was sold immediately as the tank looked even nicer in life than in pix and when my wife saw it, a kit went home with us that day.

 

Newly set up.  This is nearly identical in rock scape to the LFS BTA tank. In that tank one of the BTA's is directly in the center and the other is one the left side looking at the tank.  Together they occupy about 2/3 of the tank.

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The unit is very nicely manufactured AIO with rear sump.  Three weeks into the build I added the Red Sea in-cabinet sump since the rear sump is rather high from the floor, and with the tank near a wall, it was difficult to access.  I had to use a ladder and hang over the back.  With the in-cabinet sump everything is much easier to access.  I have the stock ATO and the stock skimmer.  The skimmer is enormously easier to monitor with the in-cabinet sump.  I will add dosing and reactors as time goes on.

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I still need to finalize tidying up the wiring.  I have let that lapse since I will likely add a controller in the next couple of week.

The kit went together very easily and everything works very nicely with everything else.  I am truly amazed at how quiet it is.  I cannot hear any pump or water noise at all.  The only criticism that I have for Red Sea is that the instructions for putting the kit together were very sketchy and the instructions for installing the sump were almost nonexistent.  Had a hobbyist not put a video of sump installation onto YouTube I would have had lots of problems.  Having watched the video, I had the rear sump drained and the in-cabinet sump up and running in about one hour with no muss or fuss.  I suspect that Red Sea has improved the quality of the piping to the in-cabinet sump since it was introduced, since several discussion boards note how flimsy and easy to break the piping is and that it should have been manufactured as standard PVC pipe.  The piping that came with my kit appears to be standard PVC and is certainly of good quality;  I had no worries about breaking it and everything screwed together very easily and well (if you put one together, make sure to wet the O-rings first and the parts screw right together – interestingly Red Sea does not suggest this in the few sentences about installing the sump, and putting the piping together was described as difficult by most posters, who probably did not wet the O-rings first). 

 

This is the tank 3 days ago.  Sorry about the image quality, everything is overexposed, filters are on the way.  The red BTA is on the left side looking at the tank and the green BTA is one the right.  It is not where I would like but that is OK at least for now.  I added two rocks in front of the originals, to house the RFA’s.  I need to figure out where to put the Acan’s, they are rather sad looking where they are but they are putting on additional polyps.

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I saw some interesting RFA’s at the local Bob Moore Frag Swap and picked up two from Legendary Corals.  I turned off the pumps so the water was still and held each one to the place on the rock where I wanted it for about 1 minute and each of them attached and has not moved since. 

In addition to the RFA’s from Legendary Corals, I purchased 7 more from VIP Reef which arrived three weeks ago, and 1 from Diver’s Den, which arrived last week.  All are doing very well with the exception of one, which disappeared from its rock last week while I was traveling and my wife was watching the tank.  It had been attached well for two weeks, more on this below.

 

The rock on the right side looking at the tank has the two Legendary Corals RFA’s (the two big ones at the top), which have easily doubled in size.  I have read that they grow slowly but tank raised specimens must grow faster as these have grown very rapidly. The lower two are from VIP Reef.

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The rock on the left side has three green based RFA’s from VIP Reef lined up in a crevice, they are also growing, along with a blue one at the top of the rock (look carefully, it is the same color as the rock).  The very nice face-forward multicolored RFA is the new one from Divers Den.  I liked the pink tentacles arranged around the circumference. Two images, one from the front of the rock and one from the side to see the RFA that is on the back of it.  The one on the back has a really nice gleaming gold coloration in its oral disk.

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I also bought two Acan’s for the 5.6 gallon tank but when I got them home I felt that both were too large since that tank has such a small footprint so I placed them in this tank.  Both are adding new polyps even though their care thus far has been woeful – but they do get Reef Roids and mysis shrimp target fed to them twice a week.  Finally, I got 15 Astrea snails, and 10 Nassarius snails.  The Astrea’s made short work of the brown algae on the rock although they have never been able to keep up with fine film that forms on the glass even though they spend most of their time on the glass.  Perhaps I will get some more, although the algae is diminishing very nicely over the past of weeks. 

 

I purchased one red bubble tip anemone from my LFS a month ago.  It was placed in a crevice on the rock has not moved since.  I feed it chopped shrimp once a week and chopped fish or scallops once a week.  It has a nice deep coloration and a green oral disk.  The green shows up very nicely in the tank but I need to work on my photography skills as it is very poorly represented in the image. 

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Last Monday I received a very nice green BTA from Diver’s Den.  It has intense coloration and pink tips to its tentacles.  I placed it in a crevice near the red BTA where it looked great. 

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I left on my trip Wednesday morning.  My wife reported on Thursday that the green BTA had disappeared but in looking around she ultimately found it, shriveled, on the substrate between the rocks.  In the image she sent me it looked more like green slime than an anemone.  It remained there the rest of the day and inflated somewhat by evening (she forwarded another cell phone pic).  On Friday morning it had disappeared again and she could not find it, in the tank or in the filter sock in the sump.  I was back Saturday morning and using a flashlight, found it at the back of a cave in the complete dark.  I removed the rocks to extricate it but it was very tightly attached.  Not wanting to damage its foot, I rearranged the rock, turning over the rock it was attached to so it is now facing bottom-side up.  The BTA did not look happy but remaind partly inflated.  On Sunday, it spent several hours excreting a nasty looking glob, while looking really unhappy.  I believe that that glob was the missing RFA since on Saturday morning while examining the tank looking for the green BTA, I noticed the small RFA was missing.  I believe that the RFA may have become detached and come into contact with the BTA which ate it and got a “belly ache” or the BTA detached and floated/rolled over to the RFA (which was in the flow path) and ingested it.  In taking apart the rock to rescue the BTA I found no evidence of the RFA so I am led to thinking that the RFA was the foul glob excreted by the BTA.  The BTA looks much better now and has wedged itself into a crack near where it was attached when I flipped the rock over.  It is on the opposite side of the tank from where I wanted it but that is life with BTA’s. 

 

A couple of days after adding the red BTA to the tank the ORA A. ocellaris arrived from Diver’s Den.  I ordered the wild patterned type at the smallest size.  All 10 of them are doing very well and they eat as often as I feed them, usually twice a day.  Fauna Marin clown pellets are their favorite but they also like mysis shrimp and finely diced scallop. 

 

The going forward plan is to heavily feed all the anemones to keep them growing and possibly adding a few additional corals and fish.  I will certainly have to thin out the clownfish population as they mature to avoid deaths, I will hopefully end up with a nice pair.  Our grandson has named 4 of them so far.  I will likely add a few additional RFA’s and I will follow the tiny red maxi mini as it grows large enough to add to this tank.  If I like the maxi mini (no doubt that I will!) I will look for some additional nice specimens.  There was a gorgeous one at the frag swap but at $300 it was more expensive than I would like for a new tank and inexperienced keeper.

 

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shaneandjohn

Great post here! It's nice to see some one else running this tank, and documenting it. I run this tank as well, but I had to change out the stand , for the very reason you mentioned. I am vertically challenged and could not handle having to be on a step stool for maintenance or tank work.

 The stock equipment is solid, and the skimmer is a beast. I added an ATO and an MP10 for a bit more flow. I see you mentioned the Bob Moore swap, so where in the PNW are you located?

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It is a great tank kit, best I have ever used and I have had about 70 different tanks over the years (I have had as many as 35 going at one time - freshwater).

 

I live on the West Sound in Seabeck, right on the Hood Canal directly across from Mt Constance in the Olympics.  It is cool seeing a mountain a couple of miles away across the water coming up from sea level to nearly 8000 feet.  The Brothers is at about 10 o'clock from the window (which is 26 feet high to catch the view) and Mt Baker is at about 3 o'clock in the Cascades.

 

We have lived in Connecticut for about 25 years but moved here last Fall.  I still go back and forth to Manhattan where my office is.

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  • OldManSea changed the title to OldManSea's Red Sea Max E-170 Anemone Tank - Happy Acan

I feed the Acan's frozen Mysis and Fauna Marin LPS pellets.  I also alternate feeding with Reef Roids and PhytoFeast.  Their favorite is PhytoFeast based on how much they expand.  PhytoFeast was added 10 minutes before the image was taken.  

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shaneandjohn

That is a great photo sir, and a very pretty Acan!!  Acans are by far my favorite coral to keep. I have a few in my LPS tank ??

 

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2 hours ago, shaneandjohn said:

That is a great photo sir, and a very pretty Acan!!  Acans are by far my favorite coral to keep. I have a few in my LPS tank ??

 

That is quite the Adan alley!  I have plans to obtain a few more.  

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It has been about a month since I have updated.  The tank continues to mature and now there is only a very fine film of green to wipe from the glass about twice a week.  I think part of the improvement is continued tuning of the skimmer which now works extremely well. 

 

Here is a top down FTS from May 15. 

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In this shot the tank is lit by the AI Hydra using the profile of Dimity Tumonov which I downloaded from the AI site.  You may have seen an ad in Coral that features his tank.  The coloration is VERY blue.  I have the camera set at flash (but am not using flash) and have a yellow filter to cut through the haze.  The colors shown represent the actual look of the animals in the tank although the blue is mostly removed. 

 

The RBTA is now about 7 inches across, I feed it 4-5 times per week.  I am modeling my tank on an identical tank at the lfs in which their are two RBTAs that are each 12 inches across,

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going completely from one side to the other of their tank.  The GBTA has never found its happy place and moves from one side of the tank to the other every week or so.  It has a very attractive pattern but is rather annoying in its behavior.  I added a "Neon" candy coral and Nuclear Green paly's from Cultivated Reef.  I did the order mostly because they had some nice colored Palythoa grandis (two plugs near center of tank). 

 

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This is a cool image of the candy coral eating at night.  Its heads retract and it sends out feeding tentacles.  Since tank light is off this is under camera flash with no filter.

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Since last update I have added a maxi mini anemone from VIP Reef (lower right) and two additional RFAs, the green mottled specimen and the green and red Belize specimen.

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The Belize specimen has very translucent green tentacles and is much thicker in sagittal section than the Florida specimens.  It is a striking specimen,  I wonder if it is the same species.

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I have noticed a number of sinister looking crabs and have observed them bothering the RFAs which then move away.  I tried the "jar with a shrimp chunk" trap and caught one the first night. 

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It has taken several additional nights to capture a second.  What a pain, but I like most of the hitchikers on live rock! 

 

I have two additional RFAs from VIP Reef in the 5 gal tank as they are both rather tiny and need to grow a bit.  I will post images of them in that thread.

 

 

Top down view.jpg

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  • OldManSea changed the title to OldManSea's Red Sea Max E-170 Anemone Tank - 6 Months Old This Month - Crab Apocalypse - Large Pectinia

The tank has been in turmoil for the past couple of months.  When I set up the tank there were a number of cute, tiny crabs in the many holes.  Over the months they grew to large, and in some cases, nasty beasts that were preying on the inhabitants.  There seemed to be 2 species, one a light color and the other, sinister looking creatures with large black bristles covering their legs.  I began to suspect them as the cause of the rock flower anemones suddenly beginning to move all over the tank, the Cestipularia losing most of its tentacles and becoming a stalk, and even the BTA’s to begin to move about.  My suspicions were confirmed when I caught one of the bristly ones ripping apart a rock flower anemone one night.  I captured a couple with traps but the others just laughed at the traps.  So, for several weeks I looked every night and when I located one in a hole, I removed the rock and went after it with a clothes hanger wire.  This occurred several nights each week.  Wow, were the corals and anemones unhappy with me! So far, I have removed 14 crabs, 8 of the ones with leg bristles and 6 of the lighter ones.  I have not seen a crab in more than a week so I must at least be getting close to capturing all of them.  The corals are all stationary again and the Cestipularia is growing new tentacles.   

For this tank and the Marineland 5.5 gal, I have gone to the Red Sea Reef Care program, starting 3 weeks ago.  I now aim for:

 

Salinity 1.025

Calcium 450 ppm

Magnesium 1350 ppm

Alkalinity 11.5 dKH

Nitrate 1-2 ppm

Phosphate 0.08-0.12 ppm

 

as recommended by Red Sea for mixed reefs.  The alkalinity is higher than what most folks on this site recommend but it is Red Sea recommendation so I will stay with it a while to see how things do.  I use Reef Foundation Part A for Calcium (and strontium) and Reef Foundation B for KH, approximately 15 ml of each per day to maintain 450 and 11.5.  In theory I use Foundation C for Mg but I find that Mg stays at 1400 or so from the time I mix fresh water (Instant Ocean) so I have never added any additional.  I add Reef Energy A and Reef Energy B every week (I change 15 gallons each week of the total 55 gallons in the system).  I also dose Coral colors A, B, C, and D with every water change and a couple of times during the week.  The title component of Coral Colors A is iodine and I test for that for dosing.  Since I am using a good bit of calcium I will start dosing using an automatic doser that can do Part A and Part B, and some of the other components as well.  I need to install it.

I feed PhytoFeast once a week, Reef Roids once a week, and mysis shrimp once a week, each on separate days.  The mysis gets fed about 12 hours prior to water change. 

About the rock flower anemones as crab food:  In an earlier post to this build I discussed a missing rock flower anemone.  Three weeks after it disappeared I found a tiny glob of goo on the gravel and when I scooped it out, I saw some of the colors of the missing anemone.  I placed the goo into the Marineland 5.5 gal where it sat without moving for a week, then began to organize itself into a miniature version of the missing anemone.  About half of the anemone was missing and over the next week, the two ends bent around and merged.  This left a tiny anemone compared to the original one and without any peripheral tentacles over half the edge.  Over the last 3 months, the anemone has regrown its peripheral tentacles and while it had no color in the healing area for some weeks, you can see that now it has excellent color – see the July 4th image in the Marineland build thread.  For the first 6 weeks or so during its recovery it did not eat at all (at least not macro food like mysis) but over the last 6 weeks it has been consuming mysis shrimp, and is rapidly gaining size.  The injury to that anemone was nearly identical to that of another rock flower in this tank – it was one of the bristly crabs. Like the first anemone, this one was massively injured but has been recovering.  It is now round again and has regrown its peripheral tentacles.  It is still recovering its color on the regenerated tissue.  The incredible recovery of these two rock flower anemones makes me wonder if rock flower anemones really cannot be fragged.  These two recovered from massive injuries;  the only caveat is that in both cases, the mouth area was intact on the surviving pieces.

In this FTS, careful inspection will find 10 rock flower anemones (there is an 11th but it is within the

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green algae growing on the back of the rock in the lower left corner).  If you zoom in you can see the injured rock flower on that same rock – it is the one just in front of the green algae on the right looking down – the one with green tentacles and red disk.  About 1/3rd of this anemone was missing only a few weeks ago.  It completed its regrowth last week and is now regaining its color – the entire anemone had no color at all for more than a week, the disk was translucent.  There is still a portion that is not colored where the edges reattached but it is filling in.  The maxi mini anemone in the lower right was not affected by the crab apocalypse, but what I have heard about them suggests that if a crab attacked, the anemone would just eat it.  The green candy cane coral started with 3 heads and is up to 7 now.  It eats pretty aggressively.  The gorgonian that was moved from the Marineland 5.5 is in the upper right corner; it is doing well.  There are two separate Palythoa grandis frags being disguised by the reflection of the lights although one can be seen under the BTA tentacles.  The base of one of them is becoming covered with iridescent, very hard, round green “pearls.”  I will pull the rock and scrape them off.  Each Paly had one polyp when I got them about 6 weeks ago.  One has now added a second polyp and one has added two more.  The toxic green Paly’s are very happy.  Not visible in this top down view are several additional polyps that are popping up here and there all over the tank.

I have decided that I have way too much rock in this tank.  In rethinking it, I should have done two separate islands of rock to give separation of the BTA’s from the other corals.  I will begin to work on that.  I will also trim back the island rocks that hold the rock flower and maxi mini anemones.  I will be careful though since distinct from the crabs, there are many interesting hitchhikers.  There are at least three species of tube worms and two species of tunicates.  There is an encrusting species of coral at the top of the rock with many tiny green polyps.  It is expanding at a nice rate.  There are also a large number of sponges that I could live without as they are not attractive and grow fast.  There is a fluorescent chiton that I see once every week or so and several species of snails.  The green macroalgae continues to expand.  It looks nice although it is getting thick enough that I considered scraping some.  Then the rock flower anemone moved into its midst so I will leave it alone. 

I bought a Pectinia two weeks ago at the lfs.  It is about 7 inches across and is of the most common color pattern.  The price was amazingly low as it came out of a 400 gallon tank he was breaking down.  I was not sure about getting it even though it was in the tank in the lfs for more than 3 years.  I did a lot of research and from highly respected sites.  I learned that Pectinia’s are very difficult to keep alive over the long term and even if they live they don’t grow.  They like low to mid flow and lower light.  I also learned that Pectinia’s are extremely easy to keep alive over the long term and grow rapidly, enjoying high flow and high light.  Most sites say they are very difficult to feed.  Tidal Gardens has a nice video showing one eating – like a hog.  Armed with all of this helpful information, I bought it.   Mine is very cool, each of the two apparent colonies has several mouths, each of which

 

 periodically open 1-2  mm or so and then close.  I captured this image with several mouths open at once (look for the dark purple circles within the somewhat lighter purple areas that meander through the green areas).  The mouths do not open on fixed cycles.  Sometimes none are open, sometimes one or two, and sometimes most of them.  They stay open for 10 seconds or so so the surface is constantly moving.  This coral is absolutely covered in slime (like candy cane corals).  If Reef Roids are fed, the particles stick to the slime and are drawn into the mouths, which become much larger, 2-3 mm, with the tissue around them puffed up greatly.  Large strands of slime covered with the particles are drawn into the mouths very rapidly in huge quantity.  The mouths clear the slime in only a minute or so.  When I don’t feed as much as the coral wants, after it clears the particles, many feeding tentacles come out (see image). 

595d01b36f40a_Pectinia2017Jul4.thumb.jpg.2b206785a169b3824f92cc591cd2b59f.jpg

They are rather short, about ½ cm, and are loosely associated with the mouths.  In the image you can see the tips which are white with the tentacles being clear (zoom in to see them well).  If I feed a lot more, the tentacles do not appear.  Given the huge amount that this coral can eat, I will start target feeding it every other day.

I have several animals coming from the AquaSD holiday sale.  I will update with a front on FTS after the new critters become comfortable.

green algae growing on the back of the rock in the lower left corner).  If you zoom in you can see the injured rock flower on that same rock – it is the one just in front of the green algae on the right looking down – the one with green tentacles and red disk.  About 1/3rd of this anemone was missing only a few weeks ago.  It completed its regrowth last week and is now regaining its color – the entire anemone had no color at all for more than a week, the disk was translucent.  There is still a portion that is not colored where the edges reattached but it is filling in.  The maxi mini anemone in the lower right was not affected by the crab apocalypse, but what I have heard about them suggests that if a crab attacked, the anemone would just eat it.  The green candy cane coral started with 3 heads and is up to 7 now.  It eats pretty aggressively.  The gorgonian that was moved from the Marineland 5.5 is in the upper right corner, it is doing well.  There are two separate Palythoa grandis frags being disguised by the reflection of the lights although one can be seen under the BTA tentacles.  The base of one of them is becoming covered with iridescent, very hard, round green “pearls.”  I will pull the rock and scrape them off.  Each Paly had one polyp when I got them about 6 weeks ago.  One has now added a second polyp and one has added two more.  The toxic green Paly’s are very happy.  Not visible in this top down view are several additional polyps that are popping up here and there all over the tank.

I have decided that I have way too much rock in this tank.  In rethinking it, I should have done two separate islands of rock to give separation of the BTA’s from the other corals.  I will begin to work on that.  I will also trim back the island rocks that hold the rock flower and maxi mini anemones.  I will be careful though since distinct from the crabs, there are many interesting hitchhikers.  There are at least three species of tube worms and two species of tunicates.  There is an encrusting species of coral at the top of the rock with many tiny green polyps.  It is expanding at a nice rate.  There are also a large number of sponges that I could live without as they are not attractive and grow fast.  There is a fluorescent chiton that I see once every week or so and several species of snails.  The green macroalgae continues to expand.  It looks nice although it is getting thick enough that I considered scraping some.  Then the rock flower anemone moved into its midst so I will leave it alone. 

I bought a Pectinia two weeks ago at the lfs.  It is about 7 inches across and is of the most common color pattern.  The price was amazingly low as it came out of a 400 gallon tank he was breaking down.  I was not sure about getting it even though it was in the tank in the lfs for more than 3 years.  I did a lot of research and from highly respected sites, I learned that Pectinia’s are very difficult to keep alive over the long term and even if they live they don’t grow.  They like low to mid flow and lower light.  I also learned that Pectinia’s are extremely easy to keep alive over the long term and grow rapidly, enjoying high flow and high light.  Most sites say they are very difficult to feed.  Tidal Gardens has a nice video showing one eating – like a hog.  Mine is very cool, each of the two apparent colonies has several mouths, each of which

image

 periodically open a mm or so and then close.  I captured and image with several mouths open at once (look for the dark purple circles within the somewhat lighter purple areas that meander through the green areas).  The mouths do not open in fixed cycles.  Sometimes none are open, sometimes one or two, and sometimes most of them.  They stay open for 10 seconds or so.  This coral is absolutely covered in slime (like candy canes).  If Reef Roids are fed, the particles stick to the slime and are drawn into the mouths, which become much larger, 2-3 mm, with the tissue around them puffed up greatly.  Large strands of slime covered with the particles are drawn into the mouths in huge quantity.  The mouths clear the slime in only a minute or so.  When I don’t feed as much as the coral wants, after it clears the particles, many feeding tentacles come out (see image). 

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They are rather short, about ½ cm, and are loosely associated with the mouths.  In the image you can see the tips which are white with the tentacles being clear (zoom in to see them well).  If I feed a lot more initially, the tentacles do not appear.  Given the huge amount that this coral can eat, I will start target feeding it every other day.

I have several animals coming from the AquaSD holiday sale.  I will update with a front-on FTS after the new critters become comfortable.

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  • OldManSea changed the title to OldManSea's Red Sea Max E-170 Anemone Tank - August FTS - Several New Specimens, Some Squabbling as Creatures Mature

This tank continues to mature.  Algae growth remains minimal and dosing is pretty constant.  I did have to lower alkalinity to 10.5 dKH as the 11.5 suggested by Red Sea was difficult to maintain.  The salt mixes at 10.5 which is easy to maintain with daily dosing.

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As the clownfishes mature they are fighting more and more.  I suspect that there will be murder within the next few weeks.  I have tried to catch several of the clear losers to move them but they quickly take refuge in the rock.  The red BTA has decided to move to near the top of the rock on the right side of the tank, just below the candy cane that was growing so well.  They have had several rumbles and the nearest polyp of the candy cane may well not make it.  I can tell when they have fought during the night since the candy cane’s polyps on the near side are closed tightly and the anemone is waving far out in the tank away from the candy cane.  If the BTA does not move I will have to pry off the candy cane and move it.  I received a chalice frag and a Fake Jack o’Lantern frag from AquaSD.  They are doing well and beginning to encrust beyond the frag plugs.  The nuclear green paly’s are expanding at an ever

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increasing rate.  I am thinking about getting Purple Deaths or similar to keep them company.  My wife accompanied me to the lfs when I needed to by salt, where she took a shine to a large rock covered with clove polyps;  it now lives in this tank.  I must say that I had my doubts but I like it a lot.  She also liked a yellow-green trachyphillia.

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She didn’t buy that one but I picked it up for her the next day.  I have grown to like it a lot as well.  It eats like a pig, opening large mouths to suck in mysis (it has three, one near each end and one in the very middle).  The image is not far from the real color but in life it is a bit more yellow-green than shown here but I just cant adjust the white balance properly to capture exactly the true color.  This coral is quite fluorescent in its color - the saturation of the image has not been touched.  Note the green shining onto the gravel below, this is visible even when the lights are just coming on and the intensity is very low.  This shot was made early morning, about two hours after lights on so is quite blue.  The coral is extremely bright, in both blue light as here as well as when the white led’s are shining brightly.  I like the bluish patches in the skin - they make the skin look as though it is pulling apart. 

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 Last week we had a family event in Denver.  We passed back and forth near Elite Reef several times and stopped in when we had a moment.  They moved into their new location only a few weeks ago so are still setting up.  I had wanted to see their nano display tanks which get a lot of attention on Youtube in the Reef Builders series.  The folks were extremely nice.  While I have not been a mushroom coral fan to date, the mushroom display tank was quite impressive with nice colonies of intense blue and intense red specimens - Discosoma I believe.  What blew our minds was the tank from the Reef Builders video “Mike’s Killer Nano Reef.”  This is a tank owned by one of the Elite Reef employees and was filmed in his home. It is beyond awesome in the video.  It now lives in the Elite Reef store, complete with a sign on the stand that reads, “As seen on the Reef Builders Youtube Channel.”  It is one crazy beautiful LPS reef.  My wife wondered several times why my tank doesn't look like his!  The staff were kind and noted that this tank has been running for four years and that all the specimens started out small.  My wife especially liked the frogspawn and hammer he had glued to the back wall.  I ordered a couple of the magnetic coral colony frag racks from Oceanbox Designs to mimic this look without attaching the frags to the back wall.  I will get the corals for her this weekend if time permits - and if the lfs has some, they usually do. 

I moved a cespitularia from the Marineland 5.5 to this tank a few months ago.  It was immediately ravaged by the rogue crabs, leaving only a nub.  Once I got rid of the crabs (O, Happy Day!) this coral has grown dramatically.  It is now an attractive member of the tank.  I need to decide where its permanent home will be in the scape.

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A couple weeks ago I also had to move the Duncan coral from the 5.5 gallon tank since its growth resulted in it being stuffed into a corner of that tank.  It looks extremely

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happy here, opening its 15 heads (up from 3 in February) wide to sway in the current.  I will make sure it has plenty of room as I am hoping to see it with 40 or 50 heads some day in the future (Elite Reef had one with more than 50 heads, it was quite an impressive colony!)

There are 10 rock flower anemones in this tank.  Some were on one half the tank whereas the others were on the other side.  I have moved them all to the right side of the tank to be closer to one another. 

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In the image just above, there was for several months another rock flower (streaked green) in the empty space on the rock.  The morning after I moved the rock to this side of the tank, I saw that the green streaked anemone moved around the back side of its neighbor and now sits in touch with its old friend and another specimen on the rock just behind, see image below.  This species certainly likes togetherness.

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I am pleased with the progress of this tank.  It seems to be settling in and requires less and less work such as scraping algae.  I do feed the anemones often and a lot so the skimmer gets real gunky real quick.  I usually clean the cup every other day.  I am changing about 8 gallons of water each week (total system volume is about 50 gallons).  I don’t know if that is really necessary but the anemones are quite a load – and I raise discus.  The discus tanks get two 90% water changes each week for the adults (discus go down hill fast if one doesn’t do those large changes and they certainly will not spawn).  For baby discus under one year of age the water change schedule is 90% EVERY DAY.  Most breeders would consider me a lazy slob with my babies (oh so true!) as the good breeders do 95-100 % water changes every 12 hours for the first year.  That’s the only way to get monster 8 inch discus.  Once a day and they top out at 6.5 -7 inches (mine), and less than once a day results in stunted discus at 4.5 – 5 inches max as adults, if they even get that far.  Being a discus person requires that I have a personality that insists on large and frequent water changes.  I have tried to cure myself with little success.  I have a hard time keeping the volume of change to only 8 gallons per week, it causes great guilt!

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shaneandjohn

Great update ?  Your tank looks great and your animals are thriving, so kudos to you!  The clove pollips are Very fast growers, and can quickly take over, so pay close attention to those. We have removed them as best as we could from our softy reef for this reason. They would grow into our zooanthid colonies and then choke them out. 

 Your duncans looks fantastic! Before you know it you will have your massive colony. We started with 3 heads several years ago, and now we have well over 30 heads! I recently upgraded to a larger tank, so they have lots more room to grow?

 

 

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6 hours ago, shaneandjohn said:

We started with 3 heads several years ago, and now we have well over 30 heads! I recently upgraded to a larger tank, so they have lots more room to grow?

That is one beautiful Duncan!  Be sure to post photos when it reaches 50 and 100 heads!   Duncan is such a great coral.  I was skeptical about the clove polyps for the reason you note.  I will be vigilant about trying to keep the colony under control.  The rock my wife bought was not actually intended to be the base for the clove polyps but the original colony spread to several rocks - Yikes!

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  • 3 weeks later...
  • OldManSea changed the title to OldManSea's Red Sea Max E-170 Anemone Tank - September FTS - New Hawfish, Blastomussa, Collospongia, Hammer, Frogspawn, Palys

A number of new citizens were added this month but sadly there was a loss as well.  The clowns continue to fight as they decide who gets to stay.  I have netted out three that were clear losers, hard to do since they dive for the rocks whenever the net comes near.  This leaves 6 still in the tank.  The trachyphyllia was killed by the Pectinia.  The two were nearly 6 inches apart but 4 days after the trachy was added to the tank, I looked in on it after dark and saw a large number of Pectinia sweeper tentacles engulfing the side of the trachy nearest to it.  The next morning much of the trachy's flesh was falling off on that side and it continued to rapidly decline over the next two days.  A real shame as the trachy was quite beautiful and was eating well.  I moved the Cespitularia up on the rocks as it has continued to grow very rapidly.  It is developing into a very nice coral.

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The Fake Jack o' Lantern leptoseris has grown a lot since it was added to the tank.  It started out covering about half the frag plug and now covers it and is beginning to encrust the nearby rock.

 

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Several new corals and two fish were added.  First the fish, two Flame Hawkfishes.  These are not a pair but rather two juveniles that arrived at the lfs along with a couple of others, each in a separate tank.  My wife and I have both admired this species.  While many people say hawkfishes fight, a search of the net including this forum revealed that quite a few people add two or more to a tank with great success.  Ellen Thaler, the hawkfish scientific expert, in articles in Coral, June 2006, said that she always keeps at least two individuals of the same species in a tank and recommends that they be kept as multiple specimens all the time.  So we tried it out.  Harvey is a bit larger (he's the one on the left in the image immediately below) and when the two fish were first added to

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the tank, he stalked the other - which of course we then had to name Hillary - and repeatedly bumped her on the tail, after which each time he quickly shot to the other side of the tank.  This lasted for 30 minutes or so and then they settled in.  Harvey stakes out the cave at the center of the tank whereas Hillary spends about half her time at the far right on the bottom and about half of her time at the very top of the rock.  The two fish largely ignore one another except at feeding time.  Since Hillary stays perched higher and more in the open, she sees food first and when she goes for it, Harvey shoots out of his cave and shares.  They do not fight over pieces, whoever gets to a piece first eats it without contest.  They are both gluttons.  Dr. Thaler notes that she feeds all seven of the species she maintains large amounts of food three times a day to keep them from stalking the other aquarium inhabitants.  Hillary is so aggressive an eater that when I feed the large anemones shrimp or scallops using forceps, she jumps on the 

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forceps and tears chunks of the meat from them, and this is after I have already fed her and Harvey.  Interestingly, Thaler said that if she does not feed large amounts, many of her hawkfishes stalk larger fish in the tank, grab them and shake them vigorously against the rocks to break them into smaller pieces!  I believe it since Hillary grabbed a huge piece of shrimp intended for the largest BTA and was not able to swallow it.  She held on and rapidly beat it against the rock which caused it to shred.  She then stood guard over the pieces until she could force all of them down.  These flame hawkfishes are beautiful and even though they have been in the tank a short time, are full of personality.  They already recognize us as the source of food and when we enter the room both of them come out and perch to let us know they are present.  Hillary has even learned to swim with the clownfish (very unhawkfish-like) and eat their food pellets as they are tossed into the tank.

 

In the FTS's above, on the back wall you can see our new pink hammer and green frogspawn.  We were in Denver and stopped by Elite Reef.  One of my favorite tanks on youtube is the one owned by an Elite Reef employee.  The video is "Mike's Killer Nano Reef" which at the time of filming was in his home.  Now it resides in the store and awesome does not begin to describe it.  He has a frogspawn and hammer glued to the back wall.  Instead of gluing to the back wall we used Oceanbox Designs grow out frag racks.  this way we can reposition the corals as they grow.  Also visible is a green toadstool.  My wife liked one at Elite Reef so now we have one.  While picking out corals on the Legendary Corals website, I ran across a bright blue sponge, Collospongia auris.  It seems this sponge has symbiotic cyanobacteria.  It is said to grow rapidly and may become a nuisance.  I was fascinated by the color in the images and 

 

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saw that Sanjay Joshi has a large one attached to a wall in his 500 gallon tank.  So, I picked up the frag and it is now attached to the wall via an Oceanbox Designs grow out frag rack. The frag is already growing noticeably.  The bright blue portions around the edge are new growth in the two weeks it has been in the tank.  This image is a week old and now the frag is growing appendages similar to a plating montipora and increasing in diameter as well.

 

In the FTS you may also see a new small colony of Red Death paly's above the ever-expanding nuclear green colony.  There is also a new small colony of Captain America's.  Those are fairly dull so far but are beginning to color up.  I would like to get some Purple Deaths to finish out the paly's in the tank. 

 

The lfs received some very nice Acropora frags from a local

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grower.  I picked up a couple to see how they will do.  One is a nice light blue and the other is a GARF Bonsai.  I need to work on the light placement as the Bonsai was quite dark purple when I got it 3 weeks ago but now is brownish purple.  I have read conflicting views about whether it needs more or less light to correct the browning.  Finally, the lfs had this Blastomussa frag.  Apparently it started out as 6 heads when it was acquired and the lfs owner cut it into 6 individual heads with his fragging bandsaw to make the cost more

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appealing.  He kept them until each had a new head well formed, about 3 months.  He said it came as a "Candy Cane Stripper".  Perhaps it was really "Candy Cane Striped"?  I really like it.  Another lfs in the East Sound had one with 3 heads for an astonishing (to me) amount of money.  This little frag gobbles up mysis shrimp like all good blasto's.  I also moved the green blasto from the 5 gallon tank into this tank.  I will make a blasto rock with these and perhaps a couple more frags.  I see that Pacific East Aquaculture carries some really fancy blasto's but they come with equally fancy prices so I will see how these do for a bit while saving my lunch money.  

 

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  • OldManSea changed the title to OldManSea's Red Sea Max E-170 Anemone Tank - November FTS - New Pectinias and Blasto's

I thought I was finished with large, predatory crabs a few months ago but in early November, the anemones started moving around which made me suspicious but laziness prevented me from doing thorough searches by flashlight in the middle of the night.  Then, one morning my prize watermelon Blasto frag was nowhere to be seen and the Cespitularia was missing from its rock.  In searching, I found the Blasto frag with its plug had been dragged under a rock and the two polyps macerated, and the Cestipularia was broken and down behind the scape.  I placed the Blasto into the 5.5 gallon tank to recover, I hoped, and that night did a thorough flashlight search.  As I suspected I found under the rock that the Blasto had been dragged, was a huge gorilla crab.  It seemed that I have caught blue crabs in the Chesapeake that were smaller – OK, an exaggeration but the thing was the largest I have seen yet.  I tore the tank down yet again and captured the monster. 

I am very pleased to say that the fancy Blasto has regrown at a remarkable rate and the two polyps are now whole again although back to about the size they were when I got the frag.  As of last week it is back in this tank. 

The FTS and top down shots show a new Pectinia on the right side of the tank that I got from the lfs.  It is quite a looker.

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I assume that like most aggressive corals, several members of the same species can be placed together but I am playing it safe and keeping them on opposite sides of the tank.  I also received a tiny frag of Space Invader Pectinia from Cherry Corals.  Frags of this variety usually cost ridiculous amounts of money but since this one is tiny, I got it for a fraction of the

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the typical price.  At the far left of the FTS, Harvey the flame hawkfish is caught as a reflection in the glass.  Harvey and Hillary have settled in nicely and are nearly always next to one another.  Like all hawkfish they are quite curious.  Sometimes, when I am in the fishroom puttering about they come to the front of the tank to watch me through the glass.  Often when they do this one will perch at the front followed by the other which perches on top of the first.

I have become obsessed with Blasto’s ever since I got the free one, and really got revved up with the fancy red and green striped one from the lfs.  I have been searching the net since and found some really fancy ones at Pacific East but they also have really fancy prices and I am not a good enough aquarist yet to justify those.  However, I saw some very good ones at Cherry Corals and AquaSD.  My favorite recent acquistions are these two red ones with dark stripes, from Cherry Corals.  They had four listed and I almost got all of them but 

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decided to stop at two.  This one with the blue and green striped oral disk near the Space Invader Pectinia is from AquaSD.  There are several others that are on the sand;  I will glue them in place in the next couple of weeks.  The tank looks like a Blasto frag tank right now but the thought was to pick up interesting specimens and to rehome them into a new, larger tank that I planning after the new year when work calms down long enough. 

The blue sponge is growing well.  The hawkfish like to perch on it to have a good vantage point, which is worrisome as the sponge, which is the consistency of rubber,

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bends a lot when a hawkfish is perched on it.  The nuclear green paly’s are still trying to take over the tank, and the Duncan coral, which is now with me for 10 months, has reached 25 heads from its original 3.  It is just to the right of the larger Pectinia in the FTS.  The Duncan isn’t really as close to the Pectinia as it appears in the image.  It is back several inches.  I have learned to keep other corals well away from the reach of the sweepers.  It puts out sweepers very rarely but they pack a punch when they do.  The Fake Jack o’Lantern Leptoseris, which covered half of its frag plug when I got it, now has overgrown the frag plug and extended onto the rock around it.  I am hoping that it continues to grow to make a nice “carpet.”  The chalice that I got at the same time has not grown at all in the several months it has been in the tank.  In fact, one edge seems to be receding a bit.  The green Caulastrea coral which was injured a few months ago in a fight with the red BTA, has recovered well.  I thought the injured head was going to die but it has regenerated.  The coral continues to grow and is now up to 12 heads with two of those in the process of budding new ones.  I had to rehome the two SPS since the red BTA decided to perch at the top of the rocks (which is where I like it best) and took over all the space.  I moved the hammer to the other side to get it away.  The BTA packs a nasty punch when it is gets upset.

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Awesome tank and awesome write-up! I appreciate it when people take time and do in-depth write-ups of what's happening in their tanks (even though I am definitely guilty of tank write-up negligence). 

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On 11/28/2017 at 10:41 AM, Cannedfish said:

Awesome tank and awesome write-up! I appreciate it when people take time and do in-depth write-ups of what's happening in their tanks (even though I am definitely guilty of tank write-up negligence). 

Agreed, great write-up. Tank looks awesome, I'll be following along as I'm seeing up a similar tank right now.

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On ‎11‎/‎28‎/‎2017 at 11:41 AM, Cannedfish said:

Awesome tank and awesome write-up! I appreciate it when people take time and do in-depth write-ups of what's happening in their tanks (even though I am definitely guilty of tank write-up negligence). 

 

13 hours ago, Halo_003 said:

Agreed, great write-up. Tank looks awesome, I'll be following along as I'm seeing up a similar tank right now.

Thank you for your kind words.  I try to be fairly complete since when I was researching small tanks I found some of the very detailed journals extremely helpful.  At that time teenyreef was well into his 4 gallon reef and then began his 10 gallon reef.  His detailed write-ups with general observations and discussions of what worked and what did not, and how he got around those things that did not work, were extremely helpful.  Plus, I am sure that people who don't want or need the verbiage can look at the images to see if something piques their interest.  That happens with me a lot as I go through the build journals and then I go back and read through them in detail.

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  • 3 months later...
  • OldManSea changed the title to OldManSea's Red Sea Max E-170 Anemone Apocalypse - Dark Ages- Renaissance - Clams have been in tank 8 months!

It has been more than a year since I last updated this tank.  In April 2018, while I was traveling for business my wife said that the tank was completely milky.  Of course I was in Day 1 of a 3 day trip.  I got home and couldn’t see into the tanks except on one side where I could make out the powerhead, and saw what looked like the shredded remains of the larger BTA.  So, I assume that for some reason the foam sleeve fell off and the BTA happened to go walking, or, perhaps the walking anemone managed to push the sleeve off and get caught.

I expected that everything would be dead and drained the tank.  I was amazed that while some corals had died, all the fish and most of the corals were still alive.  I also noted what appeared to be a small amount of “snot” attached to the power cord of the other powerhead and realized that it was a tiny fragment of the anemone, sticking to the cord.  I pulled it out and placed it into a specimen container and over a couple of days the BTA reformed itself in the diameter of a dime (it was about 6 inches when it went into the blender) and it continues to grow – in a different tank! 

I removed some of the corals (one Pectinia died before I got home so I rehomed the other 2, both of which are doing well to this day) and all of the anemones and just kept the other corals and fish in the tank.  The tank then went through its version of the dark ages – first a spectacular outbreak of cyanobacteria that I could not get rid of for about 4 months – I scrubbed the glass and coral once or twice a week, changing 25% of the water, and within 24-48 hours it looked the same.  I decided to not despair and instead scrubbed and changed water at least once a week.  When the cyanobacteria began to subside, the tank was overcome by a plague of dinoflagellates.  Again, I scrubbed and changed water – and made sure there was detectable nitrate and phosphate, targeting around 5 ppm and 0.05 ppm, respectively.  I also removed the sand as it was always nasty.

Over a period of a few months, the dino’s began to abate a bit, and to be competed by GHA.  Around October I became elated that I could see through the front glass for 2-3 days after cleaning and that that long strings of dino’s took 4-5 days to reappear after I scrubbed and changed water.  I thought that since I was following the “nothing good happens fast in a reef aquarium” I decided to gain better control of parameters.  I purchased an Apex (which now runs this tank plus the IM10 plus 6 freshwater tanks) and a DOS.  I am able to rigorously keep KH at 8.8-9.0 and calcium at 480-500 ppm.  This keeps pH at 8.20-8.30, with the day-night variability always within the 0.1 unit range.  I still dose nitrate and phosphate but those change in poorly predictable ways so I don’t automatically dose.  I check every 3 days if possible and target 5 ppm nitrate and 0.05 ppm phosphate.  By November, I could generally scrub once a week and have a nice clean appearance for a few days.  Being bored, I decided to begin to add a few things to the tank.  I have always admired Tridacna clams and late in October, my LFS received several large maxima clams along with the 2 small ones they actually ordered.   I picked up 2 of the large ones, each of which was about 5.5 inches long. Here they are yesterday on their 8 month celebration:

 ere

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At first I put them on the rock and they attached but would then cast off so I tried them on the floor of the tank, where they have happily been since.  Neither attached to “clam pillows” so I got rid of them.  Yesterday I celebrated 8 months of having the clams (I brought them home on Nov 3).  They have only grown about 3/8 inch since I got them but given how large they are, that is probably not surprising since surveys of maxima’s on reefs finds very few over 6 – 6.5 inches.  They tolerate the fish well – the hawk fish often perch on them as does the leaf fish.  The clams are used to them and generally don’t close in response to being pounced on.  They certainly respond to my hand interrupting the light!

While the algae slowly came under control over the past year (time flies when you are having fun), the dino’s formed strands at the base of the back wall, anchored into the plastic strip that Red Sea puts there.  In spite of having intense flow along the bottom of the back, it grew back (albeit progressively shorter strands each month) within a week and I scrubbed it off on Sat or Sun.  However, while the water has seemed exceptionally clear the past 2-3 months, about 3 weeks ago I came home one evening and the water was absolutely “brilliant” in its clarity and every last strand of dino’s was completely gone – COMPLETELY.  I have no idea why it happened but I don’t have any dino's at all any longer.  The film of green algae on the glass is essentially unnoticeable for days after I wipe it away.  There is still a bit of GHA but even most of that looks to be dead or dying (I cannot have hermits or snails of any kind since the hawk fish kill them within a couple of days of being added).  I only have two tuxedo urchins for algae control (one is on the front glass and one on the left side in the FTS).  I have heard of this sudden disappearance of dino's happening and will not complain.  Here is a FTS from this morning.  I have not wiped the front glass since Sunday and did not wipe it prior to this image. 

300380354_FTSRS1702019Jul4redone.thumb.jpg.0c30721ca478986614713e4ac92c0223.jpg
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Christopher Marks

Those maxima clams are amazing @OldManSea! I missed your update last month, this system has really been through a lot over the past year or so! The anemone in the powerhead, while away from home no less, is a worst case scenario. Glad it wasn't as severe it might have been. Then the months of battling cyano and GHA! I admire your perseverance and patience in turning it around, it's great to see the tank so crystal clear and vibrant now!

 

Is that a frogfish I see? 🙂 

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  • OldManSea changed the title to OldManSea's Red Sea Max E-170 February Full Tank Shot, Random Images

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