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jstj0sh's Newbie Nuvo 20 - Tank Move Complete!!


jstj0sh

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FTS - November 14, 2017

 

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This is my first tank ever. Never had a saltwater or freshwater tank so please excuse any noob moves I may have done up unto where I'm at now. Here is the rundown on my journey so far: 

 

My coworker and boss are huge Reefers. They have been in the hobby for years and years and eventually they convinced me to get a tank. After tons of research I decided to go with an IM AIO tank. I'll be at my folks place for at least a year until my fiance and I get married and move out so size was a big factor. Anyway, on to the good stuff. 

 

I picked up my tank, live rock and some sand.

 

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I soon realized more rock was needed so I grabbed some more at the LFS. While there, the owner sold me a bottle of Fritz TurboStart and told me it would work wonders. My experience with it lines up with what he said.. this stuff is the real deal. 

 

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Next it was time to add some equipment: 

 

  • Aqueon Pro 100w heater
  • Custom Caddy w/ filter floss, Chemi-pure and Seachem Matrix 
  • Hydor Koralia Nano 425
  • Tunze Osmolator Nano 3152
  • Kessil A150W

 

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After a handful of days, and checking the water params constantly, everything was leveling out and looking good. I was worried because I never went through any big algae or diatom blooms yet I saw life all over my tank. Bristle worms, Brittle starfish, Blue polyps.. everyone on the forums and at work told me I was blessed with some great live rock and to go ahead and start stocking. So I added some snails. Soon after, I added 5 Green Chromis. Those 5 soon turned to 4 (they quickly bullied the smallest guy to death) and after about 2 weeks the 4 turned to 3. The LFS and forums warned me this would happen.. something about schooling fish and odd numbers? 

 

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During this time, on a quick impulse buy, I purchased a Diamond Goby from my LFS. He was a cool looking dude, but he didn't last long. He was stressed and burrowed deep under my rock the first night and didn't come out for the next 4 days. I tried to coax him out with food, but he never emerged until I came home from work a few nights later and he was outside of his burrow floating belly up :( Needless to say I won't impulse buy fish anymore. 

 

At this point my other fish were doing great and the water params were still great so it was time to add some candy to this sucker. As I mentioned at the beginning my boss and coworker are really into the hobby.. well Boss Man was kind enough to let coworker and I go over and dig around his two massive tanks and frag anything we could fill our tupperwear and buckets with in 45 minutes. I ended up with some Zoas (Utter Chaos and Scrambled Eggs), Candy Canes, Leather, plenty of GSP, Blue Polyps and a few Gorg pieces.

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Here is how it looked after being dipped and introduced to the tank: 

 

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After a few nights, rearranging and getting a better camera filter (it was late and the leather was tired and some of the GSP had just been moved and messed with):

 

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Last but certainly not least, I picked up a nice little Hammer frag 2 days ago: 

 

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And here I am, 27 days later, ordering some designer clowns and obsessing over what coral to buy next :P A few of the pieces I got from Boss Man need to be nursed back to health, but are already making great progress. Can't wait to share my new additions with y'all and hopefully I can figure out how to take better pictures of this thing! 

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So stoked and a little nervous! Picked up two Black Ice Clowns this afternoon. Hoping they pair up and get along with my Chromis. 

 

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Also, while at the LFS, the fiance picked a new coral. It's a Ricordea Mushroom, I think the Florida type, but not 100% sure.

 

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46 minutes ago, JR! said:

nice start. love the clowns

Thanks! I do too. Couldn't leave the store without them! 

35 minutes ago, ninjamyst said:

so you have 3 chromis and 2 clowns now? 

That is correct. Pretty much done with adding fish I think. 

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So, today I discovered a little something-something in my tank.. there are a few Aiptasia heads popping up. 

They are small, but on opposite ends of my tank. If I get a Peppermint Shrimp or two right now will that most likely help my situation? 

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Unfortunately there is no why to know for sure. Some members have had peppermints that took care of the aiptasia but not always. It seems that they do best when the aiptasia are small. So get them sooner rather than later. 

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^ just make sure you get peppermints and not camelbacks. I tried to do that a long time ago for the first time and it turns out my LFS had sold me the wrong type of shrimp and they look nearly identical :/

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Tuesday I went down to the LFS and got two Peppermint Shrimp as well as a very nice great Duncan frag I passed on last week. My experience with the shrimp has been mixed. They wiped the aiptasia out in a couple days, but they piss my coral off and are WILD at feeding time - I watched one of them rip a full shrimp out of the Duncan's mouth after he was already closed up and eating. I also noticed my Hammer coral hasn't been extending as much lately and I feel like the shrimp are to blame. Thinking about bagging them up and putting them in my coworkers tank - he has a small aiptasia problem so they will be put to good use again!

 

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On 6/26/2017 at 9:14 AM, debbeach13 said:

Unfortunately there is no why to know for sure. Some members have had peppermints that took care of the aiptasia but not always. It seems that they do best when the aiptasia are small. So get them sooner rather than later. 

I haven't had experience with large aiptasia (knock on wood), but that point seems to be true. The 5-6 I had in my tank were all very small, but the shrimp wiped them out within two days. 

On 6/26/2017 at 9:20 AM, myarmolich said:

^ just make sure you get peppermints and not camelbacks. I tried to do that a long time ago for the first time and it turns out my LFS had sold me the wrong type of shrimp and they look nearly identical :/

Thanks for this heads up. I did my research before heading to the store, didnt wanna get the wrong critters. 

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11 hours ago, debbeach13 said:

Glad to read you had such a positive outcome.

Yeah they kick butt at eating aiptasia, but I came home today and my Ricordea mushroom was PISSED. It was shriveled up and looking not so great. I was having 0 problems with my corals before I put those 2 in the tank, then immediately after I introduce them to the tank, things start closing up and looking unhappy..? I'll do a full water test tomorrow morning, but my guess is those guys are walking all over everything and pissing them off :blink:

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35 minutes ago, debbeach13 said:

If they aren't nipping the coral. I would give it a couple days. My coral close up if a snail or crab is walking on them but open back up a few minutes later.  

Since I'm not at work today I'll keep a close eye on them and see what's going on <_<

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Alright so today I picked up a couple things.. one was a necessity, and one was a bit of a want.

 

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Grabbed this Eshopps Nano Skimmer at the recommendation of the LFS owner. He is running the same tank with this guy. He had the IM Ghost skimmer but replaced it with this because he said the IM unit was just not getting the job done. 

 

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I had to move the heater over to make room in the 2nd chamber for this big SOB. Hopefully I don't burn the house down.

 

As for my other purchase.. I had been drooling over SPS for a few weeks and I finally decided to say "Screw it" and see if my water and lighting could support any type of SPS. I grabbed a small frag of some Birdsnest so we'll see how this thing does :happy:

 

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A lot has been going on since my last post. 

 

First, I am getting tired of Peppermint shrimp. By day 2 of having the frag, my Birdsnest was just getting comfortable and started letting all its polyps out and the next morning I wake up and half the polyps looked like they had been ripped out. The rest were sucked in and of course later that day the frag started to get solid white. I gave it a few more days and it never recovered. Only thing I can attribute this to is the shrimp :wacko: My hammer is still pissed too. Nothing changed with the water, flow, lighting, just the addition of the shrimp.

 

Second, I'm dealing with a small outbreak of cyano on my sandbed! I test my parameters religiously and nothing is looking out of whack, so lack of flow and overfeeding are what I'm placing blame on for this. I've chilled out on how much I feed (every day to ~ every other day) and I just placed an order for a Hydor Koralia Nano 565. I plan on hooking both powerheads up to a wave controller - one will blast down towards the sand and the other will provide flow up top across the length of the tank. 

 

Besides that everything is going pretty well (knock on wood) with the tank. I'm seeing lots of coral growth which is exciting. My Zoas are sprouting off babies. The Leather is forming a new branch. The Ricordea is slowly but surely growing. The fish, we can't forget the fish, are doing well. The female chromis is a little power hungry, so she keeps everyone in check, but nothing is ever dangerous or deadly. Also, the skimmer is putting in work! After about 14 hours it hit it's stride and hasn't stopped since!

 

Thinking about adding one last and final fish to the tank. Right now my eyes are set on a Yellow Clown Goby or a Midas Blenny, but we'll see.

 

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21 hours ago, Madcat said:

I can't believe this is your first ever tank. It looks great! Sorry about your birdsnest.

Thanks so much! I really appreciate that :D 

And no worries, I will be picking up something to replace it very soon!

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Great start, but would advise to slow down a bit. In this hobby, patience is a virtue. 

 

I would not add anything else until your Cyano Bloom is gone. You're likely still cycling since your tank is so new. You've already added 5 fish and a lot of coral this early on. 

 

Also, it took me years before I could successfully keep SPS. Make sure your tank has been established for a while, and that you have pristine water, and are able to dose calcium, etc. A lot more requirements than LPS and softies. Honestly, as a newbie, I would stick with LPS and softies for now. It'll save you a lot of money and frustration. Just my 2¢.

 

Always do your own research and don't only rely on LFS advice. Their goal is to get you to buy stuff. I would rely on your Co workers and our community for advice. 

 

Great equipment so far. I will be following your progress. Best of luck. 

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Wow I've had my tank set up since march and yours already looks way better in such a short period of time! I also had a major cyano outbreak (think it got introduced from my first frag). It should eventually burn itself out if you get your nutrients under control. Also increased flow and snails always help, my dwarf ceriths seem to enjoy the stuff :)

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1 hour ago, DocReef said:

Great start, but would advise to slow down a bit. In this hobby, patience is a virtue. 

 

I would not add anything else until your Cyano Bloom is gone. You're likely still cycling since your tank is so new. You've already added 5 fish and a lot of coral this early on. 

 

Also, it took me years before I could successfully keep SPS. Make sure your tank has been established for a while, and that you have pristine water, and are able to dose calcium, etc. A lot more requirements than LPS and softies. Honestly, as a newbie, I would stick with LPS and softies for now. It'll save you a lot of money and frustration. Just my 2¢.

 

Always do your own research and don't only rely on LFS advice. Their goal is to get you to buy stuff. I would rely on your Co workers and our community for advice. 

 

Great equipment so far. I will be following your progress. Best of luck. 

I really appreciate the advice.

I do hope the bloom is over. I added a larger Hydor last week and in two days my sand bed looked brand new - so hopefully it was just a flow issue. About the SPS, I have no rebuttal for that statement. While the shrimp was absolutely to blame, I just didn't feel comfortable knowing that it probably wasn't in the most perfect of conditions. I'll put SPS on the back burner for now lol 

 

Thanks for the time to drop some wisdom. Feel free to chime in whenever, please! 

 

16 minutes ago, jesseatam said:

Wow I've had my tank set up since march and yours already looks way better in such a short period of time! I also had a major cyano outbreak (think it got introduced from my first frag). It should eventually burn itself out if you get your nutrients under control. Also increased flow and snails always help, my dwarf ceriths seem to enjoy the stuff :)

The flow, or lack thereof, was definitely my culprit. With the addition of this Hydor it definitely helped. Do you notice the ceriths making a pretty big difference? I've thought about picking some up.

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I love my ceriths and have made them the staple of my CUC. I have both florida and dwarfs which I ordered from reef cleaners. In my 30 gallon I have 7 florida ceriths and many dwarf ceriths, if I had to guess a number I'd say around 30. The dwarf ceriths seems to mostly hang out in the sand and on the glass while the florida ceriths seem to be more adventurous in venturing onto the rock work while also cleaning the sand and glass. Other CUC I have include an emerald crab, a blue leg hermit, 2 nerite snails, I think 8 dwarf planaxis snails, some hitchhiker brittle stars, and a single nassarius vibex (I have terrible luck with these surviving).

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  • jstj0sh changed the title to jstj0sh's Newbie Nuvo - Cyano outbreak

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