My 15g Reef Sanctuary

[Clown79]

THE BEGINNING:

 

I started my 15g 2.5 yrs ago. This is the 4th. time I have done a reef. I had to shut down my other two due to life changes yrs ago.

 

I wanted to  go small this time and keep things very minimalist, system wise. Hubby wanted a 40g...wish I had listened to him. Lol.

 

Started off with:

 

Used aquarium stand that we reinforced with 2x4's and 2x2's. We made a box to sit on top of the stand and the tank sits within the box. 

 

15g 24x13x13

 

Equipment:

AC30 

Eheim Jagger 50 watt

Hydor Koralia 420

 

Lighting:

Par 38 10,000k 50/50

 

Set up:

90% liverock 10% dry

Caribsea Fiji Pink Sand

RO water with Instant Ocean

 

Filtration:

filter floss and seachem matrix carbon

 

Test Kit:

Api ammonia, nitrite, nitrate

 

Set up the tank with 2 small island aquascape and a blue backdrop.

 

I tested my tank every day during cycling, ran no lights.

 

My tank cycled in 10 days and I started off with a few hermits and 2 snails after my first water change. 

 

I didn't have high nitrates, they were 20 which  was nice. I didn't suffer a huge diatom bloom. I had some but not until about  a month after cycle. 

The bloom lasted on and off for 3mnths. 

 

After  a few  weeks I added 2 clowns. A black/white  ocellaris and an orange one.

 

My first corals were a dendro, xenia, and Gsp  which were added in the second month.

 

 

[Clown79]

System and maintenance:

 

In my closet I have all my supplies in shelves and a trolley tray. 

 

 cleaning and maintenance

 turkey bastors, Tupperware containers, bottle brushes, tooth brushes, straight razors, magnet scrapers, air hoses, gravel vacuums, sponges, gloves, towels, plastic cups, testers, and buckets.

 

Products

Zooplankton, coral dip, aiptasia x, sealant, crazy glue gel, mesh for hoods, eggcrate, fish net, extra shells, battery run air pump, batteries, small desk fan, extra heater, air pump, powerheads.

 

I keep a calendar with my aquarium supplies where I document media change out/additions, equipment cleaning, anything I may need to remember. I also document my 

 

Weekly Maintenance

Filter floss-i buy this in bulk and cut it to size. I switch it out 2 times a week. 

1 on waterchange day and 1 mid week

 

Carbon- I buy media bags or use new pantyhose cut to size and zip ties for my media.

 

Seachem Matrix carbon or Kent carbon. 

I rinse the bags weekly on water change day and switch out the media every 3 weeks. 

 

Now using Reef Crystals

 

WATERCHANGE DAY:

Mix my salt for 4hrs prior to use. Add a powerhead and heater to ensure proper mixing.

 

I use a sybon refractometer which I calibrate monthly with 35ppt calibration fluid. I started with distilled water calibration but found it was inaccurate once I got the 35 ppt fluid.

 

- start by blasting my rocks with a turkey baster. I leave my filter on during this to suck up the majority of the detritus.

 

-  then turn off everything but my light.

 

- scrape off all algae on the walls, use a mini bottle brush to clean the algae off my powerhead,  vacuum sand bed and suck out any floating particles.

 

- remove the media from my filter. Put in new floss, rinse my carbon bag and replace.

 

- Refill tank and start it up. Check the salinity to ensure it's accurate. 

 

Wipe glass off then sit back, rinse all my supplies, let it sit dry, and then relax.?

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Clown79]

I decided to change the background to black, the blue just didn't make the corals stand out.

 

added a surface skimmer which was ugly and took up a lot of room but it cleared up th3 surface.

 

At this point I had also added a bicolor blenny and returned my black and white clown, it was very aggressive.

 

The blenny  was great fun. Such a character. I really enjoyed having him. Got along great with my clown. Unfortunately  it died  after 7 mnths for no known reason.

 

I also added more corals. 

 

I started having some algae on my sand bed. It was a small amount of cyano.

 

I re evaluated all my maintenance and feeding.

 

To combat the algae:

 

-Added a powerhead

- Started siphoning out my filter during waterchanges to remove any left over detritus.

- did additional water changes during this time

- Cut down my lights to 6 hrs

- Started using distilled water

- Fed every other day

- Stopped using zooplankton which I added twice a week 

 

It was gone within 3 weeks.

 

Once it was gone I slowly increased my lighting to 8hrs

 

[Clown79]

I added a rock in between the 2 islands to create a bridge.

 

My clown seemed to be lonely once the blenny died. It no longer swam around, just stayed at 1 of the seams of the tank, so I got it a mate.

 

They got along immediately. Inseparable.

 

The day I got my new clown I added a frogspawn.

 

The little guy was very curious of the frogspawn. He was  constantly hovering over it and then one day I couldn't find him...he was in the frogspawn.

The female had no idea about hosting it until he taught her. He(Floyd) kept swimming to her(Pink) and would swim back into the coral.

 

She followed him and now it's been their home forever.

[Lula_Mae]

Very nice clown!  Pink and Floyd are adorable! I've wanted to do a 15 long reef ever since seeing one in Petco on a gorgeous dark cherry stained stand way back in college--like 8 years ago now lol.  It's one of the options I'm looking at for the larger reef I'm planning in the next few months.  Look forward to you sharing more of this lovely build with us!

[Clown79]

Thank you

 

I have changed a lot since then and plan on sharing more

 

 

[Clown79]

LIGHTING UPGRADE

 

upgraded my lighting to an Ai Prime which I loved.

 

This light was strong. Accidently burnt holes in a chair setting it up. 

 

I started my lighting off at 35% and increased it by 3% a week.

 

My schedule to start 

11am to 1pm ramp up 

1pm to 5pm

B, RB, V, UV 35%

R 5%

G 5%

W 10%

5PM TO 8PM

The percentages were dropped

8pm -10pm ramp down

10pm -12am 5% RB FOR moonlighting

 

FILTER UPGRADE

 

switched my old Ac30 for an Api Superclean.

The Superclean had  surface skimmer and I could still use my chosen media.

The surface skimmer attachment was just too bulky and stopped working. It jammed. 

 

The Superclean was nice. It was completely controllable flow wise. Easy to clean, quiet, adjustable intake, and it cleaned the surface.

 

I  added a sicce 530 to my tank that I had sitting around. 

So I had the filter 100gph

Sicce 530

Koralia 420

 

70x flow rate!

 

A pom pom crab was also added. These guys are cute but very shy. When they do come out, they are very entertaining.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[fishfreak0114]

Oooh, thanks for posting this!  I've wanted to read about your tank for a long time

[Clown79]

I'm trying to back track since I never did a journal from the start.

 

 

 

 

 

[Clown79]

After about a yr I decided to revamp my tank.

 

I wanted to try out sps so I decided to go heavy lps and sps.

 

I traded in my leather, most of my xenia, my mushrooms(excluding rics), gsp, and my dendro  went to my 10g.

 

So I changed out some of my rockwork, added 2 different birdsnest frags.

 

The birdsnests were followed by styllophora.

 

I then added a few more frogspawns and hammers.

 

My favourite being my golden which looks rainbow under the leds. 

[Clown79]

At this point things were going smoothly. 

I switched from RO to Distilled which made a significant improvement to water quality.

My nitrates had been 10 and the dropped to 3-5. 

 

My coralline was insane! I started using the flipper magnet. Well worth the cost! Best magnet cleaner I've used.

 

No major issues otherwise, everything was happy but dosing was definitely important.

 

Through the months of changes I had to

Dose esv bionic 2 part.

 

I started by testing my water for a week straight.

 

I tested my tank right after a water change 

And every day at the same time to the next water change.

My parameters dropped every day so I dosed everyday manually.

 

I tried using the online calculators but the numbers seemed to be off. The sums they provided were very large so I decided to test before and after dosing what my mathematic equation came out to.

 

Glad I did this.

Online calculator suggest 15ml for alk and ca but I actually only have to dose 5ml for my numbers to go back to target numbers.

 

 

 

[gogeta]

Tanks looking awesome! I tried a blue backing once and didn't like it either ever since than always black 

[cfaye@Delaware]

Yes, this is very nice. I like this a lot......

[Weetabix7]

5 hours ago, fishfreak0114 said:

Oooh, thanks for posting this!  I've wanted to read about your tank for a long time

 

Agreed, really glad you're taking the time to go back and write this up. 

Your fans thank you.

[debbeach13]

Thanks for starting this thread it is great to see your tank. About 28 years ago one of the first NANO tanks I ever read about was a standard 15 gallon. Started by Julian Sprung the only mechanical filter was a protein skimmer (maybe 2) It was huge but I was so impressed with that cup of dirty water that it pulled out of the tank. That's when I changed my 55 gallon from fresh to salt. 

[Clown79]

9 hours ago, gogeta said:

Tanks looking awesome! I tried a blue backing once and didn't like it either ever since than always black 

On some tanks it seems to look nice but the equipment didn't blend and I found the corals didn't pop.

 

5 hours ago, Weetabix7 said:

 

Agreed, really glad you're taking the time to go back and write this up. 

Your fans thank you.

Lol. Thanks!

 

4 hours ago, debbeach13 said:

Thanks for starting this thread it is great to see your tank. About 28 years ago one of the first NANO tanks I ever read about was a standard 15 gallon. Started by Julian Sprung the only mechanical filter was a protein skimmer (maybe 2) It was huge but I was so impressed with that cup of dirty water that it pulled out of the tank. That's when I changed my 55 gallon from fresh to salt. 

I did the same thing. I had a 55 cichlid tank and switched it to sw. It was my first.

I wish I had done a nano  then and kept the cichlids. 

I really like nano's. I think if I had the money and room I'd do a seahorse nano....

 

I did things differently with the 55 when I started. A few hiccups and mistakes which is natural, part of the learning and journey but easily corrected (some were expensive corrections like lights!) 

 

Things were different before. Very strict believers on forums. If you didn't do a sump, all the gadgets, and tried something new it was like being shunned. 

 

[Clown79]

Thank you for all the kind works.

 

Honestly, we are never truly happy. Its like competing with your own self. Lol.

 

Some change things a few times, some more frequently. 

Some changes are purely esthetics and some are for the benefit of the livestock.

[debbeach13]

My 55 was also cichilds. Moved 10 years later and downsized to a 29. 

[Clown79]

On 22/07/2017 at 10:49 PM, debbeach13 said:

My 55 was also cichilds. Moved 10 years later and downsized to a 29. 

Cichlids are great fish. I really like them 

[TinyOcean]

Your tank is gorgeous and the clowns hosting the frog spawn made my day! Cuteness overload!

[Clown79]

Thank you .

 

they rarely leave the frogspawn and since hosting it they have become very protective of it and the area. Pink is quite aggressive, with me. She attacks my hand no matter what. She now jumps at the surface to get to my hand before I'm even in the water.. She splashes water all over my wall!

 

She loves to bite and pull on the skin between my fingers. She's cute but she has fishtude. 

[Clown79]

I got sick of using Reef Crystals. I had nothing but problems with consistency.

 

My alk was ok, ca changed frequently and my mag was really low and constantly changed. It fluctuated from 1050, 1130, 1200, 1170.

 

I don't overly worry about mag but when it's low, you will have issues balancing ca and alk.

 

So I switched to RSCP. I wanted the blue bucket but it's not easy to get here. 

 

I really liked RSCP but after months of using it my alk consistently rose to levels I didn't like. nor did my corals. My alk in this tank was close to 13.

 

My beautiful styllophora that was a bday gift from my hubby went downhill and within 2 days went all white. My birdsnest were still alive but not fully open. Things looked irritated and I had no growth.

 

All other parameters were stable and normal. 

 

Time for another salt change. 

 

I was pretty frustrated at this point with salt. There seems to not be a salt that can provide great numbers for everyone. I still don't understand how one brand can mix differently for everyone if they all mix it at the same salinity.

 

I also upgraded my powerheads to Jebao Sw2.

I really like the wavemaker, it's controllability and options.

It's quite a strong wavemaker. I can't even use 2 modes on the lightest setting because it pulls corals out of the sand bed and everything closes up.

 

[Clown79]

While I was doing crap loads of research on salt brands, I decided to add a spotted watchman goby.

 

I loved this fish. It was so cute! It got along great with my clowns, which was a concern because Pink can be quite territorial but she didn't even care when it hung around her frogspawn.

 

At first this fish wasn't getting a lot of food because it was pretty shy and much slower than my piggy clowns and shrimp. My shrimp also always wanted to clean the goby which freaked it out.

 

I ended up having to over feed to get it food until it learned where to catch food.

 

 

So after doing my research on salt brands I learned there is no perfect salt.

Each salt brand, even the favoured and considered best choice brands still had complaints. They all work differently for everyone.

The most common complaint has been either high alk, low alk. This is every brand.

 

I wanted either Red Sea Blue Bucket and Aquaforest Reef Salt.

 

I went with Aquaforest Reef Salt because RS blue isn't easy to get.

 

Aquaforest has some great reviews and I have to say I really like this salt. It mixes really well and it's been very consistent. 

 

Funny enough, there are now complaints on this salt.

 

So reality is. Use a salt that works for you and your tank because no matter what, there will be ppl who love a brand and others who hate it.

 

[SantaMonicaHelp]

You have a really beautiful tank! And your fish seem happy and in a good shape! 

 

-Paola

[Clown79]

I started getting some gha on one rock.

 

It was small patches but I was getting on that quickly because it's an aggressive algae.

 

I use phosguard in small quantities as a preventative but that seemed to only control it.

 

to combat the gha:

 

-tested phos and nitrates.

 

phos was 0 (mine constantly reads 0 and has from the beginning with api, salifert, seachem kits) I will only get a reading if I take water from my sand bed.

Nitrates were 5

 

-manually removed gha from rock with tweezers...what a pain

-lower my feeding over coral food and feeding of fish - I won't starve anything but rather control qty of food.

 

The gha wasn't spreading much but also wasn't going away.

I can't remove the rock as it's supporting rocks so I decided to spot treat with peroxide.

 

Peroxide spot treatment:

 

I did the treatments on water change day using 3% peroxide. 1ml of peroxide at one time.

 

- turned off all powerheads and filter. no water movement during treatment

- used the syringe from my aiptasia x kit.

- manually pulled off as much gha with tweezers before treatment

- carefully with the syringe get as close to the rock where the gha is growing and slowly and carefully apply peroxide to it.

- let it sit while I did my waterchange

- proceeded to fill tank and start up. I generally gave it 15mins 

 

this worked. Not only did the gha die, it has not returned.

I did this treatment over a month because I wanted to do it carefully and slowly.

 

There was no harm done to any corals or livestock but the gha died.

 

I also upgrade my HOB...again.

I wanted something bigger and more efficient.

 

i went with the Seachem Tidal 55.

 

I have to say, this is my favourite filter out of all the filters I have used over the years.

It has 2 intakes with 2 separate controls.

1 control for the surface skimmer and 1 for the filter intake

It has completely controllable return flow rate from a trickle to full blast

the basket is huge. I can filt a large piece of floss, a bag of carbon, phosgaurd, and purigen and there's still room

the sicce pump is silent. I never hear this filter.

I highly recommend it.

 

22 minutes ago, SantaMonicaHelp said:

You have a really beautiful tank! And your fish seem happy and in a good shape! 

 

-Paola

thank you.

 

the clowns are very happy, as long as I'm not in the tank working. lol