Jump to content
Cultivated Reef

Recommended Posts

I just posted a bunch of pics and this jumped to page 4. Go back a page to find some awesome pictures from today.

 

Here's the Montipora Spongeodes! Encrusting very nicely!!

 

My buddy chopped those acans off of a colony for his first time propagating and they're doing very nice as well!

 

IMG_2805.thumb.JPG.16be57bd2fd78bd267b27ff8f9a18549.JPG

  • Like 1
Link to comment

Are you sure you want the pulsing Xenia in there? I have them, and they are a pain! They look good, until they start spreading like crazy.

 

usually once a month I'm taking an hour to clean out all the Xenia and take it to the lfs. And you never get it all, so it grows back

Link to comment
12 minutes ago, pntbll687 said:

Are you sure you want the pulsing Xenia in there? I have them, and they are a pain! They look good, until they start spreading like crazy.

 

usually once a month I'm taking an hour to clean out all the Xenia and take it to the lfs. And you never get it all, so it grows back

 

Absolutely!!

 

money in the bank son!!!

Link to comment
22 minutes ago, I'm Batman said:

 

Absolutely!!

 

money in the bank son!!!

That might be, but I'm tired of it now.

 

i found they grow WAY FASTER when nutrients are high. 

 

Im just glad I didn't put them in my 220g tank. There would be now way to take the rocks out and scrape them off. 

Link to comment

Yeah I'm done for the most part adding corals so I'm not worried about them taking over. My biggest annoyance is these two bubble tip anemones.. look at how in just 3 days the anemone burned the skin right off this trumpet!!

 

IMG_2810.thumb.JPG.9ab7650c3bbf872895277020c11aab84.JPG

  • Sad 1
Link to comment
On 8/8/2017 at 4:29 AM, I'm Batman said:

I bought that stuff in October of 2016 and as time went on I collected everything I needed.

 

The toughest part being the return nozzle bulkhead. I ordered the return nozzle and 1/2" elbow fitting for the JBJ and they decided to send me something that doesn't fit together like the one on my existing (wrong parts).

 

I was at my LFS and ran across a beautiful 20 Long with black silicon. I had already bought black silicon and was intending on stripping the one I had, but time is money and I couldnt resist buying a pre-made black seams tank.

 

I decided to go with a 1/2" screw/slip bulkhead and my hole was too small. Bought a titanium step bit and went to town. Didn't end up working well after an hour of drilling but I finally got it so I could screw one end of the nozzle fitting, through the acrylic to the bulkhead on the inside of the main sump baffle. Not the greatest set up. 

 

In April I used WeldOn acrylic bond to attach the overflow wall to the sump baffle and finally in May I decided to use black silicon and on the acrylic sump baffle and set it into place, I then added the overflow baffle and siliconed in place. They're not kidding when they say use in a ventilated area, that stuff had me choking it was pretty bad. I let this cure for about 8 days. 

 

Pics below...IMG_1383.thumb.JPG.7acbd5c679e4701e3fb433c79a2f90c2.JPG

 

IMG_1376.thumb.JPG.88ab52dba1eb0f119cf5b7da921df4d3.JPG

 

Time for a water test!!

IMG_1504.thumb.JPG.f8af95ab215276dbbb8f5c7ef6f480b1.JPG

I like this a lot good work!

Link to comment
18 hours ago, I'm Batman said:

Full tank shot for today. So far I've got some good growth going on!! @jesseatam

 

 

IMG_2797.thumb.JPG.db38964da5f9e9755b071efd93a37739.JPG

 

45 days after the transfer/ set up of this build and the Ledtrik Par38 is 16" above water and still causing tufts of hair algae. It's really hard to see I've been keeping an eye on it and today I've noticed no it's starting to bloom up. The black figi sand does a great job hiding algae but you really need to see if there's algae so you can manage it!

 

Im not dosing because my parameters have remained near perfect and I really blame the RedSea Reef Energy for diatoms and algae. My LFS has some algae and maybe it can also be attributed to using their RO and they don't deionize. 

 

I took a cup of their RO water up there and was going to have them test it so I could use that as a tool to make sure their system is in tip top or at least persuade them to change a cartridge or add a deionizing component but when I got my water jugs out of the car I decided I didn't have an extra hand for the sample test cup and didn't want to deal with it.

 

The owner is a really nice older gentleman, always in slacks, dress shoes and a polo which is cool because I'm always in slacks, dress shoes and a button up. He has some great employees you can become friends with as well. They have a little bit of an algae problem so you need to buy corals the day they come in or take caution and cut the plugs off. They have five 125 gallon systems each independent to their own sumps and one has flat worms but they're are blooming wih coralline,  filled with codium and covered in turf algaes. The tanks are healthy and they have little individual coral and reef 10 gallons run on air stone filters under some powerful lights that are flourishing. A little branch of their own crystal frogspawn is $39 but most of the other corals are reasonably priced. They order anything I ask them to order and I'm slowly getting more variety added in. 

 

Many only drawback is no matter where you go in the city, nobody runs perfect systems. Nothing is like Tidal Gardens up north. Each store has their own individual pests and nuisances. 

 

The store up in Dayton has like a 20k gallon system with a 12ft tall filtration components. But they aren't climate controlled and in the summer everything bleaches. On top of that there's always a uv serilizer bulb or Protein skimmer down that the owner never fixes it so their fish never last more than a month or two. I've purchased several box fish and a couple blennies and nothing survives. (I have saltwater fish fish that are 6 years old so it's not me!) The corals are always bleached in the summer and they have some nice cheap corals that can be nursed back to life. 

 

Theres 3 shops within 5 minutes of my house: the one is filled with aptaisia, the other one doesn't have a coral for less than $80 and all their fish have ich and the one I do all my business regularly has somewhat of an algae issue.

Between you and me, I'd rather deal with nuisance algae than aiptasia!  Except maybe bryopsis...:unsure:

  • Like 1
Link to comment

So I have a complete Zoa colony that's taken a turn for dead over the last few weeks and just won't come back.  

 

Then as I'm looking at the rock the colony is on, I notice this pretty massive wormlike creature traveling from one pore to another in the rock. Immediately I pulled the rock and placed it in coral dip for 15 minutes. Did the iodine reef dip for 15 and then did the other dip again for about 30 minutes because I forgot about it lol.

 

I dropped this into the qt and still have this worm in the rock. Tonight I was able to observe him out of the rocks and actually munching on the zoanthids!!!

 

IMG_2859.thumb.JPG.8d14ec95ae70459a2f5d0fc3c48a391f.JPG

 

IMG_2858.thumb.JPG.2f99c26cf9a1b98d7bf1a386b48c42b6.JPG

 

 

 

Still after all of that time in the dip how does that worm live?

 

IMG_2865.thumb.PNG.40f0f0e62444c9da2f6c35299860dfe1.PNG

  • Wow 2
Link to comment

Following this as I'm also getting ready to transfer to a new tank as soon as I finish building the stand. I really like what you have done so far. Hopefully your zoas are able to rebound once you get rid of that worm. Also I'm a fan of xenias, but they can fill my Pico up pretty quick, after the last cutbacks I have two tiny colonies regrowing, can't wait. 

  • Like 1
Link to comment

Day after day warfare!!

 

I had to separate this frogspawn and ricordea a few weeks ago because they were bothering each other.

 

Today is seems as tho a sweeper from the frogspawn got caught by the ricordea and he was pulling him in... pic below

 

IMG_2867.thumb.JPG.245fc19fd2c0cad79dc3a24bd5561de4.JPG

 

  • Wow 1
Link to comment

Trials and tribs of reef keeping...

 

I've got to figure out if I can stop some of the tissue recession. I have some corals thriving, and others are thriving but losing tissue. 

 

The pocillopora below had some tissue recession on one stalk by now it has lost most of its base. There's also a white film growing on the stalks.

 

IMG_2868.thumb.JPG.1ac63d82dcd0d3085a895d68273d776e.JPG

 

My frogspawn are doing pretty good but I'm concerned about the biggest one because it has this same film... hopefully this does not affect the growth.

 

IMG_2871.thumb.JPG.0f923026226118d96d61633c5e988de9.JPG

 

This Montipora Tubbs Stelata is losing polyps and tissue on the areas that are shadowed by his growing fingers...

 

IMG_2875.thumb.JPG.898fef3a674f641632fe4a753c169eb9.JPG

 

All of my Params are in check and my salinity swings between 1.025 and 1.026 about twice a week - more depending on humidity. 

 

Using Instant Ocean Reef Crystals and everything checks around 500ppm on Calcium and 1500ppm on Magnesium.

 

Any thoughts?

Link to comment
  • 2 weeks later...
On 9/24/2017 at 1:14 AM, I'm Batman said:

Here's a better pic of that film/ growth on the frogspawn...

 

IMG_2888.thumb.JPG.49ac403dd6766c41d66b4d1de77178b8.JPG

Try scraping it off gently?  Idk what it is lol.

Link to comment

Someone in another thread mentioned Hydroids... which is an interesting guess because I have seen a hydroid or two on the glass. Nothing near as bad as the population I had randomly bloom in my puffer tank!!

Link to comment
  • 1 month later...
  • 1 year later...

Wow it’s amazing what happens to a tank after two years. I moved in March of 2018, and nothing every really settled back in. Here’s an FTS Shot from today... Ended up with a TON of sponges.... not sure where they came from. No livestock has been added however my anemones have stung just about everything to death and has split 5 times total.
 

 

BC5A24A5-84E0-47D3-B11C-DA0049E4C3CF.jpeg

  • Like 1
Link to comment
  • 1 month later...

12/10 update. No water changes, heavy feeding reef roids, Tunze 9001 slimmer, Microbacter7 and a chaeto reactor... so far things are clearing up. I only dropped the white lights on the AI Prime HD by like 4%.

 

Looks like I may be on the path to beating the Dino’s!!

 

Also the Montipora is coming back pretty rapidly. He’s grown a bunch over the last few weeks and his polyps are getting larger!!

6CC609F6-3D8D-4897-97DF-A323ECB7A9A9.jpeg

45CF4B31-8517-464B-BE6C-64B16D3B4E2D.jpeg

  • Like 1
Link to comment
  • 2 weeks later...
  • 5 months later...

Couple update pics. Tank is doing great. Montis are growing like crazy! About a month ago, all of my 8 ricordea melted but everything else is doing fine. When I had the Dino issue those ricordea were striving. 

A82797B3-32C9-457F-81C7-B84026FF2868.jpeg

F1B6AD4E-25E0-49F1-8A5B-58806DD4F14C.jpeg

E1D75D54-A863-4AD0-B3D8-4DFE6AF07096.jpeg

4786C765-7AB5-4E98-B48B-59F19C27CF9A.jpeg

BD3C482E-C37C-4731-B16B-8DF980769779.jpeg

  • Like 2
Link to comment
  • 4 months later...

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

  • Recommended Discussions

×
×
  • Create New...