Jesse's 30 gallon reef + 10 gallon planted dorm tank

[jesseatam]

I think I know what the plan is for the reef, I don’t want to break it down completely so I’m thinking about downsizing it to the 10 gallon QT. I’d transfer over all the remaining live stock, and throughly scrub whatever rock and other surfaces I transfer over keeping the old qt barebottom. It would probably just become a macro tank with whatever corals from the old tank make it. It’s really a shame that the tank didn’t do all that well in my absence, there’s still a lot I want to try with saltwater. I just really want to try some things that I haven’t seen anyone else really do a whole lot and set up like experimental systems where I could do different methods to compare or things like that. Sadly none of that is really possible for me at the moment.

 

The little planted tank is chugging along well but my ludwigia isn’t really doing much, I think I need a new background plant of some kind. I’m going to try converting some water sprite back to its planting form rather than floating but it’s gonna be a pain to try to keep it down. The betta is also limiting what I can do with stocking, as much as I love my boy Ted I just don’t feel comfortable adding anything besides more cories in with him which is unfortunate as I want to try some kind of schooling fish.

[Lula_Mae]

11 hours ago, jesseatam said:

I think I know what the plan is for the reef, I don’t want to break it down completely so I’m thinking about downsizing it to the 10 gallon QT. I’d transfer over all the remaining live stock, and throughly scrub whatever rock and other surfaces I transfer over keeping the old qt barebottom. It would probably just become a macro tank with whatever corals from the old tank make it. It’s really a shame that the tank didn’t do all that well in my absence, there’s still a lot I want to try with saltwater. I just really want to try some things that I haven’t seen anyone else really do a whole lot and set up like experimental systems where I could do different methods to compare or things like that. Sadly none of that is really possible for me at the moment.

 

The little planted tank is chugging along well but my ludwigia isn’t really doing much, I think I need a new background plant of some kind. I’m going to try converting some water sprite back to its planting form rather than floating but it’s gonna be a pain to try to keep it down. The betta is also limiting what I can do with stocking, as much as I love my boy Ted I just don’t feel comfortable adding anything besides more cories in with him which is unfortunate as I want to try some kind of schooling fish.

I know how it is wanting to try things and not having space/funds/time to do it!  I might suggest going even smaller than 10 gallons, maybe try a pico or a jar or something that is small and easy to transport back and forth (and small enough that you might be able to get away with it in the dorm along with the betta tank).  You might could stick all your extra live rock in a bucket of water and just keep it out of the way in your room or something so that it's there when you're in a place in life where you can go back to bigger tanks.  I've kept picos my whole reefing life and find them very enjoyable (I never got my first fish until about a year and a half ago and I've been in the hobby since 2008).  There's lots of interesting inverts that you can observe closely in a pico that you wouldn't see as much of in a larger tank.

[jesseatam]

On 1/2/2019 at 11:22 PM, Lula_Mae said:

I know how it is wanting to try things and not having space/funds/time to do it!  I might suggest going even smaller than 10 gallons, maybe try a pico or a jar or something that is small and easy to transport back and forth (and small enough that you might be able to get away with it in the dorm along with the betta tank).  You might could stick all your extra live rock in a bucket of water and just keep it out of the way in your room or something so that it's there when you're in a place in life where you can go back to bigger tanks.  I've kept picos my whole reefing life and find them very enjoyable (I never got my first fish until about a year and a half ago and I've been in the hobby since 2008).  There's lots of interesting inverts that you can observe closely in a pico that you wouldn't see as much of in a larger tank.

I’ve never really considered a pico, but I might be able  to kind of sneak something like that in. Definitely something I need to put more research into.

[Lula_Mae]

On 1/12/2019 at 9:57 AM, jesseatam said:

I’ve never really considered a pico, but I might be able  to kind of sneak something like that in. Definitely something I need to put more research into.

Picos can seem a bit intimidating but they're what I'm used to so I find them easier than "big" tanks lol.  There's a wide variety of options, too, from jars and bowls to proper mini tanks.  An easy one would be a 2.5 or 5.5 standard with an Aquaclear and small powerhead if needed.  A simple PAR bulb can provide the lighting.

[jesseatam]

16 hours ago, Lula_Mae said:

Picos can seem a bit intimidating but they're what I'm used to so I find them easier than "big" tanks lol.  There's a wide variety of options, too, from jars and bowls to proper mini tanks.  An easy one would be a 2.5 or 5.5 standard with an Aquaclear and small powerhead if needed.  A simple PAR bulb can provide the lighting.

I would love a tiny setup like this, I just don't have a source of rodi/distilled at school rn so that's something I need to figure out.

[Lula_Mae]

2 hours ago, jesseatam said:

I would love a tiny setup like this, I just don't have a source of rodi/distilled at school rn so that's something I need to figure out.

Do you have access to a car where you could get to a grocery store?  I used distilled (mostly from Walmart) for years and it worked well.  You could get a couple of smaller than 5 gallon buckets if needed for water changes (so they take up less space).

[jesseatam]

Hey sorry long time no post but everything is going well. I believe I have a master plan for the reef and I did a thing but I’m going to keep it under wraps for now because I don’t know what’s going to end up happening. I just want to do a complete revamp of that system, which would hopefully take place after this semester over the summer. 

 

The dorm tank successfully made the move back with no incidents and it’s doing well. I have an order of plants, amano shrimp, and some mystery snails coming in tomorrow which is exciting. While I was home the tank was receiving quite a bit of sunlight which caused some minor string algae problems but since coming back it has seemed to die back, the amanos that are coming should help finish off whatever’s left. The only real change I’ve made is getting rid of the ludwigia I had, I only had one stem of it that wasn’t dying and even then it only had leaves towards the top portion. The stocking of the tank after this will probably stay this way as long as I have my betta Ted due to his aggression. I would like to get more corys if possible but with the mortality rate I’ve had with shipping them I will only be purchasing them from a store at this point.

[jesseatam]

Did an Instagram post a couple days ago with pics of the dorm tank, I'll put the link in case any of you are interested:

 

As of today actually the dwarf lily just sent a pad up to the surface too!

[jesseatam]

Hello everyone I am now officially done with my first year of college and I’m now back home for the summer it means it’s finally time for an update on the reef.

Now I bet all of you are wondering who that beautiful broad in there is because I haven’t mentioned anything about her. Well back in my february post I mentioned I “did a thing” and said thing was buying a clarkii clown who I have named Linda AKA Big Linda. I didn’t want to mention anything because she was kind of an impulse buy and I didn’t have a QT running so I wasn’t sure how she would do. For a while this fish looked like it was on death row and I went back to school after winter break thinking she wasn’t going to make it. Somehow though she pulled through, and now seems to be doing very well thanks to my parents. When I was home for spring break I treated for internal parasites as well so by this point if nothing has else has popped up she should be all clear. Something interesting I noticed while feeding her is that she seems to be feeding the GSP. I’m not sure if she’s using the GSP as a host in the absence of an aneome or what since I haven’t seen her physically go into the coral but she does seem to tend to hang out more on the right side where she is in the photo. I know the tank looks pretty ugly with all the bubble algae but believe it or not it looks better compared to when I last saw it, a lot of the macro algae that died off is starting to grow back now which I hope can compete against the bubble algae. If you guys want me to go into the dorm tank I will too but for now I just wanted to give an update on the reef.