Dr. Felicia's Back to Basics IM14 - Retired 2/25/2020

[Felicia]

13 hours ago, teenyreef said:

Oh wow, it looks great already and you haven't even done the scape yet! This is going to be a really fun build to watch 

Thank you, Teeny!  I'm thrilled with this tank so far, so I'm excited too!  It always fun to plan and execute a new build! 

9 hours ago, vlangel said:

Your tank has such a nice sleek, clean look.  I love that.

Thank you, Dawn!  This is my first ever rimless aquarium.  All of my aquariums so far (except the seahorse tank) have been standard, Petco dollar-a-gallon tanks.  The seahorse tank was an old used Oceanic tank with a thick faux wood rim.  Its fun to own one of these sleek, modern aquariums finally.  It seems to be good quality and I like the thick rimless glass with the black silicone.  So far, I'm impressed with Innovative Marine!

8 hours ago, RIP Sebastian said:

I love the scape! I know you said you just "threw them in", but I think it's an awesome softie scape. Lots of room to grow up!

I really did just throw them in!  They were in a bucket of salt water and I just picked them out one at a time at random and set them in the tank.  I couldn't even see how I was placing this due to the tank being cloudy from adding the sand.  I actually agree that they don't look half bad in the current random pile.  Not quite exactly what I'm going for, but maybe I can start with this and tweak to get a more defined scape.  I do want to keep the scape somewhat lower since I want gorgonians to add the height.

 

 

 

 

How bad is it that I'm cycling a tank and don't have a test kit?   When I took down the predator tank, most of my kits were expired or close to it, so I threw them out.  I realized I have no way to check the cycle, so I ordered an API Reef Masters kit on Amazon.  With this tank, I plan to do no testing once the initial cycle is done.  The plan is easy and I hate testing!

 

I'm not sure how much of a cycle I'm going to get considering I used live sand and cured live rock (Real Reef rock, which is fake rock that is cured to be "live").  I also had a bottle of Seachem Stability (bottled bacteria) laying around, so I'm going to add that once a day for the first 7 days as the bottle recommends.  I probably won't get much of a cycle, but I'm going to be patient and not rush things.  I have a trip coming up and definitely don't want to stock a new tank right before going out of town.  I'm thinking I'll just let this tank sit for about 3-4 weeks to make sure its stable before adding livestock.

15 hours ago, Felicia said:

Alright, I'm off to bed, but I'll leave you all with some quick photos of the tank now that the water has cleared up.  Ignore the sand dust on the glass.  The sand dust is always such a pain for the first couple weeks until it all gets filtered out.

 

Moving these over to the new page!

[MarieH]

Ha

I gave away my nearly expired salifert  test kits and also got the api reef master set. So far I have only checked nitrates and kh.  I set up this one to avoid testing lol.  Cheers to the simple  life.

[vlangel]

I hear ya, I hate testing too.  I bought those dip a strip since mostly what I care about is nitrates and phosphates.  I keep an ammonia badge in the sump to alert me of a problem.  I prefer WCs to testing any day.  I guess its a good thing I am into ponies and not sticks!

[Sharbuckle]

19 hours ago, Felicia said:

Alright, I'm off to bed, but I'll leave you all with some quick photos of the tank now that the water has cleared up.  Ignore the sand dust on the glass.  The sand dust is always such a pain for the first couple weeks until it all gets filtered out.

 

Makes me wanna setup another smaller nano! Arrrgh

[Felicia]

6 hours ago, MarieH said:

Ha

I gave away my nearly expired salifert  test kits and also got the api reef master set. So far I have only checked nitrates and kh.  I set up this one to avoid testing lol.  Cheers to the simple  life.

Testing is overrated!    I'm all for the simple life!

4 hours ago, vlangel said:

I hear ya, I hate testing too.  I bought those dip a strip since mostly what I care about is nitrates and phosphates.  I keep an ammonia badge in the sump to alert me of a problem.  I prefer WCs to testing any day.  I guess its a good thing I am into ponies and not sticks!

Testing is just awful.  How do you like the strips?  Do they see, accurate?  I thought about getting those but then ended up just sticking with the standard API Reef Masters kit for the cycle and then to have on hand if needed.  I'm with you on just preferring to the water changes.  I don't know that I would say ponies are any easier than sticks, they just don't require testing! 

3 hours ago, Sharbuckle said:

Makes me wanna setup another smaller nano! Arrrgh

Glad you like it! 

[blizzardscout2]

I missed out on your predator thread but oh my goodness was that cool. I look forward to see what you do with this one. So far so good!

[Felicia]

14 hours ago, blizzardscout2 said:

I missed out on your predator thread but oh my goodness was that cool. I look forward to see what you do with this one. So far so good!

Thank you!  I'm sure this tank won't be quite as cool as the predator reef, but I'm hoping it turns into an easy and enjoyable tank 

[blizzardscout2]

I'm positive it will. You got skills. Reefing of course although Indiana Jones was a Dr too. ?

[Felicia]

On 8/24/2017 at 1:12 PM, blizzardscout2 said:

I'm positive it will. You got skills. Reefing of course although Indiana Jones was a Dr too. ?

Well thank you for the vote of confidence!  I am sadly not nearly as cool as Indiana Jones.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I have no new aquarium photos since its just doing its thing cycling.  However, I have a cute Lily photo for you all.

 

[teenyreef]

That Lily is such a heartbreaker 

[Felicia]

11 hours ago, teenyreef said:

That Lily is such a heartbreaker 

Yep, that's pretty much her job in life!  She has definitely perfected the art of looking very regally beautiful. 

 

 

 

 

 

Alright, working on aquascaping tonight.  Taped out the footprint of the tank on an amazon box and played with arranging rock for a while.  Lily was busy in her position as supervisor of course.

 

 

I'm not sure yet if I like what I came up with since when I moved the rocks back into the tank, I disturbed the sand and made a cloudy mess of the tank again.  Right now I have milk white water.  Clearly the fine sand dust had not all been filtered out yet.  We'll see what it looks like once the water clears and then I'm sure I'll do some tweaking.  The goal with this aquascape is to keep it natural looking.  I didn't want to make anything crazy stylized that requires a ton of epoxying structures together.  I also want to keep it reasonably low since I want to add height with gorgonians, not rocks.  And finally I want to leave some open sand bed, since in a small tank like this, I think that's key to making the tank look roomier and not overcrowded with rock.  Hopefully I can achieve all that!

 

In other news, the last piece of equipment arrived today!  I bought the AutoAqua Smart ATO Micro since the float switch for my JBJ ATO wouldn't fit in the return chamber of this tank.  I'm about to go get that set up.  I also need to finish cord organizing and get all the controllers (MP10, ATO, and heater controller) mounted to the wall next to the dresser the tank is sitting on.  The velcro-like Command Strips for hanging frames are awesome for mounting controllers.

 

 

[teenyreef]

I love that scape! I hope it turns out well when the water clears.

 

I always to try to have an open sand bed when I do the scape, and then I fill it all up with corals eventually 

[Chris!]

12 hours ago, Felicia said:

Yep, that's pretty much her job in life!  She has definitely perfected the art of looking very regally beautiful. 

 

 

 

 

 

Alright, working on aquascaping tonight.  Taped out the footprint of the tank on an amazon box and played with arranging rock for a while.  Lily was busy in her position as supervisor of course.

 

 

I'm not sure yet if I like what I came up with since when I moved the rocks back into the tank, I disturbed the sand and made a cloudy mess of the tank again.  Right now I have milk white water.  Clearly the fine sand dust had not all been filtered out yet.  We'll see what it looks like once the water clears and then I'm sure I'll do some tweaking.  The goal with this aquascape is to keep it natural looking.  I didn't want to make anything crazy stylized that requires a ton of epoxying structures together.  I also want to keep it reasonably low since I want to add height with gorgonians, not rocks.  And finally I want to leave some open sand bed, since in a small tank like this, I think that's key to making the tank look roomier and not overcrowded with rock.  Hopefully I can achieve all that!

 

In other news, the last piece of equipment arrived today!  I bought the AutoAqua Smart ATO Micro since the float switch for my JBJ ATO wouldn't fit in the return chamber of this tank.  I'm about to go get that set up.  I also need to finish cord organizing and get all the controllers (MP10, ATO, and heater controller) mounted to the wall next to the dresser the tank is sitting on.  The velcro-like Command Strips for hanging frames are awesome for mounting controllers.

 

 

Looks like that will be a sweet little scape. I like the idea of low and letting the corals grow up as well. Did you take a "top down shot" to see the open sand bed?

[Felicia]

16 hours ago, teenyreef said:

I love that scape! I hope it turns out well when the water clears.

 

I always to try to have an open sand bed when I do the scape, and then I fill it all up with corals eventually 

Thank you! I think I'm liking how it looks. The scapes always look different ones the rocks are sunk down into the sandbed. I think I accomplished what I wanted, but I didn't epoxy anything together in case I decide to tweak anything later.  

 

I'm with you on that! I always intend to leave open sand bed too and then always find things to stick on that sandbed as well! 

5 hours ago, Chris! said:

Looks like that will be a sweet little scape. I like the idea of low and letting the corals grow up as well. Did you take a "top down shot" to see the open sand bed?

Thank you! Yeah I'm liking the idea of having less rock and more heigh from the corals, especially in a small tank like this. Hopefully it works out the way I'm envisioning it. I didn't think to snap a top down of the scape laid out on the cardboard, but I did snap a top down of the rocks in the tank now that the water is clear.

 

[RIP Sebastian]

Looks great!

[teenyreef]

Looks great from the top down too! 

[Felicia]

35 minutes ago, RIP Sebastian said:

Looks great!

Thank you!  I'm happy with how its coming together so far 

33 minutes ago, teenyreef said:

Looks great from the top down too! 

Thank you, Teeny!  Quite a bit of open sand bed for me to fill up with assorted corals 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Alright guys, how about a video?!  I love making videos and haven't had an aquarium to make a video of, so I'm taking the new build as an opportunity to start making videos again.  To start off, how about the reveal of the new aquascape and a narrated tour of the equipment?

 

 

[gena]

Another FABULOUS video!!!!  The quality is outstanding, by the way.  Looking GREAT already .

[Chris!]

Looking real good! I like the openness around the scape as well as the lower scape will have a lot more room for everything that way. 

[MarieH]

Really nice! I am happy to see how you set this up, thank you!  Putting bees in my brain

[Felicia]

On 8/27/2017 at 4:24 PM, gena said:

Another FABULOUS video!!!!  The quality is outstanding, by the way.  Looking GREAT already .

Thank you, Gena!  I just film these with my iPhone and then edit them together with iMovie.  Its a super easy way to make some decent videos.  I'm glad you like how its looking!  I was laughing last night because my friends came over to watch GoT and the first set that arrived saw the tank and were like, "Oh, it has coral already?  How pretty!"  I had to tell them that nope, that was just rock with fake corraline algae painted on it.  Then the next friend shows up and says the exact same thing.  Too funny that they thought purple rocks was coral. 

On 8/27/2017 at 8:52 PM, Chris! said:

Looking real good! I like the openness around the scape as well as the lower scape will have a lot more room for everything that way. 

Thank you, Chris!  Now that I've had a couple days to look at it, I'm really liking it.  I think it will work well for the type of corals I want.  I was trying to keep it open around the rocks to make it easy to scrape the glass because I'm really OCD about algae on the glass.  I was pleasantly surprised by how roomy the 14 gallon is even with 9.7 lbs of rock in it.

16 hours ago, MarieH said:

Really nice! I am happy to see how you set this up, thank you!  Putting bees in my brain

Thank you, Marie!  Hopefully I'm not giving you too many ideas!  We're all such a bad influence on each other around here 

[Felicia]

Here are a few photos of the rock scape.  I'm really liking it and I think this is how its going to stay.

 

 

[jack1978]

8 minutes ago, Felicia said:

Here are a few photos of the rock scape.  I'm really liking it and I think this is how its going to stay.

 

 

Nice and clean.....looks great!

[Lula_Mae]

33 minutes ago, Felicia said:

Here are a few photos of the rock scape.  I'm really liking it and I think this is how its going to stay.

 

 

Love the arch!  And plenty of vertical space for gorgs and maybe macros to fill, and for fishies to swim!

[Felicia]

12 hours ago, jack1978 said:

Nice and clean.....looks great!

Thank you, Jack!  I'm so used to using inexpensive, rimmed tanks.  Its surprising how clean/sleek these little rimless tanks look.  I'm attempting to keep that look by not having too much equipment clutter or visible wires.  I was trying to cord organize and originally I was like, this isn't going to be bad at all because this tank has so much less equipment and therefore less plugs then my last build.  Somehow, even with less than half the number of things that need to get plugged in, there is still a rat's nest of wires