Upside Down Pico Reef - A very Pico Christmas!

[TFish77]

8 hours ago, micoastreefing said:

umm, Golden Mountain sauce! Now, that's a very fine and unique choice of condiment sir. 

 I was waiting for someone to notice that. My thai dishes have never been the same! 

[TFish77]

Sometimes you just make bad decisions. 

 

[vlangel]

7 hours ago, TFish77 said:

Well I didn't win the gold star but I won the orange star. Got beat out by some punk 8 year old girl .

 

I did not see hers but your seahorse is superb!

[duderubble]

I'd be tempted to buy a second container for water changes. Move the lid to a new jar full of fresh saltwater and clean out the first container thoroughly in preparation for the next water change. 

 

I'm not sure if that would be cheating but who would know? LOL 

 

[TFish77]

1 hour ago, duderubble said:

I'd be tempted to buy a second container for water changes. Move the lid to a new jar full of fresh saltwater and clean out the first container thoroughly in preparation for the next water change. 

 

I'm not sure if that would be cheating but who would know? LOL 

 

 That's crazy I was just thinking about doing something like that last night. It would give me a bit more time to clean the inside (not that it takes long) but also reduce stress on the main branch from constantly flipping it over. Luckily I had the perfect piece of tupperware hanging around!

 

 

[jahnje]

In the long run that's going  to be the approach I take with my build. Is being able to pull a central 'stalk' and place it directly into a new matching container. Though I'm going to try and have it bottom supported.  

[Christopher Marks]

On 10/28/2017 at 12:24 PM, TFish77 said:

 That's crazy I was just thinking about doing something like that last night. It would give me a bit more time to clean the inside (not that it takes long) but also reduce stress on the main branch from constantly flipping it over. Luckily I had the perfect piece of tupperware hanging around!

That's a great solution!

[metrokat]

That is a great idea for a water change

[Boggers]

I really like this idea. The snail(s) might not like the reduced food, but it will help keep things clean.

[Lula_Mae]

On 10/28/2017 at 1:38 AM, TFish77 said:

Sometimes you just make bad decisions. 

 

Beautiful. I lost mine. 

[TFish77]

2 hours ago, Lula_Mae said:

Beautiful. I lost mine. 

 

Sorry to hear that  . The one in the pico still seems good (for now ) but I did lose the nice new coco worm I got for the 20 gallon. These guys just seem kinda hit in miss when you are transferring them unfortunately. 

[TFish77]

Holy crap.... Literally . That feather duster is no joke. 

 

 

 

I was a little worried about water clarity without being able to run carbon but everything looks good so far. I am still debating on what types of coral to put in there but I definitely want to have as big of variety of species as possible just to see how different things respond to being upside down essentially. I am sure I will lose a few things (acropora?) but it's supposed to be a fun experiment so we will see how stuff responds over the next couple of months. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[vlangel]

It looks so good all clean and fresh.  I can't wait to see other coral do in it.

[TFish77]

3 hours ago, vlangel said:

It looks so good all clean and fresh.  I can't wait to see other coral do in it.

Thank you! Yeah it's very hard stopping myself from just dumping a ton of coral in there. I invested in a frag tank a few years ago and since I don't really sell much (need to start but afraid of shipping) I have a pretty good amount saved up. Too much actually. If anyone is local or has advice on how to ship please come get some of these for super cheap .

 

I'm just trying to take things slow and not overdo it at first. I've had 1 other pico before but never anything this small or with this little filtration. 

 

[Lula_Mae]

16 hours ago, TFish77 said:

 

Sorry to hear that  . The one in the pico still seems good (for now ) but I did lose the nice new coco worm I got for the 20 gallon. These guys just seem kinda hit in miss when you are transferring them unfortunately. 

Yeah, he dropped his crown after the gorgs bit it, then didn't appreciate being knocked about when I was rescaping.

15 hours ago, TFish77 said:

Holy crap.... Literally . That feather duster is no joke. 

 

 

 

I was a little worried about water clarity without being able to run carbon but everything looks good so far. I am still debating on what types of coral to put in there but I definitely want to have as big of variety of species as possible just to see how different things respond to being upside down essentially. I am sure I will lose a few things (acropora?) but it's supposed to be a fun experiment so we will see how stuff responds over the next couple of months. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Mine had a bag full of poop by the time I got him in the tank.

[TFish77]

15 hours ago, Lula_Mae said:

Yeah, he dropped his crown after the gorgs bit it, then didn't appreciate being knocked about when I was rescaping.

Mine had a bag full of poop by the time I got him in the tank.

 

I know it's crazy. I bought 2 feathers and a coco worm. Put the coco in my 20g and immediately lost it (worm and crown), put 1 in my frag system and it immediately threw its crown, and dumped 1 in the pico and he is the only one still happy  . 

[Lula_Mae]

7 minutes ago, TFish77 said:

 

I know it's crazy. I bought 2 feathers and a coco worm. Put the coco in my 20g and immediately lost it (worm and crown), put 1 in my frag system and it immediately threw its crown, and dumped 1 in the pico and he is the only one still happy  . 

My duster in my 5.5 had also disappeared with the gorg incident, but I just saw last night a tiny baby crown forming!

[TFish77]

So I made it a few days before I finally broke down and added a few things.... I am ashamed .

 

I fought the urge to add things at an angle or sideways and tried to put stuff completely upside down wherever possible (For Science!). As expected the Euphyllia has already started to try and "float" towards the surface but so far its not too extreme. The candy cane is a little pissed off mainly because I kept hitting it while messing with the filtration. I am pretty sure the encrusting monti will grow no matter what because they have no problem growing on the underside of rocks. That is as long as I don't kill it for some other reason. I figured the birdsnest would be a good way to try sps in there initially because I am pretty sure any acro would not be happy. Also plopped a few more zoas in there just for variation. 

 

For a few of these pictures I actually used electrical tape to cover up all but the small holes where the blue light comes through the bulb to drown out most of the white. DIY night mode! 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

After browsing through all the other picos I noticed a few people using lift tubes which I thought was a great idea. This is the first tank I have ever run solely off a bubbler and not only did this do a great job of redirecting a lot of the flow throughout the tank but for some reason it is SOOO MUCH QUIETER! Seriously the tank sounded like I was boiling a huge pot of soup before I added that extra pipe. I will probably clean it up a bit and try and hide the pipe a bit more but here it is for now. 

 

 

[Christopher Marks]

I love this, how interesting to see each coral respond to being upside down. I'm most curious about the Euphyllia!

[Hobbs]

So cool seeing all the corals upside down. My brain kept on trying to flip it back the other way lol. Have you thought about keeping any inverts in there (crabs/shrimp)? Might be hard with such radical water changes but i think a shrimp perching would be really neat!

[fishfreak0114]

It's seriously messing with my mind looking at those pictures!  Off to a great start.

[gena]

I can't help but think all the blood is rushing to their heads .  I feel uncomfortable looking at it!!!!  But it looks great!!!!!

[TFish77]

On 11/1/2017 at 6:00 PM, Christopher Marks said:

I love this, how interesting to see each coral respond to being upside down. I'm most curious about the Euphyllia!

 

On 11/1/2017 at 8:28 PM, Hobbs said:

So cool seeing all the corals upside down. My brain kept on trying to flip it back the other way lol. Have you thought about keeping any inverts in there (crabs/shrimp)? Might be hard with such radical water changes but i think a shrimp perching would be really neat!

 

22 hours ago, fishfreak0114 said:

It's seriously messing with my mind looking at those pictures!  Off to a great start.

 

11 hours ago, gena said:

I can't help but think all the blood is rushing to their heads .  I feel uncomfortable looking at it!!!!  But it looks great!!!!!

 

 

Thank you guys all very much!!! It's definitely turning out to be a very cool experiment and is probably my current favorite tank. I didn't take any pictures today but the Euphyllia and Candy Cane were almost double in size compared to yesterday. I think redirecting the bubbles away seemed to help them open up a lot more. Still have only fed the tank once as I am trying to take it easy initially. Also not sure when I want to do the first official water change. 

 

I am open to suggestions about corals people would like to see grown (or attempted to be grown) upside down. A few more interesting ones I thought of would be a capping monti, a chalice, and potentially a toadstool leather or sinularia. I am trying to add stuff that we know doesn't traditionally grow on the underside of rocks or very easily. 

 

When it comes to other livestock I am still not 100% sure. I definitely want to try and avoid things like sexy shrimp. 1 because they are heavy feeders and 2 because a lot of people seem to have them already :-p. I have some species of Tetralia (Acro Crab) hanging out in my frag tank that I seriously considered adding. I'm just not sure if he will hang out in a birdsnest the same way. I've heard they will but don't have any first hand experience. 

 

 

 

Also I fixed the FTS so it looks more natural 

 

[Lula_Mae]

On 11/2/2017 at 10:45 PM, TFish77 said:

 

 

 

 

 

Thank you guys all very much!!! It's definitely turning out to be a very cool experiment and is probably my current favorite tank. I didn't take any pictures today but the Euphyllia and Candy Cane were almost double in size compared to yesterday. I think redirecting the bubbles away seemed to help them open up a lot more. Still have only fed the tank once as I am trying to take it easy initially. Also not sure when I want to do the first official water change. 

 

I am open to suggestions about corals people would like to see grown (or attempted to be grown) upside down. A few more interesting ones I thought of would be a capping monti, a chalice, and potentially a toadstool leather or sinularia. I am trying to add stuff that we know doesn't traditionally grow on the underside of rocks or very easily. 

 

When it comes to other livestock I am still not 100% sure. I definitely want to try and avoid things like sexy shrimp. 1 because they are heavy feeders and 2 because a lot of people seem to have them already :-p. I have some species of Tetralia (Acro Crab) hanging out in my frag tank that I seriously considered adding. I'm just not sure if he will hang out in a birdsnest the same way. I've heard they will but don't have any first hand experience. 

 

 

 

Also I fixed the FTS so it looks more natural 

 

Reason 3 to avoid sexy shrimp: they sometimes eat coral.

[rog2961]

Nice