Subsea Posted November 18, 2017 Share Posted November 18, 2017 Us reefers will go anywhere to get our fix. 2 Quote Link to comment
jahnje Posted November 19, 2017 Author Share Posted November 19, 2017 Went to Gateway Aquatics and The Corner Reef south of Saint Louis yesterday. Gateway had a nice selection and what not, but The Corner Reef was just awesome. Really friendly and helpful people and an amazing selection. The Corner Reef really deserves all of the shameless plugs they can get. Even my two year old was happy to hang out there for over an hour while I picked out coral. Picked up a Pro Corals Rainbow Acro which should be fun, and give me a second 'tree' in the garden. Just placed him in his new digs this morning. Neither supper happy nor unhappy as far as I can tell. Also picked up a black footed Trochus snail, and some sort of crazy pink and yellow Goniopora. It's just so super cool, I couldn't pass it up. We'll have to see how it does. Broadcast reef chili should be good for it, but I may have to do so more than once a week. I have this and the acro on the high parts of the tank for more light. Not that I know if a couple of inches or so will make a difference. I'm probably also going to do more frequent water 100% water changes for a bit. The new trochus is not currently happy for some reason. So I'll have to keep an eye on him. 5 Quote Link to comment
jahnje Posted November 20, 2017 Author Share Posted November 20, 2017 Trochus snail did not make it. Had not moved from his spot in 48 hours, and did not smell great either. Will have to try again. Had some temperature issues on the 3+ hour trip back from the store that probably did him in. New corals are still doing fine this morning though. Just completed another 100% wc because of feeding yesterday. 1 Quote Link to comment
debbeach13 Posted November 20, 2017 Share Posted November 20, 2017 Sorry to hear about the snail. But good news on the coral. Quote Link to comment
ajmckay Posted November 20, 2017 Share Posted November 20, 2017 Bummer on the snail... Sounds like you went out of your way quite a bit to pick it up. Trochus are great snails though. I've had one in a 3g for over a year. I bought it the size of a dime and now it's about the size of a gold dollar coin. It's shell is also super tall so it bumps into stuff a lot. I suppose I should get a replacement and re-home this one to the 40b... Quote Link to comment
jahnje Posted November 20, 2017 Author Share Posted November 20, 2017 4 hours ago, debbeach13 said: Sorry to hear about the snail. But good news on the coral. 1 hour ago, ajmckay said: Bummer on the snail... Sounds like you went out of your way quite a bit to pick it up. Trochus are great snails though. I've had one in a 3g for over a year. I bought it the size of a dime and now it's about the size of a gold dollar coin. It's shell is also super tall so it bumps into stuff a lot. I suppose I should get a replacement and re-home this one to the 40b... That snail was a last minute throw in, in addition to the corals. So at least it wasn't the purpose of my trip. But I used my heater for my pico plugged into an inverter in my car on the trip back, and it got the water to over 90 on the way home. :-( So, going to have to rethink that for my container, or at least add a fail safe. Currently my container has been in a larger water bath so haven't really had a chance to test this little heater until this trip. Just glad it was a short enough time that the corals survived. The snail was also floating in a bag at the top vs. the corals which we're on the bottom, so that may have had an effect as well. Quote Link to comment
vlangel Posted November 21, 2017 Share Posted November 21, 2017 Very nice goniopora and acro! The colors are pretty. Sorry about the snail. Even on a long trip I would probably skip the heater. Your ambient temperature in the car with a styrofoam container would probably be fine. Coral are pretty tough about cool water but not so much about hot! 2 Quote Link to comment
jahnje Posted November 21, 2017 Author Share Posted November 21, 2017 Took advantage of BRS's sales and got a seneye so I could measure par in my tanks. They threw in a free fluid media reactor. So pretty good deal. Anyway, PAR in the pico with a RapidLED par38 mixed light bulb is 250 at best. Was not a gentle experience trying to get the sensor in the tank. Hopefully everyone will look less stressed tomorrow... Didn't end up leaving it in there. Actual PAR is probably varies around 180 - 210 depending, so just on the fringe of everything. bottom for the acro, and top for the xenia and gsp. So hopefully everything will continue to do well. I had planned to leave the sensor in to monitor things, but it's just too much for so small a tank, and I want to use it on other things anyway. On a different topic, thought I'd show my travel setup since I have to go so far to get decent fish and coral. Consists of a 4 quart lidded container from my QT system. pipette is cut short so I can close the lid on the cooler. THe Cooler is an 18 can cooler. Kit also includes a 200 watt inverter, 10 watt heater, 1.5 watt air pump. Everything can fit in the cooler when not needed. Depending on fish or coral, I have a smaller egg crate that fits easily, and some stands to keep the frags from leaning or tumbling around. I need to add an additional heat control or switch heaters since on this last trip it overheated in there. But it was a rainy 40 degree day, and dinner had to be eaten along the way. Here's everything laid out: and here it is all in service: Depending on what's going on you can have the water in just in the container, or surrounding the container as well. You can also leave the container out, and just float bags in the cooler, but not as watertight, and requires more water. I generally have the LFS just put all of the livestock in the container, and not use bags at all. Generally about 2 "bags" worth of water is enough to give you a decent level where everything stays submerged. For an extra long trip, a few drops of prime will keep things under control as well. 1 Quote Link to comment
jahnje Posted November 21, 2017 Author Share Posted November 21, 2017 1 minute ago, vlangel said: Very nice goniopora and acro! The colors are pretty. Sorry about the snail. Even on a long trip I would probably skip the heater. Your ambient temperature in the car with a styrofoam container would probably be fine. Coral are pretty tough about cool water but not so much about hot! yeah, had the family with, and knew that we'd have to stop for a couple of unexpected amounts of time on a cold november day. Meals and what not, but you're right, probably could have skipped the heater. Was just nervous about it. 1 Quote Link to comment
Lula_Mae Posted November 22, 2017 Share Posted November 22, 2017 On 11/20/2017 at 9:21 PM, jahnje said: yeah, had the family with, and knew that we'd have to stop for a couple of unexpected amounts of time on a cold november day. Meals and what not, but you're right, probably could have skipped the heater. Was just nervous about it. Try those little hot hands things you find in sporting goods sections like at Walmart, I used them on a wintertime move to Texas a few years ago. Wrap in paper towel and don't have it touching the bag/container, or do like several companies I've bought from have done and tape to the lid. I just used them to keep things from getting too cold. 3 Quote Link to comment
Felicia Posted November 23, 2017 Share Posted November 23, 2017 Hi! Just a reminder to please pm me your November full tank shot (FTS) along with a link to your build thread by the end of the day on November 30th. Quote Link to comment
jahnje Posted November 26, 2017 Author Share Posted November 26, 2017 quick update. Been worried about my hammer coral for the last week or so. To the point of daily 100% WCs. Killing algae with a passion, and over all panic. The base of all of it's tentacles turned brown. It was no longer fully extending, even when fed. I thought maybe the light was too bright, not enough flow, too much flow etc.. ugh!! Turns out it's just splitting... I think possibly on both branches even, but for sure the big one. Overall I didn't make any drastic changes, and mostly just sped up maintenance routines. So nothing was harmed. 5 Quote Link to comment
jahnje Posted November 27, 2017 Author Share Posted November 27, 2017 Current FTS for the month. At this point it's mostly just time to wait for things to grow/fill in. Having some browning with the acro in the upper right, so I've maxed out the light since it actually wasn't killing my hammer. Think I'll stick to daily 100% wc for a while though, since I can get away with feeding every day that way... Which everything but the acro will like. The goal is to get any of the encrusters to start ticking to the wall. 8 Quote Link to comment
Lula_Mae Posted November 27, 2017 Share Posted November 27, 2017 Such a neat look with that tile wall! 1 Quote Link to comment
jahnje Posted November 28, 2017 Author Share Posted November 28, 2017 12 hours ago, Lula_Mae said: Such a neat look with that tile wall! I'm going to have to figure out what to do when/if they all grow together though. That GSP is growing fast! And I'm not sure what to do if it takes over. I think it's more than doubled in size since I got it a few weeks ago. Quote Link to comment
vlangel Posted November 28, 2017 Share Posted November 28, 2017 This jar looks even cooler than I imagined it would. I have not put gsp in my jar yet because I was afraid of what you are seeing. 1 Quote Link to comment
Lula_Mae Posted November 28, 2017 Share Posted November 28, 2017 10 hours ago, jahnje said: I'm going to have to figure out what to do when/if they all grow together though. That GSP is growing fast! And I'm not sure what to do if it takes over. I think it's more than doubled in size since I got it a few weeks ago. Natalia has a monti or something in her original bowl that grows aggressively fast, I believe she uses a line of superglue to keep it in line with each water change. 1 Quote Link to comment
Coral_chef Posted November 30, 2017 Share Posted November 30, 2017 Tank looks awesome man 1 Quote Link to comment
jahnje Posted November 30, 2017 Author Share Posted November 30, 2017 Not sure if the the Pink Gono is going to make it. It's an encrusting type, and the edges have turned white. I'm getting better polyp extension, but it's not looking good. My Acro is browning out on me as well. I'm upping the feedings to daily, then followed by a 100% WC. This seems to be working very well for all of the others, but these two little guys just are not having a good time. Going to be sad if I lose everything I got up in saint louis a couple of weeks ago. I'm going to guess my problem is one of 3 things. 1) overheating on ride home. 2) I have a some hair algae 3) Not enough light. Parameters are all great because of the WC's. I'm now going to feed in morning at 8 when lights come on, and WC at 5 when lights go off. Gono is supposed to have issues with not enough food. The PAR on the acro is about ~200, with the lid on, which may be just a little low, I have a second bulb which I guess could boost the PAR a bit, but probably not without being too much for everyone else. I'm q-tiping some H2O2 on any big algae problem areas. Not sure there is really anything else I can do. Quote Link to comment
MainelyReefer Posted November 30, 2017 Share Posted November 30, 2017 I stopped doing such frequent WC's on my bowl as it was too low nutrient for my liking. I think Goniopora like dirtier water and perhaps try feeding and not doing a WC. I love that it looks like Mario will be running through the tank any second with all those bricks 1 Quote Link to comment
jahnje Posted November 30, 2017 Author Share Posted November 30, 2017 7 minutes ago, GraniteReefer said: I stopped doing such frequent WC's on my bowl as it was too low nutrient for my liking. I think Goniopora like dirtier water and perhaps try feeding and not doing a WC. I love that it looks like Mario will be running through the tank any second with all those bricks that's actually why i'm upping the feedings to daily, and letting sit all day. but the nightly WC will keep the algae under control i hope. Quote Link to comment
Lula_Mae Posted November 30, 2017 Share Posted November 30, 2017 1 hour ago, jahnje said: Not sure if the the Pink Gono is going to make it. It's an encrusting type, and the edges have turned white. I'm getting better polyp extension, but it's not looking good. My Acro is browning out on me as well. I'm upping the feedings to daily, then followed by a 100% WC. This seems to be working very well for all of the others, but these two little guys just are not having a good time. Going to be sad if I lose everything I got up in saint louis a couple of weeks ago. I'm going to guess my problem is one of 3 things. 1) overheating on ride home. 2) I have a some hair algae 3) Not enough light. Parameters are all great because of the WC's. I'm now going to feed in morning at 8 when lights come on, and WC at 5 when lights go off. Gono is supposed to have issues with not enough food. The PAR on the acro is about ~200, with the lid on, which may be just a little low, I have a second bulb which I guess could boost the PAR a bit, but probably not without being too much for everyone else. I'm q-tiping some H2O2 on any big algae problem areas. Not sure there is really anything else I can do. Can you lower the bulb just a smidge? Quote Link to comment
jahnje Posted November 30, 2017 Author Share Posted November 30, 2017 2 minutes ago, Lula_Mae said: Can you lower the bulb just a smidge? I've got it at 10". I might be able to go to 8" w/o affecting coverage. Think it's worth a shot? Quote Link to comment
jahnje Posted November 30, 2017 Author Share Posted November 30, 2017 random hammer coral picture. Mostly just messing with the camera. Though I've suddenly got a lot more color around the base of the acro. Tip is still kinda light, but bottom has goodly amount of polyp extension and green color. I'm thinking the daily, full day, feeding is having an effect. Now I see why they call it reefer mania. One day things are great, and the next they're totally a hot mess. 2 Quote Link to comment
Lula_Mae Posted December 2, 2017 Share Posted December 2, 2017 On 11/30/2017 at 9:10 AM, jahnje said: I've got it at 10". I might be able to go to 8" w/o affecting coverage. Think it's worth a shot? Maybe, though I don't know a ton about gonis lol. Quote Link to comment
Recommended Posts
Join the conversation
You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.