30l Build

[ReeferND]

That would be awesome my man. I appreciate you taking time for this. I was also curious how the im skimmer worked out for you?

[DreC80]

Well, after laying 14 yards of mulch this weekend, I was finally able to get around to performing some PAR measurements.  Please see the attached photo and let me know if you have any questions.  @ReeferND the IM nuvoskim is just okay in my opinion.  It doesn't pull dark colored skimmate like my aquamaxx does.

[ReeferND]

@DreC80, again thanks for taking the time to do this. This is going to help incredibly. You have far more experience than I when it comes to reefing so in your opinion, would these numbers be good for a softie/lps tank? Or would you bump them up more?

[DreC80]

I would start with these numbers and adjust as needed.  My wife's tank (the one in the pic) is running at 30/40 intensities on everything except green/red/white.  It is a softie/lps tank and things are doing well.  We are slowly raising the percentages.  Let me know if you have any other questions.

[ReeferND]

So now that I finally feel comfortable with my light spectrum, I am curious if any of you reading this create repreive times for you corals similar to David saxbys schedule? Right now I have 2 hour ramp up, 2 hour ramp down, and about 8 hours of "noon" lighting. That doesn't happen in nature but sometimes trying to imitate nature in these tanks can be a mute point. I guess my big question is what does your schedules look like?

 

Thanks for all the help everyone. I really appreciate this community. I also added an algae blenny to the tank and he seems happy! I am excited to start the ugly phase and get some coralline growing!

[ReeferND]

Quick update. Tank is doing good. My algae blenny is doing good, has been in the tank for over a week now. Clowns are awesome as always. I would appreciate some input on the picture. Is this coralline growing? It seems soon to have it growing already. My first dose of coralline was about a month ago, second dose was a week ago. It is definitely encrusted on the rock and there are many more spots all over rocks but I don't see any on glass or powerheads.

[Jeff Hood]

A buddy and I just bought a PAR meter to dial his tank in and my two little tanks.  I’m running the BRS settings so will be curious to see what my numbers are.  All my corals seem to like it.  

[A Little Blue]

1 hour ago, ReeferND said:

Quick update. Tank is doing good. My algae blenny is doing good, has been in the tank for over a week now. Clowns are awesome as always. I would appreciate some input on the picture. Is this coralline growing? It seems soon to have it growing already. My first dose of coralline was about a month ago, second dose was a week ago. It is definitely encrusted on the rock and there are many more spots all over rocks but I don't see any on glass or powerheads.

Picture is a bit out of focus with strong blues making ID a bit harder. 

It could be coralline but it also could be lobophora or similar turf algea. 

[ReeferND]

Hey everyone, it wasn't coralline. It was diatoms, they are gone now. Still not seeing any coralline anywhere but it will turn up eventually. I have the clowns, blenny, and now a six line in the tank. All are doing great and eat like piggies. I am looking to add some more life at this point. Need to get a cuc going. Anyone got suggestions of a good source for trochus snails, nassarius snails? I was thinking wwc but they are out of trouchus. I should be about a month or so away from trial corals! 

[VaporCountry]

2 hours ago, ReeferND said:

Hey everyone, it wasn't coralline. It was diatoms, they are gone now. Still not seeing any coralline anywhere but it will turn up eventually. I have the clowns, blenny, and now a six line in the tank. All are doing great and eat like piggies. I am looking to add some more life at this point. Need to get a cuc going. Anyone got suggestions of a good source for trochus snails, nassarius snails? I was thinking wwc but they are out of trouchus. I should be about a month or so away from trial corals! 

I got mine from a local LFS, maybe check around. I don't have any sand so I just went with 4 trochus and 5 astrea. I may eventually get rid of the trochus once algae is no longer an issue and get a few more astrea. The trochus snails are just so big and tend to bull doze a bit.

[DreC80]

I recommend reefcleaners.org

Have ordered a couple of packages through John.

 

My coralline didn't show up until about the 10 month mark.  Some say that it's due to LEDs, not sure if it's true.

[Jeff Hood]

My tank has been wet for about 8 months.  Started with dry rock.   Seeded Corraline with Corraline in a bottle at the 4 month mark and got a little Corraline on a frag and snail.   About two months later with good stable alk it just exploded.  My rocks and pumps...anything plastic is getting covered. 

     My LEDs seem to grow it just fine.   

Mine is an AI prime with BRS settings.  

[ReeferND]

Hey everyone. It's been a while. Tank is doing great. No corals yet but I am a week or so away from putting some testers in. I still get some outbreaks of what I think is diatoms from time to time so it's definitely still cycling a bit. It's definitely a struggle to not add corals after this long. Tank is one week away from being 4 months old! Hoping by at least the 5 month mark I can have some corals in there!!

[mitten_reef]

30 minutes ago, ReeferND said:

Hey everyone. It's been a while. Tank is doing great. No corals yet but I am a week or so away from putting some testers in. I still get some outbreaks of what I think is diatoms from time to time so it's definitely still cycling a bit. It's definitely a struggle to not add corals after this long. Tank is one week away from being 4 months old! Hoping by at least the 5 month mark I can have some corals in there!!

You can certainly start adding corals by now. Diatom/crank will ebb and flow for a while with new tank, just keep up good maintenance and you should be fine. 

[ReeferND]

Do you folks have any suggestions on how many corals to add at one time? Again, tank is 4 months old and I have enough cash saved up to get around 25 corals.....without the wife killing me. I was thinking of adding about 8 or at a time not sure if I could just add all at once.....

[billygoat]

50 minutes ago, ReeferND said:

Do you folks have any suggestions on how many corals to add at one time? Again, tank is 4 months old and I have enough cash saved up to get around 25 corals.....without the wife killing me. I was thinking of adding about 8 or at a time not sure if I could just add all at once.....

 

It really depends on how large they are/what type they are/how much you plan on feeding them, I think. Most SPS corals add very little to your bioload and it's fairly safe to add quite a few at once (provided of course you follow proper acclimation procedures, especially for light). Personally I would start out slowly to make sure that Ca/Mg/Alk are not being depleted too rapidly though.

[ReeferND]

Hey everyone. Quick update here. Everything is going well. I have added 7 corals to the system 5 days ago. They all seem happy. The biggest difference I am seeing between this go around and the failed first is pH. Before, I struggled to ever get above 7.8, now I have never seen it below 8.0. Only difference would be water, was using Walmart water before and 7 stage rodi this time. My biggest advice to anyone coming into this hobby is get an rodi system before you even start.

 

I included some eye candy. 

[VaporCountry]

Looking good, glad you were finally able to get some corals in. I really hope it continues to go good this time around. I should have went the route you took with a long cycle.

[ReeferND]

@VaporCountry I will definitely recommend anyone do the long cycle. Tank is just awesome. I have some algae but that's it. Overall it has been smooth and simple.....you live and learn. Every coral I have put in is happy, showing awesome color, and just genuinely seem to be doing good. I have 13 corals in there now with another order of 9 coming Thursday. I can't wait to watch them grow out. 

 

I also have coraline growing everywhere. It's not large yet but it is everywhere. This has to be from the coraline in a bottle since any corals with coraline on them have only been in the tank for a month. I figure in the next 2 or 3 months I will have coverage everywhere. 

 

It's about time for me to get my dosing pumps up and running. I left for 3 days and alk went from 9.0 to 8.3 and calc from 450 to 435. Not a big drop but corals are still new and definitely not settled in yet. Going to maintain parameters by hand for the next week or so. After adding another 9 I expect to be losing a dkh every 2 days or so. Then I will get them running....unless I get bored and just need to tinker. 

 

Question: how do you all decide your daily alk and calc uptake for your dosing pumps? Do you measure each day at the same time for a week, correct, then do that again the next, over the course of 5 days or so just calculate an average? Or do you get params where you want them and wait to check for 5 or so days, get the total amount and divide by 5 or so? Just curious on a feasible way. I do measure alk almost everyday and calc almost every 2 days.

[VaporCountry]

Awesome glad everything is doing well. I have an apex on my 30L with the DOS dosing pumps. What is recommended to figure it out is to do exactly what you said. Test, wait a few days, test at the same time and just divide the difference by the number of days. I still try to test at least my ALK a couple times a week. You would be surprised sometimes consumption varies. 

[ReeferND]

@VaporCountrythat's what I will do then. Thanks for the input. 

[ReeferND]

Hey everyone. 10 more corals added today. 23 in total now. Fingers crossed this goes well 🤣

[ReeferND]

Hey everyone. Everything is still going well. I do have a slight algae issue. I suppose it could be cyano but who knows. I am going to start running some gfo tomorrow to see if it hits it at all. I will also be feeding less. My last order from unique corals was great except I had 2 corals not make it more than a day in the tank (they looked a bit rough when they arrived). So I have a gift card they sent me. I am thinking adding an anemone for my clowns. However, there are some horror stories put there about them crashing nano tanks in particular if they die. Do any of you keep bta and if so, based on my past, do you think it would be wise to get one?

[ReeferND]

Hey everyone, need some help. My blenny is not eating and is very skinny. He/she is just sitting or laying on the sand and breathing heavy. I have tried 3 different types of pellets, flakes, mysis and brine shrimp. He won't touch anything. Water params are:

Alk: 9.2 (stable with dosers)

Cal: 450 (stable with dosers)

Mag: 1350

Ammonia: 0

Nitrite: 0

Nitrate: ~2ppm

 

Corals are fine, other fish eat like pigs, I have coraline algae everywhere so tank seems pretty healthy. I did a 22% WC to see if that helps. He was eating all last week but on Wednesday, he didn't eat anything. I  pretty sure I am going to lose him. He is about 4" to 5" long, any chance he is just out of life span? Seems strange he was doing so good and now he is dying..... any help asap would be great.

 

Thanks

[ReeferND]

Never mind, he died. Sad 

 

The only thing that changed was I added GFO about 2 weeks ago to fight some algae. There is still algae in the system but perhaps that was all it took. 

 

Well, I ain't giving up. I will miss Benny the Bleny but everything else is doing good. Anyone have thoughts on keeping a 6 line and a royal gramma in a tank this size?