NanoAaron Posted March 7, 2018 Share Posted March 7, 2018 Hi Fellow Reefers! Long time listener first time caller here... I have been reading about you guys and your awesome tanks for over a year now! I started out with an evo13.5, then upgraded to an RSM130d, then recently downgraded back to an eco13.5! My last tank was a beautiful LPS dominated tank, but life has changed recently and I had to downsize tanks to reduce the maintenance regime and not have to spend as much time tinkering. That brings us to my current tank setup! I had never done a bare bottom tank before, and I like the idea of not having a sanded to have to vacuum all the time and I also like the clean minimalist look of it. About a month into this tank being setup now and gotta say, not sure if I could go back to having a sand bed again! I had researched quite a bit looking for an example of a nano-tank that was nems-only, or BTA only, but couldn't find any! So I decided to go ahead and try my luck. I started with a large piece of LR from my RSM tank that had 7 BTA's on it already. Sucked out the water from that tank and tossed in the rock! So far, with me being able to focus solely on the BTA's and keep up with a good feeding schedule, they are really thriving in this smaller tank. Here is a quick equipment list: Tank: Fluval Evo 13.5 Flow: Aquamai KPS Pump: Stock Light: Current Orbit Marine Pro ATO: Tunze Heater: Fluval 50watt Filtration: Stock foam block with bio balls and bag of purigen Extra Filtration: Small media reactor running carbon Lid: DIY lid cut out of diffuser material Livestock: 7 rainbow BTA's 2 ocellaris clowns 6 or 7 assorted snails I had originally bought the small reactor off amazon along with a spool of LED lights with the intention of making an algae reactor... But after reading horror stories of the reactor tube cracking due to heat from lights, I have yet to pull the trigger on it... In the mean time, running carbon in the media reactor has really worked well! I have never cleaned the glass yet due to algae and my water is crystal clear! I do a 4 gal W/C every week too. Anyways I just wanted to share what I was up to and get some of your feedback! Is there anything you see that I could improve? Are there any suggestions you guys may have? I humbly open up my n00by setup to your judgement and advice! Thanks for looking! 2 Quote Link to comment
Christmas Corals Posted March 7, 2018 Share Posted March 7, 2018 woah, this is amazing!! brilliant!! love 'love' this setup!! ??? Quote Link to comment
LogicalReefs Posted March 7, 2018 Share Posted March 7, 2018 I thought anemones need stable mature tanks? Those rbtas look gorgeous though. Hopefully everything works out fine. Quote Link to comment
NanoAaron Posted March 7, 2018 Author Share Posted March 7, 2018 4 minutes ago, RocketClownfish said: I thought anemones need stable mature tanks? Those rbtas look gorgeous though. Hopefully everything works out fine. I thought about that a lot... What prompted me to risk it was that I used a large piece of live rock from my larger tank that was very established as well as all the water to fill this little tank came from my larger one. I also used a bunch of bio balls and LR rubble from my larger tank to bring over as much established bacteria as possible. Im about 6 weeks into this current tank now and its doing better and better every day! With such a light bio load and weekly w/c's I am easily able to keep very stable water parameters. Heres to hoping!! 2 Quote Link to comment
OldManSea Posted March 7, 2018 Share Posted March 7, 2018 Very nice setup. With all those BTAs you are going to need a bigger tank quickly! They grow like weeds unless you feed sparingly. With mine in a 24 inch tank and only one feed per week, two of them will take up the entire 24 inch width within 6 months from initial size of 3 inches. They are the coolest reef critters you can have. Quote Link to comment
Christmas Corals Posted March 7, 2018 Share Posted March 7, 2018 1 hour ago, OldManSea said: Very nice setup. With all those BTAs you are going to need a bigger tank quickly! They grow like weeds unless you feed sparingly. With mine in a 24 inch tank and only one feed per week, two of them will take up the entire 24 inch width within 6 months from initial size of 3 inches. They are the coolest reef critters you can have. great thing about them is they're versatile, you can spread them around tanks and all. they have smaller splits so this would make easy work! ? Quote Link to comment
Christmas Corals Posted March 7, 2018 Share Posted March 7, 2018 2 hours ago, NanoAaron said: I thought about that a lot... What prompted me to risk it was that I used a large piece of live rock from my larger tank that was very established as well as all the water to fill this little tank came from my larger one. I also used a bunch of bio balls and LR rubble from my larger tank to bring over as much established bacteria as possible. Im about 6 weeks into this current tank now and its doing better and better every day! With such a light bio load and weekly w/c's I am easily able to keep very stable water parameters. Heres to hoping!! brilliantly executed! sounds like you did an awesome job and thought everything out well in advance! ?? Quote Link to comment
Christmas Corals Posted March 7, 2018 Share Posted March 7, 2018 I'm confident this systems going to thrive and be amazing!! Quote Link to comment
Cintax Posted March 7, 2018 Share Posted March 7, 2018 Awesome! I love BTAs. I have quite few in my 30g breeder. I'm actually moving them over to my new IM20 in a few weeks once it's cycled. Quote Link to comment
NanoAaron Posted March 7, 2018 Author Share Posted March 7, 2018 Wow thanks so much for everyone's support! Now if only I could get these stupid clown fish to host the anemones!! Quote Link to comment
NanoAaron Posted March 7, 2018 Author Share Posted March 7, 2018 Well I cant seem to help but tinker... I have been watching a lot of BTA videos and reading up on care and one thing is pretty consistent- the need for really good lighting. I had an extra little baby current lumen actinic blue strip lying around so I got out the good ol superglue and egg crate and fashioned a new mounting point for the light strip on top of my home made lid! Im really happy with how it turned out... I also cut a hole in the lid under the orbit marine pro light to help make sure all the light gets through... I will run it like this for a week or two and see if I notice any improvements! Im already liking how the extra blue helps the greens in the RBTA's pop! 2 Quote Link to comment
rockryno Posted March 8, 2018 Share Posted March 8, 2018 Very cool! I just come over here from your reply on my thread and see we have very similar ideas! Even our BTA rocks look similar. My last tank was bare bottom and I loved it, but I wanted the complete reef look with my BTA tank so I went sand again. Still undecided if it was a good choice. Luckily, my BTA rock came with a pair of hosting clowns already and they sure do love them. Yours will get there with time. Your lighting looks so dim in the pics. Ive had to crank my kessil up over the last few weeks as the nems kept stretching. I'll keep following. Quote Link to comment
NanoAaron Posted March 8, 2018 Author Share Posted March 8, 2018 6 minutes ago, rockryno said: Very cool! I just come over here from your reply on my thread and see we have very similar ideas! Even our BTA rocks look similar. My last tank was bare bottom and I loved it, but I wanted the complete reef look with my BTA tank so I went sand again. Still undecided if it was a good choice. Luckily, my BTA rock came with a pair of hosting clowns already and they sure do love them. Yours will get there with time. Your lighting looks so dim in the pics. Ive had to crank my kessil up over the last few weeks as the nems kept stretching. I'll keep following. Thank you! My nems definitely keep stretching too... the light is dim in the pics due to heavy filters and also i dont have the actinic blue strip on in the last couple... Is it a bad sign if they stretch? I guess it would be so they could get closer to the light source...? Ive had them in this tank now with just the current orbit marine pro light for about 6 weeks and none of them have moved even once.. now with the extra actinic blue strip they look happier than ever! but still stretching for sure Quote Link to comment
rockryno Posted March 9, 2018 Share Posted March 9, 2018 ah much better. Yes, yours look like mine with a little upward mobility desired. If you have the ability to adjust the lights, maybe crank it up a notch or two over the next week and see if you get any results. I turn my lights up 5% every other day to make it as comfortable as possible for them. 1 Quote Link to comment
Floundering_Around Posted July 1, 2018 Share Posted July 1, 2018 Following. Wanted to get a RBTA at reefapalooza but already having other corals, I wasn't comfortable putting one in there and having it walk around and sting my corals. Quote Link to comment
dling Posted July 2, 2018 Share Posted July 2, 2018 Thats super cool. Good luck. Quote Link to comment
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