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ADA Zero Equipment Build - Life got in the way but I'm updating again!


Frag Factory

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Frag Factory

Tested nitrates yesterday and they were 0. A legit total 0....

 

Thinking about adding some bioballs and removing some rubble to boost nitrates, I've always seen better SPS colour when it's between 2ppm and 5ppm. 

 

Thanks for the tips on mollies, I was thinking about doing something similar 🙂

 

 

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Frag Factory

Had an issue with the Acro, not sure if it's a light/flow thing, nitrates at 0 thing or my emerald crab snacking thing so moved that coral onto the frag rank with the Monti.

 

Did my usual friday LPS coral feeding and water change, grabbed some pictures.

 

IMG_20180831_221358-01.thumb.jpeg.c0ce2e30ca44a8dd597341bf7fcb6fca.jpeg

 

IMG_20180831_221314-01.thumb.jpeg.b99ef48bba8b7ac3bfc35bfd254bde35.jpeg

 

IMG_20180831_221113-01.thumb.jpeg.837ad20cd4ec6b54910e05e4648001d2.jpeg

 

IMG_20180831_221217-02.thumb.jpeg.1514d14258e5fac9337772d8b5390c1f.jpeg

 

And what might be my new favourite Ike photo.

 

IMG_20180831_221123-01.thumb.jpeg.654ea30f9a9bf73861385cde1dcc94eb.jpeg

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14 minutes ago, Type-H20 said:

Very nice tank.  What media are you running in the canister filter?

Filter floss, carbon and live rock. I'm about to add bioballs to give me some nitrate.

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Spent some time tonight on the tank, gluing down corals, getting rid of the rack and cleaning. Snapped some pics, please excuse lack of polyp extension on some corals as they had just been moved a couple of hours ago.

 

I've added a couple of new Acans and some blue shrooms. I've also scored a deal on a 30x12x15 tank which will be a QT/frag system. Just in time as my Xenia has increased in size 5 fold in just 8 weeks.

 

Ike is doing well, put on probably 1/2" in length and is a lot more chunky since I picked him up. 

 

The real champion of growth though is my emerald crab, who is now 2.5" accross... Slightly bigger than Ike. He was even caught dragging my Acans to cover the front of his cave earlier.

 

I've been feeding red Sea coral nutrition lately, I think it's making a big difference to colour.

 

Semi Whites:

IMG_20180912_191228-01.thumb.jpeg.e8da37d315a2f132061324e78e56f10d.jpeg

 

Mostly Blues:

IMG_20180912_195008-01.thumb.jpeg.de98b1052fb01995507692a532ec03f8.jpeg

 

RHS:

IMG_20180912_195151-01.thumb.jpeg.ce8c67486940020fa4078f7684cd5299.jpeg

 

My Acro has coloured up the most since increasing lighting and feeding amino acids, the previous white spots and bare skeleton are recovering very quickly.

 

IMG_20180912_195122-01.thumb.jpeg.5602dea25b1535ae8c400f93dc8ae3b1.jpeg

 

IMG_20180912_195127-01.thumb.jpeg.5e577af69174e9a7bb4df9add103ce2f.jpeg

 

IMG_20180912_194900-01.thumb.jpeg.6d5d0cbc33e1e4c18da28a42ecc6774a.jpeg

 

IMG_20180912_195038-01.thumb.jpeg.4c72efe3ec6fe880df1aed11b03b12c4.jpeg

 

Top down, my favourite view 😎

IMG_20180912_195228-03.thumb.jpeg.e57d619cbe167b40cb78a389e5fb8909.jpeg

 

 

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Ike just finished digesting dinner and decided to play 😆

 

IMG_20180912_204404-01.thumb.jpeg.dbc6c749a9bc3036202bd2bc5035526b.jpeg

 

IMG_20180912_204447-01.thumb.jpeg.572029f19343a8d72df757618d15b674.jpeg

 

This is also a small frag that came off the water melon rock today. It had 5 small polyps on it so I glued it to the plug that the montipora setosa came off today. I didn't want the rack in the tank anymore so I glued it to my inflow strainer... It will come off, I'm sure. Figured it will be fun to monitor how fast they grow, there also a tiny piece of setosa on there with a couple of polyps on the none visible side.

 

IMG_20180912_204521-01.thumb.jpeg.f8192f47945571820f563c6ce6a1c151.jpeg

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I think it's good for everyone to learn from failure, and for people to share their failures in this hobby to hopefully help others avoid the same mistakes.

 

I really messed up. It was Wednesday night, about 11pm. Just finishing up some tank maintenance and noticed Ike looked like he had whitespot.

 

I thought ok no big deal, I just set up a 20 gallon tank in another room I was going to move excess corals and new corals too before putting them in my main tank. I can move him here to do some hypo-salinity for a few weeks.

 

That tank wasn't cycled, so I pulled the filter off the tank and removed about half of the bio media (LR rubble +  bioballs) ready to move to the other tank.

 

This is where I really messed up. Putting the filter back in I knocked or pulled the inline heater and it came off (not 100% sure how)... leaving about a gallon of water draining out the bottom of my tank until I worked out what happened and plugged it with my finger. I then shouted my room mate who was sleeping asking for help. I am there on my knees with my finger pluging the pipe thats stopping my entire tank draining.

 

This was mistake one, I should have used better hose barbs, hose clamps instead of zip ties, as well as installed an extra shut off valve here and even secured the heater to the stand rather than letting it dangle. In the panic of all this I asked my room mate to get me an extra/spare length of canister filter hose to put on the remaining pipe. They were brilliant help.

 

When this was done I worked on moving livestock to a plastic storage box while I drain the tank, move it, clean up and fix the plumbing. 

 

I started moving some water, this was my next mistake.

 

With the tank half drained this left very little room to net Ike and get him in a jug of water without exposing him to air. Unfortunately despite my best efforts he gulped a huge pocket of air in the process. I was super concerned about this and ultimately last night, he passed away. I think this was the cause, the white spot probably didn't help, the stress I caused on him would not have helped either, but to die with a belly full of air I am absolutely gutted at the torture he must have gone through.

 

I've kept fish on and off since I was 5. I don't think I've ever been this hurt over losing a fish. This was genuinely my fault and I caused it. I've had tank wipe outs, diseases, heaters stuck on... but to be the cause of this is horrible.

 

I tried burping Ike, I tried everything I could taking 3 days off work to try and save him. I phoned every LFS I could looking for help who all tried their best. I don't think I could have done more and if a "frogfish vet" existed or there was something more I could have done I would have.

 

Genuinely felt like just selling everything last night partly out of guilt, partly because I don't want to be the direct cause of death of another fish again. 3 months ago he was swimming in the ocean, to be picked up, flown 1000's of miles and be put through that in a glass box in my living room is just cruel.

 

Thinking about it and letting a little time pass I'm not going to quit/give up but there will be a "redesign" of my plan with this tank.

Things to work on:

  1. A real live stock structure. I bought Ike on kind of a whim, that was not acceptable. I need a plan of well researched animals I know I have no issues keeping.
  2. Tank bred livestock only. Not that killing a tank bred fish is "better", but I'd rather not be responsible for mistreating a fish that was happily living in the wild again. Corals is pretty easy to do this with but of course it will restrict fish choice somewhat.
  3. Rebuild the under tank set up, I think the hidden canister filter idea works brilliantly but if I used inline gate valves instead of relying on the built in canister filter stop I could have avoided this. I also used hard pipe instead of real hose barbs, that was just stupid. I also used zip ties, not hose clamps. Changing any one of these could have made the difference.
  4. Quarantine everything, no more livestock until that system is set up, cycled and 100% ready. This is doing it's thing now.

 

I'm genuinely gutted, I feel awful. I've lost pets/other fish before but it's not been directly because I failed them in this way. Things get out of control and fish die, I get that but this was cruel.

 

During the move corals got knocked off the rock work, tank looks a bit of a mess but everything else is healthy with the slight except of my Acropora which look very sad and annoyed... This was just starting to colour up at the base in a brilliant green colour.

 

This sucks, but I can learn, adapt and improve.

 

Poor Ike. I failed him.

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Bummer. Don't get discouraged. Try to come up with better design that works for you, is easy to maintain and that will include safeguards to prevent (or at least minimize) major disaster. As far as fish guilt well, don't be....... industrial pollutants and fishing industry, outnumbere reefing hobby demend by billion to one. Lol 

 

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Aw, yeah let this incident make you all the more wiser—so sorry about Ike!  In the wild, maybe his life would have been super shorter and much harder to feel safe and fed anyway, you probably gave him the best he could ever ask for. Thank you for sharing, this could potentially help many.

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Frag Factory

Small post Ike update.

 

Things have recovered since the incident. My Acro got a bit battered during the move but it's recovering nicely. Recently had a 4 day business trip and returned to see both my Montis colour up in a huge way, the green one was very bleached. The Acro is looking happier too.

 

Since my last update I ordered some mushrooms, a bargain zoa pack, a green UV singularia and a Kenya tree. All this filled the tank nicely but some will be moved to my QT/frag tank when it cycles as the colours are very average or I already had the same strains.

 

IMG_20181002_144112.thumb.jpg.3a834f4c6b0e5d05a326b9698428bb36.jpg

 

IMG_20181002_144050.thumb.jpg.30c4dc4d0c362a970f9ed8fc8d6f1121.jpg

 

IMG_20181002_144140.thumb.jpg.bf370c7c1b66e313dfaed9af90f7eb53.jpg

 

IMG_20181002_144208.thumb.jpg.60bca642b4c65883c9088235eb458e4f.jpg

 

The colour is coming back on the Acro, that green on the base is fantastic.

 

IMG_20181002_144223.thumb.jpg.f353eec26e1e6ccf0e7a42cc7ad3fab6.jpg

 

If there is any positive in losing Ike... The goniopora no longer gets walked on.

IMG_20181002_144134.thumb.jpg.0168166cbeaa24f2939a925985c626f8.jpg

 

IMG_20181002_144212.thumb.jpg.f3b374b6a68cabe4c7466c83afac6f15.jpg

 

I'm 3 weeks into feeding red seas coral nutrition and Acropower. I fed both as they instruct you to but got a bit of algea... So current feeding the RS food every other day and feeding Acropower once a week at half the dose after a water change. Not sure if pictures will show it but it's changed my montipora setosa from link to red, and the Acro colour has improved since doing this. 

 

Polyp extension on everything has improved too. I also thing the particular matter in the RS food helps the goniopora. It looks far happier.

 

Any ideas on fish? I'm probably going to add a blood shrimp or cleaner shrimp duo at some point. It's a small tank, I was thinking clowns but it's probably a little small.

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Sorry for the loss 😞 Tank looks great though. Looks a bit small for clowns, heres some ideas for captive bred fish: yasha goby + pistol, neon goby, white spotted pygmy filefish.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Thanks @Tamberav, I think I might keep an eye out for a Neon goby, or wait it out, upgrade and get a pair of clowns. I'm in no rush. I'm enjoying the tank a lot.

 

So I've not spent a whole lot of time at home lately due to work, but today I did a big water change and algea clean. I've not been away more than 2-3 days at a time but it's been frequent.

 

I was enjoying my tank tonight and something caught my eye... 

 

 

My fungia seems to be spawning 😍

 

Very very very cool.

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sorry about your little buddy Ike.

but the tank looks amazing. I am still debating on a AIO or something like this.

 

thanks for the inspiration keep up the good work.

   

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2 hours ago, devaji108 said:

sorry about your little buddy Ike.

but the tank looks amazing. I am still debating on a AIO or something like this.

 

thanks for the inspiration keep up the good work.

   

I really like the floating cube look I have going on right now, I think it suits me well. 

 

The one problem I have with this tank/set up is surface scum. There's no surface skimming and it can get kind of thick unless I manually skim it out (takes 20 seconds with paper towel or a cup). 

 

I built this tank/set up with the idea if I want to upgrade I can slap a 18" cube in the same place and life is good, but honestly I would probably go with a peninsula next to my couch and I would probably use a sump, although a 4" AIO would be a close second.

 

What I've done works, I like the style but it's not perfect.

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18 minutes ago, Frag Factory said:

What I've done works, I like the style but it's not perfect.

nothing is reefing ever is eh...but in the end as long as we are enjoying it and the animals are happy then life is grad.

so many ways to reefing and options these days its nice but can get over whiling if we let it.

   

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Went to my LFS today, was driving past and it's rude not to see what they have but I left my wallet in the car this time 😂

 

They have a tank full of red head gobies, they look very cool. About an inch long or so, not sure how big they get I need to do a little research. 

 

They also have two pistol/goby pairs which look great but fail the tank bred rule which I've set. 

 

They also had a pair of 3/4" tank bred naked clowns which was the original idea when I got the tank 

 

I have some thinking to do 🤔

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Weekly Update Time!

 

Bad things:
Something went on with my heater, I did a water change last night and thought all went well...

 

Came down at 1am to get a drink and just walked past the tank. By pure luck I ran my hand on the glass and thought that's warm... Pull the thermometer out from my kit and my tank was at 32 degrees C.....

 

I grabbed 2 bottles full of ice I froze for the summer heat and put them in and worked out what went wrong. 

 

To be honest, I think I knocked the dial when putting supplies back in the stand and it got hot. But when at temperature I'm hearing the "click" for the heater relay a lot more (but it is October in Northern England).

 

Good things:

I just scored this on Ebay.

 

s-l500.jpg.f7a9a4073f94c68154d4e405b7c99195.jpg

 

I've been looking for a Gold Euphyllia since I started the tank, I've only ever seen one in the flesh and it blew my mind many years ago and that had a price tag far beyond my means at the time (£300ish for a 6" piece). This one was £40 with delivery which is a bargain. I wish they had more than one available.

 

I'm hoping this lives up to the image the seller used... 

As for fish, I went to the LFS but decided not to get anything again. I want to make sure I get the right thing.

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52 minutes ago, Frag Factory said:

Weekly Update Time!

 

Bad things:
Something went on with my heater, I did a water change last night and thought all went well...

 

Came down at 1am to get a drink and just walked past the tank. By pure luck I ran my hand on the glass and thought that's warm... Pull the thermometer out from my kit and my tank was at 32 degrees C.....

 

I grabbed 2 bottles full of ice I froze for the summer heat and put them in and worked out what went wrong. 

 

To be honest, I think I knocked the dial when putting supplies back in the stand and it got hot. But when at temperature I'm hearing the "click" for the heater relay a lot more (but it is October in Northern England).

 

Good things:

I just scored this on Ebay.

 

s-l500.jpg.f7a9a4073f94c68154d4e405b7c99195.jpg

 

I've been looking for a Gold Euphyllia since I started the tank, I've only ever seen one in the flesh and it blew my mind many years ago and that had a price tag far beyond my means at the time. This one was £40 with delivery which is manageable.

 

I'm hoping this lives up to the image the seller used... 

As for fish, I went to the LFS but decided not to get anything again. I want to make sure I get the right thing.

This thing is smoking hot btw.  If its color is anywhere close to the picture you got a steal. 

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Just done my weekly maintainence, missed a few algea spots but I'll sort it tomorrow when aclaimitising the yellow/gold hammer 😎

 

A few pics, please excuse the plastic cup and thermometer. Not sure I trust my heater... It's been clicking on and off far more than it used to. I'm going to look at a oase biomaster canister filter when I've got a day off as a possible filter/heater replacement. I'm so paranoid about the current set up after the accident. 

 

Small updates, I've been placing corals. I fragged my orange Ricordea into 3 last week. It was getting big and I thought they would fill that gap nicely.

 

The bargain pack zoa's have not been moved to my frag tank/QT as I thought I would. I might not go frag tank route with that... I might make a thread about it soon.

 

I had spirts of green hair algea in my gravel so I sucked a load of it out today and replaced it. My crab no longer really eats algea, he seems much fonder of formula1 pellets I was using to power grow him 🙄

 

Top down:

IMG_20181022_182439.thumb.jpg.bac725543887f72e36c406e819b4bd94.jpg

 

Front:

IMG_20181022_182301.thumb.jpg.f3acc67118fd15e8507c3b70db6e3cd4.jpg

 

Couch side:

IMG_20181022_182507.thumb.jpg.9313cebc5874ed1bc0a748e4ad64815d.jpg

 

Other side:

IMG_20181022_182536.thumb.jpg.79ae5154476883e310f7bc17263529df.jpg

 

Zoa corner:

IMG_20181022_182319.thumb.jpg.28b920886a87f1069954e68cda312eb6.jpg

 

Mushroom corner:

IMG_20181022_182349.thumb.jpg.a4d92b95f906013effe5b4a0b9f32d4f.jpg

 

My pink setosa is growing also 🤩. Lots of encrusting going on, my green Monti cap has fought back from bleaching to super bright green again, I thought it was dead at one point. I snapped it off the rock and threw it down the back 🤐 then one day I saw a green thing and thought wtf was that...

 

My Acro though does not seem happy, I'm having small issues with temp swings I need to sort. 

 

After the yellow hammer it will be a strict pretty coral only policy in favour of letting things grow in.

 

I'm happy with things and theres lots of spaces left for small additions but I want some special stuff, the kind of things I could only dream about as a teenager 😂

 

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