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Joe's IM 20: Got a couple clowns, call it a circus 🎪


Joevember

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Well.... have some sad news to share.... Woke up early to try to catch the last couple sexy shrimp to sell and noticed that my RFA was missing. And, of course, it was where every missing anemone goes: the powerhead. The oral disc managed to get caught by the mp10 and slip through 2 slits in the cover. I tried to push it through, but the tissue was pretty hard. I put the cover on the sandbed with its foot facing a rock. I'm hoping that it is able to pull itself back through the cover and heal up.

When I pulled it out it didn't smell too terrible. I started making some SW for a big WC that I know the tank will need. I know RFAs aren't great at healing, but I hope it can pull through because it's one of my favorite things in the tank that I've had since day one of getting a tank. When I first got the setup it was only an inch, and it was an ugly brown. 

 

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This could have been avoided if I used my DIY anemone guard... hindsight 20/20

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I got my brother to send me a picture of how it's doing since I'm in school and he is on break right now. 

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He told me that some of the tentacles look like they are missing, but it's not as bad as I thought it would be. I'll take it off of the glass when I get home. He had his foot attached to the glass before, and that's how I think he got up to the powerhead. I'll try to get him to attach himself to the bottom of the tank under the sand where he was before because I have no room for him anywhere else in the tank.

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I put a trochus in the fuge to clean it up and keep algae off the submersible light. So far he's been keeping it tidy. It has enough algae to keep him fed consistently too.

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The RFA is doing better. Some parts aren't inflating as much as others and the oral disc is a little bit darker, but it's doing better.

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I picked up a new neon green montipora cap that I just glued in. Made a frag off my stylo to make room, but it still wouldn't have fit in the place I wanted. I mounted part of it in the front, and a bigger chunk in the back where the jedi mind trick used to be (which has been doing poorly). 20190119_170421.thumb.jpg.d23434f18bc6a793fd0dd22adaf18ce9.jpg20190119_170400.thumb.jpg.77c4c9bda367addfa188e50e22455288.jpg

Just like with everything else I had to take out, the sexy shrimp were a pain in the ass. My strategy was simple, suck them out with a 1/2" vinyl tube. It worked for 3, but number 4 was elusive. The rock on the right in the scape has a network of caves that this shrimp has used to escape me. Anytime I put the tube near him he would disappear into the rock. I had to take out the whole rock and scoop him out with a net to catch him. Anyways, they're all caught and ready to go to whoever comes to pick them up tomorrow. 20190119_171152.thumb.jpg.767244c2f72ce9c93660eaceb00e9a67.jpg

 

Here are some underwater shots I got:

 

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I'm a fuzzy stick man now. Traded some chaeto for a discounted 2" acro frag (first pic) and a cheap tiny frag or 2 more. 

Say hello to my oregon tort

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Miyagi tort

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And Pink lemonade

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I really need some more practice taking pics of acros. Colors are off and you can't see the polyp colors at all.

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Forgot to turn my heater on after my water change last night. Everything looked closed, the clowns were at the bottom, and the shrimp was barely moving. I tested using every test kit I have and everything came back normal. Then I put my hand in the water and it was cold. The tank got to 60.8. Fml... this has been a stressful week.

 

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1 hour ago, Joevember said:

Forgot to turn my heater on after my water change last night. Everything looked closed, the clowns were at the bottom, and the shrimp was barely moving. I tested using every test kit I have and everything came back normal. Then I put my hand in the water and it was cold. The tank got to 60.8. Fml... this has been a stressful week.

 

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Everything should be fine, I had a chiller malfunction and stick on.  The water got to 49°F and I did not lose a single coral, including a crocea clam.  I only lost a damsel and 2 chromis but the clownfish, a purple firefish and 2 lyretail anthias revived even though they were all swirling lifelessly on the sand bed when I discovered the problem.  It's amazing how cold they can take it.

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45 minutes ago, vlangel said:

Everything should be fine, I had a chiller malfunction and stick on.  The water got to 49°F and I did not lose a single coral, including a crocea clam.  I only lost a damsel and 2 chromis but the clownfish, a purple firefish and 2 lyretail anthias revived even though they were all swirling lifelessly on the sand bed when I discovered the problem.  It's amazing how cold they can take it.

Yeah, I think everything will be fine by the end of this. The corals are all really pissed right now. The clowns are acting weird, but they still get livid when I put my hand in the water.

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Happy to say the tank has made a (nearly) full recovery. It's amazing to see such a drastic change from everything closed up to what it was before. I overreacted when I saw what I had done to the tank because I didn't think that tanks could survive an 18° temp swing and bounce back in practically a day.

Unfortunately, there are a few corals that still look off. My purple torches have both receeded from their skeleton quite a bit (you can see the line where the tissue used to be).

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I think they can bounce back, but I don't know if the tissue can grow back over.

Here is the list of corals that just aren't fully opened yet: duncan, neon trumpet, bubble, blasto, and lobo. The nems' shapes are looking pretty weird too. And also the oregon tort has some bleaching on the tip with brown algae on it, but the polyps and color look great.

 

Happy FTS

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Didn't get away free. Both of my montis are RTNing. Came home and found them like this

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I'll cut them up later and keep the clean bits. I'll have to pick up some replacement setosas because they're my favorite sps right now. Everything I said wasn't extending fully in the last post are doing better today. You can't win 'em all.

 

Edit: Couldn't save the setosa. Most the tissue came off with a turkey baster. Nothing big enough to work with.

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Moved the 2 small acro frags to places where they will do better. The green monti is doing better.

The blasto is looking worse lately, it's been losing many polyps. I don't think I can do anything for it.

 

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And another pic of my BTA because it has been looking amazing20190125_200328.thumb.jpg.e552fd507ff11a396637325c1b07327d.jpg

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Another one bites tbe dust.20190129_152302.thumb.jpg.bd508d76272a15e2d10a0e8f901663b4.jpg

Started off as a small infection after the temp swing, then it swept through the entire colony. I should have gave it an iodine dip when I had the chance.

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Picked up a replacement acan from Tank it Easy earlier. It also matches my trachy's color scheme. 20190201_193327.thumb.jpg.1b4df62856d9555ac5506be26ac6f8f2.jpg

Also got a small zoa frag that hasn't opened up. I don't remember the color, but I know it looks cool 😂

 

Here are some cool things in the store they let me take pics of:

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(The cynarina is only $70! If they still have it in a couple months and I don't spend any money on other corals I'll buy it)

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The new elegance hasn't been doing well now. It has been making a lot of mucus and is mostly closed. Seems like every time a coral is looking better a different on will turn on me. If you have an idea other than the temp swing, it'd be appreciated.

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Thinking I'll sell my blastos. Want to put a nice softie garden under the overhang. I'll also sell my stylo frag I made a week ago.

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Didn't want to make another post for a while, but I felf like this was worth saying.

A head on my lobo started RTNing. Don't know why, but it looks similar to what happened to my acan.

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I also moved the rock with my cyphastrea and zoa to the front of my scape. It will become my softie garden. The bubble coral can't do much to softies IME. 

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And a new FTS for ya'll as well

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Seems like sps is becoming easier than lps at this point 😂

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Well the lobo section that was dying was about to split, so it looks like the other half of the head is just splitting off from the necrotic half. I'll keep you guys posted.

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Also moved my old hitchhiker shrooms to my future softie garden. I didn't notice how awesome they look now. They used to be just red, but now they are splotched with a dark neon green and have neon blue spots on them. Never seen another mushroom like it.

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I also traded the stylo frag for an orange rhodactis tonight. It isn't fully open right now.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Nothing new with the elegances. The lobo has healed around the dead head and all the others look great.

The acros I got are all good, except for the pink lemonade. I'm not sure if it's dead or not because it's so small. Nothing is growing on it so I think it's still alive.

I've recently been having issues with algae on the glass. It's thick, brown, and grows back within a couple hours. I decided to put a bag with less than a tbs of gfo and a tbs and a half of rox carbon. I think the problem is from my purigen finally exhasusting itself. I'll pick up a new bag once I see how the carbon and gfo goes.

 

Here are a couple filtered/blue light pics:

 

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I know this isn't exactly a reef tank, but I thought I'd share a cool project I have going at my school. I'm in a project called operation endangered species in Illinois that is currently trying to bring the alligator snapping turtle back to Illinois. It became locally extinct in Illinois around 1980. It's a beautiful native species that plays an important role in the freshwater systems here. 

 

So, at my school and another local high school we have small alligator snapping turtles that we are raising to adulthood and eventually releasing back into the wild. I'm in charge of the turtles here and I do all the maintenence for their tank. It's a 125g 6' tank with sump (it was actually a saltwater setup donated to us, that's why we have kessil tuna blues runnijg on it). Here's a picture of one of our turtles waiting for an unsuspecting fish to swim too close:

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If you want to check it out you can go to http://operationendangeredspecies.com/who-we-are/. 

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