Slow growing college reef

[IronsDan]

The poor college reef

 

 

Display: Mr. Aqua 12G long (non-low iron)

Lighting: Current Orbit Marine

Heater: (Was Eheim something, something) now cobalt

Circulation: (Was mystery wavemaker, Aquaclear 50) now mystery wavemaker, mystery pump and Aquaclear 70

Skimmer: (Was Aquatic Life 115) N/A

Filtration: Biological (HOB refugium w/ chaeto)

Top-Off: ( Was Large water container gravity fed with drip nozzle) N/A

 

 

Reefing is an expensive hobby and I'm a poor college student, while the things in there are doing amazing and I have a lot of the tools to make a reef with many corals the money for corals is not something I have in abundance sadly. I would love feed back on the tank and the photos, photography is something I'm extremely new at and I love tips!

 

Stock:

     fish and inverts

        x1 mandarin goby

        x2 cerith snails

        x1 feather duster

             

    corals

        x1 "starry night" fuzzy mushroom coral (that's what I call it anyways)

            

       x1 favia

            

       x1 green toadstool leather

     macro

       chaeto

       bubble algae

bad hitchhikers in there

       ding dang hydroids

 

lots of changes have happened and I have not done a crazy super good job of keeping track but I will from now on!

 

11-19-2018

 

 

 

 

 

 

[IronsDan]

What do you all think I should add next I'm thinking about updating the lame wavemakers to either hydor nano or jebao SW 10, after that what corals do you think would fit in well?

 

and I forgot to mention I do daily maitnence to clean algae and clean glass, every three days I do a water change, and every time i notice wear and tear I give the equipment TLC

[jesseatam]

If you want a more programmable powerheads with more interesting options go for the jebao, the controller I have my my koralias only allows them to alternate but I bought this about two years ago now so I don’t know if there’s a different option available now. For corals I’d reccomend maybe some orange clove polyps, branching gsp, photosynthetic gorgonians, some euphyllia. Your tank looks really nice, I have a planted tank in my dorm right now but I really miss my reef which is at home.

[Clown79]

The tank looks good.

 

There are so many options you can go with. 

 

How about rock flower anemones? They are really cool, pretty easy, and beautiful.

You could do an rfa garden. 

 

Theres blasto's, acans, ricordea mushrooms, plate corals(fungia) all are fairly easy to keep.

 

Wave makers are nice but so are standard powerheads.

 

I personally like Hydor and their customer service is excellent, they mail you replacement parts for free, get back to you within 48hrs. 

 

I love the kps aqamai wavemaker. Its not cheap but not very expensive. Its made by hydor. 

 

Jebao can be hit and miss. Some have great success others not so much.

My personal experience, 2 brand new sw2 went to craps in 3 mnths.

 

Apparently you get no warranty with Jebao products so you want to purchase them from a place that does give you warranty.

 

Other options you can look into

 

Sicce powerheads, Tunze both great products as well.

[IronsDan]

Rock flower anemones are gorgeous i think thatd be really cool to have an rfa garden thatll be something to look into thanks! I ment the sw2 btw idk why i thought it was the sw10 whoops. Glad i asked because i was leaning towards the jebao but ill probably go for the hydor or check out the kps.

[IronsDan]

@jesseatamI love the look of branching gsp that might be a move! Planted tanks are awesome too tho i have one in my apartment too but its less showy than the reef at the moment

[jesseatam]

4 minutes ago, Ironsman said:

@jesseatamI love the look of branching gsp that might be a move! Planted tanks are awesome too tho i have one in my apartment too but its less showy than the reef at the moment

The branching variety is nice too because it won’t spread horizontally as fast and regular gsp either, it seems to focus most mostly on vertical growth and branching. I also second Clown79s reccomendation on rock flower nems they’re super hardy and come in many beautiful variations, you might even get spawning action as well! I mainly went planted over another saltwater tank just due to not being sure about having access to “good” water and I wanted to give my 4 year old betta an upgrade. I never stop scheming though about another saltwater set up, thinking about doing something with macros and maybe some softies next if I can.

[IronsDan]

 

1 hour ago, jesseatam said:

I mainly went planted over another saltwater tank just due to not being sure about having access to “good” water and I wanted to give my 4 year old betta an upgrade. I never stop scheming though about another saltwater set up, thinking about doing something with macros and maybe some softies next if I can

I honestly cannot decide what type of tank this ones going to end up being the softy macro look is super colorful and nice looking but then the fluorescence of corals looks too cool too and then now the idea of rfa has me clueless on direction lol. My RO buddy water purifier does the job for getting clean water out of my extremely hard hose water.... Which has been tough to use even when its filtered for a wild type betta ive had for a year that needs low low pH.

[IronsDan]

I think this is a nice looking edit i did on accident

[Clown79]

1 hour ago, Ironsman said:

 

I honestly cannot decide what type of tank this ones going to end up being the softy macro look is super colorful and nice looking but then the fluorescence of corals looks too cool too and then now the idea of rfa has me clueless on direction lol. My RO buddy water purifier does the job for getting clean water out of my extremely hard hose water.... Which has been tough to use even when its filtered for a wild type betta ive had for a year that needs low low pH.

Well you could do rfa garden on one rock, place some really nice macros through the tank, and do softies as well.

 

 

[WindyCityReefer.]

Love to see another college reefer! I am loving your setup. It is definitely a nice way to get away from reality.

 

You cannot go wrong with some softies and macros like Clown79 suggested. Some dragon's breath macro would really pop in there! 

[IronsDan]

The tank definitely takes away a lot of stress from classes whenever I need it @WindyCityReefer. I haven't been able to find the dragon's breath or any cool macro in stores near me i'd love recommendations of online stores for that type of thing, but no doubt it would look awesome. @Clown79 you're absolutely right I'm definitely going to end up with a very mixed reef! I can't wait till it's filled in!