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Curtis’ Evo 13.5 New PICS


Curtis_Rose

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Hello all! My name is Curtis. I have quite a bit of freshwater experience. I had a few tanks including a 50 gallon African cichlids tank (uncle now has the fish) they bred and I didn’t have room or money at the time now he has a 200 gallon tank for them as well as a few of his own. I haven’t had a tank since and I have always wanted to do saltwater. Just never had the money or time to get into it until now. A little over a month and a half ago I started to read. I bought a Fluval Evo 13.5 the low initial cost was nice. I read more and upgraded the pump before I filled it up to create more flow. Now has a 237 gph return pump. I cycled for 3 weeks closely monitoring the tank. With live rock rubble and turbo start my cycle didn’t take long at all. About two weeks in I added a clean up crew. Three hermits and two trochus snails. A week later the tank was still holding great water quality with the clean up crew and ghost feeding. Then this Sunday I added my two fish (two clowns) and a gsp. I will not be adding anything else until after christmas except maybe a nessarius snail or two.

I’m getting more test kits and a wave maker for Christmas and probably more corals

 

Current levels

Salinity  1.026

Ammonia 0

Nitrite  0

Nitrate 5

PH 8.2

Temp 79-80

Clowns Nemo and Willy imageproxy.php?img=&key=c50b0cddbe5b031bimageproxy.php?img=&key=c50b0cddbe5b031b

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No auto top off yet I’m thinking maybe after Christmas depending on funds but as it stand I’m topping off abt half a cup a day. Been closely watching salt level to make sure this is adequetate. Trying to figure out how much I’m losing per day so that I can make it routine  I been adding a half cup for four days now without seeing a decrease or increase in my salt content 

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24 minutes ago, Curtis_Rose said:

No auto top off yet I’m thinking maybe after Christmas depending on funds but as it stand I’m topping off abt half a cup a day. Been closely watching salt level to make sure this is adequetate. Trying to figure out how much I’m losing per day so that I can make it routine  I been adding a half cup for four days now without seeing a decrease or increase in my salt content 

When i was manually topping off (when i first started), I put a small piece of tape to show where the top of my water line was. Then when i would come to top off the next day, i would fill it back up to that line. This gave me a decent idea of how much to put in. I would say get an auto top off as soon as you get the funds to. It'll make it much easier for you. Because if you're out for a couple of days and cannot top off, the evaporation may affect the salinity enough. 

 

 

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7 hours ago, Curtis_Rose said:

I will eventually frag  the gsp to a bigger piece of rock than the plug it’s on and remove the plug probably to sell off

Don't.  Gsp grows quickly and will over take your rock, killing everything in it's path.  Keep it isolated to it's own island or just leave it on the sandbed.  It will spread over the sand.

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That’s what I mean a small piece of rock that will sit isolated just bigger than the frag plug maybe the sand haha I’ll depends how how it looks I guess

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8 hours ago, Curtis_Rose said:

That’s what I mean a small piece of rock that will sit isolated just bigger than the frag plug maybe the sand haha I’ll depends how how it looks I guess

Sounds good. I have some GSP on it's own rock and it's really nice. I especially love the green colour when the lights are mostly blue (i use blues mostly for my ramp up/down). Hasn't grown as fast as others have claimed, but has grown faster than the others. 

 

What some people do is frag a piece and put it on the glass. It grows into a GSP wall over time. I haven't done it and i'm not sure how it would look to be honest. But sounds like a cool idea.

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I noticed when I brought my gsp home it had a spaghetti worm living inside the coral. Will this harm my gsp? If not I’ll leave it. It does seem to drag sand and pulls it up against the frag but doesn’t seem to bug the gsp...

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  • 3 weeks later...

Little Christmas update-  everything is good and going well. GSP seems to be a little finicky the last two weeks. I have more stuff coming in the mail soon. Test kits, coral food, fritz rpm salt and temp controller. Also picking up a few corals this week from shipwreck corals in Everett. 

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Alright guys big update tonight as Christmas is over and I have added a few things. First off I got my first rodi filter installed and running 0 TDS woo!! Also bought a tds meter. My tap is only 22 tds! Pretty nice to discover. Now for what I added to my lil tank. I recieved  an Aqamai KPS. Love this pump does really well for my little nano. Made a world of difference. After this was all installed I went and bought some corals I added two acans, a purple tipped frog spawn, a metallic green blasto, and my favorite a rainbow Ricordea.  All doing great fully open and strategicly glued to the rockwork. I also bought some nice forceps for grabbings stuff, a Red Sea test kit for the basic alk/cal/mag, an Inkbird temp controller for protection, Reef Roids and calibration fluid for my refractometer. Here’s where it gets hairy, the refractometer I have been using was off. My tank is running at 1.022 when I thought it was at 1.026, the plan is to slowly correct this. Kinda feel bad and this was my only mistake so far. I have been very dillgently watching my salinity everyday and feel like I screwed up but on the flip, everything is happy and thriving just need to correct this in the next week. Anyways that’s all for now here’s the pics more to come. Really excited to watch things grow and I’ll add more but for now I’m content to watch and see what happens. 

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On 12/28/2018 at 5:12 PM, IamJoHo said:

What pump did you upgrade to? I am wanting to get more flow in my Evo but dont really want to add a powerhead in the display.

I upraged to an aquatop 237 gph return pump. Works well and is seriously quite. I still check to see if my pump is even on. Happy reefing!!

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Might be ugrading my lights. I was thinking of going with the current USA 18-24 inch and a diy mesh lid. I don’t want to spend the money on a prime as the next tank I get will have the need for it. I don’t see a need for all that power for my little nano that will only have softies and lps. The current marine is totally adjustable this is big for me because the stock Evo light isn’t and it’s harsh white light. Also a lot more development went into the current USA light. Many features and better growth from what I have seen and read. What do you guys think?

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11 minutes ago, Curtis_Rose said:

Went with the ic version it’ll be here in a week maybe sooner. I’ll report bak on what I think. Only time will tell if it works for me. 

can't wait to see the tank with the new light.  i HATED the stock light.

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  • 2 weeks later...

New light added. DIY screen and new scape to improve flow as I am dealing with my first bit of Cyano!  Just added two nessarius snails and three more hermits as well improving my clean up crew!

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Oh and the light. As first I wasn’t sure about how powerful it was the big rock shaded so much since the recaps it has been better looking. I am considering sending it bak and ordering the pro but everything has seemed happy I have a few more days to decide. I really do like the light and every coral has been happy since the change. Just not 100% sure yet. There is new growth in the green stars and the acans and it hasn’t slowed down since the light change so that’s a good thing! 

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Picked  up a really nice rhodontis mushroom this weekend saw the pic of it on fb and had to have it looks amazing under blue lights and nice under my daylight setting 

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Cyano seems to be licked. I changed the scape which changed the flow feed less and only feed every other day . Turned down my white lights.   And sucked out all the bit bits with a turkey baster it’s been three days and no new Cyano growth some smallish pieces that I missed with the turkey baster that havent grown or spread that I’ll get with my water change this weekend. Makes me happy I’m sure it’ll be bak eventually. Little update on the light. I’m gonna keep it. It is plenty for this tank. I have noticed new colors and much new growth since I added it. 

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  • 2 weeks later...

Well after repeated testing and monitoring over the last few weeks. I’m changing salts. Fritz just isn’t mixing up to what it should calcium is high, mag is high every time two different bags. 

 

First bag I got was 500 calcium and 1480 mag

second bag was 490 calcium 1600 mag.  (Totally different batches) amazon sent me two cause the first bag came damaged

 Thinking of switching to Red Sea blue bucket..opinions?  I want something that’s gonna mix up the same everytime I want stability and simplicity ( as simple as it can get anyway)  Thanks all

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  • 2 weeks later...

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