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My 20 gallon "au naturale" tank


Frag Factory

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Hey all,

 

So when I started my 6 gallon cube up I realised I needed a QT system and a frag system because things were going to quickly out grow the other tank. So I bought a 30" x 12" x 15" tank. Along with a cheap fluval Quad T5 light. Hooked up an old canister filter with some LR rubble, a jebao wavemaker and a heater.

 

The tank was born... but it sat neglected for 4 months. Built up algae, pod life exploded and so did aiptasia. I've never done a water change, I've cleaned the glass twice... Life seemed to be doing well in there so I let things go a bit. It surprised me how a neglected tank was growing corals so fast.

 

So now I don't really need a QT tank I'm going to turn it into something interesting, as it currently stands I have this.

 

Dip6Jan.jpg

 

We are running a DSB which I added today. Currently it's 6" deep in the corner with all the xenia but I will probably make it more even. I've run DSB's before, the natural life they add is fantastic. I'll be looking for sand sifting critters to add to stop gas forming.

 

Currently I have some Zoas in there, a tub with some mushrooms and 20+ xenia frags. Everything looks a bit pissed off because I've been moving them around for the last 3-4 hours and cleaning, killing aips, adding sand... None of the current livestock is guaranteed to stay. I might take it all to my LFS and swap for rock or something.

 

Livestock wise I have 3 thoughts:

  • We add some rock, lots of arches and overhangs. Macro algaes and I get a frogfish.
  • I go with a small group of bangaii cardinals, one of my favourite fish but I've never had them. I keep the tank relatively rock free, lots of macro like a sand flat where they are found in the wild with the occasional soft coral.
  • There is a guy locally who is breeding pipefish. I'm also tempted with this idea. Again will entail minimal rock and macro algae. I'm hoping I have not destroyed the pod population with my clean up operation. 

 

The tank is located in my home office, I'm the only one that will see it so it doesn't have to be perfectly clean. This tank will be all about the livestock, I will use biology over technology. There will be lots of natural life, lots of pods and corals and inverts (unless I go with the frogfish...). 

 

Can't wait to get started 😄

 

 

 

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21 minutes ago, micoastreefing said:

Love your cube, will keep an eye on this one as well.

IMHO, grab some rocks, a few flatter, low lying ones. It should also help with frag placement. 

Thank you dude!

 

TBH I want to avoid frags, I can go a bit bigger here. I'm a huge fan of Japanese reefs, they have minimal rock, 3-5 species of corals and just let them grow nice and big. I wouldn't mind that here.

 

The mushrooms and Zoas will probably stay because I want a biological back up of my main tank if anything did ever happen, the xenia I am 50:50 on. Between the two tanks I have 30 pieces, in less than 6 months. All these pieces are bigger than the one I started with but they are also a solid nutrient exporter. 

 

I might let the tank sit for a month or two also, let the pod life come back up as I think I've just siphoned a lot of them out by accident and go with pipefish. 

 

I've kind of got my head set on bigger soft coral pieces, macro algae, diversity inverts/clean up crew and go with a sand flat kind of style. Kind of bio-tope like.

 

My favourite images of the reefs include lots and lots of fish which are pretty much the same kind and large areas of a single species of coral. Kind of like this (and I know its photoshopped):

 

banner2.jpg?itok=CwGiolD-

 

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  • 3 weeks later...
Frag Factory

So I've made a move and "scaped" the tank, it's a bit different to my other reef.

 

Scaping consisted of emptying a bucket of dried rock rubble into the tank in a pile and sort of shaping it, I call the method "raining rock" due to the amount of water that ended up on my wall and inside my PC monitors next to the tank. 😂

 

38691094e894963ed7c5c5114453d687.thumb.jpg.550ff28dac27482df39e44dfc5efc52b.jpg

 

I also added a handful of Caulerpa Taxifolia to help with nitrate/phosphate control. I also like the look of planed marine tanks, I think they are probably under played.

 

I'm also keeping the Xenia field, I've grown to like it a lot. Once it's fully expanded it looks amazing in the flow.

 

The frags that were in the tank have dotted around the rock pile, they will most likely be staying and I have some more to add from my other tank soon. The only exception to this is the rock of superman shrooms (which don't look very superman like under 10k bulbs). This is in the tank to help seed coraline algae. 

 

IMG_20190108_160235.thumb.jpg.9c322d5c743d1fddc1b59f777f5a599b.jpg

 

IMG_20190108_160312.thumb.jpg.44cd2021c4f137418a72bb20cd76946a.jpg

 

I also seem to have a bit of breeding going on which is awesome. I have 100's of baby stomata snails everywhere (and flatworms......)

 

IMG_20190108_160253.thumb.jpg.bca7ef4f7bc027b8e91bf1a572743794.jpg

 

Pod population seems to have recovered from the mass extinction of cleaning the tank and adding the DSB. 

 

 

To help them further I'm feeding a cube of brineshrimp every few days (you can see some of it in the water during the video). I'm hoping some of it makes it's way into the rock pile so the pods move there. I'm hunting for tank bred pipefish right now, if I find them those pods are going to be super helpful.

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  • 2 weeks later...
DSFIRSTSLTWATER

That is a really nice scape, now you have me rethinking my 20 scape. I like that you used small rubble and I wish I had thought of it lol. Looks great :-)

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Two reasons for rubble:

  1. I already had it 😂
  2. I figured it would give more spaces the fish can't get into, helping pod population.

I'm also going to be feeding frozen which they did accept in the shop, and also culturing copepods + phyto (pod food) outside of the tank and regularly harvesting them.

 

I'm a little concerned about them not accepting frozen food in the future when they have had the live thing. I've been watching them all day while working from home and they constantly forage for pods. I fed frozen food twice today in short bursts and it's hard to tell if they ate it.

 

I also think that pod population will sustain itself once the caulerpa really takes hold giving even more area for pods to hide and breed.

2 hours ago, Dutchymomo said:

Can't wait to see this tank grow out. I would love pipe fish. in a future tank. If yours breed in your tank would you sell the babies?

I doubt I would have the time to raise them if I'm honest. I also think I have two females, this is by no means a breeding pair.

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DSFIRSTSLTWATER
3 minutes ago, Frag Factory said:

Two reasons for rubble:

  1. I already had it 😂
  2. I figured it would give more spaces the fish can't get into, helping pod population.

I'm also going to be feeding frozen which they did accept in the shop, and also culturing copepods + phyto (pod food) outside of the tank and regularly harvesting them.

 

I'm a little concerned about them not accepting frozen food in the future when they have had the live thing. I've been watching them all day while working from home and they constantly forage for pods. I fed frozen food twice today in short bursts and it's hard to tell if they ate it.

 

I also think that pod population will sustain itself once the caulerpa really takes hold giving even more area for pods to hide and breed.

I doubt I would have the time to raise them if I'm honest. I also think I have two males, this is by no means a breeding pair.

I'm going to figure out how I can get my rock into rubble. I have something close to your layout only i have large pieces. This is my first tank so I didn't know how to scape good. 

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39 minutes ago, DSFIRSTSLTWATER said:

I'm going to figure out how I can get my rock into rubble. I have something close to your layout only i have large pieces. This is my first tank so I didn't know how to scape good. 

You could try a hammer but you're going to end up with lots of sharp edges and it wouldn't look too natural.

 

I got these from my LFS, they just chuck the rubble from their dry rock selection in buckets. I just bought a bucket for filter media and had 10lbs left over.

 

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DSFIRSTSLTWATER
Just now, Frag Factory said:

You could try a hammer but you're going to end up with lots of sharp edges and it wouldn't look too natural.

 

I got these from my LFS, they just chuck the rubble from their dry rock selection in buckets. I just bought a bucket for filter media and had 10lbs left over.

 

Yeah you're right, plus all the coraline algae on all the rocks. I guess I have a scape idea for my 75.

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  • 2 weeks later...

I've absolutely loved these guys.

 

They seem to spend all day grazing pods together, not sure if male/female. Can't seem to find any way to sex them but wouldn't surprise me if they are a pair.

 

They seem to have eaten a solid 80% of the pods but that's fine, they are still taking frozen cyclops like champions. 

 

They are so graceful and chilled out, it's brilliant. 

 

Forgive the bleached shroom, it's recovering from my other tank.

IMG_20190201_182914.jpg

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On 2/1/2019 at 1:35 PM, Frag Factory said:

I've absolutely loved these guys.

 

They seem to spend all day grazing pods together, not sure if male/female. Can't seem to find any way to sex them but wouldn't surprise me if they are a pair.

 

They seem to have eaten a solid 80% of the pods but that's fine, they are still taking frozen cyclops like champions. 

 

They are so graceful and chilled out, it's brilliant. 

 

Forgive the bleached shroom, it's recovering from my other tank.

IMG_20190201_182914.jpg

I am a seahorse keeper and I read lots on pipefish too since they are related.  I am not sure about your pipefish but some species the male has more of a bump at the end of his snout.  Also some species the male has a flatter belly either where his pouch is or where the eggs are attached.  Most pipefish do not get along unless they are male and female.  If I had to guess I would think the bigger pipe in the foreground is the male.

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On 2/4/2019 at 5:41 PM, vlangel said:

I am a seahorse keeper and I read lots on pipefish too since they are related.  I am not sure about your pipefish but some species the male has more of a bump at the end of his snout.  Also some species the male has a flatter belly either where his pouch is or where the eggs are attached.  Most pipefish do not get along unless they are male and female.  If I had to guess I would think the bigger pipe in the foreground is the male.

Yeah I'm not sure how to sex them, I read the snout tip but both appear to be the same. 

 

I also saw another page showing that males have a blue/orange spot on their underside, but both appear to be the same again.

 

I've looked for a pouch and it's not really noticeable if it's there...

 

I might speak to the LFS and find out who the local breeder is but honestly I'm not trying to breed them. They seem to be getting on and that is what matters.

 

On 2/4/2019 at 4:58 PM, Firefish15 said:

Wow, this tank is a lot different from a lot of the others on here! I like it!

Thanks dude! 

 

I love a "pure" reef as much as anyone but I wanted something a little different to my other tank. So far so good 🙂

 

On 2/4/2019 at 2:01 PM, Dutchymomo said:

can you show a picture of the whole tank?

The pipefish are really cool

Sure!

 

f5b9a99c429a10543e70d04b9b615e26.jpg

 

Algae growth has been almost nothing, but the macro algae has EXPLODED! 

 

It needs a prune and a water change, I've been working away for 2 days so it needs topping up. I also have a eheim surface skimmer to install and I may remove the canister filter. I don't see a need to run carbon or rowaphos when I have so much macro algae.

 

The surface film algae on the left hand side of the front glass is 10 days growth.

 

1aed422c1c4d34e6b172cd96bd72db5e.jpg

 

They seem to have eaten ALL the pods but still take frozen food which is excellent, trying to feed them 3 times a day.

 

I might go shopping later, I've pulled an all nighter and done my days work and it's only 9.30am... I think I deserve a LFS trip.

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I am liking the looks of the tank now with the caulerpa really growing well.  Do you test for magnesium?  I have found that caulerpa will really suck it up.  Also dosing iron and a small amount of iodine is good, but do the iodine sparingly.  If you do regular water changes then maybe the salt has all the iodine and iron you need.

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  • 2 weeks later...
On 2/8/2019 at 12:17 PM, vlangel said:

I am liking the looks of the tank now with the caulerpa really growing well.  Do you test for magnesium?  I have found that caulerpa will really suck it up.  Also dosing iron and a small amount of iodine is good, but do the iodine sparingly.  If you do regular water changes then maybe the salt has all the iodine and iron you need.

I've not tested anything in the tank since setting it up, it gets a small water change and that's it. I've not even needed to scrape the glass since the Caulerpa went in, it just seems to suck all the phosphates up from what I see. I feed a cube a day of frozen copepods too, quite heavy.

 

Some pics before I prune it tomorrow.

 

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I have a LOT of flatworms that I need to work on, will pick up a 6 line wrasse next time I see one.

 

IMG_20190220_165153.thumb.jpg.6e1074546bd5559c8f40c698ee052fd2.jpg

 

I also have a LOT of aiptasia in both my tanks, Aip X should be renamed to Breed Aips 👿

 

My little 12" cube has one every couple of inches, very small. 

 

This tank has many more... 

 

IMG_20190220_165207.thumb.jpg.c6bb9775c6fb356832c3c17cbe499c15.jpg

 

I don't know what to do about them, I think I need something to eat them in both tanks but filefish and peppermint shrimps all seem to have their risks of eating corals.

 

Bhergia nudis are an option, if I can get some I'll grow aips in a separate tub and start a breeding culture for a little project. There isn't many of them in the UK.

 

IMG_20190220_165159.thumb.jpg.862bfff56d8e05dddc1100e8ae667883.jpg

 

The fish don't seem to care though!

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