🐻’s Reef

[BearTheSquare]

@WV Reefer 

Thank you! I was looking at the prices and figured I needed to try something else instead bc my Lfs doesn’t get them and shipping would be ridiculous for 1-2. I took the rock out and threw some super glue on them and right now they seem to be covered so we’ll see if it worked!

 

@billygoat

Thanks for the idea, I gave it a shot and it’s looking like it worked. Last time I tried aptasia x it seemed like it was helping them spread. They took over my 29 gallon biocube and I still have ptsd lol.

[BearTheSquare]

Decided I'll make the 22nd of every month FTS day to track growth, because that's the day I got this tank set up. I'm still trying to figure out taking pictures under LEDs, but I found a pair of yellow sunglasses that helped a little bit. 

 

Nothing special, but current FTS (4-22-2019):

 

Since 1.0 is a monster of a pump:

 

Left side:

 

Right side:

[Sunday]

I love your aquascaping 👌

[BearTheSquare]

@Sunday Thank you very much! Scaping this size tank was so much harder than I was expecting. I have no idea how people that scape pico tanks do it.

[BearTheSquare]

Wondering how to stop micro bubbles in my tank, because they are getting very distracting to look at. I'm still only running the filter sock and sicce 1.0 return pump, so I'm guessing that they are building up in the back chamber and getting blown into the display. Any help or suggestions are greatly appreciated so please hmu before I feel forced to change it from a reef tank to an incredibly disappointing version of this:

   

[BearTheSquare]

Moving into the apartment on Thursday so here’s the plan as of right now:

-Move in and bring five gallons of saltwater, heated to 78 degrees

-Empty 5 gallon bucket for rocks and water

-Another 5 gallon bucket for rest of water

-Styrofoam cooler for corals

-Once I move the tank immediately get in place and start adding rocks back in, then add water

-Let settle for 30 minutes

-Do a 50% waterchange

 

Last pictures before the move and I can finally start to actually stock it:

 

 

Am I missing anything right now? The apartment is only five minutes away from my current house.

[BearTheSquare]

Officially moved everything yesterday and didn’t lose anything, so I’d say it went alright. Changed the scape around and I’m liking it a lot more because there’s so many more places to put coral. I’m excited now that I can finally start actually stocking this.

 

Stocking plans for now are:

• Fill in Zoanthid garden (rastas, goblin fires, and something pink)
• Add to Euphyllia garden
• Add some type of clownfish
• Add neon green toadstool
• Leave top open for possible sps down the road...

 

FTS with new scape:

 

Also scrambled egg zoas have doubled since I added them last month

 

First day in:

 

Today:

 

[BearTheSquare]

Here’s a top-down shot I took earlier today:

 

Also looks like my hammer might be splitting, for the past week it’s gotten narrower in the center of one head. Today I noticed that it is bubbling in the center of the two mouths (just noticed the second one a few days ago). It’s really hard to get a picture, but here’s the best I could do:

[mtgmichaelg]

Normally the splitting happens really slowly. An easy way to tell when the hammer has finally split into two heads is to just look at the tank at night when the tentacles are contracted. Looks good though! That scape is going to be hard to place corals though. I had a similar vertical scape it got annoying. 

[WV Reefer]

3 hours ago, BearTheSquare said:

Here’s a top-down shot I took earlier today:

 

Also looks like my hammer might be splitting, for the past week it’s gotten narrower in the center of one head. Today I noticed that it is bubbling in the center of the two mouths (just noticed the second one a few days ago). It’s really hard to get a picture, but here’s the best I could do:

 

Looks good. Glad the move went well. 😊

[BearTheSquare]

@mtgmichaelg

 

Yeah, I could definitely see how a vertical scape could be annoying. I'm still playing around with it, but the one I had before was literally straight up in the tank. I'm hoping since it's wider now I'll be able to figure out how to place everything. I'll have to check the hammer out after the lights are off. Thanks man!

 

@WV Reefer

 

Thank you! Now I'm just hoping to not move it again for a couple years 😂

[mtgmichaelg]

Actually I didn't notice you rescaped it in a later post. The new scape looks good and gives you a lot of spots for corals. Looks good 👍

[Christopher Marks]

Glad to hear the move went well @BearTheSquare! That was a good opportunity to change up your aquascape, the new layout will give you a lot more room for coral mounting.

 

The first coral additions look to be doing great too, love those zoanthids, I'll have to keep an eye out for a frag to add to my pico reef! Have you considering adding any acans to your reef? They're like the zoanthids of the LPS coral realm 🙂 

[BearTheSquare]

@Christopher Marks

 

Thank you! I really wasn’t liking the rockwork at all from the beginning so being able to do that while not really disturbing the tank was a benefit of the move for sure.

 

Acans and zoanthids are two of my favorite corals so I’m sure there will be some in the future. I saw a YouTube video by “eat sleep reef” on making a zoa garden where he included acan lords with no problems and it looks amazing. 

 

The orange color on the scrambled eggs is amazing, I’d definitely recommend them. I’m just worried they’re going to spread completely over that rock before I get all the colors I want on it lol.

[Christopher Marks]

2 hours ago, BearTheSquare said:

The orange color on the scrambled eggs is amazing, I’d definitely recommend them. I’m just worried they’re going to spread completely over that rock before I get all the colors I want on it lol.

Haha I know the feeling! The first zoanthids in my pico reef are a really nice vivid yellow, I split the initial frag into two colonies and they both took off growing, so I'm trying to add more colors before they claim too much territory 😄. I was able to add two new colors just the other day, but it's not enough! 

 

That looks like some intense surface agitation based on your photos, are you seeing a lot of evaporation that needs to be topped off? Nothing an ATO couldn't handle of course.

[BearTheSquare]

@Christopher Marks

 

I never thought of the surface agitation causing the evaporation (I’ve been topping off manually 3 times a day). Fixed it yesterday and have only had to top off once. Thanks for the suggestion and saving me two extra trips to the top off bucket a day 😂.

[Christopher Marks]

Wow haha! Glad I could help! 

 

Surface agitation is still a good thing to have in your tank, but reducing is ok to do, especially if evaporation is getting out of hand. 😅

[crusty reefer84]

On 5/12/2019 at 4:01 PM, BearTheSquare said:

Officially moved everything yesterday and didn’t lose anything, so I’d say it went alright. Changed the scape around and I’m liking it a lot more because there’s so many more places to put coral. I’m excited now that I can finally start actually stocking this.

 

Stocking plans for now are:

• Fill in Zoanthid garden (rastas, goblin fires, and something pink)
• Add to Euphyllia garden
• Add some type of clownfish
• Add neon green toadstool (middle right)
• Leave top open for possible sps down the road...

 

FTS with new scape:

 

Also scrambled egg zoas have doubled since I added them last month

 

First day in:

 

Today:

 

Looking great...love the scrambled eggs zoanthids 

[BearTheSquare]

@dferrari13

 

Thanks man, how’s your tank doing? Im trying to get mine that full one day.

[BearTheSquare]

I’ve been looking for pictures of my first nano reef since early this year and I finally found them. Made me feel a lot better about how my tank looks right now. These were taken right before the Xenia took over the entire tank and you could barely see inside. Enjoy these pictures from 2010 posted by a 11 year old on a flip phone. (The maxi mini is still alive in the 75 gallon at my parents house) 😂

[BearTheSquare]

Just added a nice, neon green toadstool to the tank about 20 minutes ago and it’s almost fully open already. Really looking for suggestions on placement, because I don’t want it to eventually block the return pump if it grows taller. Any help would be great!

 

Here’s a picture of the toadstool:

 

And here’s an FTS to show its current placement:

[BearTheSquare]

Fully open:

 

[crusty reefer84]

On 5/17/2019 at 8:55 PM, BearTheSquare said:

@dferrari13

 

Thanks man, how’s your tank doing? Im trying to get mine that full one day.

So far so good...almost 4 years old soon

[BearTheSquare]

Just picked up a black ice clownfish from the LFS after two months of having this set up without fish. Getting acclimated right now and then I’ll try to get some pics. So excited to finally have some movement in the tank. Hopefully I’ll be adding some new corals and a possible new lady friend for him in a few weeks with my internship finally getting started.

 

So everyone welcome Jeff Bezos (he was paired up with a larger clownfish that had to get moved to a different tank, because she was bad to him; stole all his assets, etc., etc.) 🙂

[BearTheSquare]

He’s been hanging out all day, hoping he decides to play in a coral some time soon. Overall, I’d give him a 5/5 stars for deciding not to host the return nozzle.

 

Here are some pictures with as much glare as physically possible: