Ratvan's Old School Pico - Rockwall Pico v2

[MetaTank]

4 hours ago, Ratvan said:

MAY FULL TANK SHOT 31.05.2019

 

I have trimmed, split and attached the Gracilaria to various small rubble pieces and arranged the (now) five separate strands around the intake for my HOB (with Crab Guard) I hope that this area takes off as an "in tank refugium" of sorts. I also tore the Codium into a few pieces to see if/how it'd grow back. I have one section in a "shaded" area of the tank, one in the HOB with light bleed and finally one piece in the Hob which I have "blacked out" so will see what conditions it prefers. 

This should, in my mind at least give me two area's of movement within the tank, having the Macro Algae on the right hand size of the tank and the Xenia and Duncan taking the left. 

 

Also added a darker background which i much prefer, which will also fit my "theme" of Ric's and Monti's (Rick and Morty! Get it? Get it?) will be looking for anything alien looking or sounding. (Reverse Space Monster's etc). 

 

May 2019 Tank Goals

So at the end of last month I started to review what I wanted to achieve within each month, I will be reviewing 

• Coral Growth. I will be doing as much research as possible to get the best growth on my existing Corals

Not a great deal of growth to report in all honesty. Although Comparing the Zoa's on Plugs that I received from MOC (Mail Order Corals) each now have more heads than when i started. My Sump Zoa rocks (in backup) seem to grow new polyps on a regular basis which is nice even if i think they are "magicians" but not 100% certain.

• Coral Colouration. I want to be able to produce some really interesting and bright Zoa heads from the tank

The Asta 20 LED light has definitely improved the colouration on my Corals, I am excited to receive my first SPS corals (Monti's) to see how they fare in my tank. The only issue I have currently is that I cannot really see a Blue within my Zoa's, especially the MOC Cool Citrine, slightly disappointing but still a ways to go and I still have a lot to learn

• Fragging, I want to learn how to Frag these corals and maybe also create some of my own Zoa Frag Plugs

Well this was not as bad as I thought that it would be, things could be tidier but overall happy with my progress on the Zoa's 

• Aquascape. I am very unhappy about my Aquascape and want to change it, however i know that i am likely to change this again later so considering removing the large live rock for some smaller individual pieces.

Still not a great fan of the Aquascape, but to be honest I think I am going to leave it now and focus on getting coral growth and obviously a few Ricordea's, I will most likely fiddle around with the rockwork but think i will hold off any major rescape for the contest at least.

• DIY Frag Tree, I love the sand bed and watching my critters scuttle about on it, so i want to expand my use of the tank beyond simply Rock and Sand  

I looked into what I wanted to create and to be honest the items that I was looking at building I would not have made a great deal of savings, so i have ordered some Frag Pug Holders in various shapes and layouts to get free shipping on my Coral Order. I think that I will revisit this idea for my Home Tank (if i get one) or even my 7.5G Betta Cube at work

• Lighting. I think that my first two points (Growth and Colours) are going to need an investment in a more suitable light. The Nicrew lights seems to do well for growth (crazy amount of new heads) but the colours are severely lacking. I will be looking for a light unit for approximately £75.00 

Well picked up the Asta 20 LED after a few recommendations and love the light for it's price. I might be looking at picking up the Pixie 30 for the 7.5G Cube if i set up that tank

• Reef Lenses. Related more to the photographing of the tank more than the contest itself. Related again to Colour, I have played with my apps and camera settings as much as possible and think that i need another smallish investment to be able to better translate the tank in pictures. 

I love these, combined with the Lighting upgrade I am more impressed with my photographs. I still need a better phone eventually but so far very happy with the tank related purchase.

Great update!

[pricewayne]

LOVE rick & morty!! Tank is perfectly on theme and it's so awesome!

[kimdawg]

I am glad you like the light.  I also like the open look of your sand bed with the frags.  The way you have the rocks leaves a lot of open space.  Sometimes I think  I have too much rock in my little janky tank.  I just don't know which one to remove.

[Ratvan]

19 hours ago, MetaTank said:

Great update!

Thank you, I'm going to try and do this monthly to track progress. Really enjoying this tank and saltwater as a whole. 

12 hours ago, kimdawg said:

I am glad you like the light.  I also like the open look of your sand bed with the frags.  The way you have the rocks leaves a lot of open space.  Sometimes I think  I have too much rock in my little janky tank.  I just don't know which one to remove.

Thanks. I must have played with my rock work whenever I did a WC. It's still slowly coming together but I have an idea of how j want this to look. 

 

Am debating trying to obscure the HOB inflow with entrusting monti or find something interesting to grow it on instead. Something to fill in the right side ideally. 

 

I am looking forward to the frag holders so I can arrange the Zoas somewhat to my liking and have some more sandbed to play with.

 

Still up in the air about creating an armature for something to encrust over, also been reading a lot about coral grafting and eyeing up the pictures of the monti again

[748S911]

That background is amazing!! Rics and montis 😂

 

Amazing progress, cool ig vid too. 

[Ratvan]

Morning All, So i have encountered an issue I believe.

 

Each morning when I get to work the sand bed is "covered" with a red stringy algae, this usually disappears during the day with the lights on only to appear again over night, I am not entirely sure what is causing this issue. This morning the algae was not too bad as I have yet to find a timer that I trust so have been leaving the tank with natural lighting only on the weekends. 

 

So because I am nosey as anything I took a cheap microscope into work this morning, took a turkey baster and took a sample and photo through the lens, (using Macro Lens too). 

 

 

Does anyone have an idea on what these are?

Set up a thread int the pest section under the topic: Algae Issue

 

[A.m.P]

Some dinoflagellates go into the water column at night or during the day and stick to the tank surfaces the rest of the time. From what I've read, usually any algae which is motile turns out to be a species of dino... But I'm far from an expert, hopefully someone with more specifics will be able to help you out.

 

If it turns out to be dinos, you can spot treat with 3% H202 not exceeding 1ml per gallon and then spot siphon out the gunk through a filter sock and add the water back into the tank to try to keep nutrient levels elevated.

[Ratvan]

Well still struggling along with the Algae issue

 

It does look better than it has so far this week, the speed of growth has slowed, if that makes sense?

[Ratvan]

In other news I seem to have an extra snail, tiny tiny snail (2mm)

 

 

Is this a Trocus? 

[seabass]

10 minutes ago, Ratvan said:

Is this a Trocus? 

Yep.  Hitchhiker?

[Ratvan]

1 minute ago, seabass said:

Yep.  Hitchhiker?

Guess so, not sure when it came in. Not made an addition in the last month or so... 

I am seeing a lot more stuff coming out of the rocks as well which is fun to try and ID, most of it I pretty much have to grow out until I can photo and ID it

[Proxo]

Looking good mate, had a good flick through and got hungry in the process thanks for that lol. 

[Ratvan]

So for better or for worse I received my Corals this morning, left them floating in my Betta tank as per usual (same temp). While this was happening i cleared out as much algae as possible and reintroduced the water back into the tank. After filtering through a lot of floss. 

 

I ordered 6 Montipora Frags and got two Freebies. Always awesome.

 

 

And also some Frag Holders. My apologies rushed shots as have to leave the office for the day shortly. but wanted to get them in and photos posted. 

 

So I put both my Danea on a twin frag holder. Purple and Blue

 

I placed the Greens on the second twin holder. Superman and the second is a Freebie

 

The orange and Mystic went onto the 7 way holder along with some of my Zoa's that i needed to lift (stretching) 

 

Well, I reached the upload limit quickly today. 

 

 

[Ratvan]

Final freebie

 

 

[Proxo]

Nice nice, you order them online? If so where? 😮 If you say charterhouse i'll head butt my table because they owe me money 😄

[Ratvan]

Apologies for the photo dump, will look into reducing the sizes of the images at some point. 

 

RUSHED FTS - EVERYTHING JUST ADDED

 

So spoke with JBS Marines were I ordered the Frags from. They were unable to give me a Green Montipora so they shipped me something else instead. Sadly they didn't note what the freebies were. But I think I may have found out at least two

 

Green Pavona?

 

Tri Colour Acropora? Can't get a good shot of this in my tank, does not appear this way IRL

 

NO idea, most realistic photo I got of all of them with colours etc.

 

 

@Proxo, Ordered from JBS Marines, I have only so far ordered from here and also Mail Order Corals (where I got my Zoas and bonus Duncan). They do really good starter packs and coral mixes. No not Charterhouse Lol, I dislike that company hugely. 

[MetaTank]

7 hours ago, Ratvan said:

Apologies for the photo dump, will look into reducing the sizes of the images at some point. 

 

RUSHED FTS - EVERYTHING JUST ADDED

 

So spoke with JBS Marines were I ordered the Frags from. They were unable to give me a Green Montipora so they shipped me something else instead. Sadly they didn't note what the freebies were. But I think I may have found out at least two

 

Green Pavona?

 

Tri Colour Acropora? Can't get a good shot of this in my tank, does not appear this way IRL

 

NO idea, most realistic photo I got of all of them with colours etc.

 

 

@Proxo, Ordered from JBS Marines, I have only so far ordered from here and also Mail Order Corals (where I got my Zoas and bonus Duncan). They do really good starter packs and coral mixes. No not Charterhouse Lol, I dislike that company hugely. 

The “green pavona” looks like a leptoseris to me. A convict leptoseris maybe? Not sure the actual morph, definitely looks like a lepto. Nice purchases!! 

[Ratvan]

12 minutes ago, MetaTank said:

The “green pavona” looks like a leptoseris to me. A convict leptoseris maybe? Not sure the actual morph, definitely looks like a lepto. Nice purchases!! 

It could be although looking at the frag prices I'm leaning towards the Pavona's being1&3 and the acro as 2nd. Lepto is £25 and Pavs are £5. 

 

Really happy with the purchases regardless of what they turn out to be. Have to be spot on for water changes now

[Wendy]

I'm not familiar with any of your new corals, but that last one looks really cool!

Kinda like the surface of the moon in neon colors.

[Ratvan]

28 minutes ago, Wendy said:

I'm not familiar with any of your new corals, but that last one looks really cool!

Kinda like the surface of the moon in neon colors.

Me neither but really want to try grafting. Figured that plating monti would be a good start. Then I saw variety packs and well just went for it. 

 

It doesn't help that my lights are different to shop lights (not to mention monitor settings) when trying to ID. Also is it some sort of law that LFS owner like Doctors have illegible handwriting. 

Edited June 6, 2019 by Ratvan
Plating not playing

[Wendy]

I'm sorry about the handwriting @Ratvan! I just received a shipment of coral this morning & the handwriting on my packages was legible -(;

 

Oh gosh, don't I know it! The lighting can make so much difference!

 

I dipped all my stuff so I really couldn't keep up with the names of the zoas.

I had to wait till they opened up & look on the vender's site to match up the names.

 

Couldn't you just shoot an email over & ask what the other items are that they sent...

 

Good luck with grafting, those montis grown out are always really beautiful!

[Tamberav]

Grow baby grow!

[Ratvan]

18 minutes ago, Tamberav said:

Grow baby grow!

Not yet they need structure and I need to re arrange.

[MetaTank]

3 hours ago, Ratvan said:

It could be although looking at the frag prices I'm leaning towards the Pavona's being1&3 and the acro as 2nd. Lepto is £25 and Pavs are £5. 

 

Really happy with the purchases regardless of what they turn out to be. Have to be spot on for water changes now

I dunno, looks like this “Hulk” lepto to me, but I’ve never had a pavona

 

[Ratvan]

It does doesn't it? I'll refer to them as mystery SPS

 

Everything looks terrible this morning (apart from Zoas) so nice water change and find a timer that works for the lights this weekend