Yoshii's Old School 2.5g Hawaiian Pico 🌴

[yoshii]

7 minutes ago, MetaTank said:

Could you use fish traps or anything like that? Weigh them down with fishing weights and bait them with shrimp or something? Sorry, this was the first pic I saw, lol

 

I thought about that too but the old law includes traps with nets for needing a permit so I don't want to risk it. Plus catching fish with my hands sounds more fun haha

[Wingy]

Do you think blackout window film on part of the window would help?  You could do a trial run by using brown craft paper or cardboard just to see if that made any difference.

[yoshii]

11 minutes ago, Wingy said:

Do you think blackout window film on part of the window would help?  You could do a trial run by using brown craft paper or cardboard just to see if that made any difference.

I've been using my curtain to get a similar effect by diffusing/shading the light. If leave that side of the curtain drawn then temp shouldn't be a problem, but I don't know if the reduced light intensity would be enough for corals/macro

[yoshii]

Broke the rocks up today, I think I might go for a spur and groove style aquascape. I probably won't use all the rocks and focus more on the macros providing the scape

[Christopher Marks]

That rock looks like it will make for awesome live rock, super porous!

 

That's neat you might be able to hand catch a fish from a tide pool! What other kinds of invertebrates do you think you might be able to collect for the pico? Any snails?

[yoshii]

1 hour ago, Christopher Marks said:

That rock looks like it will make for awesome live rock, super porous!

 

That's neat you might be able to hand catch a fish from a tide pool! What other kinds of invertebrates do you think you might be able to collect for the pico? Any snails?

Yeah I can't wait to make it live!

 

I've got 1 Astrea already, maybe I'll pick up some hermits too. I'm sure I can find a variety of inverts in the tidepools, I've seen tons of cucumbers, coral banded shrimp etc. I think the hard part will be find pico-sized inverts!

 

I think I might add a feather duster in here too, although I might buy that from the LFS. I'll just start up a phyto culture if I get one.

[asting]

One CBS. Make it his manhattan studio.

[Snow_Phoenix]

If you can get the blue CBS somehow, that would be okay, I *think. They stay quite small. I have the golden variety. The shrimp itself is not very big but the claws definitely boost its size. I've also observed it cleaning my Starry a few times. I didn't even know they did that until I caught him at it. 

[yoshii]

I'm not a huge fan of regular CBS, but the gold and blue ones are cool. Idk if they occur here, but I'll keep an eye out!

[yoshii]

Filled the tank for its leak test (it passed yay) and took PAR measurements this morning. I took measurements directly adjacent to the tank, and also inside the tank

 

With shade (aka my sheer curtain)

7am

Adjacent: 70-95 micromol m^-2s^-1

In tank: 50-100 (numbers vary due to the folds in my curtain providing more shade)

8am

Adjacent: 135-180

In tank: 160-190

9am

Adjacent: 150-185

In tank: 150-195

10am

Adjacent: 130-160

In tank: 130-160

11am

Adjacent: 90-110

In tank: 85-110

 

Without shade (in direct sunlight)

7am

Adjacent: 500-550

In tank: 350

8am

Adjacent: 1100

In tank: 800-1100

9am

Adjacent: 1260-1300

In tank: 600-1200

10am

Adjacent: 900-1400

In tank: 900-1300

11am

Adjacent: 850-1000

In tank: 600-850

 

Yesterday I also took measurements of direct sunlight outside (2300+) and the location of that lace algae I got the other week (1300, underwater)

I would like to aim for a min of 200 in this tank, but higher light algae may need more than that, given that many are directly exposed to the sun when it's low tide.

 

Temperature

As awesome as it would be to get 1000+ PAR in this tank, it's only 9:30am right now and the sun has really heated up the tank. It's almost at 84F right now and I think it will continue to climb. Edit: Now 85F at 10am. So looks like direct sunlight is a no-go unless I come up with a way to cool the tank. I might try to add a fan and see if that helps at all. Any other ideas?

With the shade (curtain) I'm still getting an ok amount of PAR (150-195) so I may just leave it that way for now and see if I can keep high light algae

[yoshii]

Current tank view

 

 

Besides running around taking PAR measurements everywhere, I also stopped by Petsmart yesterday and looked at their HOB filters. The smallest AC they carried was the AC30 for around $40. There were some other smaller ones I liked, but all had an ugly black intake tube. So off to Amazon I went, and I actually really like this cute blue one! Despite the black intake tube lol. Maybe I'll make a DIY clear intake. I'll probably stop by Petco today too and see what they have.

 

 

 

[asting]

1 hour ago, yoshii said:

Current tank view

 

 

Besides running around taking PAR measurements everywhere, I also stopped by Petsmart yesterday and looked at their HOB filters. The smallest AC they carried was the AC30 for around $40. There were some other smaller ones I liked, but all had an ugly black intake tube. So off to Amazon I went, and I actually really like this cute blue one! Despite the black intake tube lol. Maybe I'll make a DIY clear intake. I'll probably stop by Petco today too and see what they have.

 

 

 

Ac30 is like  $22 on amazon!

What par meter do you have? If you have a fan, expect you'll need an ATO

[Tigahboy]

1 hour ago, yoshii said:

Current tank view

 

 

Besides running around taking PAR measurements everywhere, I also stopped by Petsmart yesterday and looked at their HOB filters. The smallest AC they carried was the AC30 for around $40. There were some other smaller ones I liked, but all had an ugly black intake tube. So off to Amazon I went, and I actually really like this cute blue one! Despite the black intake tube lol. Maybe I'll make a DIY clear intake. I'll probably stop by Petco today too and see what they have.

 

 

 

That blue HOB looks really cool!  

[yoshii]

13 minutes ago, asting said:

Ac30 is like  $22 on amazon!

What par meter do you have? If you have a fan, expect you'll need an ATO

I saw... unfortunately they won't ship it to Hawaii 😞

 

It's an Apogee, model MQ-510. I borrowed it from work.

 

Nah, I don't want an ATO, I would just top off daily.

 

It's a little past 11 here now, and the tank isn't getting nearly as much direct sunlight anymore, so maybe the fan would just need to be on for a few hours in the morning when it's hot? Although I don't know that strategy would work in the upcoming summer months...I'll have to test out the fan method soon

[yoshii]

2 minutes ago, Tigahboy said:

That blue HOB looks really cool!  

Doesn't it? Maybe because blue is one of my favorite colors, but I really like it! If Petco doesn't have something I like today, I think I'll order the blue one

[yoshii]

I stopped by two Petcos, the first one didn't even have any fish stuff at all, and the second one had an even worse selection of filters than the PetSmart I went to yesterday. So I think I'll order the cute blue one on Amazon.

 

Also, I just remembered that several years ago Dana Riddle (I think it was him) published an article about light/PAR/spectrum in a shallow Hawaiian tidepool...I'm going to try to dig up that article and see what his PAR values were.

[748S911]

https://www.ebay.com/itm/70W-100W-Aquarium-Water-Chiller-Fish-Shrimp-Tank-Cooler-Heating-Cooling-Machine/283282120298?var=584141790912

 

 

I'm looking at trying this not sure yet

[yoshii]

48 minutes ago, 748S911 said:

https://www.ebay.com/itm/70W-100W-Aquarium-Water-Chiller-Fish-Shrimp-Tank-Cooler-Heating-Cooling-Machine/283282120298?var=584141790912

 

 

I'm looking at trying this not sure yet

Oh interesting! I also remember Micro-Reefs selling an Ice-Probe chiller that would sit on top of your HOB

[Tigahboy]

50 minutes ago, 748S911 said:

https://www.ebay.com/itm/70W-100W-Aquarium-Water-Chiller-Fish-Shrimp-Tank-Cooler-Heating-Cooling-Machine/283282120298?var=584141790912

 

 

I'm looking at trying this not sure yet

That's sweet. Seems like a great price. 

[748S911]

17 hours ago, yoshii said:

Oh interesting! I also remember Micro-Reefs selling an Ice-Probe chiller that would sit on top of your HOB

I think they still do, im sure I saw it around somewhere.

[yoshii]

Thanks for the suggestions, I think for now I'm going to try to see what I can grow with the "shade". Then later I'll probably complain about not being able to keep high light macros and I'll cave and buy the chiller 😅

[748S911]

1 minute ago, yoshii said:

Thanks for the suggestions, I think for now I'm going to try to see what I can grow with the "shade". Then later I'll probably complain about not being able to keep high light macros and I'll cave and buy the chiller 😅

cheap desk fan should work too.

[yoshii]

45 minutes ago, 748S911 said:

cheap desk fan should work too.

I want to test out my mini desk fan, but I'll have to wait until the weekend so I can see if it really could lower the temp at least 5 degrees at the peak sun exposure.

[yoshii]

Although the tank doesn't have saltwater in it yet, I figure I'd introduce some of the future livestock.

 

For the past few weeks I've been keeping a few tiny hitchhiker gobies at work, in this ultimate jank tank (The dive slate is for shade from afternoon sun)

 

 

Two are "Petite Gobies" Priolepis farcimen. They like to hang upside down under ledges, so I haven't gotten a good picture of them yet.

"A tiny and rarely seen inhabitant of reefs.  Reddish-brown to greenish gray with fine blue vertical lines on the head.  Attains 1 inch.  Endemic to Hawaii and Johnston Island.  Formerly known as Zonogobius farcimen."

These guys are really tiny but cute, I've been feeding them sprirulina brine, they are too small to eat mysis.

 

The other goby is a "Halfspotted Goby" Asterropteryx semipunctatus. It changes color a lot (dark/light) but usually looks like this picture. Since it got added with the Petite gobies, I think they have become much less shy. Although I'm not sure if I want to keep this goby in my pico...kinda drab.

Edit: Just looked up reefs.org says this goby can live at least 11 years in an aquarium!

 

I also found this anemone I really like, but it's NPS and will probably eat my gobies

 

[Tigahboy]

Oh wow.  Hands down the most interesting/cool/awesome livestock in this competition thus far.  Get those in the pico asap!