Seafurn's Old School Pico featuring Chrysophytes, Cyano, and Brown Algae

[SeaFurn]

So here's the story and an update on the SPS I got at MACNA.  I drove to Orlando and took my 5 gallon Home Depot bucket filled with salt water, heater, and air pump.  I put all the nems, zoas and SPS in the bucket and all seemed to be fine on the drive home.  However, when I got home I found that wasn't the completely the case.  The pink lemonade I picked up, which I was a little hesitant to get and put in a little pico in the first place, was starting to RTN.  Brace yourself, this isn't pretty...

 

My first glance down into the bucket.  This is the frag and little bits of flesh were fluorescing and swirling in the water:

 

 

Out of the bucket - I was a bit panicked because I've never dealt with RTN before.  As I was trying to determine what do it was just getting worse.

 

So I fragged off the RTN parts as best I could and then glued it down.

 

 

But the RTN continued.  Finally, I was able to get enough of it that it stopped.  So that was Sept 1, and this now all I was able to save of that beautiful frag. 

My fingers are crossed that it settles in and makes a come back.  I think it's placement is good for flow and lighting.  The light is the best it can be considering its just a PAR38 bulb.

And I'm really trying hard to keep the parameters of this little tank as stable as possible.  I haven't seen many polyps extending but again, I'm hopeful. 

  

In the good news category - the Forest Fire Digi I got at the same time is doing amazingly and growing like crazy! 

I've placed in the front corner of the tank, which may seem a little odd, but I think it works.  You'll get the idea when I post a FTS. 

 

 

In other news, the zoas are just so so still.  Some are open, some open and close. The Bob Marley's are still closed very tightly and have white tips. Only 2 polyps open up occasionally. Something is up with them and I'm not really sure what to do.  I have noticed the rocks in the tank seem brown and are very very slimy to the touch. The hermits and snails are not able to get them clean down to the stone.  There's really no other serious algae problems but I'm wondering if should pull the trigger on that chemi-clean treatment.  Or, should I take the rocks out during the next water change next weekend and scrub them with a brush and do a little peroxide treatment on them?  Opinions welcome!

 

Will post a FTS shot soon....

[kimdawg]

Sorry you are having problems with your frag.  I don't do sticks so I am no help there, but I have used chemi-clean treatment on my contest tank.  I followed directions exactly and saw an improvement in the slime brown on some of my rocks.  It didn't harm any of my inverts, fish, or corals, but I just have GSP, zoas, and ricordea in there.  Good luck with what ever you decide to do.

[William]

I would dose microbacter 7 to r some other bacterial supplement. Chemi-clean is just at oxidizer that will help but will not solve the problem. If you can I would also throw some high porosity biological filtration in your setup (I buried mine in the sand) 

[William]

I just remembered that you are running bare bottom, you may also want to throw in a bottle of copepods. 

[SeaFurn]

7 hours ago, William said:

I would dose microbacter 7 to r some other bacterial supplement. Chemi-clean is just at oxidizer that will help but will not solve the problem. If you can I would also throw some high porosity biological filtration in your setup (I buried mine in the sand) 

All good ideas. Thanks.

I have some of those marine pure bio balls. I can put a few in the HOB - it’s big enough! Lol.

I put some copepods in shortly after it was set up but not sure it was enough or that I fed enough phyto to sustain the population. 

[SeaFurn]

So a few of the Bob Marley polyps opened ever so slightly yesterday. I could see yellow and purple! Maybe there’s hope for them?? 

 

And this may be a controversial move but I temporarily moved my emerald crab from the 45 to the pico to get to work on the slimy rocks. He got right to it.

That thing was a machine in the 45 so he make short work of the pico. I’ll evaluate how things look this weekend and decide whether to leave him longer or move him back.

Will also get more filtration in the HOB this weekend along with ordering some copepods.

 

The shark nose goby is so cool. At feeding time, I turn off the HOB and he goes right to the outlet ledge and sits there waiting for the food. I need to get a video of that. 

[seabass]

58 minutes ago, SeaFurn said:

And this may be a controversial move but I temporarily moved my emerald crab from the 45 to the pico

Nothing wrong with that, as long as there is food for it.  They are very opportunistic feeders, so you don't want them too hungry.

[kimberbee]

1 hour ago, SeaFurn said:

I temporarily moved my emerald crab from the 45 to the pico

How'd you catch him?? 

[caas1496]

2 hours ago, SeaFurn said:

So a few of the Bob Marley polyps opened ever so slightly yesterday. I could see yellow and purple! Maybe there’s hope for them?? 

 

And this may be a controversial move but I temporarily moved my emerald crab from the 45 to the pico to get to work on the slimy rocks. He got right to it.

That thing was a machine in the 45 so he make short work of the pico. I’ll evaluate how things look this weekend and decide whether to leave him longer or move him back.

Will also get more filtration in the HOB this weekend along with ordering some copepods.

 

The shark nose goby is so cool. At feeding time, I turn off the HOB and he goes right to the outlet ledge and sits there waiting for the food. I need to get a video of that. 

Keep an eye on that emerald crab. I made the same move to help eliminate some bubble algae in my pico. As soon as it was gone he feasted on my agave zoas and was a real pain to catch and get out. 

[SeaFurn]

1 hour ago, kimberbee said:

How'd you catch him?? 

He’s out all the time. There’s not many places to hide since it’s the RFA tank. So I reached in and grabbed him! 😂

He wasn’t happy and tried to make a run for it!

(Salinity and temp are the same in both tanks)

[SeaFurn]

1 hour ago, caas1496 said:

Keep an eye on that emerald crab. I made the same move to help eliminate some bubble algae in my pico. As soon as it was gone he feasted on my agave zoas and was a real pain to catch and get out. 

Yeah that’s what I’m worried about. He’s basically just taking a couple day “all the algae you can eat” vacation! 

 

It’s going to be more difficult to get him out of the pico for sure but I can always break that down quickly to get him! 

[caas1496]

33 minutes ago, SeaFurn said:

Yeah that’s what I’m worried about. He’s basically just taking a couple day “all the algae you can eat” vacation! 

 

It’s going to be more difficult to get him out of the pico for sure but I can always break that down quickly to get him! 

We had a nice long tug of war before he decided to give in and let go of the rock! They have an amazingly strong grip. 

[SeaFurn]

September's been a ride on the Struggle Bus...

 

Here's the Sept FTS.  WYSIWYG - all month long.

 

 

The month has been characterized by fluctuating parameters early in the month, then slimy rocks, and all the while most zoas still rarely open.  Frustrating.

I got the parameters stable and started feeding the tank more. Not sure if that caused the slime the but snails and hermit crab couldn't keep up nor were they effective at all. 

Then mid last week I moved the emerald crab to this tank to take a crack at the slime.  More on that in a minute.

I did a 90% water change yesterday  and scrubbed all the rocks hoping that would reset the tank but this all I got...more of the same.

 

RIght side of the tank.  This is how it usually looks.  I've tried everything to get more of the zoas to open. A couple of them do seem like they are growing though so that's weird.  I also think something happened to the purple/yellow ones (center of the photo - I mistakenly keep calling them Bob Marleys - but they seem more like LA Lakers).  They seem to be disappearing/shrinking.  The hammer isn't even looking good today.  I guess I'm happy the pink lemonade hasn't lost any more flesh....maybe one day it will be beautiful again...

 

 

Left side - frogspawn has been growing and splitting so that's good.  The bubble gum and the psammacorra is doing well.  I'm sick about the stylo (I think that's what it is). It hadn't had its polyps out for a week or two but I think the emerald crab might have scrapped the flesh off of it in the last few days.  I really hope that's not the case but you can see white skeleton. I doubt that's coming back.

 

 

 

Close up....what do you all think? What should I do about this coral?   I need to pull the crab ASAP since I manually cleaned off the rocks this past weekend.  

 

 

The bright spot has been the goby!  I do love to go look at the tank just to see what he's doing.  He's getting more brave is out a lot more now.  

Can't believe we only have a one more month to go. 

[Wonderboy]

Regardless of any issues, I think it's still looking really good. Have you tried reducing the intensity of the light for the zoas? Are you still using the tuna blue LED? I have found that thing to be a little too intense for some of the corals in there, particular disc-like corals. Not sure what to do about that frag, but I think I would just leave it and maybe also reduce the intensity of the light.

[seabass]

29 minutes ago, SeaFurn said:

What should I do about this coral?

I would take a bone cutter and break off the top.  Then cut away damaged sections.  If alkalinity and other parameters are good, the resulting frags should be fine.

[SeaFurn]

47 minutes ago, Wonderboy said:

Regardless of any issues, I think it's still looking really good. Have you tried reducing the intensity of the light for the zoas? Are you still using the tuna blue LED? I have found that thing to be a little too intense for some of the corals in there, particular disc-like corals. Not sure what to do about that frag, but I think I would just leave it and maybe also reduce the intensity of the light.

Thanks for saying that. Some days  it doesn’t look too bad I suppose. 

 

Yeah I’m still using the bulb. Raising it and diffusing it didn’t seem to make a difference so I’ve kept it. 

[SeaFurn]

33 minutes ago, seabass said:

I would take a bone cutter and break off the top.  Then cut away damaged sections.  If alkalinity and other parameters are good, the resulting frags should be fine.

I was thinking that I’d probably have to do that. Thanks for the advice. 

[SeaFurn]

Fragged.  Looks like they will be fine as long as I keep the parameters in check.  Also put a frag in the 45 for safe keeping.  

I may pull the melting purple/yellow zoas out this weekend. There's one polyp that opens and I may try to save that one and build from there.  

I also raised the light 6 inches.  More to come...

 

 

[SeaFurn]

Tank was looking good this morning and believe it or not most all of the zoas opened up by mid-morning. Took this photo and posted on IG before that though. 

Not sure what’s changed for the better but i’ll take it.

 

 

[debbeach13]

Yes it does look good. Real good. The coral color is great.

[SeaFurn]

12 hours ago, debbeach13 said:

Yes it does look good. Real good. The coral color is great.

Thanks! It looked even better today. ALL THE ZOAS were open, the LPS was full, and excellent PE on the SPS!  I have no idea what’s going on.

Going to test the parameters tomorrow to document where things are at. 

I’ve been so frustrated but really enjoying the tank the last couple of days. 

[SeaFurn]

Check out the zoas - most are open! Can’t believe the contest is about over.

 

 

[Reefkid88]

Loveeee all the colors !!! Goodness I need to get my tank wet 😟

[WV Reefer]

7 minutes ago, SeaFurn said:

Check out the zoas - most are open! Can’t believe the contest is about over.

 

 

I need the yellow ones!! 🤩

[SeaFurn]

7 minutes ago, Reefkid88 said:

Loveeee all the colors !!! Goodness I need to get my tank wet 😟

Thanks!

Yes get yours going!!  Glad you got your light all squared away now or so it seems.