Snow's 60G Secret Predatory Sanctum 🐲🐉 - Shutting Down

[Snow_Phoenix]

Update #2. The Giant Bubble. 

 

The giant bubble coral hasn't quite opened fully yet in my tank - and the bubbles still look a bit deflated. 🤔

 

 

 

I think it'll take a few days before it completely adjusts to the reef. I set it on the sandbed because it's huge - it's actually the size of a small ball when full open. 

 

My pearl bubble is still very happy and bubbly though: 😊

 

 

Bonus pic of Goblin getting comfy in the cup coral:

 

 

 

[Snow_Phoenix]

I forgot to add earlier - I will most likely be picking up a 2nd hand light from my primary LFS (if the manager wants to get rid of a few as they move shop). 

 

Light #1: 72W, multiple colors, quite powerful and in good condition. 

 

 

 

Light #2. Very bright, adjustable via wifi-app, 7 color channels:

 

 

Depending on price/availability, I'll pick up either - adaptor & stand included in the deal. I will use one of these lights alongside my AI Prime, so the coverage should be more than enough for a 2' ft cube. 

 

These are from China - on par with the Chinese black box. My LFS uses black boxes over their frag tanks, and coral growth is very, very good (been observing it for a while). 

 

I actually wouldn't mind picking a black box + hanging kit from them second hand, but I'll need to commission the building of a mount to hang the lights, which might be more expensive than the light itself. That's why I was looking into other options - mainly other lights which already tag along with adjustable brackets/mounts. 👍

[WV Reefer]

3 hours ago, Snow_Phoenix said:

Update #1: Meet Spyder! 😊

 

I dropped by my LFS today to pick up the giant bubble coral - and I spotted something large scuttling around one of the corners of their frag tanks. 

 

Turned out to be a very large decorator crab - I recall seeing it in one of their other tanks last year - can't believe how huge it has grown! 😮

 

I was pretty fascinated by it. I've never owned a decorator before, because it isn't exactly reefsafe. But I do have a large fuge with plenty of tunicates, sea sponges and macro (and okay, okay, I admit I did feel bad for it because it has been at the store so long that they even forgot it existed until I pointed it out today) - anyhow, I bought it, acclimated it, then released it into my fuge:

 

 

 

(And yep, that's actually GHA on its limbs 😂)

 

He's actually very cool to watch. And he blends in very well with the rocks (sorry for the dirty glass):

 

 

 

 

One of his limbs:

 

 

Such a strange and unique critter. Will feed him a small slice of chopped shrimp shortly. 😊👍

He’s so cute!

[Snow_Phoenix]

11 minutes ago, WV Reefer said:

He’s so cute!

Thank you! I tried to feed him some shrimp but he ran away. ☹

 

Now I can't find him because he looks exactly like a piece of LR in my fuge. 🙄

[Snow_Phoenix]

Scrolled through some very old posts last night to find out exactly how *long my decorator crab has been at the LFS:

 

 

Turns out he has been there for 1.5 years! 😮  

 

So yeah, he's a little old, and pretty much full size - I hope I can keep him for at least 2++ years (not sure what a crab's lifespan is, but inverts in general don't seem to last beyond 5 years, if I'm not mistaken (?) ). 🤔

 

Add-On: Just texted my friend - she said the crab in the pic is older, the one I currently have was added directly to their coral frag time some time last year. So he was not as old as I originally presumed. But he is full-size (for his species) though. 😊👍

[Snow_Phoenix]

Bubbly. 🥰

 

 

 

Still not fully open yet though. 🤔

[Snow_Phoenix]

Look who decided to crawl out of the rocks for a bit: 😂

 

I can see he's fashioned a new sponge on one of his legs too! 😊

 

 

 

 

 

[Snow_Phoenix]

Took a peek at the coral hospital tank downstairs. Looks pretty bad - I don't think any of them will make it: 😭

 

 

 

 

 

The bin is roughly 15G, but I only filled it up to ~9G. Lighting is my PAR38 LED (36W). 

[Snow_Phoenix]

Poseidon on the hunt for pellets today: 😊

 

 

 

 

 

Poseidon eating Formula One pellets:

 

Illaron posturing at Bella: 🙄

 

Heavy traffic over Bubble Avenue: 🤗

 

 

[debbeach13]

I was catching up on this thread. When viewing Tuesdays pictures 2. Of Bella she looks like a frog. Your pictures are always great.

[Snow_Phoenix]

18 minutes ago, debbeach13 said:

I was catching up on this thread. When viewing Tuesdays pictures 2. Of Bella she looks like a frog. Your pictures are always great.

Heh. They all do have that 'froggy' appearance when captured head-on. I actually think it's kinda cute. 

[Snow_Phoenix]

The Big Guy laying low today morning:

 

 

 

[Snow_Phoenix]

Bubble under heavy blues:

 

 

Dragonets taking turns eating/browsing through the food:

 

Bella eating pellets: 🥰

 

 

[Snow_Phoenix]

Another quick update. Have some very bad news about the hospital tank, guys. My cynarina succumbed to BJD overnight and was a big blob of brown goop today: 😭

 

 

I had to throw it out because there was nothing left once the goop was sucked out using a baster. 😔

 

One of my symphyllias is also showing early signs of BJD and some of its flesh was detached today. The largest symphyllia's remaining flesh is still existing, but I personally don't think it'll make it either. ☹

 

I am secretly relieved I removed and isolated these 3 pieces from my main tank, though. It would have been very difficult to clean up the 60G if I had brown goop being blown all over the rocks and other corals by my wavemaker. 

 

Back to a slightly lighter note, I got to enjoy viewing Spyder's antics up close today. He mainly gave me a great view of his underside, where he has attached more cyano (urgh! 🙄 ), a caulerpa strand and more grayish-purplish sponges from my fuge:

 

 

 

I don't think he likes me filming him very much though - he can go incredibly still for several long seconds if he sees me hovering too close - stranger danger, maybe? 🤔 :

 

 

And then I finally got a chance to feed him two tiny chunks of shrimp, but...he *threw it away: 😭

 

 

 

I'm like:

 

 

Anyway, I still love him, and he has been pretty cool so far. 😊👍

 

[Ratvan]

Sorry about the BJD, it really does suck. 

That crab is awesome

[WV Reefer]

29 minutes ago, Snow_Phoenix said:

Another quick update. Have some very bad news about the hospital tank, guys. My cynarina succumbed to BJD overnight and was a big blob of brown goop today: 😭

 

 

I had to throw it out because there was nothing left once the goop was sucked out using a baster. 😔

 

One of my symphyllias is also showing early signs of BJD and some of its flesh was detached today. The largest symphyllia's remaining flesh is still existing, but I personally don't think it'll make it either. ☹

 

I am secretly relieved I removed and isolated these 3 pieces from my main tank, though. It would have been very difficult to clean up the 60G if I had brown goop being blown all over the rocks and other corals by my wavemaker. 

 

Back to a slightly lighter note, I got to enjoy viewing Spyder's antics up close today. He mainly gave me a great view of his underside, where he has attached more cyano (urgh! 🙄 ), a caulerpa strand and more grayish-purplish sponges from my fuge:

 

 

 

I don't think he likes me filming him very much though - he can go incredibly still for several long seconds if he sees me hovering too close - stranger danger, maybe? 🤔 :

 

 

And then I finally got a chance to feed him two tiny chunks of shrimp, but...he *threw it away: 😭

 

 

 

I'm like:

 

 

Anyway, I still love him, and he has been pretty cool so far. 😊👍

 

Maybe he no like seafood. 🤷🏻‍♀️

[Snow_Phoenix]

24 minutes ago, Ratvan said:

Sorry about the BJD, it really does suck. 

That crab is awesome

He is indeed!

18 minutes ago, WV Reefer said:

Maybe he no like seafood. 🤷🏻‍♀️

😂

[A.m.P]

Uhm, he's vegan -how dare you.

[Snow_Phoenix]

I woke up today and I noticed my bubble coral is finally (!) fully open, and bubbly:

 

(With clip-on yellow filter lens) :

 

 

 

(Without clip-on filter lens) :

 

 

 

So nice to see it so big and poofy. 😊

[Snow_Phoenix]

If everything goes well, this piece should be home some time next month:

 

 

I miss my cynarina so much. Before the bleach-spray accident, it was one of my most stable LPS in the reef. Even more stable than my euphyllias and symphyllias. 

 

There is still a bit of space on the sandbed, and reef is healing, so I figured I might as well put this one on hold at my secondary LFS. 

 

They only had 3 cynarinas left, and the red one was double the price, but I preferred this one because it was dual-colored (green & orange):

 

 

Also, the 60G is okay - both bubbles are doing great and are now wide open, but the hospital tank took another dip. The BJD has spread to both my remaining symphyllias. They're actually pretty much gone, but there is still a *bit of flesh here and there, and I have no heart to bin them when there *might be a fighting chance for both corals. 😔

 

I'll keep an eye on them and see how it goes tomorrow. 

 

Also, I found out the spotted mandy at the secondary LFS is actually 4-years-old! 😮

 

Eats both pellets and mysis. 👍

 

Quite happy to hear that, because if my dragonets continue taking in a mix of various prepared food (and live food too), then I can look forward to having many years with them too! 😊👍

[Snow_Phoenix]

Sushi, my aquacultured regular occy. clownfish turns one today. Happy birthday, Sushi! 🥰

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Snow_Phoenix]

Pearl bubble this morning: 

 

 

Curious Miko:

 

 

Illaron on the hunt on mushroom mountain:

 

 

Bullesye rhodactis under early morning blues:

 

 

Goblin getting comfy again:

 

 

I think I need to move that favia - it appears to be getting stung by the pearl bubble coral at night: 

 

 

Thanos:

 

 

🤗

 

[Snow_Phoenix]

So...I came home from the hospital and I decided to check up on my fuge. I noticed Spyder had decorated himself with more pieces of my macro, and has tiny red and green bits all over him, which is colorful and cute: 🤗

 

 

 

 

However, there was one thing he decorated himself with that boggled me:

 

 

Where the heck did he get the green thread from??? 🤔😮🤣

 

 

Seriously though, I know these guys are great at picking up stuff, but I didn't know know they could find things that I'm pretty sure I did *not put in the tank in the first place. 😅

 

Anyhow, mysterious green thread aside, here are two quick vids of him:

 

 

Wonder what he'd stick to his carapace next. So far he's done sponges, macroalgae, cyano, thread and a small broken clam shell. 😊

 

[Snow_Phoenix]

Asleep. 😊

 

 

[Snow_Phoenix]

Doc on standby today morning:

 

 

 

 

Giant bubble under heavy blues:

 

 

Leopold out for a swim with friends: