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

[Snow_Phoenix]

Morning! 😊

 

Icarus hunting for pods very early today: 

 

 

Large & bubbly: 😊

 

 

Apparently seaweed is an acquired taste for this big guy:

 

 

Love the gentle motion of these corals: 🥰

 

 

[Snow_Phoenix]

*yawn : 😊

 

 

Red devil shroom: 

 

 

Bright yellow yuma: 

 

 

Puffy in a different way today: 😅

 

[Snow_Phoenix]

So, we just had a late night delivery of some fresh crab from a fishing village up north:

 

 

The haul was good, and I managed to extract a *pinch of roe (bright orange) from this batch as well:

 

 

I'll feed them to the dragonets tomorrow morning as a breakfast of sorts. It'll be a special treat for them. 😊🐲🐉

[Snow_Phoenix]

Goblin peeking: 

 

 

 

For a tiny fish, he's very active and full of personality. I'm glad that he's bold too, so I get to see him out in the open most of the time. 🤗

 

I also topped up a new seaweed strip in the clip today and my blenny went all out for it: 😄

 

 

Beau the angel had a bit of misgivings though. I think he was more content of taking a few bites as a *test today, rather than actually eating anything: 

 

🤷‍♀️

[Snow_Phoenix]

I decided to take several topview pics for a change, to see how the corals actually look like from above. 😊

 

Yumas from the Yuma Bridge: 

 

 

 

 

 

Planning on getting a pink - maybe even red yuma in the future to be added to my collection. 😊

 

Giant bubble coral colony on the sandbed:

 

 

Love this colony. It's capable of swelling double the size above, and does so during certain periods of the day, when my lights run at stronger blues. 👍

[Snow_Phoenix]

My bicolor hammer: 🥰

 

 

Cynarina on the sandbed: 

 

 

Hammer & cynarina together:

 

 

The cynarina can actually get puffier than this on a good day. Not as large as the hammer though. 😄

 

Elegance coral from above:

 

 

Frontview:

 

 

The frontview shots always cannot capture the original greeness of the coral correctly, but I'm glad a topview shot can. 😊

[Snow_Phoenix]

Critters from my refugium - apparently I now have fluorescent red flatworms as well:

 

 

 

 

 

Must have been hitchikers from my latest batch of macro from the LFS. I like the little hydroid jellies too. 😊

 

Ah, and the pods. Still got plenty of them. 👍

 

[A.m.P]

Those look like they might be planaria flatworms, they have a very nasty reputation in the hobby stateside. They lack the trident shape of most slower reproducing and less toxic species and the red is quite disconcerting.

 

The hydroids are beautiful though.

[Snow_Phoenix]

11 minutes ago, Amphrites said:

Those look like they might be planaria flatworms, they have a very nasty reputation in the hobby stateside. They lack the trident shape of most slower reproducing and less toxic species and the red is quite disconcerting.

 

The hydroids are beautiful though.

I have battled red flatworms before, but none of them have *glowed red. These ones are actually neon-colored (difficult to see in pics), which I find strange. Since they're in the fuge/sump, and not the DT, shall I just leave it as it is and observe/watch them closely for now? 🤔

 

I figured if they truly get out of hand, I could try manual removal with a baster, then dip the rocks. 

[Snow_Phoenix]

Also, I went out for dinner and returned home to a pitch black room. Guess who was out and about for a change? 😄

 

 

 

Haven't seen him for a while. Glad to know he's okay though. 😊👍

[Snow_Phoenix]

Definitely not something I wanted to wake up to, today morning:

 

 

That's Icarus, my ruby dragonet. 😭

 

He jumped out some time in the middle of the night, and actually made it past the gap in my lid. I use a form of egg crate as a lid cover, but I think I need to modify it further - maybe by gluing a piece of plastic mesh over the gaps so that small/fish with streamlined builds can't go through. 😔

 

He was completely crunchy though - so he must have been out of the tank for a while. 

 

Also, excuse the hair, but I presumed he landed on the rug, flipped around for a bit, then landed on the tiles. 😔

 

Three days ago, I noticed my bottom dwelling fish were vanishing one by one. I didn't think much of it, because my gobies & dartfish have a tendency to hide in their burrows for prolonged periods, which is not unusual. Four fish were MIA for 3 days - my zebra barred dartfish, steinitz goby pair & tangaroa goby. 

 

Yesterday, one of my steinitz gobies popped out of my dartfish's burrow, and then I spotted my tangaroa in a different section of the tank, so I blindly assumed they were all there - just hiding. 

 

But now I suspect I might have an unknown nocturnal predator of sorts lurking around the sandbed at night. I have a lot of bristleworms, and some are medium-sized, but I *think I might have a eunicid on the loose which is spooking the fish (or maybe even hunting them). 🤔

 

I did spot a new large, papery white tunnel on one of the rocks at the far back of the tank about  a week ago, and I was wondering what built it, because the tunnel was fairly large. 

 

I'm now quite worried. Almost every fish I keep retires to the sandbed for rest at night - dragonets, blennies, gobies, wrasses etc. 

 

If I can somehow catch this thing and remove it from my tank without undoing my entire scape, that'd be great. I'll quickly get some mesh to modify the lid in the meantime. 

 

Still feeling quite crushed. I've only had him for 2 months, and was hoping to keep him for 5 years or more. 😭

[Snow_Phoenix]

I really miss Icarus. 😓

 

While I was feeding the fish, I instinctively looked at the rocks at the back of the tank, because I usually drop food at certain specific spots for him to eat. That's when it really, really hit me that my little red dragon is gone - and he won't be returning. 

 

I only had him for a very brief period of time, but he added a lot of color to my tank, and had a great personality for such a tiny dragonet. 😓

 

Despite the rough start to the morning, I have some good news - I found all 4 of my sand-dwelling gobies, and they are safe:

 

 

 

It turns out they've traded burrows with each other. My zebra dartfish found a new burrow at the back, left corner of the tank, and my Steinitz gobies now occupy the same burrow my dartfish had just vacated. And my tangaroa took up residence at the back, right corner near the branching rockwork. They're all okay. 👍

 

Illaron surprised me a little bit today afternoon - caught him trying to posture next to Bella with his dorsal fin raised. His body condition has definitely improved over the months - he's still a bit lean, but he's not skinny and his belly is full:

 

 

 

 

Bella's appetite is still very good - I went simple today, and mostly fed the fish a higher ratio of pellets than live/frozen in the evening:

 

Goblin cheered me up a bit though. Loved watching his antics in the elegance coral:

 

 

 

 

My red devil shroom fell down from Mushroom Mountain - will reglue them back up tomorrow:

 

[debbeach13]

So sorry about Icarus. I enjoyed watching that fish go from a shy little guy to exploring the tank and interacting with his tank mates. After years of having my clown to find him on the floor one morning was so sad. So I know how you feel. Even with a lid they still sometimes make it out of the tank. 

[Snow_Phoenix]

12 minutes ago, debbeach13 said:

So sorry about Icarus. I enjoyed watching that fish go from a shy little guy to exploring the tank and interacting with his tank mates. After years of having my clown to find him on the floor one morning was so sad. So I know how you feel. Even with a lid they still sometimes make it out of the tank. 

I know. I truly wish I had more time with him to watch him grow more. But sometimes, it is simply not meant to be. 😔

 

This hobby throws really hard curveballs at times. You try to do everything correctly, or even take all the necessary precautions, but you can still lose animals along the way. It can be challenging at times, I guess. 

[Snow_Phoenix]

I just returned to my bedroom for the night and flipped the lights on. Found this guy out in the open again, and in camomode to boot: 

 

 

 

I have another saron in my picoreef that goes bright red at night. But this saron prefers going green. 😊

[A.m.P]

I'm sorry about your run of bad luck...

 

That was the one of the best videos you've caught of a dragonet eating pellets, you can actually see that awesome vacuum they can form and watch them spit leftovers out of their gills and mouth.

Really, really cool.

[Snow_Phoenix]

Hammer coral (taken without yellow lens filter) : 

 

 

Hanging upside down: 😅

 

 

Seaweed for breakfast for these two: 😊

 

 

[Snow_Phoenix]

So, I caught Nero hovering really close to the hammer coral today afternoon:

 

 

 

 

Think she'll dive into it eventually? 🤔

 

Would be actually cool to see her hosting it. I'm just sayin'. 🤷‍♀️

 

[Snow_Phoenix]

Doc cleaning Beau: 

 

 

A brief display:

 

Trying my best to record the courtship ritual, but no luck so far - I keep missing it because I'm not in the room when it happens. Will still try to see it for myself someday though. 🙂

[Snow_Phoenix]

Morning! 🤗

 

A closer look: 

 

 

Beau chasing his reflection: 

 

Thanos was putting ona territorial display and going full white - he does this from time to time. I took pics of him changing colors and compared them side by side:

 

 

I find it fascinating how he can revert from one shade to another in the span of seconds. 😊

[Snow_Phoenix]

Tinkered around with the R60's light schedule yesterday:

 

 

 

I've been using manual mode all this while, which didn't bug me too much at first, but then I realized I can't be away from home for more than a day if I wasn't physically present in my bedroom to manually select/deselect the light's wifi and switch it on/off every morning/night. 

 

Since there is no manual for this light online and I was unfamiliar with how to set it up automatically, I contacted my worker-friend at the LFS (where I purchased the light from 2nd hand) and she was patient enough to walk me through the steps. 

 

My schedule might come off a bit wonky to some, but so far this has been the color setting that has kept my corals (especially LPS) happy. I *might increase the intensity of the blues & UVs over time though. As for right now, I'm leaving it as it is. 👍

[chipz]

Wow, so glad to know the color change thing is normal for starry blennies! Mine has done it a couple times during meal time, and I keep freaking out that he's choking on the food or it had gone bad and poisoned him!

[Snow_Phoenix]

11 minutes ago, chipz said:

Wow, so glad to know the color change thing is normal for starry blennies! Mine has done it a couple times during meal time, and I keep freaking out that he's choking on the food or it had gone bad and poisoned him!

Oh, it's normal - don't worry! The first time Thanos went white, I was quite worried too. But then I googled it up and found an old post online with someone else who had the same experience with their blenny, so I discovered it was mostly a territorial display. 😊

[Snow_Phoenix]

Goblin staying hidden in the elegance:

 

And this:

 

I was mostly watching his eyes, and how they kept shifting as he took in his surroundings. I find it intriguing that blennies can do this - shifting their eyes, I mean. Most other marine fish can't do this much. 

 

[Snow_Phoenix]

A simple hello from Goblin: 🤗

 

 

My largest 🐲🐉: 😊

 

 

 

Managed to get 2 semi-decent shots of Beau:

 

 

 

Several quick nips of seaweed:

 

Slightly puffy: