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

March 27, 2022

I fragged a few corals from my nano today while I was WCing it, then added them to this tank. 😊

I tried sticking a few pieces of GSP to the back wall, but I'm unsure if it'll take:

One of the pieces also had a Red PE polyp, which was accidently attached to the clump. 😅

Most of the Zoas & Palys are not open yet, but hopefully they will once they stabilize:

It does look a bit messy, but I'm hoping these polyps will eventually grow out and populate the rocks. Foxy currently shows no interest in them, but that might change with time. At least she's ignored the kenya tree for now! 😅

March 27, 2022

In my experience if gsp likes your tank it can quickly cover and your rock if left unattended. Give it a week and I bet you will see it start to grow. My foxy the foxface never bothers any coral in my tank. He checks every new addition out and then leaves the alone.

March 27, 2022

27 minutes ago, kimdawg said:

In my experience if gsp likes your tank it can quickly cover and your rock if left unattended. Give it a week and I bet you will see it start to grow. My foxy the foxface never bothers any coral in my tank. He checks every new addition out and then leaves the alone.

I actually don't mind if it becomes a tad overgrown - your tank was my inspiration to try and create my own GSP wall in this tank. :happy:

I really love the look of corals encrusting on surfaces. I was thinking of purchasing some normal (but colorful) rhodactises and discosoma shrooms in the future, and sticking them on the central ledge in hopes of watching them overlap each other and grow out.

I'm observing Foxy right now, and she hasn't touched the new additions either. I heard that Foxfaces are notorious for munching on zoas, but I *think if you keep them well-fed, they will ignore most of the corals in the tank. 🤔

March 27, 2022

This tank is making great progress. You keep adding frags and they keep doing well. This will be a full-blown reef again before you know it.

March 27, 2022

8 minutes ago, debbeach13 said:

This tank is making great progress. You keep adding frags and they keep doing well. This will be a full-blown reef again before you know it.

Thanks, Deb! I truly hope so too. 😊👍

March 27, 2022

Happy to report that most of the polyps have finally opened up! 🥰

Devil's Armor & Metallic Nuclear Greens:

Purple Monsters:

GSP + Red PE clump on the back wall:

GSP patches on different areas of the back wall:

March 27, 2022

Older corals are okay, too. 🥰

Rainbow yuma:

Kenya tree:

March 28, 2022

That's a unique looking kenya tree I've ever seen! Most of them I see around are tan or brownish.

March 28, 2022

My lights are currently running heavy whites, so coral colors are a tad dull - sorry!

Anyway, the GSP frag that came attached with the accidental Red PE polyp fell off the back wall last night. I think it was simply too *heavy. It landed on the rocks below at a tilt (under the leptastrea), but I think I'll just glue to the rocks and stick a proper strand/patch of GSP on the back wall the next time I frag it:

The other GSP patches that I glued to different sections of thr back wall are still there and fully open though! 😊

The Kenya tree looks less vivid under heavy whites. It's colors only truly show under intense blues:

March 28, 2022

Also, most of the new Zoa & Paly polyps are open today! 👍

Here's a couple of topviews:

^Was a bit surprised to see some Pinwheel polyps next to the Purple Monster - thought that entire clump were all the same type. 😅

Pinwheels:

My apologies if the pics are blurry. Had to zoom in quite a fair bit. 😅

April 3, 2022

I'm tentatively planning to drop by my primary LFS tomorrow (Monday) to pick up my brain coral & some much-needed CUC for this tank.

I'm actually experiencing some issues with multiple systems in my home - both my 4' ft long FW tanks had clogged filters yesterday - I managed to unclog and clean out (+90% WC) my discus tank today, but it looks like I'll have to unclog the filter for the predator tank either tomorrow or the day after.

I still haven't WCed my nanoreef for the week, and also need to do a quick WC of this tank as well. The glass is very dirty, so I'll give it a quick scrape before I set off for the store (will only do so if my back doesn't trouble me too much in the upcoming morning).

I'm unsure about picking up any new fish to be QTed. Initially, I planned to pick up at least a pair, but now that I have a few things to clear up at home first, I *might abstain from purchasing any fish, and go for inverts instead. *But, if there's a unique goby or blenny or even some skunk clowns at the store tomorrow, I'll probably fold and get 2 lil' guys.

My priority is getting all the current tanks settled first, and the CUC. Mr. Prickles needs a stronger back up unit to help keep the film algae on the rocks & sand under control. So I'll keep an eye out for some snails and urchins - hopefully there are still some at the store. 🤔

April 4, 2022

So I went to the store this morning and reserved 19 frags of various zoas, palys and shrooms, which will be paid for and picked up over the course of the next 2 to 3 months:

The zoas & palys will most likely go into my nano, but the shrooms will be placed in this tank. I intend to recreate a Mushroom Mountain again - a bigger, and hopefully more colorful & healthier one than before. 😊👍

My brain coral was unhealthy and bleaching badly on one side, unfortunately. The dorsal view looks fine at the store:

But I'm glad I checked the sides. I was quite bummed out, though. 😕

Mooched around the LPS rack for a bit, spotted these amazing Elegances which were up to 1' ft wide (when fully open), and I definitely couldn't afford those atm:

They are very beautiful though - maybe, one day...but not today. 😔

But (!), my LFS was kind enough to allow me to swap my reservations, so I ended up purchasing an orangish-whitish cynarina (with a slightly pinched corner) instead. 😊

I also managed to acquire some much-needed CUC for this tank, and picked out the last tiny pink kenya tree frag at the store! 😊👍

April 4, 2022

For CUC, I ended up selecting a white halloween urchin (they only had 2 urchins left, both in extremely large sizes), a blue legged hermit and 2 snails:

I personally feel like I should have picked up at least *four more snails, but this batch of CUC alone was quite pricey, so I'll get more next month. 👍

April 4, 2022

The CUC adapted pretty quickly after being acclimated and added to the tank. The giant urchin already anchored itself to one of the rocks:

And as usual, I have that one CUC member that's a complete derp. 🤦‍♀️

My crab is faring better, although he ended up toting the snails around for a bit. 😅

April 4, 2022

The new kenya tree is actually a nub compared to my current green one - all the softie frags had been sold out. There was a 1 frag for RM 10 promo that had been going around which I completely missed out on, so all the weeping willows and tiny toadstools were gone too. I didn't get the memo. :tears:

The cynarina hasn't opened up completely. I tossed out the empty aiptasia-encrusted clam shell in favor of positioning my cynarina in the middle of the sandbed:

I think it'll be the only LPS in this tank for a while - at least until I pick up either (or both) a frogspawn & elegance colony in the future. 🤔

My orange cloves have now increased to six visible polyps though! 😊

And the green kenya tree has grown even taller:

^You can even see a new tiny Devil's Armor zoa polyp coming up on the rocks too! 🥰

I didn't purchase any fish this round. They had a pair of tiny ~0.75" spotted mandys, but I wasn't too keen on them. The lone pink skunk clown they had was unusually large, and the last lawnmower blenny at the store was a bit thin. There was a beautiful, but unknown striped wrasse at the store, but I avoided it because it might not be reefsafe.

The rest of the fish available were either too large, aggressive or not reefsafe, so my choices were super limited. Didn't matter though, because I was more vested in getting a proper CUC this round. 👍

April 4, 2022

That was a very good trip to the store. Future purchases lined up and you stayed strong and did not impulse buy. I hope all the new creatures love their new home.

April 4, 2022

8 minutes ago, debbeach13 said:

That was a very good trip to the store. Future purchases lined up and you stayed strong and did not impulse buy. I hope all the new creatures love their new home.

Yes, the not-impulse-buying was tough, but I truly wanted to focus on getting this tank back on track - and the only way to do that is start by getting something to keep the algae under control. Otherwise, I'd have purchased the coral frags and brought those back first instead of the CUC.

As for the fish, I think not getting any this round actually helped a lot. I could have caved in for either (or both) 1 dragonet & the last skunk clown, but I'm glad I didn't. I still need to resolve the clogged-filter-issue in my predator tank and WC both the nano & the 60G. Basically, I need a full week (or more) to space everything out and tackle the issues one by one.

If I had brought some fish home today, I'll have to go through the added stress & anxiety of hybrid-TTMing on top of what's already going on at home. So it worked out for the best.

Plus, there's always next time!

I already told my LFS manager more or less what I'm looking for. He suggested an Ember blenny, which sounds fairly interesting, but I'll have to research more into it. 🙂