Lula Mae's Mr. Aqua 7.5 gallon bowfront--on hiatus :(

[Lula_Mae]

In January or February I took down my dino-ridden Innovative Marine 14 gallon peninsula tank and put the survivors into my old 5.5.  I chose the Mr. Aqua 7.5 gallon bowfront tank to be my main tank because it's small enough that water changes will be easy and yet large enough to allow me to keep a variety of corals, inverts and even a fish or two.  I've been dealing with a lot of fatigue lately, to the point that it's difficult for me to get things done, so it's taken me a long time to actually get a move on with setting up the tank (I did a leak test two or three months ago, and just set it up last week).  I got the tank on the bookshelf and sand in it a couple of weeks ago and last week finally got water in it with a powerhead.  The other day I got the AquaClear on it.  So as you can see, this build is coming along rather slowly but the important thing is that it IS coming along.  I ordered my rocks from K.P. Aquatics and they should be here tomorrow!  They did note that they don't have a lot of macro or corals on their rocks, which is a bummer.  Hopefully there's still lots of life and color on them as I've generally heard good things about them.

 

Equipment:

Mr. Aqua 7.5 gallon bowfront rimless tank

Koralia Nano (may add a second if needed)

AquaClear 30

Marinepure gems in a basket I made (in the filter)

filter floss

Fiji Pink sand, about 1" thick

AI Prime (standard, not HD)

50 watt Archaea heater from Aqua Forest Aquarium (once I figure out where I put it)

 

Livestock:

Stuff from my IM14 and pico tanks; detailed list coming at a future time

 

Thanks for tagging along on this journey.

[Lula_Mae]

Reserving for future pics and stuff.

[WV Reefer]

3 minutes ago, Lula_Mae said:

In January or February I took down my dino-ridden Innovative Marine 14 gallon peninsula tank and put the survivors into my old 5.5.  I chose the Mr. Aqua 7.5 gallon bowfront tank to be my main tank because it's small enough that water changes will be easy and yet large enough to allow me to keep a variety of corals, inverts and even a fish or two.  I've been dealing with a lot of fatigue lately, to the point that it's difficult for me to get things done, so it's taken me a long time to actually get a move on with setting up the tank (I did a leak test two or three months ago, and just set it up last week).  I got the tank on the bookshelf and sand in it a couple of weeks ago and last week finally got water in it with a powerhead.  The other day I got the AquaClear on it.  So as you can see, this build is coming along rather slowly but the important thing is that it IS coming along.  I ordered my rocks from K.P. Aquatics and they should be here tomorrow!  They did note that they don't have a lot of macro or corals on their rocks, which is a bummer.  Hopefully there's still lots of life and color on them as I've generally heard good things about them.

 

Equipment:

Mr. Aqua 7.5 gallon bowfront rimless tank

Koralia Nano (may add a second if needed)

AquaClear 30

Marinepure gems in a basket I made (in the filter)

filter floss

Fiji Pink sand, about 1" thick

AI Prime (standard, not HD)

50 watt Archaea heater from Aqua Forest Aquarium (once I figure out where I put it)

 

Livestock:

Stuff from my IM14 and pico tanks; detailed list coming at a future time

 

Thanks for tagging along on this journey.

 

Yay!!!! 

[seabass]

My first tank was a 7 gallon bowfront.  This tank will take me back; although I'm sure yours will be nicer.

[Lula_Mae]

1 hour ago, seabass said:

My first tank was a 7 gallon bowfront.  This tank will take me back; although I'm sure yours will be nicer.

Awesome! I just hope it doesn't look totally janky lol.  Part of what I liked about this tank besides the size was that the bow is very gentle and doesn't really distort the view inside like some do.

[fishfreak0114]

Can’t wait to see what you do with this one!

[Wingy]

I can't wait to see the rock you get.  

[Lula_Mae]

I got a note from KPA saying they didn't have any rock in their tank that was suitable for my needs so they will go out diving and get some.  So no rock today, but hopefully soon.

[Firefish15]

9 hours ago, Lula_Mae said:

I got a note from KPA saying they didn't have any rock in their tank that was suitable for my needs so they will go out diving and get some.  So no rock today, but hopefully soon.

That's nice they're being considerate about it and keeping you informed though. 

 

Interested to see what you do with this!

[Lula_Mae]

Guys!!! My rocks are coming!!! My rocks are coming, they shipped today!!!  Time to prep some water and buckets for rinsing and sorting.  I haven't gotten proper live rock in years!  Here goes nothing!

[WV Reefer]

5 minutes ago, Lula_Mae said:

Guys!!! My rocks are coming!!! My rocks are coming, they shipped today!!!  Time to prep some water and buckets for rinsing and sorting.  I haven't gotten proper live rock in years!  Here goes nothing!

[Lula_Mae]

Rocks came this morning, they were much bigger than I expected lol. Beautiful coralline coverage. I've spotted halimeda, some probable spongy things, a couple tiny porites or similar coral which may be dead, and some slightly terrifying hitchhikers lol. I just realized I didn't take any full pics of the rocks so I'll do that later.  I did take pics while I was prepping the rocks though.  There were three rocks, two quite large for the size of the tank, and one pico-sized one.  Let's see if I can get some pics from my phone. 

 

Halimeda and near the center left by the white stuff is (I think) a chiton or something similar. 

 

Porites or something like that. 

 

Teeny urchin! Don't think it's alive sadly. Maybe a pencil urchin?

 

Turned the second rock around and squealed a little in surprise when I saw this staring back at me lol. He was DOA and pretty wedged in there. There was another tiny crab also DOA. 

 

(Tiny crab DOA)

 

I dunno what this is, but it was hard. I may have broken it. 

 

More pics incoming. 

[Lula_Mae]

Some of y'all will understand how stoked I was to see the critter in the top left!  Turns out I got about a half dozen that I found who survived!!!   

 

I found a couple shrimp who were DOA in the bag and a couple more who are definitely alive but I'm not sure what they are! Here's the first one. Atlantic pistol maybe?

 

Looks like I've maxed out my upload limit so the rest will have to wait till I get them on the computer lol. The other shrimp is tiny with black and white stripes, maybe a banded pistol? 

 

I have a couple of live crabs, one I think is a gorilla crab (he made straight for the dead mithrax and ripped that sucker open... ), one is tiny and pinkish and one is microscopic, seriously maybe 2-3 mm and white and black. Also there was a VERY LARGE and scary worm thing as well as a very small scary worm lol. 

[WV Reefer]

17 minutes ago, Lula_Mae said:

Some of y'all will understand how stoked I was to see the critter in the top left!  Turns out I got about a half dozen that I found who survived!!!   

 

I found a couple shrimp who were DOA in the bag and a couple more who are definitely alive but I'm not sure what they are! Here's the first one. Atlantic pistol maybe?

 

Looks like I've maxed out my upload limit so the rest will have to wait till I get them on the computer lol. The other shrimp is tiny with black and white stripes, maybe a banded pistol? 

 

I have a couple of live crabs, one I think is a gorilla crab (he made straight for the dead mithrax and ripped that sucker open... ), one is tiny and pinkish and one is microscopic, seriously maybe 2-3 mm and white and black. Also there was a VERY LARGE and scary worm thing as well as a very small scary worm lol. 

 

Yay for starfish!!! 😄

The rock looks great. 

[Christopher Marks]

That's some awesome looking liverock @Lula_Mae! 😮 

 

So many cool hitchhikers like those pistol shrimp! Hopefully you can sort through and catch any bad ones. Have you found any more?

[Tamberav]

Really loving the rock! 

[Lula_Mae]

On 5/17/2019 at 12:41 AM, Christopher Marks said:

That's some awesome looking liverock @Lula_Mae! 😮 

 

So many cool hitchhikers like those pistol shrimp! Hopefully you can sort through and catch any bad ones. Have you found any more?

I haven't looked too hard but haven't seen anything other than what looked like the remains of another shrimp at the back of the tank, which I finally fished out. I tested nitrites and nitrates on Tuesday, nitrites were 1 and nitrates around 20. Checked nitrites again yesterday and it's down to 0.25. I couldn't test ammonia because I can't find the second bottle of testing solution lol. Was hoping to move corals from the pico straight into here but I think I'll have to set up something temporary to rescue my zoas because the stupid amphipods are eating them grrr. I chase them off with a pipette but it's not much deterrent. Stupid pods.

[Tamberav]

A cute little green banded goby will probably eat those big pods for ya.

[billygoat]

Beautiful Atlantic rocks! The little coral looks like it is the same as one that I got on my own Atlantic live rock. I believe it is the Blushing Star Coral, Stephanocoenia intersepta. Hard to tell if it's alive or not, but mine kind of looked like that when it arrived and it ended up coloring up and surviving just fine.

 

Here's hoping that some of your awesome hitchhikers make it through the cycle! 😊

[WV Reefer]

9 hours ago, Lula_Mae said:

I haven't looked too hard but haven't seen anything other than what looked like the remains of another shrimp at the back of the tank, which I finally fished out. I tested nitrites and nitrates on Tuesday, nitrites were 1 and nitrates around 20. Checked nitrites again yesterday and it's down to 0.25. I couldn't test ammonia because I can't find the second bottle of testing solution lol. Was hoping to move corals from the pico straight into here but I think I'll have to set up something temporary to rescue my zoas because the stupid amphipods are eating them grrr. I chase them off with a pipette but it's not much deterrent. Stupid pods.

 

You about ready for some Branching GSP?  

[Lula_Mae]

17 hours ago, Tamberav said:

A cute little green banded goby will probably eat those big pods for ya.

I actually have one but wanted to put him straight in the new tank instead of in the pico, then the new tank lol.  I may change my mind on that...

 

8 hours ago, billygoat said:

Beautiful Atlantic rocks! The little coral looks like it is the same as one that I got on my own Atlantic live rock. I believe it is the Blushing Star Coral, Stephanocoenia intersepta. Hard to tell if it's alive or not, but mine kind of looked like that when it arrived and it ended up coloring up and surviving just fine.

 

Here's hoping that some of your awesome hitchhikers make it through the cycle! 😊

Thanks for the possible ID!  I have to figure out where exactly on the rocks they were lol.  I haven't even tried to scape yet, just plunked the rocks in and left them for the moment. Need to get my Prime set up over the tank too.

 

7 hours ago, WV Reefer said:

 

You about ready for some Branching GSP?  

I hope so! Going to test nitrites again and see if they're down to zero yet. I figure if they're at zero, ammonia should be too, right?

[Lula_Mae]

Tested nitrites, hard to tell in the lamplight but it looks like between 0 and 0.25, but not 0 yet.  Dumped more Microbacter in lol.

[Lula_Mae]

Nitrites still not quite 0. Argh lol.

[seabass]

Nitrite often lags behind ammonia.  Luckily, nitrite isn't very toxic at marine pH levels.  In fact, most people don't bother testing for it.  The exception would be dosing ammonia when cycling dry rock (you don't want it to be 5ppm or higher, which will dramatically slow the cycling process).

[Lula_Mae]

On 5/28/2019 at 11:06 AM, seabass said:

Nitrite often lags behind ammonia.  Luckily, nitrite isn't very toxic at marine pH levels.  In fact, most people don't bother testing for it.  The exception would be dosing ammonia when cycling dry rock (you don't want it to be 5ppm or higher, which will dramatically slow the cycling process).

Now that you mention it, I remember you telling me that when I was cycling the 15L. I'd forgotten it. I did test yesterday and nitrites are at 0! Time to start moving stuff over. I'll need to do something with the stuff from the IM14 before I add it because there's dinos in the 5.5 they're sitting in. Yuck! Still need to set up the light, scape, and find the heater I bought for this tank lol.