Paul’s BioCube 29

[pdiehm]

This tank was up for about 2.5 years previously but due to a home renovation had to be torn down.  It wasn’t anything special, a candy cane, 2 frogspawn, some zoas and a lot of mushrooms (hitchhiked on with the zoas).  But it was self sustaining.  I changed 5G water every other week and things were doing really well.  

 

But new new flooring meant it had to be moved. Into a 29 gallon holding tank the contents went. 2 clowns, a bi-color blenny, skunk cleaner, 25lbs of rock, and lots of vermetid snails.  

 

Some elbow grease, some vinegar, and a jet stream hosing...it’s clean.  Mostly.  

 

With Th the vermetid snails all over the rocks, I decided to just mix those rocks, and got 20lb of Caribsea Life Rock shapes.  I toyed with going barebottom, buuut it’s an LPS tank.  Flow isn’t a massive requirement, though some is needed.  I decided to go with Caribsea Arag Alive Fiji pink.  

 

I dosed the tank tank yesterday with 1.2ml of ammonia, a bottle of birospira, and 5ml of Microbacter7.  Tested today and it’s zero with a trace of nitrites.  Dosed again today with 1.2 ammonia, and tomorrow after we get back from Wildwood, I will test again.  I actually may be able to move my clowns into the tank I think.  I am also dozing 5ml of Microbacter7 daily.  

 

Prior, I had an aquamaxx HOB-1, and it’s a great skimmer.  But this time, I think I will go the five route and skip the skimmer.  I have the InTank Media Rack, and will be getting the InTank Fuge Basket.  I am leaning toward the JBJ Nano Glo but there are some $15-$20 grow lights on amazon that I may be able to stick to the back and use that instead.  I have time though to figure that out.  If anyone has thoughts, please post them.  

 

I toyed with getting an mp10 but think I am going to try to split the return using a Y valve and loc line.  If that doesn’t give me enough then I will look into a used mp10 and run lagoon.

 

As for my plans...the 3 fish I have.  And I think I will add either a pink streaked wrasse or a mccoskers wrasse and a small diamond goby for sand maintenance.  Other sand maintenance creatures will be 6 or so nassarius snails, some dwarf cerith snails, 3 or 4 nerites and 2 scarlet hermits and of course a skunk cleaner shrimp.  I also have 2 Green Bubble Tips that will go in before any of the corals i have go back in so they can find their home and get settled.

 

for salt, I will be using ESV only on this following the cycle.  

 

And the light will will be a Noopsyche Pro II.

 

I think the aquascape turned out pretty badass.  Very happy with it!

[WV Reefer]

1 minute ago, pdiehm said:

This tank was up for about 2.5 years previously but due to a home renovation had to be torn down.  It wasn’t anything special, a candy cane, 2 frogspawn, some zoas and a lot of mushrooms (hitchhiked on with the zoas).  But it was self sustaining.  I changed 5G water every other week and things were doing really well.  

 

But new new flooring meant it had to be moved. Into a 29 gallon holding tank the contents went. 2 clowns, a bi-color blenny, skunk cleaner, 25lbs of rock, and lots of vermetid snails.  

 

Some elbow grease, some vinegar, and a jet stream hosing...it’s clean.  Mostly.  

 

With Th the vermetid snails all over the rocks, I decided to just mix those rocks, and got 20lb of Caribsea Life Rock shapes.  I toyed with going barebottom, buuut it’s an LPS tank.  Flow isn’t a massive requirement, though some is needed.  I decided to go with Caribsea Arag Alive Fiji pink.  

 

I dosed the tank tank yesterday with 1.2ml of ammonia, a bottle of birospira, and 5ml of Microbacter7.  Tested today and it’s zero with a trace of nitrites.  Dosed again today with 1.2 ammonia, and tomorrow after we get back from Wildwood, I will test again.  I actually may be able to move my clowns into the tank I think.  I am also dozing 5ml of Microbacter7 daily.  

 

Prior, I had an aquamaxx HOB-1, and it’s a great skimmer.  But this time, I think I will go the five route and skip the skimmer.  I have the InTank Media Rack, and will be getting the InTank Fuge Basket.  I am leaning toward the JBJ Nano Glo but there are some $15-$20 grow lights on amazon that I may be able to stick to the back and use that instead.  I have time though to figure that out.  If anyone has thoughts, please post them.  

 

I toyed with getting an mp10 but think I am going to try to split the return using a Y valve and loc line.  If that doesn’t give me enough then I will look into a used mp10 and run lagoon.

 

As for my plans...the 3 fish I have.  And I think I will add either a pink streaked wrasse or a mccoskers wrasse and a small diamond goby for sand maintenance.  Other sand maintenance creatures will be 6 or so nassarius snails, some dwarf cerith snails, 3 or 4 nerites and 2 scarlet hermits and of course a skunk cleaner shrimp.  I also have 2 Green Bubble Tips that will go in before any of the corals i have go back in so they can find their home and get settled.

 

for salt, I will be using ESV only on this following the cycle.  

 

And the light will will be a Noopsyche Pro II.

 

I think the aquascape turned out pretty badass.  Very happy with it!

 

Looks nice. 😊

[Krish87]

Awesome aquascape!!!

[pdiehm]

54 minutes ago, Krish87 said:

Awesome aquascape!!!

Thanks.  It was really easy to put these 4 pieces together.  Can’t recommend this stuff enough.

[Krish87]

1 minute ago, pdiehm said:

Thanks.  It was really easy to put these 4 pieces together.  Can’t recommend this stuff enough.

I have the same in my tanks! Love it.

[pdiehm]

Dosed another 1ml of ammonia today.  Tested 0, 12 hours after last dose.  I am sure with the daily dosing of 5ml microbacter7, and the initial dosing of BioSpira, I have enough bacteria for my fish.  Also considering both the rock and sand are supposedly made with bacteria...

 

if its good tonight night when I get home, and good tomorrow, I may put in my 2 clowns and the bi color blenny.  

 

Need to to think about that though.   

[pdiehm]

No ammonia again.  But solid nitrites.  The daily addition of MB7 is processing ammonia but not yet the nitrites.

 

nitrites aren’t nearly as toxic to saltwater fish as freshwater, but I don’t have the guts to add the clowns to the tank.  Need the NO2 to fall before I will think about it.

[pdiehm]

Just ordered a Clearview lid for the biocube.  Knock on wood, no surfers at this point in the cube life but since I do want a diamond goby and a wrasse in there it’s probably a wise investment.

[Krish87]

8 hours ago, pdiehm said:

Just ordered a Clearview lid for the biocube.  Knock on wood, no surfers at this point in the cube life but since I do want a diamond goby and a wrasse in there it’s probably a wise investment.

Good call on this lid! Clearview lids are real nice! 

 

As of today, what is the lead time? When I wanted to get one for my BioCube, it was a lot.

[pdiehm]

1 hour ago, Krish87 said:

Good call on this lid! Clearview lids are real nice! 

 

As of today, what is the lead time? When I wanted to get one for my BioCube, it was a lot.

Not sure.  Certainly not before I get any more fish.  I think 6 weeks or so.

 

Cost with the feed door was $159.  It’s fine.  

[pdiehm]

Got my InTank Fuge basket, got the neon green water deflector (Seahawks fan), and the loc line y adapter to split the return line.  I just need some plumbers tape to make it fit onto the output or cut the old loc line fitting and fit with plumbers tape to create a DIY adapter.

 

now to start thinking about a small fuge light to fit on the back of the cube to grow chaeto.  

[pdiehm]

Decided to get the Chaetomax 2N1 light.  Chaeto probably added within 2 weeks and ran on a very simple timer opposite of the light schedule.

 

time to figure out how to set up the noopsyche light!

[pdiehm]

Well, patience is a virtue.  We can process 1.5ppm ammonia in 24 hours but still have nitrites.  

 

I wanna put my fish in here but not until we can have 0 nitrites and ammonia in 24 hours

[pdiehm]

No ammonia again, and no nitrite.  Dosed 1.5ml of ammonia, check it tomorrow.  It's close.  I probably could put my 2 clowns in there now.  

[pdiehm]

Added an mp10, running 50% lagoon...this may be too much for my frogspawn.  But time will tell.

 

also added the Chaetomaxx Fuge light.

 

We are just waiting for this thing to process nitrites in 24 hours.  So far, it is easily processing 1.5ppm ammonia in 24 hours.

 

Next up will be a reeflink.

 

 

[pdiehm]

Coming along slowly.  Ammonia and Nitrite were at 0 yesterday after work.  Dosed 1.5ppm (1.5ml) of ammonia and we'll see where we are today.  I'm hoping to get fish in there this week so I don't have to toss a shrimp in there and feed the bacteria when I'm gone.  

[pdiehm]

Ammonia 0 after work, but still nitrites.  Dosed 1.0 ppm ammonia.  This is going to be cutting it very close.  

 

If not ready by tomorrow at 5pm, I will need to get a small shrimp and put in there.

[pdiehm]

Got home and both are 0/0.  One more dose.  Crossing them fingers

[pdiehm]

we are cycled.  doing a large water change, putting the clowns and the blenny into the tank and figuring out the noopsyche light.  Or I can just leave it off...which is an option since the room gets a ton of ambient light.

[pdiehm]

DIatoms!  Just ordered:

 

6 nassarius snails, 4 Nerites, 3 cerith, 2 trochus and 2 scarlet hermits. 

 

Chaeto and pods be here from algae barn on Thursday.  

[pdiehm]

we are smack dab in the middle of the ugly phase.  I basically have to wipe off the glass daily and my rock has a reddish hue to it as the diatoms are running rampant.  

 

on a side note, the chaeto is going nuts with the growth.  

[pdiehm]

here we are a year later.  I just pushed through a long battle of cyano/hair algae that dissipated about 2-3 weeks ago.  Added some chemipure-elite, and waste-away gel.  Also reduced photoperiod from 8 hours to 3, which I am sure helped.  I recently changed to 5 hours and will up that to 6 hours this week, with a 30 minute ramp up.  

 

looking into getting a 5 frag pack from WWC in the coming weeks, but we will see.  I just added a frogspawn and it appears to be doing well.

 

Water quality has been a bit challenging, but over the past couple weeks have started to nail it down as life has settled down and with me selling off my 120 gallon to focus on this smaller, easier to maintain tank.  For example, during the prime stage of the ugly period, we were running 0 NO3 and 0 PO4.  But I had algae, knew that wasn't right.  Alkalinity was hovering in the high 6's.  

 

As i started to kill off the algae, the NO3 and PO4 readings got stronger, the bubble tip anemones colored up and bubbles showed again.  This most recent test yesterday was as follows:

 

1.025

5 NO3

0.04 PO4

8.8 dkh

410 Calcium

1440 Magnesium

 

I have been using regular IO, but am toying with switching over to Tropic Marin as the inconsistency of the batches is irritating me.  Following a water change my alkalinity jumped from 8.8 to 9.4 giving me confidence that I will likely be able to maintain calcium and alkalinity with weekly 5 gallon water changes.  Will do my weekly tests next sunday and see where we are, but that was a 0.6 dkh increase.  If I do try out the tropic marin pro, will add some soda ash to increase the alk to 9, as that is where I want to run at.  Eventually this tank will move to a 40 breeder and am toying with running 2 hydra 26's or getting 2 AI PRime 16 HD's for that 40 breeder.  TBD.

 

 

[pdiehm]

I think i'm starting 2.5 gallon changes this week.  Tests revealed:

 

1.025

7.0 dkh

400 calcium

1400 mag

8 NO3

0.02 PO4

 

I just worry that if I continue to 5 gallon changes, i'm going to drive the nutrients so low that dino's will enter.   Or I can keep doing my 5 gallon changes and start feeding every day (I'm feeding every other day, every 3rd day).  

 

Thoughts?   2.5 gallon weekly or stay with the 5 gallon changes?

[melson]

Do you think Dr. Tim's waste away gel packs worked?

 

Looking to get my fuge back up and in the meantime looking for better options. I've got dinos on the sandbed that just won't go away!

[pdiehm]

36 minutes ago, melson said:

Do you think Dr. Tim's waste away gel packs worked?

 

Looking to get my fuge back up and in the meantime looking for better options. I've got dinos on the sandbed that just won't go away!

i can say it hasn't hurt.  The Waste Away/Refresh 2 week treatment knocked out cyano.  I am trying to dial in the skimmer  running time but so far i think the waste away works, and it's really simple.