Banasophia’s Biocube 32 - Return of the DragonReef 🐉

[Coolbreeze]

On 12/1/2019 at 2:00 PM, banasophia said:

That’s interesting... it seems like as with everything else in reefing, there’s so much seemingly contradictory info, but I really think it’s not contradictory at all, there are just so many variables to account for that each system is so different.
 

I got rid of all my LPS corals and my gorgonians from my Nuvo (torches, acans) intentionally so I could run high flow in this system. I’m hoping it’ll work fine with it dialed back if it’s too much at the max flow. Most importantly at this stage I wanted to be sure the sand could handle max flow if needed without blowing around, and that the gyre flow will avoid a lot of dead spots. I saw a few mentions of people running their gyres at 10-30% in their Biocubes, but most Biocubes are growing soft corals and LPS. 

Another option if it ends up being too much of a direct hit is that I can position the gyre vertically blasting the front glass first... you think I should try that and see how it looks? I had considered it but felt like it would look too dizzying, like a whirlpool haha. 

 

I ran mine at 10 to 15% on the IM Nuvo Concept on one side. That is a 10 gallon and it did just fine, everything was happy until the tank needed to taken down do to a crack in the bottom. Nice build going on so far. 

[banasophia]

Just now, Coolbreeze said:

These things are awesome. I had three of them on my DSA 105. Best pump ever.

Yes, I love it, though I did have an issue over the weekend that a small snail got stuck in it and the powerhead automatically shut off but there’s no alarm or anything to let you know... it was off for who knows how long and it really messed up the corals, more than I would have expected with the pump still running. I wish there was some kind of alarm when that happens! 
 

And apparently the 1Ks were discontinued, but maybe they are just being modified. 

[banasophia]

2 minutes ago, Coolbreeze said:

I ran mine at 10 to 15% on the IM Nuvo Concept on one side. That is a 10 gallon and it did just fine, everything was happy until the tank needed to taken down do to a crack in the bottom. Nice build going on so far. 

Thanks! Yes, still really working on figuring out how to run this tank. So many things to figure out!! I hope I can make it work with the SPS under stock lights... 

[MarieH]

update?

[banasophia]

Check this out, friends... SaltFishTV posted PAR readings for his BioCube 32 with stock lights... the PAR readings may surprise you:

 

 

[banasophia]

Tank is hanging in there, but I’ve never really stocked it due to the pandemic and it’s pretty neglected. Hoping once I’m out and about more I’ll be able to spend more time visiting my LFSs and getting it stocked. I currently have aiptasia and a little cyano in all 3 of my tanks. This last batch of berghia nudibranchs don’t seem to be doing their job, so I guess I need to take action. 
 

I’m also not thrilled with the flow in this tank with the gyre... I don’t think the fish like it, so they don’t swim around much when the powerheads are on. I may swap out the gyre this weekend. 
 

Anyway, here are a couple pics from last night. 

 

 

 

 

[debbeach13]

It does not look neglected actually looks good to me. I also am looking forward to getting back out especially to visit a few LFS's. 

[banasophia]

4 hours ago, debbeach13 said:

It does not look neglected actually looks good to me. I also am looking forward to getting back out especially to visit a few LFS's. 

Thanks, but that’s probably cuz I only showed the good part haha. Notice no FTS. 😜

 

 

And I swear, I’m terrible at keeping SPS... I have accidentally fragged that digitata so many times, I don’t test, I don’t dose... but at least it’s been “curing” for a long time now, so maybe if I can work up some motivation I can take it for a spin.

[banasophia]

Just realized I never posted pics of my 2 new fish. We had family over last Sunday for the first time since the pandemic and my brother asked if there were any fish in this tank. There were 6, but all of them hide most of the time so it looked like there were no fish at all.
 

I decided it was time to change things up a little and went to get a lawnmower blenny and a sixline wrasse the next day. Of course the azure damsel was not a fan of the sixline. I decided to relocate the damsel to my 5g for now and may rehome him since I don’t really like keeping a solitary fish in a tank and definitely can’t house anything else in a 5g with him.
 

Sadly, my scape totally split when I tried to remove the top piece to catch the fish. I accidentally fragged the corals some, and they were out of water and sustained some damage, but I got everything back in propped into position well enough and all my livestock seemed to make it through, so it could have been worse. Hopefully I can secure the rock tomorrow and hoping my corals bounce back. 
 

I adore the lawnmower blenny, hoping I can find foods he will eat, he seems to be a picky eater. And the sixline is amazing - very active and a much better pest eater than the damsel, which really didn’t pick at the rocks at all. 
 

 

 

 

 

[Zer0]

I’m in love with your monti digi, it’s magnificent! 

[banasophia]

1 hour ago, Zer0 said:

I’m in love with your monti digi, it’s magnificent! 

Thanks, wish you lived nearby, I’m such at clutz I accidentally frag it all the time... I have 3 nice frags sitting on the sandbed right now. I could totally make this a forestfire digi tank and glue them in different spots on the scape. 🤔 hmmm

[banasophia]

 

[Murphs_Reef]

 

😱

[banasophia]

 

[debbeach13]

Great picture!

[Nano sapiens]

3 hours ago, banasophia said:

 

 

LOL, it looks like the two fish on the right are casting dubious looks at 'Mr Grumpy' 🙂

[banasophia]

5 hours ago, debbeach13 said:

Great picture!

Thanks 🤗

5 hours ago, Nano sapiens said:

 

LOL, it looks like the two fish on the right are casting dubious looks at 'Mr Grumpy' 🙂

Haha totally… Mr Grumpy (aka Falcor) just started hanging out in there with them lately so I think they are trying to decide how they feel about it. 

[gena]

On 8/22/2021 at 1:48 AM, banasophia said:

 

hahaha one of these things is not like the others.

 

Have you started testing and dosing this tank?

[banasophia]

11 hours ago, gena said:

hahaha one of these things is not like the others.

 

Have you started testing and dosing this tank?

That is what I almost captioned it, too 😂🤣

 

Not yet, just got my holder for my dosing hoses today. 

[banasophia]

Not sure if anyone else will find this interesting, but I went to turn my pumps back on in my Biocube 32 after feeding and saw this little creature zooming around. Please excuse the shaky camera.. should’ve grabbed my tripod!! I’m not sure what it is, please let me know if you do!
 

 

[gena]

I totally think that's interesting!  That looks familiar to me so I think I've seen those before, but no clue what they are.  

[banasophia]

My sixline loves to get in the pictures!
 

And as you can see I have quite a bit of bubble algae… just ordered some emerald crabs from Reef Cleaners. I haven’t tried to keep emeralds in any of my tanks for quite a while… they are probably my favorite reef inhabitants, but I’ve had a hard time keeping them since I started making my own water. I’ll be running some Poly-Filter the next couple days to hopefully filter out anything like heavy metals in the tanks. 

 

 

 

[banasophia]

New coral, apparently a sour apple birds nest per my LFS, added yesterday. I love the @NanoRox magnetic frag collars… I was able to swap the location of my pavona in order to place the birds nest up top for better lighting.

 

 

 

Also, in the front right sandbed you can see the branch of my digitata I had to break of a few days ago cuz the whorl of the red monti cap was growing too close, and the monti cap definitely overgrows the digitata. I was very thankful it broke where I wanted it to and didn’t just break off the whole thing. 

 

[banasophia]

Well, if you haven’t been following along in Reef/Life/Chat thread, my coral banded shrimp that was in my Biocube 16 may have injured my mandarin, so I grabbed it out of the 16 and put it in this tank. Shortly thereafter my diamond goby’s fin was injured, and then last night I watched the shrimp approach my different groups of fish and try to grab them.

 

It’s not totally clear to me whether the shrimp was trying to harm the fish, or if it was just trying to clean them, because apparently coral banded shrimp do clean fish in the wild. I think it may have just been trying to clean them, but that it was sneaking up on the fish and startling them, so when the fish jumped and swam away they got hurt on accident. 

 

So today I took apart the tank so I could get the shrimp out and take him to my LFS. 
 

 

 

[banasophia]

A few pics from yesterday before I tore it apart, wish I’d taken a FTS. The green monti cap had finally started to get its color back after the last time I had to take the tank apart. We’ll see what happens after this go round.