My Journey Begins

[Jerad81]

It's been a long time since I've been able to post anything. My life has been in chaos and not just from this virus but I finally got everything settled back down again. I have managed to maintain my tank through it all but not as well as I would have liked. I had a pretty big bubble algae infestation that I'm finally getting under control but is now being replaced by hair algae. I've lost a few coral and all of my crabs except my hermit crab. I sometimes wonder if he's working as an assassin to keep my tank to himself lol. I also have a pretty big aiptasia infestation going on as well. I have finally admitted defeat and spent the money on some berghia to help me out. I just put them in a couple weeks ago so now it's just a waiting game for them to reproduce and start eating. Here's a pic of what my tank looks like right now. Hopefully I will be able to start sharing more regular updates again. I have really missed talking to everyone here and I can't wait to get back into the community again!

[Jerad81]

Feather dusters everywhere! I really don't understand what I'm doing wrong/right. I can't seem to keep any new coral or inverts alive no matter what I do but my hitchhikers always seem to thrive lol. I have nassarius snails and bristle worms reproducing like crazy. I'm not sure if my aiptasia counts since they seem to thrive in any conditions. Now I have feather dusters popping up all over my tank! I'm starting to think I should just turn this into a hitchhiker tank and see what happens lol.

 

 

Unfortunately the picture didn't turn out as well as I hoped but I'll see if I can get a better one.

[Jerad81]

I finally have time to do a good cleaning day. I'm currently soaking my return pump, wave maker, heater and all my hoses in vinegar. I also managed to pull all of the hair algae out of my overflow as I could find as well as what I could peel off the rocks in my display. I'm planning on doing a 5g water change when my equipment is done soaking in vinegar since they are using my spair bucket. Now I just have to keep fighting all this aiptasia. I'm really hoping the berghia's I bought will do the trick otherwise I might be rehoming my fish and coral and gutting my tank out to start over. If anyone has any ideas/suggestions I would love to hear them. 

 

 

[Jaren45]

Careful using vinegar on your pumps, its been known to kill the magnets that allow them to operate. Citric acid is just as cheap, and works even better at dissolving organics

[Jerad81]

19 minutes ago, Jaren45 said:

Careful using vinegar on your pumps, its been known to kill the magnets that allow them to operate. Citric acid is just as cheap, and works even better at dissolving organics

That is good to know, I did not realize that. I will definitely look for citric acid in the future. Thanks for letting me know!

[banasophia]

7 hours ago, Jerad81 said:

I finally have time to do a good cleaning day. I'm currently soaking my return pump, wave maker, heater and all my hoses in vinegar. I also managed to pull all of the hair algae out of my overflow as I could find as well as what I could peel off the rocks in my display. I'm planning on doing a 5g water change when my equipment is done soaking in vinegar since they are using my spair bucket. Now I just have to keep fighting all this aiptasia. I'm really hoping the berghia's I bought will do the trick otherwise I might be rehoming my fish and coral and gutting my tank out to start over. If anyone has any ideas/suggestions I would love to hear them. 

 

 

Hopefully the berghias will do the trick… takes about 6 weeks to start to see them do their job, in my experience.
 

For some reason the last two batches of berghia haven’t seemed to help much in my 16 gallon, unlike previous times I’ve used them. At this point I’m also using Aiptasia X and peppermint shrimp in a multi-pronged approach. Hoping we will both get these buggers under control. 

[Jerad81]

11 hours ago, banasophia said:

Hopefully the berghias will do the trick… takes about 6 weeks to start to see them do their job, in my experience.
 

For some reason the last two batches of berghia haven’t seemed to help much in my 16 gallon, unlike previous times I’ve used them. At this point I’m also using Aiptasia X and peppermint shrimp in a multi-pronged approach. Hoping we will both get these buggers under control. 

I actually tried peppermint shrimp. I put 2 in my tank, 1 dissapeared a couple days later and the other randomly died for no apparent reason after about a week. I did find the one who dissapeared a few days later in my overflow lol. I have no idea how it got back there since I keep my tank covered with a screen but it seems to be thriving somehow.

It actually came out into the display area when I had all the hoses removed yesterday. I was hoping it would stay but it clearly started stressing out big time and went back into the overflow section pretty quickly. I kinda wonder now if it's become so used to being in the dark that being surrounded by so much light all of a sudden was too much for it?

 

Yeah, I've heard that berghia's can take some time to start showing noticeable results. Looking at how big some of these aiptasia are getting though is making it tough to stay patient lol. I'm probably going to start using aiptasia x again on the really big ones and see if it works better for me on the older ones than it did on the babies. I might be using a double approach myself if it does lol.

[LazyFish]

"F aiptasia" works prety well on the big ones killed them fast in one application they just melted and I dont see any new ones comming up in that spot. Just be sure not to get ANY on shrooms or other types of nems it will hurt them my zoas didnt like it but it didnt perminantly damage them. I zaped my largest most unsightly ones with this stuff and left the nudis to take care of the bazillion baby ones that are popping up all over.  I saw a nudi munching one last night.

[Jerad81]

1 hour ago, LazyFish said:

"F aiptasia" works prety well on the big ones killed them fast in one application they just melted and I dont see any new ones comming up in that spot. Just be sure not to get ANY on shrooms or other types of nems it will hurt them my zoas didnt like it but it didnt perminantly damage them. I zaped my largest most unsightly ones with this stuff and left the nudis to take care of the bazillion baby ones that are popping up all over.  I saw a nudi munching one last night.

That is good to know, thanks for the advice! I will definitely give it a try. 

[Jerad81]

I finally made the investment in an auto top off for my tank. I'm a little frustrated though because apparently I misunderstood when I bought it and it didn't come with a pump or reservoir. Now I'm finding out that 5g jugs/tanks that have a lid or cap large enough for a pump to fit through is more difficult to find than I expected. I do have an extra bucket I can use but was hoping to find something that isn't as much of an eye sore. I'll probably start with the bucket until I can find something better for now. 

[banasophia]

I use a food grade two gallon jug with a couple holes drilled in the lid for the hose and plug, and when I had an ATO on my tank in the family room I used a basket tipped on its side to hide the container 

 

[Jerad81]

1 hour ago, banasophia said:

I use a food grade two gallon jug with a couple holes drilled in the lid for the hose and plug, and when I had an ATO on my tank in the family room I used a basket tipped on its side to hide the container 

 

That would be perfect! I'm definitely looking for something similar if I can find one with a lid big enough to fit a pump through lol.

[PeterU]

I brought this water jug off Amazon, holds about 5 gallons. The spigot would normally screw into where the hose and wire are going into it.

[Jerad81]

1 hour ago, PeterU said:

I brought this water jug off Amazon, holds about 5 gallons. The spigot would normally screw into where the hose and wire are going into it.

That is awesome! I will definitely start looking a lot harder at Amazon since I can't seem to find one at any stores nearby. Thanks for letting me know!

[PeterU]

https://www.amazon.ca/REDCAMP-Gallon-Portable-Container-Camping/dp/B07YW92VDW/ref=sr_1_15?crid=9TZ1UNJENM7X&dchild=1&keywords=5%2Bgallon%2Bwater%2Bjug&qid=1635125098&sprefix=5%2BWater%2BJug%2Caps%2C156&sr=8-15&th=1

[Jerad81]

My new water reservoir was just delivered today! Now I just need to go pump shopping and get some hoses long enough for everything and I'll be able to get this ATO set up and running. 

[Jerad81]

I got my new ato up and running today! I also just found out I invested in one just in time. My job is sending me to another site to work all next week and now I don't have to stress out about coming home to a dry tank! This might become a normal thing for a while too so I'm pretty happy with myself for FINALLY getting one for my tank. 

I also decided to add a little more rock to my tank. I'm hoping the new "caves"/hiding spots will be more suitable to shrimp and help keep them alive. My plan is to add at least 1, maybe 2 peppermint shrimp to my tank again to hopefully help with my war on aiptasia. And who knows, maybe the new rocks will also encourage my circus goby to come out of his hiding spot more often now that he has more places to hang out as well. 

Plus this also gives me some more area for corals when I do get this aiptasia under control. I'm still not sure how I feel about the little island in the front though. It's definitely not going away but it is actually a couple pieces of rock so it might be getting rearranged or split up until I find a position I like better.

On a side note, my turbo snail died about a week ago 😭. I noticed it wasn't moving all week so today I finally flipped it over and found it's shell empty except for a few bristle worms finishing off the clean up process. I'm not sure why it died and I'm a little bummed out because it was one of my favorite cuc members. I left it's shell in the tank though. I'm hoping my hermit crab will find it and take a liking to it. I know he's been wanting one for a while now but so far I haven't been able to find one for him that he finds suitable and is larger than his current shell. Maybe this one will peak his interest 🤞.

 

[Jerad81]

After doing some more research on peppermint shrimp I decided to use some more of my aiptasia x on the larger aiptasia in my tank as well as the larger colonies of them. If my past experience holds true, most or all of them will be making a comeback in about a week. From what I've read though, peppermint shrimp are more prone to eat the smaller "babies" as they appear and very likely to ignore the larger ones because they're a bigger pain in the ass to kill/eat and will probably decide they're not worth the effort. I wonder if this will help my berghia's get a better foothold in my tank as well, assuming they're still around. 

My mushrooms seem to be very stressed out now though. I didn't think to turn my pumps off first and they seem to have gotten some of the aiptasia x as well. I used my turkey baster to gently blow them off so hopefully they will settle down and survive the experience. 

 

[Jerad81]

I just got home with a couple peppermint shrimp that are currently acclimating. Hopefully they will like my new rock additions and help me fight all this aiptasia. I did notice that my yuma and ricordia appear to be very happy with the new rocks which was a nice bonus. Two of my orange mushrooms still appear to be a little stressed out after yesterday's aiptasia x treatment. Hopefully they'll bounce back to normal in another day or two. Now I'm just going to leave everything alone for a week or two (except for feeding and a water change) and see how it plays out. Hopefully I can finally start shopping around for some new coral again soon. 

[Jerad81]

I made it home from my work trip and for the most part everything is doing well. The only thing that worries me is one of my new shrimp has been MIA all day so far. I'm trying to stay positive and believe he just found a good hangout that is difficult/impossible to see from the outside. Considering my track record with shrimp though, I can't help but be a little worried. The other one however has been out and about all day so hopefully that means he's settling in and getting comfortable in his new home.

I also picked up some new snails today. I have been neglecting my CUC algae eaters for too long so I decided to give them a little boost. I picked up two trochus snails and a new turbo snail. I went in expecting to leave with a smaller turbo snail but they gave me this monster instead. Apparently it was the same price as the small ones so I'm definitely not complaining. It's probably a good thing I don't have a lot of algae eaters now because this guy will probably have a much bigger appetite than I was planning for lol. 

 

I also found this unknown snail in the store bag when I got home. I believe the turbo snail was on top of it in the store and nobody noticed that it hung on to it when it was picked up. So I ended up with four new snails instead of three 😀.

[Jerad81]

Every time I think my life is finally settling back down again something new happens to stir it back up. Now I'm getting ready to move to Kansas City in the next week and have decided to cut my losses and give away everything in my tank. Don't worry, I'm not getting out of the hobby. I'm keeping my tank and all the hardware so I can set it back up once I get myself established. It's probably going to be at least a month, maybe 2 or 3, to get it back up and running though and I'm not very confident I can keep anything alive long enough to justify trying to keep it. 

 

This tank has been a great learning experience that should help me have better success when I do get it going again. Although I was getting my ass kicked pretty hard in my aiptasia war. At least now I understand just how bad this stuff can be and will take it far more seriously in the future if it ever shows up again. 

 

I also finally found someone locally that would have been a great mentor for me and even a source to buy new coral as they have their own frag tank. It's unfortunate I didn't find them until I'm getting ready to leave but they did offer to stay in contact with me and even frag the corals I'm giving them if I want any of them back in the future. Thankfully I'll only be a couple hours away so I might take them up on that offer.

 

Whenever I do get my tank running again I'm going to start a new journal for it. I really appreciate all the help and advice everyone here has given me with my first saltwater tank. This has been a much bigger adventure than I ever expected it to be. Hopefully I won't be gone too long and look forward to talking to everyone again in the future!