10 Gallon Rock Wall

[growsomething]

51 minutes ago, Jakesaw said:

Curious about the Emerald Crab too.  I've got a recurrent bubble algae problem that is driving me nuts.  I've been manually removing it from frags, successfully, but it's finally gotten a hold of my main rocks.  Everything in the tank is thriving but these darned Bubble Algae.  

 

Probably should have cleaned all my frags with hydrogen peroxide before entering my tank, but hey - Newbie mistakes right. 

 

Anyway, willing to try an Emerald Crab and have read that the Females are the ones that eat BA more than the males.  You can ID them by looking at underbelly.  

 

 

Is yours Male or Female?

 

How is it working on beating back BA?

 

Thanks

 

My bubble algae is no longer spreading, is turning clear, and doesn't come back where I scrape it off.  This is due to cutting back on fish feeding, no more reef roids, and going back to weekly 15% w/c now that the Gulf is healthy.  I would like to feed more, since my ricordea only look healthy spot fed rr.

The crab seems to be doing zip, but there is so much valonia it could be eating small amounts of it and I wouldn't know.

One problem is it knows to wait in certain areas for the few pellets the fish miss, and gets its fill there.  I just received Mastic and plan on sticking it on the glass away from the flow with some pellets mixed in, hoping the fish get all of it.  It's really expensive compared to pellets or frozen, but I need to get the fish used to it so a tank sitter can use it instead of pellets.  If the Sicce 1.0 is turned off so pellets do not just float into the aio sump, it doesn't want to restart about 15% of the time without tapping it hard with a 14" cold chisel.  These pumps have very low starting torque.  A tank sitter can't do this, ergo the mastic may help with 2 problems.

The crab may not get any food and then have to eat Valonia.

[growsomething]

Haven't looked to sex this crab.  I had one a few years ago when starting this tank that I got for Valonia that completely eliminated it.  That is interesting research and I may try to sex it this wknd, see what it is.

[Jakesaw]

3 hours ago, growsomething said:

7 I may try to sex it this wknd, see what it is.

Please do,

 

I'm frustrated with the BA.  I got 7 snails and my algae is minimal since getting CUC in there.  Corals are thriving.  But this BA thing is really a gut punch to otherwise great hobby. 

 

I may pick one up this weekend just because, but I'm thinking when I go to bigger tank, I may start over from scratch rather than using these live rocks.  But I really wanted to bring over the seasoned rocks for quick upstart. 

 

If an emerald crab would solve the problem, I'd rather do that as a quick fix.  Willing to try about anything.  Learn something new every day.

 

 

[growsomething]

Went fishing with family last eve.  These ugly anemone things were all over.  I've never seen them in that area before. 

 

Most of their tubes were around 1 1/4" thick.

[growsomething]

My lfs convinced me to start back with the hammers and frogspawn that I don't really want myself.  This little "gold" Aussie hammer was $100, but I still had more than enough credit from my $300+ frogspawn for it.  It is yellow under my natural light program.

Have had zero success with the emerald crab and bubble algae, unlike last time I had it, ao I picked up another. I know I've got 2 pepperment shrimp and 1 serpent or brittle star in my nuvo sump, but there is no way to get them out of the part that goes under all 3 chambers (for pump volume I think), so I got a larger peppermint that can't crawl through the overflow weir.

 

 

 

Btw, I asked if I was seeing 1/2 the skeleton of my old frogspawn the store fragged half of and kept, and they said yes.  Someone has been poisoning tanks at several stores in the Sarasota/Bradenton area, and their reef system crashed.  They had huge ammonia spikes 3 times, and no real fish load in the system.  They have no camera system, but another frag store caught someone squirting bleach into multiple tanks with their security system.  Maybe a local online seller looking to decrease competition?

[growsomething]

It's been a minute!  Life got very busy after our 2nd child.  Friends who have 4 said it is much harder going from 1 to 2 than #3 and 4.  We still had a tiny bit of free time with 1, no free time w 2.  Worth it.

 

 

Installed some expensive cabinetry and had to travel for a week at a time to different E coast FL cities to do it.  Not worth the bump in pay as my boy develops behavioral problems when I'm gone.  Can't imagine being military or something like that, gone for months at a time.  

Tank had very little maintenance, just fish pellet feeding, and no water changes.  Interestingly, the gorgs and porites plate have done well.  The gold hammer has shrunk, zoa do not grow, and even the red dictyota doesnt grow.  Valonia is almost all gone, smothered by the green cyano (?) and the remaining emerald seems to eat whats left.  Fauna are doing well, except for the peppermint shrimp, which always disappear. Had a 2"+ aiptasia and 5-6 babies pop up.  Had to treat 2x with Aiptasia x ( which also works on xenia btw).

Ricordea have shrunk to 1/2 their size as is usual in my tank.  Pics to follow in next post.  I havent tested anything yet.

[growsomething]

Fts of how it looks at the end of every week.  Cleaned every wknd, maybe 1g nsw change over the holidays.  

 

Closeup of green slime (cyano?) That develops on the sand and any exposes rock not covered by coral and shots of the 2 fish.

 

 

 

 

silver eyed lepto has done well, getting mostly covered with xenia and zoa.  Took some tiny scrapings of it and glued them to the return rfg where zoa and xenia arent allowed.

 

 

plate is gliding over the rock, doing great.

 

 

 

i seem to have developed old tank syndrome.  My plan is to remove and replace all the sand, empty and clean the back chambers, several 90% nsw changes after, and start pippet feeding rr to the ricordea and gold hammer.  Will test with the few parameter kits I sprung for so far 1st.  My thought is my aragonite sand has lost its buffering capacity, and there is a buildup of organics (although it sounds like it is inert after a bit, according to some.  Good to see some soldiering on here on NR.

 

[Tamberav]

Most of the corals look good despite you being busy. Maybe the hammer is angry at the other coral encrusting onto it. Frag time? 
 

Should be easy enough to rip clean for a fresh slate being it’s a 10g. 

[banasophia]

Wow, the tank still looks beautiful and your kiddos look so happy!
 

I just replaced the sand in my 5 gallon and added to the sand in my 32 gallon a few weeks ago and it went pretty smoothly. Though I am dealing with a little cyano in both tanks, I’m thinking probably due to needing to reestablish a good balance.
 

Not sure about the whole "rip clean" concept, which I thought also included scrubbing the rock and sounds pretty intensive, but new live sand and water was nice in my tanks. 

[Tamberav]

2 hours ago, banasophia said:

Wow, the tank still looks beautiful and your kiddos look so happy!
 

I just replaced the sand in my 5 gallon and added to the sand in my 32 gallon a few weeks ago and it went pretty smoothly. Though I am dealing with a little cyano in both tanks, I’m thinking probably due to needing to reestablish a good balance.
 

Not sure about the whole "rip clean" concept, which I thought also included scrubbing the rock and sounds pretty intensive, but new live sand and water was nice in my tanks. 

sorry I didn’t mean to scrub the rocks. Just replace the sand. The rocks don’t look like they even have any algae on them. 

[growsomething]

Went on the last adventure of '22.  Dozens of little shrimp with every net scoop, half berried up.  No pencilfish, seahorses, or colorful shrimp we had hoped for.  Surprised with the amount of life as we had moderate red tide 1 mo ago with lots of dead small fish, no gamefish.  Lots of sponges, tunicates and unidentified goodies.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Sister and nephew.  Encrusting sponge w fans and shrimp went in the tank.  Lots of the white golf ball things, some orange, felt like hard plastic, not slimy.

Happy New Year.

[banasophia]

What a fun adventure for the end of the year! I am really curious about those ball shaped things!!

[growsomething]

19 hours ago, banasophia said:

What a fun adventure for the end of the year! I am really curious about those ball shaped things!!

Didn't quite dare put them in a little 10 g for fear of causing a crash, but thought about it.  Really unusual.

The water temp felt about 7-10° warmer in the tank, but the sponge and all the shrimp went in.  Not overly attractive 😄

 

 

Remembered yesterday family had given me a gift cert to an lfs and thought I remembered it being an Xmas present that expired 1st of the year.  Was already in the truck so I ran there and dug it out of my truck papers.  Here it was a bday present and expires next June.  Oh well, was already there 😏

 

Got 2 peppermint shrimp and these acans.  Detached from the base and threw them in immediately as we had to go to an early party for families.  Looked really happy when I got home. I've never had luck w acans.  Had them on top of my bottom rock before as they very slowly withered away.  Planning on feeding these rr.  Here is their placement in the tank:

 

 

 

This is them in the eve w ambient room light.

That's all, happy 2023!

 

[Tamberav]

I think the sponge looks cool. Has lots of dusters on it. I wish I could collect my own critters. 

[growsomething]

 

All the little bay critters are still there.  The emerald crab has mostly destroyed the sponge by eating the macro it was encrusted on.  Actually, the smallest shrimp, which were sarker and had a "hitch" in the middle I believe the rfa's ate.

 

 

 

Finally cleaned the glass.  Been sick all week.  Just enough energy to do some jobsite work, then take care of sick kiddos at home w the wife.

[banasophia]

4 hours ago, growsomething said:

 

All the little bay critters are still there.  The emerald crab has mostly destroyed the sponge by eating the macro it was encrusted on.  Actually, the smallest shrimp, which were sarker and had a "hitch" in the middle I believe the rfa's ate.

 

 

 

Finally cleaned the glass.  Been sick all week.  Just enough energy to do some jobsite work, then take care of sick kiddos at home w the wife.

I just love your tank. Sorry you and the kiddos have been sick… hope you all feel better soon.

[growsomething]

30 min walk in the surf at 6 before sunrise is "my time", and all it takes to make the week worth it.  Here are a few rhings I saw.  Had some gobies gather around my feet in the phone flashlight but by the time I turned it off and got the cam on they disappeared, just an empty sand shot.  Lots of live scallops and clams so we must not have red tide at the moment.  Wish I'd have brought my water buckets.

 

 

 

 

 

I put the sand dollar in my tank.

 

And here is the situation at sunrise!

 

 

[DNR88]

Man, I would be collecting every minute of my free time with a sea nearby! 😁

[growsomething]

Not with a nano, they fill up in 2 trips!

[growsomething]

Got a 200g unused acrylic I saved from a large remodel, and if I set it up it would be all FL with Keys/Carribean and locally collected Gulf stuff, but we know we are going to move to upstate SC at some point, so it just collects dust in the garage.  Someday...

[DNR88]

What about live rock? I would be very interested to see what you could collect. 🙂

[growsomething]

Well DNR, that woulf be illegal here in FL.  Most anything can be collected that is not hard coral or live rock with a few exceptions like queen conch.

 

Here is the Sun morn update:

Went to get water without checking the red tide report and found the beach littered with dying scallops,the 1st sign of red tide usually.  Saw a few dead fish, as well.  Brought my bucket and boy along for nothing.  Well, he did enjoy looking at all the dying things washed up.  Some would have been super interesting to put in a tank.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Here you can see the foot or base in the last pic of whatever this stuff is.  The red one with a sea fan would have been awesome in a tank.

 

 

Lot's of fun was had, so trip was not wasted.  Better luck next time...

 

[growsomething]

Here is a brilliant blue Linckia starfish we found on Samal island, PH.  The sun is so intense the cam makes it look black in the shadow.  Wanted to buy an Olympus sports camera beforr we came but just couldnt justify the expense.  Wish I would have as several beautiful Picasso triggers kept bitting me.  Felt like a crab pinch, kind of painful.  Must have been spawning or something.  

The water is noticibly less clear and smells more of sewer than 5 ys ago, and the majority of coral has died from being stepped on and stressed at this very popular beach.

 

[banasophia]

Piranha triggers? 😳😬😜

 

That sea star is incredible!!

[growsomething]

Had to go buy salt water today as I spent 3 mo waiting for red tide to dissipate, and it's worse than ever, so no Gulf water for the foreseeable future.  Picked up an rfa and a nassarius snail while I was there.  Used up the last of my store credit.  This new little guy is tiny but settled right in.  I located it at the top of the tank hoping it will be easier to relocate to my new 3g when I get it up.