30 Gallon Stocking

[jt8791]

Clicked export instead of save as on the display light schedule and it switched over to a planted schedule, think I will run with a bit and see if there are any improvements. It cut the intensity down like I planned anyways and brought the blues way down, which could have caused the microalgae growth in the first place. I did have the blues right up with everything else, and left them at 5% at night.

 

Edit: Took a screenshot of the lighting schedule, thinking I may want to adjust it but it's so crazy I don't know where to start or if I should just go with it and adjust the fuge light schedule to alternate.

Lowered intensities and tweaked timing a bit, will see how it does. 

[jt8791]

Did a 50% water change and added a scarlet skunk cleaner shrimp and 4 bangai cardinals, pj's didn't come in so went with my original choice. One is a tad smaller and spends more time alone but they typically stay in a group most of the time. Clownfish hardly even notice them. Slight bacterial bloom at the moment but it's slowing clearing up, turned the lights down a bit for that. Gracilaria seems to be growing pretty good.

[jt8791]

Probably should have tested the water before that water change, but the bloom seems to have cleared. Nitrates bottomed out and started up some gha, so I trimmed the gracilaria in the tank, about 2 cups.

 

Feeding exclusively frozen brine shrimp, only thing the Bangai seem to eat consistently. Still no nitrates as of this morning, went up to 3 feedings a day of brine and a pinch of flakes.

 

May need to turn lights down more, gha is worse in the fuge, turned down red and yellow lights and turn the flow up between feedings.

 

Other than that the livestock seems to be thriving, smallest clown had a few spots that looked concerning but it cleared up. All 6 fish hang out in the same open area, Bangai have really come to life since I started feeding brine shrimp multiple times a day. 

 

Noticed I have 2 female peppermint shrimp, may pick up a male at some point. Unsure of sex on the cleaner shrimp but would like to get another to go with that one as well.

 

Never been a fan of retail work but just got a callback for the aquatics dept at petco. Have always wanted a job working with fish, betting I could learn way more than I do at home. 

[jt8791]

Figured out the problem, lack of flow in the fuges. Ordered new media baskets mainly to get flow under the live rock rubble, pulled the side piece off and it was full of dinos like crazy. Started dosing nitrates yesterday, had swapped the gracilaria in the fuges for sea lettuce but swapped that out for chaeto for the pod population. Ended up with a free peppermint shrimp and a mystery hitchhiker, no idea what it was. Red in color, almost looked like a tiny starfish, but was too small to tell what it was. Looked cool so I tossed it in the tank. 

 

Edit: Didn't get a good look at the body but it does look a lot like the serpent sea star nano on KPaquatics, maybe Easy Aquariums had some in that tank at one point. 

[jt8791]

Current stocking

 

2 Ocellaris Clownfish

4 Bangai Cardinals

1 Yellow watchman goby

1 Six line wrasse

1 coral beauty angelish

4 peppermint shrimp 2m2f

2 skunk cleaner shrimp

2 camel shrimp

6 Nassarius snails

3 Super tongan nassarius

9 Cerith snails

5 Trochus snails, lost 4 the other day, think it was lack of food from nitrates being bottomed out. 

 

Started dosing nitrates yesterday, gonna pick up red sea test kits at the lfs, API is nearly impossible to tell the colors apart. Got 20# of reef grade live sand coming to cap off this fiji pink, goby has yet to make a burrow, hoping it will help. Really intrigued by these nano Serpent sea stars, may try to get a few more of them and maybe some nano red brittle starfish as well. 

 

Shocking part was having to dose nitrates with this heavy stocking and the heavy feeding, but at least now I can feed a more reasonable amount. Hoping to find a pair of candy cane pistol shrimp after the sand is added, should get them in soon with having the 6 line. Doesn't seem to bother any shrimp at the moment though which is a good sign.

 

[jt8791]

Have been watching the Bangai cardinals closely for aggression, debating if swapping 2 of them out for pajama cardinals might be safer in the long run. Nothing major so far, occasional chasing but they are still very small.

 

Edit: Just noticed a nipped fin on one of the Bangai's. 

Now that I am dosing for nitrates I'm questioning if it's still necessary to push the stocking so much. 9 fish seems like a lot for this tank long term.

Two stick together at all times, other two wander around. Thinking cutting it down to 2 will be the safe bet, not sure if I should swap two for PJ's or just cut the fish stock down to 7, even that seems a bit heavily stocked. Did take a few doses to get the nitrates up, had turned the lights up too high and most the gracilaria fuzzed over and started dying off from lack of nitrates.

[jt8791]

Starting to realize the camel shrimp may have been the cause of my snail losses, not positive could have just been opportunistic but they were harassing the other shrimp and each other as well so I removed them. Have only seen one of the skunk cleaners in the last few days, haven't seen either so far today. All peppermints are accounted for, coral beauty and the six line don't seem to bother with or mind the shrimp. Although the cb was irritated by the camel shrimps constant darting in and out of its cave.

 

Did a 10gal water change last friday and dosed fertilizers again, got loads of microalgae growth. Gonna change 5gal friday and not dose anything and see how the tank reacts. Would think I wouldn't need to dose nitrates with 9 fish but they still have a lot of growing to do, will test nitrates and see where I am at. Still debating on the cardinals, no major aggression and they will group together at times but will have to keep an eye on them. Not sure if swapping 2 for PJ's would really help long term either way, everything is still small, but these 9 fish full grown sounds like a massive bioload for this tank.

 

Going with 1 tiger pistol shrimp and debating on adding 16# of the arag alive gravel to mix in with this half fiji pink and half reef special grade sand. Could add a bit of live rock rubble as well but figure the gravel would help with amphipod population and hopefully be useful in the burrows. Already have 3" of sand towards the back with a low spot in the front of the tank. 

[Tired]

The best thing for a pistol shrimp to use in burrowing is a bunch of shell pieces. Busted-up oyster shells would be good. I had a tiger in my prior tank, and it did some interesting things with a few smallish (2" or so) mussel shells. It used them as additional roofs to extend its tunnels. 

[jt8791]

Well got busy for the last 7 months, ending up going to about 80lbs of live sand, fiji pink, special grade, gravel and oolite, and sure enough nitrates caught up quickly. Made quite a few stocking changes and just finally had to go through the work to catch the six line wrasse, lost both cleaner shrimp, a few snails and one of the tuxedo urchins. Actually managed to find captive bred tuxedo urchins in stock, but it was a 3 pack on divers den, had planned to rehome one or two before someone made a snack out of one of them, still debate if I should rehome one.

Gracilaria died off a while back, I've given up on growing anything other than chaetomorpha and it seems to finally be growing pretty good, other than a bit of hair algae and cyano. But I'm also running 16 hour lighting periods to boost the chaeto growth, with the six line gone I'm trying to get copepods re-established. Had added them probably 8-10 times by now, just small bags at the lfs but I've started getting the 5280 pod blend from AlgaeBarn.

Just 3 fish now, pair of clownfish and the yellow watchman goby. Tiger pistol shrimp, the other green pistol that stays by itself, a few peppermints, tons of snails and 2 tuxedo urchins. Have only been changing 15 gallons of water once a month, even with the six line and a 5th fish that didn't make it, my nitrates have been around 5. Dosing fertilizers weekly, flourish planted fertilizer for now, reef complete for calcium and flourish nitrogen. Come to think of it I haven't checked nitrates since pulling the six line but I've been dosing nitrates and have yet to see dinos, which I hope to avoid.

Really debating on another fish or two but can't decide what would work well for the tank. Want to stick with captive bred, have had a lot of fish not work out and I don't want to take chances with wild fish again. Debating on a captive bred Court Jester Goby but not sure what else to consider. Worst case it will be a chaeto farm, which I should be able to trade at the lfs for my rodi.

Was considering a captive bred royal gramma but after some research I decided to pass on that one. Read a few forum posts about them getting aggressive, not sure if it would bother the ywg. Too bad because the captive ones on divers den are nice looking. Could always consider orchid dottyback as well, but that's moving back over to the semi-aggressive side again.

A mandarin is tempting someday, but I'm not sure I am up to that challenge, even captive bred sounds like quite the gamble. Granted I have a lot of sand, rock and chaeto but I'm not certain it could hold enough copepods to sustain a mandarin and ywg.

[jt8791]

Only fish I am finding captive bred that really catch my attention and may work well with the tank are the Court Jester and possibly a coral beauty, but think it would be a bit of a stretch on that one as far as tank size.

[jt8791]

Hmm, talked to my local lfs and she suggested not to go with a cb, says in a few years it will outgrow the tank. If my landlord ever gets around to remodeling my mudroom/entryway downstairs on the cement I may do a bigger tank but could be years before he gets around to it. 

 

Think I will go ahead and order a captive bred Court Jester Goby, should go pretty well with the current stock and I'll call it fully stocked at 4 fish, thinking that will be plenty.

[jt8791]

Wow I really went in circles with this tank, ended up going back to my initial plan of bubble tip anemones. Had a heck of a time making up my mind, running into territorial issues now so might be changing the livestock  up.
 

Thinking of my original stocking idea of just a pair of blood orange clowns. Pistol shrimp keeps irritating the bta and the ywg is getting too territorial. Also thinking about slowly pulling sand out to get back down to 1” to boost the water volume and cut down on the weight.

 

Ended up picking up a Reefbreeders Photon 24-V2+ for a light and a rainbow bubble tip anemone. Was planning to also get an mp10 but transmission in my car failed so had to put that on hold. Got a new vehicle but with a car payment now so i would like to simplify the tank a bit.

 

I imagine I would have a heck of a time keeping nutrients in the tank with just a pair of ocellaris clownfish. Was nice when it was just them and they explored the whole tank, they hide in the back top corner now.

 

 Banggai cardinals barely move more than 6”, orchid dottyback and the ywg barely come out. Seems far too complicated to manage six different fish and bubble tip anemones vs just a pair of clownfish. I know clownfish tend to pick a spot and stay there but they are my favorite and hate seeing them pinned in a corner, which it seems they are.

 

Edit: gonna go slow and pull sand out with the gravel vacuum slowly as well as catch the goby and pistol shrimp. Will see how the rest of livestock reacts to the extra swimming room and the goby out of the tank. Clowns are my favorite but the banggai cardinals are a close 2nd. Maybe that will balance things out, I was a bit overstocked anyways.

[jt8791]

I cut the sand down to 1-1.5” but didn’t have the ambition left to try to catch the goby and pistol. Hopefully the extra swimming room will take care of the territorial disputes. Cardinals hang out with the nem now and so far the goby isn’t bothering anyone.

 

bad news is I just noticed gha taking off on the back glass and the top of the rock work. Time to rig up a guard for the koralias, also shut all the red and white lights off for now. 

[jt8791]

Picked up 4 turbo snails and a foam filter insert for an ac110 for nem guards on the koralias. Not the prettiest but should do the trick. The rbta seems to like the extra room to stretch out, have blues and violet at 90% and brought the white back up to 30%.

[jt8791]

Well that was a chore and a half, got all 6 fish out and rehomed, even managed to get the pistol shrimp out. Fingers crossed it works out okay but just placed the order for 2 Blood Orange Clownfish and a red tuxedo urchin from Ora, coming in Thursday. Probably could get away with a third fish bioload wise but I would just assume let them have the whole tank to themselves.

[jt8791]

Not fighting too badly, they seem to be settling in well, just occasional pecking form the female who was hosting in the rbta within a few hours. Have been doing many extra feedings of dry food to try to keep up with nutrients, nitrates are barely over 5 and I've only been running the blue lights 100% on the fuge light. Debating on what would work for a third fish with these two, almost consider another six line wrasse but not sure how that would work out.
 

Would be handy to not have to overfeed, just bumped the white and red leds up to 25% on the fuge light so will have to watch nitrates closely. Don't want the chaeto to die off, not sure the blue and red leds on fluval plant 3.0 are that powerful anyways. Six line might work, with all this extra feeding I imagine my bristle worm population is growing quickly. Read of a few people that had a six line and maroon so I imagine it would work, hard to say if my peppermint shrimp would survive.

 

Edit: added some pictures, sorry about the blue lights, fighting gha so white lights have been off. Will try to get some better pictures with white light later

[Tamberav]

Beautiful clowns! I think they are an underrated type. 

[jt8791]

I got tired of driving around looking for a six line so I ordered one on la coming from Wisconsin Friday. Hopefully will get the clowns to swim around more. Overfeeding to keep nutrients in the tank wasn’t gonna last long with bristle worms. Kinda missed the six line anyways, think I was too quick to blame the last one for the shrimp I lost, good chance it was the pistol shrimp that killed those anyways.

[jt8791]

Well I lost my lucky streak of on time orders from live aquaria, hoping to hear back from them tomorrow to figure what's going on. They never sent a shipment notification so assuming they never shipped it, it would be nice if they let you know if the order will be delayed. Heading to the lfs this afternoon for saltwater, rodi and a purple short spine pincushion urchin and will see what they have if I don't hear from LA by that time. Think that will be the last piece of livestock I ever order online, far too nerve racking to question if it will ship on time and arrive on time then the hassle of waiting for the delivery to show up. Just assume check random lfs or have the lfs order stuff for me.

[jt8791]

Live aquaria was having issues securing the order, they shouldn’t list in stock if they don’t have it on hand. No big deal, found a huge six line wrasse at the lfs where I got my rbta, also grabbed another rbta from the same split.

Had picked up a plain white short spine pincushion urchin at my usual lfs but this place had the purple ones. I didn’t grab one, figured three urchins would be overkill, but it’s tempting to take a ride back tomorrow and grab one.

 

The six line seems to be settling in well, was qt in copper, dumped the bag into a clean bucket and slowly added tank water. Scooped him out with a net and rinsed him and the net off in a measuring cup of tank water. Hoping no copper made it into the tank, noticed a dead emerald crab just then which was odd.

 

just changed 15 gallons of water earlier but might do another water change tomorrow to be on the safe side. Everything else in the tank seems fine so far, new nem seems to be settling in. Took it a bit before it finally stayed put. The male clown managed to get into the new nem a minute before the female kicked him out.
 

No major aggression so far so maybe adding the six line will mellow the female out a bit. Curious how many rbta I need before the female lets the male host in one. I can see buying a third but that might be pushing it, at that point in a split or two between the trio the tank would be full.

[jt8791]

Need to find a camera filter to help make up for the blue light, slowly turning the whites up though 

[jt8791]

Think i need to buy better test kits to be certain but pretty sure it’s diatoms in the sandbed since nitrates seem to be holding steady at 5. Haven’t decided if I want to stress the rbta’s with a 3 day blackout or not

[jt8791]

Shot in the dark but ordered a cheap 550gph pump to hook the uv sterilizer back up and see if it makes any improvement 

[jt8791]

Well two lessons learned, 550gph pump was way overkill. The manufacturers chart doesn’t specify the flow rate for a smaller tank but I had a feeling those number were wrong. Pinched the hose with an alligator clip or whatever you call them, slowed the flow down enough that it’s not blowing sand all over now.
 

Other issue is I forgot to rinse it out when I took it down after the pico pump died. Saw a cloud of salt creep and my salinity shot up to 1.028, quickly brought that back down to 1.025.

I shut the fuge light off and gonna leave it off a few days, probably only gonna run the uv for 3 days to see if it makes any improvement on what I think is diatoms. The hose and pump are an eyesore in the tank, can’t see running it long term.

 

The blood orange clowns are picky eaters, really only going for frozen brine and mysis, got them to eat flakes if we soak them in tank water and a bit of garlic guard. Only about a week and a half they have been in the tank though. they went for freeze dried brine shrimp so might try freeze dried mysis, maybe a few other options like copepods or other meaty items.

Six line wrasse cruises all over picking at random things but hasn’t eaten anything we’ve offered but it’s only been in since Friday. Will probably try to add a few new food items to what I have, don’t want to bankrupt myself but also don’t want fish to starve if there is something I can get they will eat.

[jt8791]

Crap nitrates bottomed out, I had turned the fuge light intensity up last night not even thinking. That was dumb. Shut the light off for a few days anyways, will be throwing a bit of everything I have on dry food to bring it up. 

Now it has me questioning if it was dinos or diatoms, nitrates were steady at 5 but I ended up doing another 10 gallon water change yesterday which probably brought them too low. Hopefully the cuc is good and hungry