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Natalia’s Evo 13.5: alk spike aftermath


natalia_la_loca

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natalia_la_loca

Yay new EVO tanks 😁😁😁

 

im kinda regretting getting chaeto this soon, it looks janky in the display and the tank’s temporary location doesn’t allow me to set up the fuge yet. So I cut it in half and put half of it in a little pouch I made from an avocado bag, to keep it from spreading its little spaghetti noodles around the tank. The rest I threw in a jar with a mini-jet in case I need it later.

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natalia_la_loca
1 hour ago, debbeach13 said:

Sounds like the tank is progressing nicely and that you are enjoying this new set up. I forget what your plans are. Are you going to just keep this tank and one reef bowl?


yeah, so far so good 🙂 yup, the plan is to keep the older reefbowl and transfer everything in the newer reefbowl to the EVO.

 

this morning the temp in the chaeto jar was 83F, yikes! Guess even a mini-jet generates too much heat for a gallon jar. Thinking I’ll run the mini-jet for just a couple hours a day, hopefully that will be enough circulation to grow chaeto.

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natalia_la_loca

The dead parts of the red ogo finally fell apart, but the live parts are growing little branches yay! I glued them all to the rock today.

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The dragons tongue halymenia is really pretty and is the only one of these macros that actually fluoresces under actinics. V curious about what form it will have when it grows out.

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and I moved the rhodactis from the quart jar to the Evo. 

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Lots of room for coral 🥰 so far the diatom stage has been pretty mild. Maybe the macro is helping with that?

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natalia_la_loca
1 minute ago, TrashTank said:

Told you that ogo would probably come back! Glad it is. It's a really great macro, and everyone in my tank loves it. 👍

 

Love the scape as well.


yup that was a good call! I’m really excited about it, I used to have red ogo years ago and I love how it looks when healthy.

 

Thanks re: scape ☺️ With this one I wanted to keep all the rocks away from the walls (easier to clean glass) and not stacked or glued (easier to remove individual rocks to attach frags, treat for pests, etc).

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What are you planning to stock your tank fish wise? Right now I have an ORA Elongate dottyback but don’t know what else to do. I want a pair of Pygmy filefish but I feel like they will destroy my feather duster population 

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natalia_la_loca
10 hours ago, Frozen_Reef said:

What are you planning to stock your tank fish wise? Right now I have an ORA Elongate dottyback but don’t know what else to do. I want a pair of Pygmy filefish but I feel like they will destroy my feather duster population 


My current plan is 2 active fish and 1-2 gobies. would like to get 100% captive bred.  I’m thinking an azure damsel (ORA) and either a royal gramma (Biota) or an orchid or elongate dottyback (ORA). For gobies, I’d like a watchman goby with pistol shrimp and maybe either a court jester goby or a clown goby.

 

Not sure how easy it will be to find these fish captive bred. My LFS often has CB azure damsels and orchid dotties, but they don’t seem to have most of the others lately and most online stores seem to be out of stock. The LFS just got a few grammas but I assume those are WC because they’re adult size.

 

I’d worry about those filefish too, but they’re super cool fish ❤️

 

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6 minutes ago, natalia_la_loca said:


My current plan is 2 active fish and 1-2 gobies. would like to get 100% captive bred.  I’m thinking an azure damsel (ORA) and either a royal gramma (Biota) or an orchid or elongate dottyback (ORA). For gobies, I’d like a watchman goby with pistol shrimp and maybe either a court jester goby or a clown goby.

 

Not sure how easy it will be to find these fish captive bred. My LFS often has CB azure damsels and orchid dotties, but they don’t seem to have most of the others lately and most online stores seem to be out of stock. The LFS just got a few grammas but I assume those are WC because they’re adult size.

 

I’d worry about those filefish too, but they’re super cool fish ❤️

 

If you have a local petco I know they have a contract with ORA and you can see if they will order in the fish. Just make sure to tell them to leave the fish in the bag so it never touches Petco water, just like you ordering a fish online without having to pay shipping. That is how I got my Elongate dottback actually, though he might be moving tanks and I might end up with some scorpionfish in my tank 😅

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natalia_la_loca
4 minutes ago, Frozen_Reef said:

If you have a local petco I know they have a contract with ORA and you can see if they will order in the fish. Just make sure to tell them to leave the fish in the bag so it never touches Petco water, just like you ordering a fish online without having to pay shipping. That is how I got my Elongate dottback actually, though he might be moving tanks and I might end up with some scorpionfish in my tank 😅


Ah I’ll have to look into that! How are you liking the elongate? I like the idea of getting a dotty because I saw an orchid playing nice with an azure damsel in a nano tank at the LFS, but I worry about dotties attacking a pistol shrimp.

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13 minutes ago, natalia_la_loca said:


Ah I’ll have to look into that! How are you liking the elongate? I like the idea of getting a dotty because I saw an orchid playing nice with an azure damsel in a nano tank at the LFS, but I worry about dotties attacking a pistol shrimp.

The elongate is great, typical dottyback that likes caves but will come out once it knows im there and will sometimes wiggle its tail at me to show who is boss. Of all the dottybacks, the elongate is very relaxed and got along with a sunrise dottyback for a few weeks at the LFS

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natalia_la_loca
58 minutes ago, Frozen_Reef said:

Sooo we got a green clown goby and a tailspot blenny at work and I really want to bring them home 😂


ugh I feel that. I might break my captive bred vow for a green clown goby. AFAIK they’re only breeding the yellow ones...

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natalia_la_loca

uh, spoke too soon 🤦🏻‍♀️
 

I do have me the uglies

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corals are looking happy though. And so many pods! I added another trochus snail to help clean up.

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I’m still dosing 3-4 drops of very very dead phyto every other day. It’s an ancient bottle of Phyto Feast that dates back to my old Nuvo 8 zoa garden that I shut down over 5 years ago. It may be super-expired, but corals are happy, pods are happy, macro is growing, and it still has that weirdly pleasing sweet seaweed smell, so...🤷🏻‍♀️
 

still, I’m interested in having this system mimic mother nature at least a little bit, so I’ve ordered some live phyto. I decided to take a chance with a new startup called Joey’s Reef Juice that offers a mix of 4 different live strains. Reviews to follow.

 

current params in case you’re horrified that I’m dumping zombie phyto from the jurassic period in my tank:

 

Ammonia 0 ppm

Nitrite 0 ppm

Nitrate 2 ppm

Phosphate 0.03 ppm

kH 9

cal 420

salinity 1.025

 

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natalia_la_loca

Loving this trail of destruction.

 

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those green strands are chaeto bits. I found an old filter media bag that I might try using to contain the chaeto when I set up the fuge. It looks like it will be fine enough to keep the noodles from getting out while letting light in.

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1 hour ago, natalia_la_loca said:

Loving this trail of destruction.

 

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those green strands are chaeto bits. I found an old filter media bag that I might try using to contain the chaeto when I set up the fuge. It looks like it will be fine enough to keep the noodles from getting out while letting light in.

I love it! I just got my CUC order so I’ll have to post about it later tonight 

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natalia_la_loca
1 hour ago, Frozen_Reef said:

I love it! I just got my CUC order so I’ll have to post about it later tonight 

Yay, post pics!

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natalia_la_loca

Just about all the brown diatoms are gone now, replaced by this neon green film. Based on a cursory internet search, this means the tank is reaching the end of the cycle. The snails are pretty good at scraping it from the glass but there’s still a fair amount of it on rocks and sand. Not planning to intervene.

 

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The gracilaria hayi (above) has little grayish branchy stringy things growing around its base. Not sure if I should worry about them? They don’t look like any kind of nuisance algae I’ve ever seen. They do seem to be growing but it doesn’t look like they’re invading the surrounding rock.
 

love how weird and spidery the dragons tongue halymenia is.

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natalia_la_loca

Added another CUC member: one tiny blue leg hermit. I’m excited to be able to have more inverts again 🥰 also added some shells to give it new houses when ready.

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This little euphyllia frag kept getting knocked off its frag rack in the sculpture bowl and was never super happy because it was directly in the path of the bubbles. Today I found it face down on the bottom and instead of putting it back, I put it in the Evo. It already seems happier with the lower current despite hermit crab greetings.

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I noticed part of the skirt on one of the oompa loompa heads looks like it’s been nibbled. Any ideas what it could be? I scrutinized it for zoa eating nudibranchs, spiders or eggs when I got it, but didn’t see anything. Have also been checking with a flashlight when closed at night and still nothing.

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natalia_la_loca

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seems to be settling in pretty well ☺️ Tbh this is the best it’s looked in a long time. It was definitely less happy in the high flow area of the bowl.

 

btw this frag (along with a bigger one still in the sculpture bowl) is a cutting from the euphyllia that I added to the OG reefbowl 5 years ago, and still have. Yay aquaculture!

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I just went through the uglies for a while, then I used vibrant and I was awesome. It's only a bacterial strain that help balance the natural cycle in your tank....I highly recommend it.

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Murphs_Reef
15 minutes ago, dferrari13 said:

I just went through the uglies for a while, then I used vibrant and I was awesome. It's only a bacterial strain that help balance the natural cycle in your tank....I highly recommend it.

Oh.. easy you will upset @seabass

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  • natalia_la_loca changed the title to Natalia’s Evo 13.5: alk spike aftermath

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