Wuzzo’s Cube Revival Project

[tidepooldreamer]

Love how colourful the royal gramma is, how are you liking him in the tank? Definitely on my potential stocking list!

[wuzzo]

1 hour ago, tidepooldreamer said:

Love how colourful the royal gramma is, how are you liking him in the tank? Definitely on my potential stocking list!

Thanks! I don’t know if it’s because I added him first and this is probably my most successful tank, but he has easily been my favorite saltwater fish I’ve ever had. When you have a certain fish for a while you notice how overtime it’s attitude changes and how it’s habits develop. I’ve only ever had nano reefs so I haven’t had a ton of different fish though. I think I might have said this before, but he is a role model of a gramma. I always hear that they can be a little aggressive, but if you add them last they are fine. I added this guy months before any other fish, and ever time I add a new guy he adjusts pretty quickly. Especially for the chalk basslets, it was a little rough for the first couple days, but now I catch him swimming around and under rocks with the pair.

 

Id 100% recommend a gramma, for me he went from being shy and timid to now really being comfortable and a personable fish. It’s odd how much I know about his habits and things he does, but I do lol. Some fish are colorful but bland personality, but mine is bright in both ways. The purple on him is so strong that even the yellow and orange filter has a hard time getting my phone camera to adjust, I can never get a picture of him without a little blue highlight in the photo.

 

Maybe it is different for other people, but for me he has been great. Id still recommend adding one a little later on as I’ve seen other grammas be a little mean.

 

Ok, ramble over. Kind of weird how much I talked about this gramma lol

[wuzzo]

On another note, I was thinking about getting a single pink skunk clown, I know the tank size is good and I know they are only aggressive if had an established territory, but what do you guys think? Really starting to love them

[wuzzo]

Ok, well I have plans to pick up a 6+ inch green goblin anacro colony, and I was planning on just taking a chunk and gluing it to my rockwork, but I’m not sure what to do with the rest lol

[BadCrab]

I guess you could take your cut and pass along the rest of the colony for nearly the same price if you got a reasonable deal on it. Maybe an LFS would even take it in trade for a pink skunk. I've found myself passing on all sorts of reasonable colony deals because the scale of them is already too big for my nano.  Also everything looks smaller in a store's big frag tanks 

Regarding your fish; I've always found grammas to be boisterous as a general species trait but every fish has an individual personality (basslets may be more variable in this than other species, too.) 

Is your future Skunk going to get territorial and aggressive? Probably.  But that's every species of clownfish - they just have a tendency towards being mean.  In years working at fish stores and cleaning tanks in homes and businesses I've never been bitten or stung by any creature a tenth of the times I've been charged and bit by clownfish.  Ocellaris, Maroon, Tomatos, Skunks.  Wonderful fish.  All of them will vigorously defend "their spot" from intruders many times larger than them.  But they'll be meaner towards the soft spot between your fingers than the basslets and crew you're stocked with.

[wuzzo]

10 minutes ago, BadCrab said:

I guess you could take your cut and pass along the rest of the colony for nearly the same price if you got a reasonable deal on it. Maybe an LFS would even take it in trade for a pink skunk. I've found myself passing on all sorts of reasonable colony deals because the scale of them is already too big for my nano.  Also everything looks smaller in a store's big frag tanks 

Regarding your fish; I've always found grammas to be boisterous as a general species trait but every fish has an individual personality (basslets may be more variable in this than other species, too.) 

Is your future Skunk going to get territorial and aggressive? Probably.  But that's every species of clownfish - they just have a tendency towards being mean.  In years working at fish stores and cleaning tanks in homes and businesses I've never been bitten or stung by any creature a tenth of the times I've been charged and bit by clownfish.  Ocellaris, Maroon, Tomatos, Skunks.  Wonderful fish.  All of them will vigorously defend "their spot" from intruders many times larger than them.  But they'll be meaner towards the soft spot between your fingers than the basslets and crew you're stocked with.

I was thinking this, might resell frags locally or trade in, I was going to pay 20 for the whole thing but I gave him 40 because I’m holding it until June. The skunk will definitely get aggressive, but it won’t go out of its way to hurt things which I don’t mind, just defend its space. Honestly that’s the same thing my porcelain crab does, if anything gets near him or his anemone he waves his claws and tries to ward any fish off. Don’t mind if he bites me, but if he starts drawing blood then back to the store it is lol. Might get one with the credit I have from the silver belly and damsel I gave to them.

 

Basslets have always been a bit more personable to me, but I know they can get a little nastier as they age. Everything is going good with the 3 basslets in this one tank right now, so we will see how that ends up in a year or two from now

[wuzzo]

[debbeach13]

Very nice. Everything looks healthy.

[wuzzo]

Kind of interesting that I just realized this, my zoas are growing fairly slow. I know stability and just leaving stuff alone but most of them have only gained like one or two polyps in the past 4-5+ months I have had them. I need to start dosing stuff honestly, but maybe at some point they will grow a bit faster, just me being impatient but 5 months seems like a considerable amount of time for some of these frags to not do anything at all

[wuzzo]

As soon as I posted that some of my zoas popped out another couple polyps lol.

 

On another note, being aware I’m on a budget but also that I said in the beginning of this thread that I want to cover the sand bed with rock flowers, I was researching on breeding them.

 

Seems like just a change in something will usually start it, but there’s no real research. I can’t change much because I’m still running a mixed reef here. So I think I might just start feeding Mysis heavily. 
 

I had this same group, except 13-14 or so of them instead of the 6-7 I have now post-leaving the hobby for a bit, and they spawned in my old fluval 13.5 once or twice but I only got one baby, and that one passed away later on as I neglected this tank more, before this thread

 

Guess it’s just a matter of waiting, I’ll take more pictures most likely today or tomorrow, I haven’t done anything new besides just normal maintenance , everything is as good as ever.

[wuzzo]

Alright, need some help

 

Just noticed some algae is growing on the bonsai tip, so I’m assuming it’s burnt tips or receding? It’s odd because I can tell there is a considerable amount of new encrusting, and it is much brighter than when I first got it. Probably should test alk and ph, I know my ph has always been on the lower side, 7.8-8. Probably should start doing kalk to raise it and also since I don’t do water changes too often. If anybody has any other tips or reasons it could be? The other original 2 acros are doing great, one has colored up and encrusted a tiny bit while the other one already has new growth at the tips and little stubs.

[BadCrab]

Algae only grows on skeleton, not live tissue, so there was a burn or recession at the tip.

Check your parameters but stability is more critical than hitting a specific number.  That said, Kalkwasser really is a cheap easy way to keep elements up and pH elevated.  The best part is that it's dosed with your top-off - just a little bit here and there all day.  If I'm maintaining a reef that actually consumes more than frequent water changes can replenish, Kalk is my go-to.

[wuzzo]

1 hour ago, BadCrab said:

Algae only grows on skeleton, not live tissue, so there was a burn or recession at the tip.

Check your parameters but stability is more critical than hitting a specific number.  That said, Kalkwasser really is a cheap easy way to keep elements up and pH elevated.  The best part is that it's dosed with your top-off - just a little bit here and there all day.  If I'm maintaining a reef that actually consumes more than frequent water changes can replenish, Kalk is my go-to.

Alright thanks, so my assumption was correct. I’m guessing there was an alk spike, it’s just weird that only one acro out of the 3 is doing this, and the only coral in my tank that is even somewhat unhappy. I guess acros are just weird in general lol. 
 

I 100% need to get an ATO, I might get one from autotopoff.com, they are pretty budget friendly and seem to be good review wise. Or a reefbreeders one locally, not sure. Choosing kalk over any 2 part because it’s so easy and cheap, but the main reason is the ph raising factor. Gives me all the calc and alk I need but it acts kinda like a ph buffer, since mine has always been low. Probably a mix of having a glass lid, and having a family in the house with a dog. Gas exchange just doesn’t work like that i guess

[wuzzo]

Well, here’s the start of an actual monthly fts to keep track:

First fts of tank post cleanup

Fts now June 2nd

 

You never notice how much a tank changes until you go and look back at older pictures, definitely starting to fill out as I add new pieces every once in a while and as the corals get used to tank parameters.

[wuzzo]

So, I got what I think is a cycloseris: 

Picked it up locally for only 15 bucks or so, but it had a good amount of red planaria on it. I didn’t have coral dip, and my lfs was closed until Tuesday. I did something in hindsight that probably wasn’t smart and did a quick 15 second fresh water dip. I know it works on softies and some lps, but couldn’t find enough research on it for plates. It killed all the planaria instantly, and I couldn’t find eggs so I think I’m in the clear. He looks good for now, just closed up. As long as he doesn’t die I’m in the clear

[natalia_la_loca]

I’d dip again in case there were any eggs you missed, just because red planaria are such a pain to deal with! it’s pretty cool that you were able to kill them with just a fw dip. 

[wuzzo]

1 hour ago, natalia_la_loca said:

I’d dip again in case there were any eggs you missed, just because red planaria are such a pain to deal with! it’s pretty cool that you were able to kill them with just a fw dip. 

I was thinking about this, I looked for eggs but couldn’t find any. So far the little guy actually reacted really well to the dip, he just slimed a little bit after being put in the tank but now he’s almost fully out. I never see them with a metallic green like this, or an orange mouth, was a pretty neat grab.

In the future at least with soft corals and some lps I might just do a quick freshwater dip if the coral looks suspicious. Flatworms are extremely intolerant of freshwater, and most of them died off of the plate within seconds. Some were tougher but they were all off with just swishing the plate in RO water for a couple seconds at a time

[wuzzo]

Hey yall, everything has been going good, small inconveniences here and there with the acros just not being 100% and stuff. My gramma for some reason stopped eating for a couple days but all of a sudden is again, not sure what happened there, but he seems to be exhibiting his natural behaviors much more now, sitting in caves and chilling in odd places, it’s very fun to watch. Another thing that’s starting to make me believe fish do have some higher level of knowing is that now my lawnmower blenny is having an identity crisis lol! He acts like a watchman goby now, and has his own den under the zoa garden rock that he’s made on his own, and spits out sand or burrows with his body. It’s difficult to get good pictures because of the acan in the way, but this is what has been happening:

He has his little den, then will peek out and slowly move up the rock, then swim back into his den quickly. Not sure why he does this but I’ve heard of them doing this rarely before. He’s still healthy, fat as ever after eating.

 

The acros for the most part are decent, the tip burn has seemed to stop on the bonsai, it was odd because while it was getting worse the bonsai was still gaining new polyps on the body and encrusting part.  The sugar daddy in the middle is doing the best, no signs of unhappiness and just slowly budding out new tips and encrusting. The green one (can’t remember the name, think it’s some deep water acro?) Has also recovered but then will lose flesh then grow it back, just keeps doing it. So odd how acro colonies work though, because while this was happening he’s encrusted enough to attach himself to the rock without glue. Honestly I think I just need to be more consistent with my top off or getting an ATO.

 

Photo dump incoming

[wuzzo]

[tidepooldreamer]

Gorgeous photos! Lovely to see how this tank is all coming together.

[Sharbuckle]

Wow! What a come back victory! The tank looks fantastic. Goes to show what a little motivation and dedication can achieve! Great job. 

[wuzzo]

Thanks y’all! Everybody on here is so supportive and it’s wonderful, never seen such a great little community online. It definitely took some patience, but I think I was able to complete the job of reviving the cube fairly quickly, and I’d say the mission is accomplished. Still so much more to come for the tank though, s tank is never really done, this one has much more growing and filling out to do. Not sure if you can change a thread name but I think it’s appropriate that the title of this thread changes

[MLS_Reef]

21 hours ago, Sharbuckle said:

Wow! What a come back victory! The tank looks fantastic. Goes to show what a little motivation and dedication can achieve! Great job. 

i was thinking the same thing but i wanted to try to ask/explain this tank has alot of energy in it, it could be very explosive or it could fizzle or you could focus on a specimen this is a wonderful job done! Congrats!

[wuzzo]

17 hours ago, MLS_Reef said:

i was thinking the same thing but i wanted to try to ask/explain this tank has alot of energy in it, it could be very explosive or it could fizzle or you could focus on a specimen this is a wonderful job done! Congrats!

Thanks! I know what you mean, I can't really describe it though haha. I was thinking about it and one thing this thread had me learn is that a mature tank is the best possible thing you can have in reefing.  I believe that's what let me add so much stuff and have things be successful fairly quickly.  The tank had already been running a good 2.5 years or so before this thread, then I let it go and now I'm here

[wuzzo]

Couple new zoas today, Rastas, rainbow hornets and 2 of the same unknown.