Sapling's Waterbox Peninsula Mini 25

[sapling]

a bit of an update here and question for anyone keen to give me their 2 cents, 

I'm noticing there is a deadspot where detritus is collecting; it's below the weir of the tank. I am running the stock return. I am thinking I need to improve flow, I thought about either trying to find an upgrade for the return, or bringing in a powerhead. 

However, been looking into this for over a month now lol, still indecisive. Tank is LPS with a couple SPS, so not trying to make it wildly strong flow, just good flow, 

Currently considering powerhead-wise; 

• Mp10 
• nero 3
• hygger mini wave

For return, I'm unsure still what pump would fit and actually work in tank, worried about it fitting and for it to be at least more quiet than what's currently in. Also considering one of the Nozzles BRS has to help create more random flow

would like to hear opinions on this, especially others with the same/similar tank,

~~

Tank overall is looking good, alkalinity has only dropped .1 since last post, so looks like I have breathing room there currently. Some Coral growth notes;

 

• The pipe organ continues to form small polyps at the base, from 2 new, to 6+ , it's still wonky about when it wants to be open, but has been fine recently
   
• Duncan appears to be forming something near the base of the polyp where it meets the skeleton, I assume this is a new head, but because of the position, I can't quite see it well. Dont want to bother the coral atm. 
   
• Acan has almost healed at this point from the fragging cut, besides a lack of color in the new flesh, I expect to regain
   
• The bleached Blasto still hanging around, has not bleached more, does look more open than it did earlier. 
   
• Monti has continued to grow, need to consider placement since its edges reached sandbed. 
   
• Cyphastrea continues to grow, can now see tiny spots where I think new polyps are going to be forming,
   
• The Yuma finally got off the frag and found a random spot in the tank, It looks more like chewed up green gum with a coral mouth on it than anything else, Hoping it can recover where it found its home now. 

~~

Today is the last day of the light acclimation for the corals, plan to give them a week to stabilize, and start creeping a few up the rockwork to their intended spots. Not sure if I should take them halfway or just straight to the intended positions. 
 

[BadCrab]

Of the three, I've only used Vortechs and I love them.  I use an Apex to control them and I think I benefit from that, too.
I'm keen to try the Neros, though, and anticipate doing something with them and Blades sooner rather than later.
If you do go with the Nero I'm keen to hear your opinions after use.

The first thing I'd try is to change the nozzle, though.
VCA has a random flow eductor sold at BRS that's worth looking at!

[sapling]

On 5/30/2023 at 2:10 PM, BadCrab said:

Of the three, I've only used Vortechs and I love them.  I use an Apex to control them and I think I benefit from that, too.
I'm keen to try the Neros, though, and anticipate doing something with them and Blades sooner rather than later.
If you do go with the Nero I'm keen to hear your opinions after use.

The first thing I'd try is to change the nozzle, though.
VCA has a random flow eductor sold at BRS that's worth looking at!

feels like vortech is the better option but regardless neither of those options have had a good sale for me to pull the trigger on . 

~
Small update 

Corals continue to do their thing, been giving reef chili biweekly and also broadcasting brightwell amino daily. Can't say I see any obvious difference yet. dosing about .4-.5ml . I might lower the dosing .1-.2ml since I've noticed a what looks like a little bit of diatom action on one of the frag plugs. not sure if they are related, but being cautious

The Ceriths love to lay eggs, there's usually a 1-3 clusters on the glass or rockwork. Im unsure if they actually hatch or not. I haven't seen a baby cerith yet. If they are hatching, I'm imagining they aren't making it thru their larvae stages. besides the corals possibly catching the larvae, I dont think there is possible predators in the tank. not sure why they aren't completing the cycle besides lack of phyto dosing. only other thing I can think of is the filter is gnabbing them. Maybe I ought to get more phyto haha. 

I also decided to leave the corals as they are instead of moving currently; reason is Ill be taking a trip next weekend, rather do it after. 

 

[sapling]

long time since last update, basically took up another job so its been hard to handle 2 jobs and have any kind of hobby haha, but to give some notes, 

         On the corals;

• the mystery coral never really took off, eventually seemed to waste away, I didn't really know what to do with it since I didn't know what it was, feels bad,
• both of the Yumas I have both pedal laceration at different points, so this is cool to see, 
• both my candy canes have receded tissue from the base of the frag to about where the polyp itself is, but they both have done splits, so a bit of good there
• my Duncan has formed a baby polyp at its base, nice to see
• my hammers have either split or formed baby polyps at its base, so also cool to see, 
• my Acan has formed multiple heads and does not at all look like it did when it was a fresh frag,
  
  On the Snails;
   
• One of the largest ones did pass, but for the most part have baby trochus snails in the rear chamber and in the display, the ceriths are still around. 
  
  On the Tank;
   
• I Havent been dosing Amino acids for a while a bit on laziness so I'm picking that back up. I do think the corals benefitted from that and the coral foods.
• tank is showing some dinoflagellates on the rockwork, been cleaning some of it off as I go.
  
  I have some glue and some citrix acid coming so I can get some maintenance done on cleaning. I essentially did an unintentional fallow of the tank, and I'm hoping I can spur some nice growth with moving some of the corals to better spots from the sandbed(something I still haven't done lol) and more vigorous feeding and Water changes. Once that gets here, and I get this little renovation done, I'll be sure to share,

[sapling]

Big changes; 

 

just to go over it, 

 

I decided to make an order for some fish, and they were received Tuesdays and yesterday. I decided on:

 

• Royal Gramma
• Tail Spot Blenny
• Pink Streak Wrasse
• Yellow Clown Goby

 

The Gramma and Blenny have acclimated pretty well, and they look good. I didn't realize but the Royal Gramma is a bit more territorial than expected in the tank. The Blenny seems to hold his own, and will either ignore or snap back at the gramma. I'm hoping the Gramma calms down some once food starts coming in. 

 

The Goby and wrasse when added, were sized up a bit by the gramma, sat around for a while, and decided to go into a rock. I'm surprised they haven't been evicted from the hole, and I haven't really seen them since. I'm hoping they become more outgoing later. 

 

My epoxy and glue came in, along with my bone cutters and I got to work on getting the corals finally off the ground! it took a really long time, as I also took the chance to rescape some adding a couple new pieces of dry rock to try and get the Gramma to calm down a bit and get better spots for coral. the process wasn't too bad but it was surprisingly messy. I would take the frag, clean it, and take the plug off where i could or snap the end off. Then I would use the glue epoxy glue method and mount to the rockwork. I was a bit worried I botched the process but most of the corals are out today and that's good. 

 

I also replaced the return nozzle for the random flow one and it seems pretty good. I feel like the tank needs a bit more flow though. 

 

Lastly, I decided to turn down the whites by about 10 percent because I felt they weren't flattering for the corals. I may bring the lights down some more but haven't decided. 

 

Here is a few pics of the tank as it is, I havent got to the sandbed yet, but now with most of the coral up, I can finally clean it better. 

 

 

[sapling]

updates, and not all good. 

 

the 2 smaller fish still haven't been out and about so decided to go with a more thorough search while i do some maintenance, today, I was sad to see but while changing the filter sock out, I found the goby. I couldn't tell was the issue was, but he was very very dead. 

 

The Pink Streak, I just cannot figure, checked for any carpet surfing, the return chambers, and some of the rockwork I saw it near the first day, even took my tweezers and raked the sand. some people said it can be very cryptic and reclusive for a little while before being more active, so maybe that's what happened? Id like to be hopeful and id be very happy to see it, but ive accepted maybe it just noclip into the backrooms or something. I feel the timing in how they fulfilled the orders from online may have made this issue worse than it should been. maybe I should have had better foresight to leave the gramma in a bucket until I saw the other 2 come in. 

 

I do think this gramma is a bit worse in person than its reputation online. I've created multiple hides, 1 major, 3 minor, at different areas of the tank and it's a very greedy fish, wanting not just the caves but also the areas around it. I am not a fan of the couple times of head biting its done to the blenny, but the blenny stands up for itself. I was worried it would show stress marks and hide, but its been a trooper, and bites back. 

 

considering this gramma, I just dont think smaller fish can work in this tank, and I've been rethinking the end goal stocking. I like the fish but this personality is kinda awful. Maybe larger or more assertive fish is what's better here, I've also been considering how to try breaking the line of sight more around the tank. 

 

~

 

onto the corals, I think the lighting change was a overall good thing, the corals look happier in the new placements, especially the blastos and duncan. I definitely think the lighting was too strong for the blastos as in the shade its the biggest ive seen them in a long time. I might drop the whites a tad bit more but im undecided

 

it seems like coral amino really antagonizes cyano in my tank. so I went ahead and Ive added a small wavemaker I had laying around to help with improving flow overall in the tank. its been a real pain to find the right placement to not have bald spots in the sand though, as I want it lower, but the sand doesnt agree haha. Hoping that helps discourage the cyano. 

 

[sapling]

Updates, 

 

Tank:

• I'm sticking to the daily dosing of my coral amino, but I did see the wavemaker and more detailed cleaning did not get rid of the cyano well enough. So on thursday, I went ahead and started chemiclean to get it out of the way. In the past, i'd use antibiotics, but decided to go with chemiclean this time around. I will say that it is not as fast acting, it actually took about 4 days and me doing a 20% waterchange and redose on day 2 before the cyano lost its color and is now dissipating. Im happy with this result, and the only 2 algae visible in tank is a dark brown tough algae on the side wall i need to scrape, and what seems like diatoms, 

Corals:

• My Alvepora i was hoping would come out in its higher flow higher light spot from the sandbed, but I cant seem to convince it yet. the polyps are only about 1/8th an inch extended from the base, but they aren't buried in. Im not sure why they are so contracted, I know they did this one day and never really opened again, but it doesn't appear to be dying. my only guess is maybe thru the year when the tank was not getting much nutrient it was unhappy about this and maybe just needs more nutrition to get back to it. 
   
• I finally noticed that there appears to be a gall crab living in one of my candy canes, and I am moreso surprised I still have it with these 2 fish in tank. I have a couple bad pics because its actually very small and hard to get a good look at, but ive seen the little baby claw it has and eyes, I've never noticed it before and I'm not sure where it came from, but it is what it is. reading about them, they don't seem to be a negative addition to the aquarium. 
   
• One of my cyphastrea has gotten slightly better color at the polyps now, and I'm happy to see anything with those, as they didn't have much of any color to them for some reason almost the entire time I've had them. 

Fish:

• Still no sign at all of this wrasse, not even ammonia I've tested for.
   
• the gramma is still belligerent towards the blenny, but knock on wood it seems the aggression overall has died down a bit and both are eating well.