The great Canadian 9 gallon cube - Farewell - upgrade coming.

[Koleswrath]

So it’s around the 1 month mark for this little tank and at this point we’re 3 weeks in after adding live bottled bacteria. I’m still showing a tiny amount of nitrite but ammonia is gone and nitrate is slowly rising which tells me the bacteria is alive and multiplying albeit not as quickly as advertised. I’d love to know why some live bacteria cycles take longer than others. I’ve seen many reports of 8-11 day cycles where both ammonia and nitrite are zero. All other things being equal I can only guess that it’s the condition of the bacteria from things like shipping, storage, etc. I guess in the long run it’s irrelevant but one of my favourite things about the aquarium hobby in general is trying to visualize what’s going on in the tank at a microscopic level then being able to translate those assumptions to visible results - test kit results, fish health, coral growth/colour, etc.

The mystery and trying to solve it is a big part of what makes this interesting for me.

[debbeach13]

Not me I hate testing.

[Koleswrath]

Ya, once things are stable and the test results are typically the same I can see it getting old.

[Koleswrath]

Big day today! Feels like we’re moving fast but I don’t see how a sterile tank is going to mature by itself. 
Our tester coral is in the tank after a quick peroxide dip. I used about 50ml 3% in a liter of tank water.

Here he is looking rightly pissed. 

 

 

Sorry for the blue. Lens filters are ordered!

We’re also going to add some pods and live phytoplankton today. I’ve got Apocyclops, Tisbe and Tigriopus swimming around in a little bottle waiting for lights out.

We’ll see how this guy makes out in the next few weeks and hopefully we’ll be off to the races!

Happy times!

[Koleswrath]

Ho boy! Note to self: if your copepods are mostly clumped up at the bottom of the bottle and not swimming around so much maybe don’t dump the whole bottle in a tank with only 7 gallons of water. 

These are my water parameters the day before and the day after adding the pods and 10ml of live phytoplankton:

Before - pretty reasonable eh?

 

Aaaaand after - MY GOD
 

 

Wanna know the best thing about nano tanks? It’s being able to do a 50% water change in 6 minutes.
Happy Monday!

Greg

[ml86743]

What is that app you are using to log your parameters? I NEED something like that...sorry if I missed it in posts prior. 

[Koleswrath]

15 minutes ago, ml86743 said:

What is that app you are using to log your parameters? I NEED something like that...sorry if I missed it in posts prior. 

Aquarium note 2. It’s $13 (Cad)and worth every penny. It actually motivates me to test more often so I can see trends in graphs. I like data. My favourite thing is the recurring task reminders though. 

[ml86743]

16 hours ago, Koleswrath said:

Aquarium note 2. It’s $13 (Cad)and worth every penny. It actually motivates me to test more often so I can see trends in graphs. I like data. My favourite thing is the recurring task reminders though. 

Heck yeah thank you so much!

[Koleswrath]

Not much activity over the last week or so until yesterday; I've been doing regular changes of filter floss every 3 days; a few 30% water changes to bring down phosphate levels after dosing too much copepods and/or phytoplankton; feeding fish; feeding my lone tester coral - who's looking fantastic by the way. 

I learned that Salifert Nitrate test kits are affected by Nitrite in the water so I can scrap all my Nitrate readings to this point. I'll have to wait for the Nitrite oxidizing bacteria population to catch up to the ammonia oxidizing bacteria population. Slowpokes.

I've had a few short bacterial blooms I can't quite pinpoint the cause for. Research says it's heterotrophic bacteria feeding on increasing amounts of organics in the tank but I've noticed  that it happened twice after dosing a small amount of Microbacter start XLM (trying to get those Nitrites moving). It only lasts a few days each time and I'm not too concerned about it. Apparently it's common when starting with dry rock and dry sand.

Now we get to yesterday........drum roll please........drum roll......

THE UGLIES ARE HERE!!

 

  

I assume this is the typical brown diatoms that typically appear in new systems but we'll see how bad they get and how long they last. I have an Amscope microscope on order to help me grow phytoplankton and copepods down the road but it's not scheduled to arrive until February 6th. I wonder if a sample would last until then. Pretty excited to see everything that's growing in here.

 

Here's a tank shot on Sunday showing clean bare rock and nice clear water:

 

 

And here's yesterday showing diatoms starting to grow in the bottom right corner in the sand and on the glass. Water's looking a tad cloudy. 

 

 

Exciting stuff. Hopefully the copepods and bacteria from the Ocean direct can keep this ugly phase to a minimum. Time will tell.

Today we're adding a Blue Hornet Zoanthid. I figure I'll get all the low/medium light corals added first then add the higher light corals and slowly ramp the lights up from 25% to 75% which will put me in the 200-275 par range for a final goal.

Take her easy eh!

 

[Koleswrath]

Well we have some interesting progress since last week!

The diatoms peaked after a few days and are on the decline along with the "bacterial bloom" (I'm pretty sure it was a phytoplankton bloom from the color of my filter fleece). I got home from skiing on the weekend and was astonished at how crystal clear the water was. This is typically what is reported after a bloom of either bacteria or phytoplankton so that makes sense. 

I've added a small frag of Blue Hornet Zoas which is doing well at the moment. The candycane is loving life and starting to consume a little bit of alkalinity which dropped a few tenths over the week. We're going to slowly start adding Kalkwasser in the top off container (which is now a 5 gallon bin due to the amount of evaporation this little tank experiences) to maintain levels as long as we can. 

Another reason I'm suspecting the cloudy water was phytoplankton is that our phosphate actually dropped a good bit while I was skiing. I measured on Friday at 0.09 (with my fancy new Hanna checker) and on the following Monday it was 0.05. Not sure if a bacterial bloom would consume that much.

Nitrite is way down to 0.1 from 2.0 so this time I'm pretty sure the cycle is nearing completion. I'm still not confident in the Nitrate kit's results until Nitrite is 0.

Current FTS as of this morning a few minutes after lights turned on.

 

 

 

 

[PJPS]

Keep nutrients off 0.  Zero nutrient environments, nitrate or phosphate or both, are hospitable to dinos or cyano.  Letting them bottom out, even early, will just bring them on.  Once your nitrogen cycle is going, it’s time to build food chain.

 

Personally, I’d put some pods in and start dosing a tiny bit of live phyto to feed them.  0.2ml of nopox every few days to encourage the healthy bacteria, and you’re on easy street.  For the phytoplankton, I’m talking three ml every few days. One jar of pods should be plenty. A quarter dose of any good bacteria a week for the first few weeks.

just my 2 cents 😊

 

[Koleswrath]

7 minutes ago, PJPS said:

Keep nutrients off 0.  Zero nutrient environments, nitrate or phosphate or both, are hospitable to dinos or cyano.  Letting them bottom out, even early, will just bring them on.  Once your nitrogen cycle is going, it’s time to build food chain.

 

Personally, I’d put some pods in and start dosing a tiny bit of live phyto to feed them.  0.2ml of nopox every few days to encourage the healthy bacteria, and you’re on easy street.  For the phytoplankton, I’m talking three ml every few days. One jar of pods should be plenty. A quarter dose of any good bacteria a week for the first few weeks.

just my 2 cents 😊

 

All over it! Pods went in a couple weeks ago and I'm culturing phyto to have fresh live phyto on hand all the time. Most of it will go down the drain unless I find some local folks to take some though. I don't think low nutrients will be a problem in a skimmerless, low coral biomass, no chaeto, filterfloss only system with fat fish but I'm on a good testing schedule so I'll be sure to monitor. My targets are around 0.05 or so for phosphate and 5-20 or so for nitrate. 

Having been in the hobby when 0 and 0 were bragged about and algae was the bane of everyone's existence I'm not sure I'll ever be able to dose Nitrate and Phosphate. Just feels wrong.

Thanks for the input!

[PJPS]

25 minutes ago, Koleswrath said:

All over it! Pods went in a couple weeks ago and I'm culturing phyto to have fresh live phyto on hand all the time. Most of it will go down the drain unless I find some local folks to take some though. I don't think low nutrients will be a problem in a skimmerless, low coral biomass, no chaeto, filterfloss only system with fat fish but I'm on a good testing schedule so I'll be sure to monitor. My targets are around 0.05 or so for phosphate and 5-20 or so for nitrate. 

Having been in the hobby when 0 and 0 were bragged about and algae was the bane of everyone's existence I'm not sure I'll ever be able to dose Nitrate and Phosphate. Just feels wrong.

Thanks for the input!

In a nano, give yourself a bit more wiggle room.  That goes for all of your parameters actually.
 

lately I aim for:

NO3 10-20

PO4 .1-.2

ALK 7

CAL 420

MAG 1380

 

 

it seems to work better than anything I’ve tried previously.  I’ve had to unlearn 00, as well as ignoring most scientific literature on how the ocean works.  Running your tank as if a marine biologist was telling you how to run it, makes all the sense in the world when I think about it.  I haven’t had a single issue since I started running my tank as if I was trying to make an ocean ecosystem.  Using a guiding philosophy of a finger on the scale, not a sledgehammer for every problem.

 

sounds like you’re already starting down a good path😊

 

just passing along some nano lessons I’ve learned over the years. My first nano was in 2006. 🍻

 

[Koleswrath]

Quick update today after a short hiatus while travelling for work:

Current full tank shot- Feb 5, 2023

The uglies aren’t too bad and are already receding. Overall we’re still looking really good and the corals and fish are doing great! Can’t ask for much more. Nitrite finally hit 0!!! 

Here’s the new Zoanthids:

I harvested my 1st batch of phytoplankton and started dosing 2ml per day which doesn’t seem to add an abundance of phosphate or nitrate. Nitrate is actually undetectable at the moment now that I can test for it without Nitrite giving me false readings. Might need to think about increasing it. Phosphate is right in the sweet spot of 0.05 which is lovely.

I added a Montipora digitata over the weekend as well so should have some pics of that beauty coming soon. 
Until then,

Greg

 

[Koleswrath]

Here's the Forest fire Digitata I picked up from New Dawn Aquaculture. Love the colors. I also picked up some Brightwell Coral Amino and started dosing a few drops a day to ensure that the corals always have access to some nutrition. 

 

 

Here's the placement in the tank. The polyps are blowing around nicely and randomly so I think the 2 little Jebao powerheads are a win.

 

 

Have a good one eh,

 

 

[Koleswrath]

Parameters for 2 month update:

 

 

 

Nitrate has read 0 for about a week. I would usually attribute this to algae consumption but there's not much algae in the tank. Some dusting on the glass and a bit of scraggly looking brown  algae growing a little on the rocks and on the HOB filter but really minimal. I've been dosing phytoplankton hoping that some of the fertilizer is still in the culture water but no upticks that I can test after dosing. I SHOULD have a steadily increasing bacteria population growing and although I can't see any copepods they should definitely be in there after adding a whole bottle. Maybe these organisms along with the minimal amounts of algae are consuming all the nitrate? 

Might need to think about dosing now - never thought I'd say that. Phosphate levels are looking great though.

Any one have suggestions on an inorganic Nitrate source and a dosing regime? 

 

 

 

[PJPS]

Brightwell, ESV, start with a quarter dose.  Once you get it back in line, I suggest balancing your inputs.  Frozen foods for your nitrates, amino acids and dry food or coral food for phosphates 🐒

[Koleswrath]

1 hour ago, PJPS said:

Brightwell, ESV, start with a quarter dose.  Once you get it back in line, I suggest balancing your inputs.  Frozen foods for your nitrates, amino acids and dry food or coral food for phosphates 🐒

Thanks, I typically do more pellets. I’ll switch to half and half. The clowns spit out the frozen mysis though. Don’t know what their problem is.

[PJPS]

20 minutes ago, Koleswrath said:

Thanks, I typically do more pellets. I’ll switch to half and half. The clowns spit out the frozen mysis though. Don’t know what their problem is.

I like Nano Reef Frenzy from LRS, but look for marine food.  Hikari has a few, you basically want stuff from the ocean, not freshwater.  Some shrimp in an otherwise oceanic blend is fine, but I have found finicky fish take the ocean food very fast.  Let it sit out a while, let it get some stink.

 

my clowns also like arctipods from Reef Nutrition, which also bumps nitrate.  I like to feed as much variety as I can if you can’t tell😜.  It’s probably not appropriate for a full diet, but they love the stuff.  A few drops in a powerhead twice a week or so.

[Koleswrath]

Growing Phyto is working out great! I have way too much so if anyone is in Edmonton feel free to take some off my hands. 

 

 

[PJPS]

24 minutes ago, Koleswrath said:

Growing Phyto is working out great! I have way too much so if anyone is in Edmonton feel free to take some off my hands. 

 

 

Looks nice!  Well done!

[Koleswrath]

 

I was hoping for a quick breeze through the uglies but no such luck. 
While I was travelling my Nitrates hit zero and I didn’t act quick enough to get them back up. I’d guess about a week to a week and a half of zero nitrates.

To get the tank back to balance I’ve started dosing Brightwell Neo-nitro to get the nitrates back in line and I’m blowing off rocks/changing filter floss daily since yesterday. One thing I didn’t realize I should do is lay off the amino dosing. I’ll keep dosing my phyto as I see this recommended when dealing with Dino’s.

 

Here they are - Osteorepsis

 

 

Here are the weird spiral shaped things. They move back and forth. I could spend a whole day just taking samples of tank water and trying to find cool stuff!

 

 

That’s all for now, I’ll update during the week and see how the dosing and cleaning works out.

Greg

 

 

 

 

[Koleswrath]

UV sterilizer is ordered and arrives on Wednesday. Hoping for a quick two week battle like I've seen with others who are dealing with Osteorepsis. 

Going with the IM universal 10W UV. I think it's the only one that's not way oversized for my little 10 gallon. I'm also going to start dosing 0.5-1ml per day of H202 which I happen to have on hand for dipping corals. Love the stuff. Just now hearing about some of the benefits from dosing it. Hoping to not have to change my lighting schedule but I will if I don't see results in a couple weeks. And lastly, I'll start my planned Microbacter Clean dosing which was on the schedule anyways. 

Any other recommendations?

 

[PJPS]

34 minutes ago, Koleswrath said:

UV sterilizer is ordered and arrives on Wednesday. Hoping for a quick two week battle like I've seen with others who are dealing with Osteorepsis. 

Going with the IM universal 10W UV. I think it's the only one that's not way oversized for my little 10 gallon. I'm also going to start dosing 0.5-1ml per day of H202 which I happen to have on hand for dipping corals. Love the stuff. Just now hearing about some of the benefits from dosing it. Hoping to not have to change my lighting schedule but I will if I don't see results in a couple weeks. And lastly, I'll start my planned Microbacter Clean dosing which was on the schedule anyways. 

Any other recommendations?

 

Not sure about the h2o2, but the rest sounds right 👍🏻. I don’t like blackouts although they can work. If you do five days in catch early, so I advise embracing the suck for now and you’ll never let PO4 bottom out again 😅.  It took. a couple of times, but it sunk in for me after a particularly bad battle with LCA last year.

 

edit: Sorry, I just reread this.  The UV should deal with the Osteorepsis, I might go easy on the other stuff. That isn’t to say don’t do it at all just go lightly 😊.  Give it a few days with just the UV before you start “aggressively” using other stuff.  Just my $0.02

[Koleswrath]

2 hours ago, PJPS said:

That isn’t to say don’t do it at all just go lightly 😊.  Give it a few days with just the UV before you start “aggressively” using other stuff.  Just my $0.02

Yep, good advice, I’ll take it to heart