❤️🏚️The Love Shack🏚️❤️

[PJPS]

2 hours ago, banasophia said:

Sorry I probably just missed this… did you add some live rock or bottled bacteria? 

1. Add all the different bacteria sources. Media from the SPS tank mixed with new Marine Pure Gems (I just have them, any porous material will do), Ocean Direct sand, unseasoned Caribsea Liferock (I don’t consider this a useful source btw), 1 tsp Aquaforest life source mud (gets stuck in rock crevices and biomedia).  Dose .5ml nopox to feed all the bacteria.

hopefully that gets softies through, I wouldn’t add fish or inverts, although there’s an ammonia badge on it, and put food in.  If the badge budges, the coral will go in a bucket of SPS tank water.  I think that’ll cover the worst case, but I’m actually pretty optimistic from my reading this afternoon.  The overnight with SPS cycled media should have essentially instantly resolved any nitrogen cycle worries.  But we’ll soon find out.  The reef roids should break down over the next 24h.

 

e: because OF COURSE… CAM got back to me and offered free amphipods for the inconvenience.  So there’ll be a crazy diverse micro and mesograzer population 🤞🏼

[PJPS]

The Love Shack goes to bed angry.  Hopefully things are looking better after a night’s rest.

 

[banasophia]

11 minutes ago, PJPS said:

The Love Shack goes to bed angry.  Hopefully things are looking better after a night’s rest.

 

Looks amazing already!! 
 

 

[PJPS]

Because he’s a NR superstar, a bit of a personal hero, and I just placed an order with CAM and Regis is sliding me some amphipods on the sly.  They’ve been out of stock for… ever?

 

 

 

@Aqua Splendor

[debbeach13]

Thats a great aquascape.

[PJPS]

Since everyone is posting theme songs for their tanks... I love the B-52s, but my love shack is more this vibe 🙂

 

 

 

Tank - everything is open and fluffy except the leather.  I don't think it liked all the trunk surgery to cut him out of the rock he'd grown over, halfwy up the trunk.  Hopefully it rebounds over the next few days.  GSP A+, mushrooms A, Gorgs B-, Leather F  for recovery so far.  The tank looks too sterile so I again fed the thing.  With pods coming and the CUC ready to order once they go in, that should work out to minimal uglies *hope* 

[PJPS]

Someone feels neglected.  "If this is where all the fuss is, I'd like some fussin too?"

 

[PJPS]

Removing the mechanical filtration, and running with 1 teaspoon of mud overnight.  Hopefully this ultra fine abrasive in the water will help the leather shed.  The extra bacteria can’t hurt at this point, everything got a bit rushed there…

[banasophia]

Leathers sometimes take a week or two to open up in my tanks…

[PJPS]

22 minutes ago, banasophia said:

Leathers sometimes take a week or two to open up in my tanks…

I’m OK with light exfoliation, Johnny Murder will have to “endure” his spa treatment 😅

[PJPS]

Microdermabrasion treatment was a success (or enough time passed lol), either way, the leather is half out.  Still bent at the waist after surgery, but coming back strong (woohoo, I like it a lot).  Pics later, SO is training a new hire over the internets in that room at present.

 

Worked with Afnan at Candy Corals to put together a package of CuC, gorgs, fan and coco worms, and shrooms we could both swallow, and to get it ready for a fishy 😁 (Captive Bengai when I can find one).  I should shout out Afnan and CC, they always accommodate my disability and income.  It's gorgeous stuff, but a bit pricey for a broke boy like me.  I'd pay full $ if I could, Afnan treats me well.

[PJPS]

Once this has been up full of fan worms and gorgs for a while, I’ve always wanted one of these, but was never on top of my phytoplankton feeding enough to try one.  They’re so cool

 

https://www.americanoceans.org/species/christmas-tree-worm/

 

 

[PJPS]

WARNING 

 

I just need to say this out loud before this either works, or haunts me forever.  I’m playing with fire, trying to jiggery poke a biological process that takes time, but I don’t have any.  I spent three days reading everything I could about what needs to happen for the bacterial part of the food chain to take hold, as well as ensure the nitrogen cycle would be flawless, even though there’s no fish in there. 

 

I’m rushing live grazers of all levels (micro, meso, macro) to basically get a biological stew of things that prey on the next thing down, in hopes this speeds up “balance”.  The theory being that if everything has a predator until the physical size I want predation to stop, everything will eat anything ugly on their own journey to becoming food.

 

🤞🏼we don’t have a Challenger style take-off.  1 week from dry to however this looks Tuesday at 8pm.
 

 ✊🏻solidarity friends ✊🏻

 

What I plan to do over the next five days is some thing I’ve never done, but feel I’ve done enough research on it to try responsibly.  Basically, don’t try to do any of this, this goes against most advice I would give anyone.  However, if it works, it’ll all be documented here.
 

TANK

It’s bed time in the tank, but I’ll try to get afternoon shots for the next little while so there’s some consistency.

 

disregard the unhappy Gorgs, we’re waiting on epoxy. they’re just tucked into a hole, loose at the moment.  They’ll come out once firmly seated.  I’m dosing 3ml phyto and 1/32 tsp probiotic powder, and 1ml or so of LRS broth.  Deliberately adding a little crud before the bugs arrive 😊.  There needs to me a bit of grime for them to eat.  I’m also testing that decomposition cycles smoothly to nitrate.  I’m watching to see if I can trip it into an ammonia reading.  So far so good.
 

 Once it’s only missing fish, it’ll be fed to sustain its inhabitants.  They’ve been chosen to remove anything that bothers me, so I’m going to ensure they’re happy workers.  Management 101. A happy worker is a productive worker.

[PJPS]

For the time being, I’m learning to see the upsides of the lid.  If you skip tiny skittish fish, it’ll provide better gas exchange compared to a snug polycarbonate lid.  So the fish stocking idea changes a bit, but I’m not terribly worried a bengaii cardinal will take a leap through the gap.  So with those considerations, the lid is kinda perfect for the right stocking.

 

I half take back my earlier gripe.  I still think the gaps are too big, but the mesh size is good.  This may seem confusing at first.  The mesh holes are as wide if not wider.  But with unrestricted space in one direction, the “launch” needs much less precision.  Reefing is all about trade-offs, simply adjust responsibly 👍🏻

[debbeach13]

For comparison

Studio 12. Medium holes gaps around the edge, can fit the wire for a wave maker or pump.

IM pro 10 Large holes But fits snug all the way around.

DYI lid small holes and huge gap in the back. In 8 years I have had one clown fish jump out. 
IMO some sort of lid is so much better than no lid if you want fish.

[PJPS]

Totally agree 💯.  If the fish is wider than a few mm, any lid is essentially fine.  Never keep fish without a lid, they’re all capable of hopping over the edge with no lid.  You really should have a lid if you’re intent on keeping the fish in water (you should be, they require water).

 

Glad you chimed in!  Any lid > no lid, always.  Also, there’s no perfect lid, especially for nanos.  My IM lid has great edge coverage, but the mesh is too big for some nano fish.  Polycarb covers a lot of surface, it must effect gas exchange to some degree.  Again, endless trade-offs 😊

[ml86743]

On 2/16/2023 at 1:17 PM, PJPS said:

Someone feels neglected.  "If this is where all the fuss is, I'd like some fussin too?"

 

Yeah he doesn't look happy...great lookin kitty tho!

[PJPS]

You will learn more in seven minutes, than a thousand minutes of influencer videos.

 

 

[banasophia]

1 hour ago, PJPS said:

 

 

Great video! Made me wish I’d pursued marine biology… what an interesting career that would be! 

[banasophia]

4 hours ago, debbeach13 said:

For comparison

Studio 12. Medium holes gaps around the edge, can fit the wire for a wave maker or pump.

IM pro 10 Large holes But fits snug all the way around.

DYI lid small holes and huge gap in the back. In 8 years I have had one clown fish jump out. 
IMO some sort of lid is so much better than no lid if you want fish.

Great comparison, Deb. And compare those mesh lids to the lids on our Evo 5s where there’s a huge hole in the middle, under the light:

 

[banasophia]

Okayyy… the AI apparently knows how much I like your map backdrop and started sending me this ad last night, instead of the usual black shirts I get. Did I even say how much I like it? Did it read my mind? 😳

 

😯😯😯

 

Did you see this article that came out yesterday about AI:

 

[PJPS]

That’s just crazy… although I have long believed, Google knows me better than I do 

[PJPS]

Meh… the shrooms are crazy, still waiting on epoxy for gorgs, leather is still pissy.  Nitrogen cycle seems fine, tank needs life… hopefully that’s Tuesday. There’s nothing fragile in there, so I’m not particularly worried, but it could look better.  Harumph 😤

if anyone’s curious, we haven’t measured par yet, although we own a meter.  I just arbitrarily set the light to 50% so as to not grow crazy algae before there’s critters in there to eat it.  It’s set to 13500 Kelvin.

 

It’s all pretty resilient coral so I’m not particularly worried about burning anything either.
 

[PJPS]

Yikes, the gorgs look way worsse in that photo.  That peeling look is just caustic lines from the light. They are uniformly purple.

[banasophia]

They look good, just not open yet