fewskillz Posted July 15, 2006 Share Posted July 15, 2006 Hello Everybody! Been posting for a week or so, lurking for much longer than that. On June 30, 2006 I purchased my first real attempt at a marine aquarium. I've been keeping freshwater aquariums for the past 6 or 7 years. Still have a nice 29 gallon Tetra tank in my bedroom, it would get turned into a reef too if I weren't so attached to my silver dollar tetras. My tank: A 46 gallon BowFront with a 2x96 Coralife PC. I bought the tank all established with about 60 pounds of LR and 80 pounds of LS (about a 4 inch deep sand bed). The previous owner had worked at the LFS for 4 or 5 years and basically just stopped taking care of this tank about 2 months ago. He had gotten a bad case of hair algae and just turned the lights off to kill it. The only survivors were 1 Bi-color Pseudochromis, a handful of mushrooms, one colony of unidentified polyps and one unidentified soft coral, I guess it's some kind of leather. FTS from just a few minutes ago: The tank has been setup for 2 weeks now and all params seem to be back to normal after my 5 or 6 water changes. He had been topping off with tap water those last few months of neglect, so I wanted to get as much of that out of there as possible. So I let it go through its own mini-cycle, and everything seems ready to go. FTS with just the actinics: I am still trying to get a good picture of the surviving corals, the bowfront makes things tricky. The leather? is the light colored fleshy looking growth on the top left, with the mushrooms all being on the rock just to the right of the that, and the polyp colony is right in the middle of the aquascaping. Last week I got 3 blue/green reef chromis to help with the cycle of the tank. Apparently the bi-color is a bit more aggresive than I realized having them all three MIA within 4 days. I guess he's become a bit territorial of the whole tank since he's been alone for a month or 2. So I am setting up a 10 AGA for him to live in for a month or so. Then I'll try him back in the big tank with whatever livestock I decide to go with. Hopefully he won't be as territorial then, b/c I'd hate to give him to the LFS, he's got a cool personality. I plan to turn the 10 gallon into a nano-reef whenever I'm done using it as a solitary confinement cell for Mr. Bi-color. I will create a thread for it in the nano-reef section within a few days. So this is my tank, I'm very excited to have a marine aquarium up and running smoothly. You guys have a great website here, hopefully I can become a contributing member. I will keep trying to get better pictures of my corals, maybe I can get some IDing help. Hope you like my tank. Link to comment
NanoGuy153 Posted July 15, 2006 Share Posted July 15, 2006 Nice looking tank! God.. i feel sorry for the corals and fish that guy made them go through. I would think after him owning a lfs he would at least have some sence in him.. Link to comment
travisurfer Posted July 15, 2006 Share Posted July 15, 2006 Hey, i just saw your thread. I dont check the large reefs section for fear of upgrading. I think I like smaller tanks anyway. The new pic is a lot nicer. Link to comment
fewskillz Posted July 15, 2006 Author Share Posted July 15, 2006 Honestly, I think I like smaller tanks too. I like huge tanks, like 90 gals or above, but I'm amazed by smaller tanks. I'm stuck on the livestock for this one, it's just big enough to be tempting to put larger stuff in it, but in reality its too small for anything that will get bigger than 4 or 5 inches. Theres a gorgeous black percula at tropical paradise that I'm very tempted to get. Then a flame or coral beauty angel and call it a tank. Link to comment
sr71pav Posted July 15, 2006 Share Posted July 15, 2006 Looks like a promising tank. I think this ~45G tank size is fantastic! Sure, no tangs or large angels or anything, but you can get a lot more corals inside of it! And, there are some fantastic fish available for this size in any case. Link to comment
Pili Posted July 17, 2006 Share Posted July 17, 2006 AHHHHHHH!!!!!!! GET THAT BICOLOR OUT OF THE TANK!!!! They are the worst!! Will kill anything you try and put in the tank (besides coral) and eat snails and stuff. Good luck taking him out though, i had to take out all of my rock to get that mother out. Agh, i hate that fish so much! Just warning you... Link to comment
fewskillz Posted July 17, 2006 Author Share Posted July 17, 2006 He hasn't killed anything other than the 3 chromis. I'm removing him this weekend, still undecided as to just keep him alone or trade him in. I didn't buy him, he was the only fish still alive when I bought the tank. Thanks for the warning. Link to comment
ENraged Posted July 22, 2006 Share Posted July 22, 2006 make an aggressive tank stick a lion fish in there or an eel Link to comment
fewskillz Posted July 22, 2006 Author Share Posted July 22, 2006 make an aggressive tankstick a lion fish in there or an eel Thought about it! Link to comment
fewskillz Posted July 28, 2006 Author Share Posted July 28, 2006 Shot from an angle, gotta love the bowfront! My new Zoas! Finally got some decent upclose shots of the coral that came with the tank. Some kind of leather? Ricordea? Unknown polyps with unknown hermit crab, I'm thinking he's not reef safe: I think I'm going to give my 3 unknown hermit crabs to travisurfer as some snacks for Cozmo the Mantis Shrimp. Link to comment
Monkeyrobb Posted July 29, 2006 Share Posted July 29, 2006 Hey Few, I have a diadem dottyback in my nano right now with a neon damsel and a scribbled rabbit. They are all moving to the 75 when it cycles. The Dottyback was very aggressive toward the damsel and the arrow crab until I put in the rabbit. He's bigger but not mean. The Dotty seemed to chill out immediately and now is a great tankmate to the others. At feeding time, he'll grab a chunk of food (if he can get it before the hungriest fish ever, the rabbit, gets it) and sneak behind a rock to eat it. Robb Link to comment
fewskillz Posted September 9, 2006 Author Share Posted September 9, 2006 Updated FTS from 9-8-06 The Bicolor pseudochromis was finally caught using a homemade water bottle trap. He has been replaced with a Cherub Pygmy Angel, a Lawnmower Blenny and a pair of Pink Skunk Clowns. All of the corals and a few lbs of LR have been moved to my 20h. This allowed me to open up some swimming caves for the FOWLR. There is also a pair of peppermint shrimp and a coral banded shrimp along with some scarlet hermits and a bunch of snails. I am thinking of getting an anemone for the pink skunks. What anemone do y'all think would do well under the 192w of PC? I'd place it right on top about 6 inches from the surface. I'd like to add one more fish, just for visual interest. Something shaped different than the current livestock, something pointy and thin. Must be a carnivorous, can't have anything else competing for algae. I was thinking maybe a candy hogfish. Not sure though. from the left from the right Link to comment
fewskillz Posted September 12, 2006 Author Share Posted September 12, 2006 Had to re-scape the top-right quarter of the tank, a rock fell. So I opened it up a little more to direct a little more flow to the front. Took a shot with just the actinics. Then the same picture after I messed with it for a little while. I was bored. You can see the pink skunks on the left and the lawnmowers head right in the center of the center hole. Enjoy. Link to comment
travisurfer Posted September 13, 2006 Share Posted September 13, 2006 nice, the scape looks a lot better Link to comment
fewskillz Posted September 13, 2006 Author Share Posted September 13, 2006 Thanks. I like it alot. It's even more open in person. There is a lot of depth from front to back with even more caves and things that you cant see from a FTS. Link to comment
scarf_ace1981 Posted September 13, 2006 Share Posted September 13, 2006 yes that is a leather(cabbage??) and rics. looks bleached but can turn back around. Link to comment
fewskillz Posted September 13, 2006 Author Share Posted September 13, 2006 The rics are looking good now. The large one on the right has a second mouth and is beginning to form a crease like it's going to split. All the corals are in my 20h now. The 'leather' looks alot better now as well. better color, extended it's 'leaves' alot more. I'll take more pictures of them tonight, might even start a thread for my 20h. Link to comment
fewskillz Posted September 19, 2006 Author Share Posted September 19, 2006 The bicolor pseudochromis went carpet surfing at the LFS. Apparently he couldn't take it anymore and he jumped. Glad I got a free clown out of him before he snapped, haha! Now, the real point of this post: I want one more fish. What should I get? It needs to be a carnivore (or mostly carnivore) because the pygmy angel and lawnmower blenny already compete for algae. It also needs to be tough because the female pink skunk will probably be pushy at first. I want something colorful that is an active swimmer (something long and pointy shaped, not short and round like the clowns/angel or long and stubby like the blenny). I saw a candy hogfish at the LFS that was very pretty. What do y'all think? Link to comment
proraptor2 Posted September 19, 2006 Share Posted September 19, 2006 be careful with that pygmy angel as they love to eat coral....The lawnmower blenny will run out of food (algae) in such a small tank so you might want to buy some algae sheets and try to get him to eat them... Tank is looking really good Link to comment
fewskillz Posted September 19, 2006 Author Share Posted September 19, 2006 be careful with that pygmy angel as they love to eat coral....The lawnmower blenny will run out of food (algae) in such a small tank so you might want to buy some algae sheets and try to get him to eat them... Tank is looking really good Thanks! I'm developing a bowfront fetish like you. No worries about the coral, this is FOWLR. All of the corals from the above posts were moved to my 20h because I knew I wanted an angel and an anemone for whatever clown pair I decided on. The lawnmower is eating well. He has actually plumped up quite a bit from when I got him. I give him a small aglae sheet every few days and He's started eating some of the veggie flake food I give the pygmy. I watch him carefully since I knew this was a pretty small tank for one to be completely self sustaining. Even if he quits eating algae alltogether and only eats stuff I give him that's fine, I think he's cool looking. Link to comment
rissaroo Posted October 12, 2006 Share Posted October 12, 2006 i love my bowfront I also have the 46g and I had someone custom make me a canopy and I love the way it all turned out. Link to comment
fewskillz Posted October 12, 2006 Author Share Posted October 12, 2006 Yeah, I've been looking into a hood for mine lately. Link to comment
fewskillz Posted December 28, 2006 Author Share Posted December 28, 2006 Almost 6 months old! At least since I took over. Not bad for 6 months turn around: the ricordea: the unkown polyps: zoas: cleaner shrimp: I got a tripod for Christmas, so my pics are much clearer. Especially the closeups. Link to comment
travisurfer Posted December 28, 2006 Share Posted December 28, 2006 very nice! i agree, that is a huge difference Link to comment
Recommended Posts
Archived
This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.