mattyice Posted September 22, 2006 Share Posted September 22, 2006 Well guys im excited my dad just told me that he doesnt want his tank anymore and instead of trying to sell it he said i could take care of it! its a damn nice tank but the guy who was supposed to take care of it abused it so now i have to pretty much do at least a 50% water change and scrub the alage off of the rock but im pysched its been up now for about 6-7 years, was in a 120 corner before and everything was transfered over to the new tank and it still looks amazing, lights are getting ordered, cleaning out the preotein skimmer (hasnt worked for a year ), doing the water change, rearranging the rock, and growing the zoo that sprouted on its own somehow, the tank has never had a zoo in it and it grew on a piece of the rock! im also fraggin out the torch coral that has at least grown to be 10x its original size and its a mix of the green/brown polyps on most of the colonies, he also has multiple kinds of mushrooms raning from flourescent orange to a cool blue, has a full rock filled with brown/green polyps (i still have to identify them) and has feather dusters everywhere that sprouted, im thinking about selling them as well if its possible, but enough of the rambling i just wanted everyone to know that i went from starting off with a 12 gallon marineland kit to having a 90 gallon bowfront and a custom 20L in a matter of weeks! im also turning the sump into a fuge it needs it bad! i will post up pics after i get everything replaced which should be in a couple days! Link to comment
fewskillz Posted September 22, 2006 Share Posted September 22, 2006 Cool! Good luck with everything, keep us posted! Link to comment
mattyice Posted September 22, 2006 Author Share Posted September 22, 2006 ohh boy this is not good guys, there is a mantis shrimp somewhere in the tank!!!! its absolutely destroyed the cleaning crew and the reason i say this is because all of their shells were crammed into the caves in the rock, they even destroyed two nice crabs my dad had and his piston shrimp, so im going to hunt that little bastard down, i have the rock sitting in a tupperware container right now with a little water at the bottom to try and sufficate him! but besides that most of the rock is out, the torch corals has been fragged a bit, and the sand is being replaced sunday evening, and found multiple mushrooms growing on different rocks so im going to take them all off and but the blue ones on one rock and orange ones on another and let them grow like that to attach to the rock, i cant wait its looking and going great so far! Link to comment
mattyice Posted September 22, 2006 Author Share Posted September 22, 2006 pictures tomorrow, letting the tank settle for the rest of today and tonight and tomorrow i get to put in the new bulbs...2 400W 20,000K bulbs!!! then i will clean it out a bit more filter through the sand and add another 20lb bag for a thicker substrate, also thinking about monday adding a new cleaning crew and then im going to get some more coral and reef fish to finally get the tank to where it should be! Link to comment
proraptor2 Posted September 22, 2006 Share Posted September 22, 2006 2 400's over a 90? I hope you have a big chiller Link to comment
mattyice Posted September 22, 2006 Author Share Posted September 22, 2006 no wonder why it grew so much alage, im going to have to order some bigger fans, the guy that used to take care of it only had 1 4" computer fan that can not be good, im going to go with the 6 chiller fans they have on ebay along with a 4 fan for the sump Link to comment
proraptor2 Posted September 22, 2006 Share Posted September 22, 2006 you are going to need more than fans with 800 watts of halide over a small 90....You might want to look into a chiller.. Link to comment
mattyice Posted September 22, 2006 Author Share Posted September 22, 2006 thanks for the tip im going to start looking into them but for now the fans will have to do i suppose, i just dont want to kill off anything that didnt die for the previous care takers mistakes, the thing that really worri homedepot this es me is that he doesnt even have glass in front of the halides!! i need to get some glass, i guess i will pick some up when i go to get some plexiglass where i have it does have AC does that matter? we keep the room about 72 Link to comment
mattyice Posted September 23, 2006 Author Share Posted September 23, 2006 so i finally got the tank finished about 15 minutes ago and he lied about the bulbs they are only 175W which means i need to get more lighting and a chiller, next i think is going to be a custom LED lighting array for the top to replace the actinics and im going to use the PC lighting and ballasts for my 20L project... but here are the pics, i wasnt able to get all of alage off but it was enough to let the new cleaning crew take over where i left off, i think im going to get about 25 snails, 4 emerald crabs and about 15-20 scarlet leg hermits... with the old lights and in need of a sweeping and cleaning the new 20,000K MH and 2 96W actinic PC's the new rock formations and coral in place with the hood getting ready to be put on the torch coral now has purple tips with a green base! it never looked that healthy before AND NOW THE MAIN EVENT, A LITTLE SLICE OF THE OCEAN FOR EVERYONE TO SEE! Link to comment
proraptor2 Posted September 24, 2006 Share Posted September 24, 2006 2 175 watt halides is plenty of light...anymore would be overkill... Ditch the emerald crabs they arent as reef safe as everyone says...They will use their claws Nice tank I like bowfronts Link to comment
mattyice Posted September 24, 2006 Author Share Posted September 24, 2006 can anyone give me advice on what would be a good reef animal that loves to eat hair alage, im looking to get some good fish that loves reef tanks and are safe, im also looking for the best cleanup crew around! im going to get a better picture on monday when i let everything settle and i add the cleaning crew, then it will be more coral time! more pics as i go Link to comment
Reef Casa Posted September 24, 2006 Share Posted September 24, 2006 Tangs, I good size blue or yellow, or even purple will look good in that size tank.. Link to comment
Micro-Reefs Aquariums Posted September 29, 2006 Share Posted September 29, 2006 Nice tank I also like Bowfronts.... MG Link to comment
mattyice Posted October 16, 2006 Author Share Posted October 16, 2006 well the hair algae came back fast and im currently battling it but i think its winning, a bag of phosguard and purigen are going in the tank, im converting the sump over to a fuge because the guy who set it up has no filtration besides a big filter and a protein skimmer, adding a JBJ ATO and adding a reefkeeper 2, to battle the algae im getting a couple tangs and a HUGE cleaning crew of about 100 snails Link to comment
proraptor2 Posted October 17, 2006 Share Posted October 17, 2006 The hair algae will go away when you get a fuge running....Im not sure Id buy 100 snails if I were you Id wait to see the fuge do its work Link to comment
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