eolith's JBJ Nanocube 28g LED (Reef)

[eolith]

Thank you. Once the tank has finished cycling, I'll be removing most of the rock on the bottom down the center "tunnel" to provide more swimming room and sandy surface. I'll likely use it to start cycling my QTs (along with a water change).

[eolith]

 

 

Plenty of green algae, some brown, few small spots of purple.

 

Extension tube came in, took a closeup

[eolith]

Took a few more shots last night of the algae. It looks like I may already have dinoflagelates, according to this ID thread.

 

 

The suspected Dinoflagelates:

 

Some lovely oxygen generating green algae:

 

Some lovely oxygen generating diatoms:

[eolith]

 

 

I think I've got Bubble Algae too, now :/

[eolith]

Ok, big changes today. Added a starter CUC:

 

1 - Emerald Mithrax Crab (for the bubble algae and dinoflagellates) (drip acclimated)

3 - snails, 1 margarita, 1 nerita, 1 other I can't remember (mix acclimated)

3 - hermit crabs (mix acclimated)

 

Also bought a couple bags of shells and split them up for the kids to drop them into the tank for these and future hermits.

 

Yesterday I installed a 20amp GFCI socket where the aquarium is plugged in. I saw that in Adam_Bobomb's build, and I had one laying around, so in it went. I didn't have a wallplate for it, but that's taken care of thanks to a trip to Lowe's today.

 

Measurements before heading to the LFS were pretty good.

 

...so CycleGuy0623 and I went to the LFS to get our CUCs started. Tomorrow we'll take a look at another LFS and check out their fish, probably to bring home a damsel, maybe 3 blue/green reef chromis' for me.

 

I received my SpectraPure CSP RO/DI System w/ Manual Flush - 180 GPD, opened it and examined it. Went to Lowe's to pick up a faucet adapter. I'll be installing it in my bar in the basement. Much better water pressure down there.

 

2

Hood Fan Modification:

He also helped me modify my hood to put in SilenX IXP-34-08 fans (purchased for $12 from Newegg). to replace the noisy stock fans. The stock fans are 50mm, these are 60, but the gap where the fans are mounted are almost exactly 60mm, so you don't even have to secure the fans, friction holds them in place. The connectors are different, though, so we cut the wires and twisted them together with the stock connectors with heat shrink tubing to seal them; using extra tape to seal better. This worked like a charm. The fans are almost inaudible now!! Incredible noise reduction. This is a must for someone that is near their aquarium all day (like I am since I work from home).

 

Here are shots of what I have going now:

 

Hermits:

 

The Bubble Algae has grown, hopefully the crab will find it:

 

Two of the shells that made a nice shot:

 

New FTS:

 

The crab shortly after dropping in the tank (cell phone photo):

 

Tucked himself into a nice cozy spot (used my cell phone LED for lighting to avoid a flash):

 

The Nerita went straight to the top (cell phone photo):

[eolith]

 

NO3 went up again :/ Phosphates also sky-rocketed.

 

Picked up 3 Green Chromis from the LFS, 1 died on arrival. Not promising. I think they gave me one I specifically asked them to avoid, maybe a miscommunication. I'll swap that out tomorrow. I also got a cleaner shrimp.

[eolith]

so I discovered I was doing the PO4 test wrong. 15ppm is much more realistic.

 

For the last 6 days:

 

 

Some of the new life:

Jimmy the Margarita Snail:

 

Jack the Cleaner Shrimp:

 

Baltic the Cerith snail:

 

Centauri the Spiny Star Astraea Snail:

[eolith]

It has been an eventful last couple days. I didn't test last night, was so sleep I passed out at 830pm, too many late nights researching aquarium stuff...

 

 

I just tested the LFS (Gerber's Brightwell mix) salt water, and found some disturbing stuff:

pH 8.2, Ammonia 0, NO2 0, NO3 10ppm, KH 7.3 dKH, Ca below my scale <290, Mg 1040ppm, PO4 52ppm, Salinity 1.020

 

This won't be a problem any more as I'm installing my RODI system.

 

Anyhow, brought home 3 reef chromis on Sunday, if you'll recall, one was dying before it went into the tank. Another died 2 days later, and is stuck in a hole under my rock where I can't get it. I think my crab is eating on him because I don't see the crab anywhere. I got the first replaced for free, bought another (because I think my NO3 was too high). Tank is getting overrun with diatoms, but my CUC from ReefCleaners shows up tomorrow.

 

I also found out my Coralia Digital Thermometer was showing 4 degrees higher than it should. I picked up other thermometers for water changing, and found out they all match :/ so my tank was actually more like 75 the whole time. So now it's up to 78 for real. I also did a 20% water change to help drop the Nitrates, and that helped, as you can see above.

 

My order from John:

20 Dwarf Ceriths

7 Nassarius

9 Florida Ceriths

7 Nerites

4 assorted hermits

2 Zig Zag Periwinkles

1 Thin Striped Hermit

1 Scarlet Hermit Crab

1 Ruby Mithrax Crab

 

 

Latest FTS (diatoms blowing up):

 

All 3 Chromis (2 new guys):

 

Emerald Crab before he ducked and covered:

 

A cool shot of the underside of the Spiny Star:

 

This was the sole survivor of the first batch of Chromis':

 

This shows the one that kicked the bucket:

 

When I put the bag of the two new guys in for temp matching, the first swam up to check them out, and stayed there, kinda cool:

[Eclipse]

Loving the scape. Chromis are... well, even though they're considered beginner fish, they just have a habit of dying in the home aquarium for some reason, as nice as they are, which is why a lot of people generally avoid them.

[eolith]

thanks. Yeah, it seems you're right. Another one died today apparently while I was napping. Can't find it anywhere. I won't be buying any more. I'll wait til the parameters stabilize, then get some clowns.

 

As for Reefcleaners, there was a problem with the delivery. The cooler was packed inside the box well, but inside the cooler the bags of livestock were just sliding around with nothing to keep them in place. Further, the orders weren't labeled to aid in identification, and my buddy and I struggled to figure out what was what. There was one of those hand-warmers *outside* of the cooler, which would do effectively nothing. The Ruby crab was upside down, looked pale and ill on delivery, is now dead. They missed two crabs I ordered, and didn't deliver my two zig-zag periwinkles. They gave me a dubious answer, told me I'd get a refund, which I said I didn't want. I got one anyways, and now they're not responding to my emails. When I sent them an email with photos to help identify stuff, they barely bothered to help. Customer service was ababsolutely terrible. I will give them no more business. The one positive is that what they provided was more than ordered in the cases of the snails, but nearly every other part of the order was botched.

 

The CUC has gone crazy on cleaning up the tank. Looks so much better in there already.

 

Water: Nitrites are up a little, nitrates are stable. I got my RODI installed in 10 minutes, 0 ppm water in minutes after that.

 

I posted these in the ID section, and no one has an answer thus far:

 

No idea what these are (use link above for more details):

 

Dead Ruby Crab:

[Eclipse]

Really? I'm quite surprised, Reefcleaners is usually one of the best places in terms of products and customer service.

[eolith]

Image dump of various critters, and the latest FTS, notice all the white areas now where the CUC is hard at work!

 

[eolith]

Really? I'm quite surprised, Reefcleaners is usually one of the best places in terms of products and customer service.

that's what I heard, too. To be fair, they refunded me the dead ruby and two missing hermits, but there's no sign of the two periwinkles, and there's no refund for that.

 

Here's a cell phone shot of the cooler I received, just look at all that empty space for these things to get tossed around. As the USPS guy was unloading it from the van, he had it up sideways, so I know they got tossed around plenty.

[eolith]

 

 

trace elements are dropping. It could be the two mangroves I put in the back of the tank (one on either side). Nitrites down, nitrates down.

[eolith]

here's to hoping the numbers stabilize. Btw, the pink things above are identified as parasitic trematodes

 

[eolith]

numbers are all out of whack. Hopefully it'll come back in line and stabilize.

 

[Adam_Bobomb]

You may have answered this already but what are you using for tests?

 

I dig the graphs too. seems like a lot of data entry though.

[eolith]

On my mobile I just enter each value, and it auto-uploads to AquaticLog which generates the graphs. I retested and recalibrated my refractometer this morning and got 1.023 SG.

 

All my test kits/equipment is on the first post.

 

I now have a Tunze 9002 skimmer, intank cup, two MJ1200 pumps (one for the skimmer, other for the pump not paired with the Koralia. QTs are filled with water, each with a piece of live rock, and a dwarf cerith snail (to keep the rock clean). Potentially picking up a bicolor blenny this weekend.

[eolith]

Just had some great father/son time, by having my son do all the tests; he loved it. I call it Chemistry so he gets the idea of what we're doing (he's almost 8). All the numbers but phosphate are heading back into range. I'll have to check my salt and see if it's bringing the phosphates.

 

[eolith]

Jack the Shrimp running on the "ceiling":

[eolith]

most numbers are coming in good, but the phosphates are way up there. No idea why.