Dad and daughter tank

thought I would start teaching chemistry, science and bio all in one while having a little fun. Only have a small 32 gal nanocube but it’s been up and running close to a year now.

Things seem to be going well after a few issues in the beginning and that’s what a great LFS makes all the difference. They even know my two young daughters name and bring them into the conversations when we visit for our bi weekly water changes.

My middle daughter is so into it that it was she asked for for bday gifts was corals from her friends. Talk about fun explaining what LPS/SPS are to other parents...lol. Excited to share what we have learned and my youngest will probably even start a you tube video segment on her account.
 

Pancho75

Well-Known Member
Welcome RS!!! Good to have here! it is really cool that you guys are working together in a tank, it is so cool when the family enjoy a hobby together.

Post some pics!


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Plan on it tomorrow. Thx for the welcome. Will need some help on something tomorrow. I’ll post pics but my Duncan and Hammer have closed up. My Duncan has just grown 5 new heads about a month ago. Was going to take into my LFS to have it fragged but now all of a sudden just those two items have closed up.

My Zoas, leathers, trumpet coral, polys, mushrooms are all great, open, not showing any signs.

Water parameters are same as always. About 10-20 on nitrates and 0 ammonium. That’s all I’ve ever tested for. Water temp is same 78, haven’t moved anything in tank in about 2-3 months.

I will post pics tomorrow. Thanks ahead of time.


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StirCrayzy

Well-Known Member
I love it when the kids get into it.
Most of mine learned how to test once they turned 7. About when they start figuring out that science is real and all around them.
 
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nanoreefing4fun

Well-Known Member
RS STAFF
If you take like a turkey baster can you blow it off ? If so, I guess cyano algae, if it hard, coralline algae, if it is the same that is growing on the back wall and on the pump. I like the latter :)
 
If you take like a turkey baster can you blow it off ? If so, I guess cyano algae, if it hard, coralline algae, if it is the same that is growing on the back wall and on the pump. I like the latter :)

So how do I get rid of it? Coralline Algae because I don’t think it’s cyano algae.

Thanks!


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Thanks. Disappointed. Lost our first fish today. I think the phosphorus got to high on us. We caught it to late to save everything. Hope I don’t lose our hammer and Duncan.


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Uncle99

Well-Known Member
Hi that's coraline algae and some think it is a plus.
High phosphates don't usually kill fish, but may make corals unhappy.
It is important to measure and maintain all 8 major water parameters, stability of the system is paramount to a healthy biosphere.

Where parameters are stable, on-point to NSW ranges, and appropriate light in the right intensity and colour spectrum, everything you drop in that tank will do well.

Since your teaching chemistry, get your daughter to measure all 8, adjust where necessary (except PH, don't chase this one) and keep a weekly worksheet of those numbers. Watch ALK very closely, ups and downs of this ion can bug corals.
 

DaveK

Well-Known Member
...
Since your teaching chemistry, get your daughter to measure all 8, ...

This kind of begs the question, how old is the op's daughter? Many of the test kits contain some powerful acids and/or other chemicals that need to be handled with care. Maybe let the daughter do the tests if there is adult supervision and she's old enough to understand the potential danger.
 

Oxylebius

Well-Known Member
Looks like coralline algae to me. Good on rocks, not necessarily on the glass. If the tank is glass, using metal scrappers will get it off. If your tank is acrylic, don't use a metal scrapper. Acrylic can scratch really easy. There are scrappers you can get for acrylic, look into them to scrape the coralline off the sides of the tank.
 
Hi Uncle. Thanks for the tips. What would the 8 parameters be?
1. Ammonia
2. Nitrates
3. Nitrite
4. Phosphate
5. Salinity
6. ???
7. ???
8. ???

Do they make a kit that can measure them all? I currently have Red Sea test kits for nitrate, nitrite, ammonia and then have a very good salinity tester.


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Ok this is going to be a long post. Woops. Maybe I should have read past the first post... the oldest is 8 and she doesn’t test the stuff without me and I handle the chemicals on the nitrate and nitrite and ammonia tests.

Ammonia has always been zero and only had one spike which was due to a fish that got crushed by a live rock slide. Removed fish end of issue.

Nitrites have always been zero and nitrates have always been around 10-20ppm and I have always fought them. We do bi weekly water changes as we have gotten conflicting info on that. My LFS that I trust tells me to change the water often weekly if I could. The one I purchased the bio cube has the same bio cube on their front counter with thousands of dollars in fish and corals in it. They say they do a 10 gallon change once a month or so. They also told me not to change or rinse out my filter moss in my media basket so I haven’t in a few months. I also run a small Biocube skimmer in my first chamber but it never gets out the black slimy water like I’ve seen on YouTube from other skimmers. What’s everyone’s input on these last 2 parts???

Thanks Charlie


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Finally, 2 separate questions. First, have a lot of small white baby snails. Are they all going to grow and need shells? How fast do they grow? They seem to get smushed when we clean the tank with our magnetic cleaner. Should I worry about them becoming to much or get them out?

Second, no issues with keeping crabs alive. But cannot keep snails alive. Most die within a few days of buying them. I have read that snails in saltwater tanks aren’t a good idea because really the water is to warm for them to live in for long periods. Opinions? If I have enough crabs do I need snails?

I know that my Mexican Turbo died because it didn’t have enough food as the tank was spotless when I had it within a couple weeks time. So I purchased different margarita, trochus, Nassarius, Astrea, and 2 bumblebee(daughters liked the looks) and one that goes under the sand. The extremely small ones seem to be lasting longer but the halfway decent size ones seem to flip over constantly and die in the front left corner of my tank. Is there something I have that might be eating the snails or my dead fish as I still have not found it.

On the crabs we have only lost one crab in a year that we have had tank and not sure how it died and not sure it did as only saw a small leg piece, so do crabs shed their legs as they grow?

Thanks for all the help!!! Everyone have a good Turkey Day today.


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If anyone has any questions about other parts of my tank just ask. Here’s a current list.

First fish- Small Black/white clown. Grown a lot
2nd fish- Royal gramma-just died
3rd fish- Green chromis not aggressive at all
4th fish-neon dottyback(took out of tank was picking on other fish)
4th fish replacement-Bengai Cardinal(has gotten to big for the tank in my opinion)

We really want another royal gramma as well love the colors of the fish and we also want to get a flame angel...will the flame angel learn to eat mysis like I feed now or will I need to get a nori seaweed holder if we go with Flame angel?

Is five fish to much with one of them being a Flame? All of my fish are the smaller or smallest size I can get as I know my tank isn’t big.

Also have about 45-50lbs of live rock along with about 30 small corals. I cannot list the corals as I don’t know the name of all of them but the ones I am most proud of are the

Purple Hornets that I purchased 3 of and that have multiplied to 10!!! And the Duncan which I know have 6 heads of from only 1!!!

Also we have a yellow trumpet and something that looks like a Xmas tree behind the Kenya tree to the left of the red mushroom or leather(don’t know what it is either lol) and the LFS both told me they were a little harder to keep alive and they seem to be growing or flourishing so all of us are happy that they are living. Oh and I scraped off the bubble algae that was on the trumpet coral stand, it came off in one sweep and didn’t bust in the tank!!!

2 water pumps the stock pump and a small wave maker that you can see in the photos. You can see the bengai cardinal in the photo. It is almost double the side of any of my other fish.

Finally will the corals grow better if I take them off their plugs? As you can see some are and some aren’t.


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