Cody & KCs Newbie Reef Tank!

[Craig Manoukian]

Glad you guys had fun as well. The worms, aka polycheates, are very good for your tank as suggested above.

 

[Melanie]

Re: Picture's Finally!!!!

Hey Everybody!

Welcome back Casey!

So I broke my promise and did not get pictures up that weekend, which was quite a while ago! In fact, I apparently haven't posted anything in so long that the mods are threatening to whip me with caulerpa if I don't post something soon! LOL It is kinda a shocking little thing to see at the top of the page! I ha to laugh! :LOL: HAHA

I haven't seen that! Maybe I need to go away for awhile ;O)

We have made some new additions to the tank & are preparing for some more! We noticed a lot of worms in our tank recently that we never saw before! These were, from what I could gather, a bad bristleworm... (maybe one of you can confirm this for me) they varied in size but were black in the middle and red on the ends with little bristles all over the body... Am I right in thinking that these can be harmful to corals and others if they get too many or big enough?

I have the same kind of bristleworm and it is about 10" I think. It doesn't seem to bother anything and just cruises around inside the rocks and I only see it in the middle of the night.

Either way we decided to be safe and went to the LFS and purchased an Orchid Dottyback to hopefully help get rid of any babies that may arise and are planning on trying the whole shrimp in nylon to get the larger ones out that the fish doesn't get to. She is very active & seems at home in tank, probably because she is happy tobe out of the little box of a tank she was in at the LFS though!

She is GORGEOUS!

The goby and pistol are still doing well excavating their burrow under the LR, and the goby doesn't like it too much if the Dottyback gets too close but they seem to be doing ok.

I SO want a goby pistol pair!! Yours are stunning.

We also got some new corals! Let me first start by saying that I really like Dr Fosters & Smith's Liveaquaria.com! It is really AWESOME, especially since I have not found an LFS around that I am really happy with! Liveaquaria's prices are way better than our regular LFS and the corals seem to be in better shape too! Surprising considering that they are shipped! I think I am in love! LOL We ordered a frag pack that included 5 different small frags: a pineapple tree coral, silver branch pumping xenia, taro tree coral, evergreen starburst polyp, and it was supposed to come with either a lemon or purple tree coral but they were out of stock so they gave us a white pom pom xenia instead.

I LOVE DF&S! Their customer service is top notch and I agree that everything I've bought there is just even better than on-line.

They all seem to be doing well so far and they took a little bit of a beating while I was trying to trim down the aragonite plugs they were encrusted on... I wish we would have been able to remove them and put them on our existing LR instead, but oh well we worked it out... I think with what we trimmed the squares down to hopefully after being in the tank for a while they will color up and blend in with the LR... we will see... unless someone else has a better idea! I am always open to that!

If you use frag epoxy or stick them in crevices, they will soon encrust over your existing LR and you won't see the plugs any more! It will be before you know it.

Finally, I had a question about a new worm I have discovered. It is a whittish clear, smooth looking, worm that stays in one hole in the LR and never moves out of it... it will completely disappear into the rock, but when the lights go out it will come out less than half an inch and when it is hungry it stretches out like a rubber band to like an inch or longer and grabs what it wants and then sort of snaps back to its shorter length again. It is pretty interesting to watch... I don't think it is harmful, but I thought maybe you guys could tell me what it is and for sure if it is reef safe...

I have one of those and it sometimes comes out and sticks to the glass. Like a skinny piece of spaghetti.

Without further ado... here is the picture's I have been promising for so long!!! Enjoy!

Thank you fo sharing your cruise photos! Looks like you had a blast. You got a super photo of the sloth. I saw a baby one in Costa Rica but it was too far away to get a good shot with my disposable camera.

 

[cynicechoes]

Thanks so much everyone! It is always a pleasure to share with you all and here your opinions and advice!

Thanks for the comments on my fish Mel! I love the color of the Dottyback, it is so vivid even though you can't really tell from the dark picture. The goby & pistol are very neat! I often worry about them though because they will go days without emerging from their tunnel under the rocks! I am still very nervous about them dieing because of the newness and all so that really freaks me out! It was nice to add the dottyback too since it gave some life to the tank, finally a fish that swims around and you can see!


We are planning on revamping the aquascaping next month. We are going to order some fully cured LR from DF&S... its the kind that is high quality manmade... we decided on that since it was the only kind that they offered fully cured. We are also adding a very large fuge to increase our water volume and will be moving some of the tonga branch to it to make room for some new rock work! Can't wait!

Well later ev1! happy reefing

 

[Dentoid]

Nice to hear from you again Casey! Pictures are great. I love the Dottyback. The Dec 07/Jan 08 issue of Coral magazine was all about pistol/goby pairings. Very interesting if you get a chance to pick up the magazine. I very rarely see my pistol, yours seems to be living it up in broad daylight. That's cool!

 

[cynicechoes]

Thanks Dentoid! I rarely see my goby or pistol too, those pics were from their first couple of days in the tank... they were excavating a burrow under my zoa, since then they have moved to the much more covered and spacious under the LR display... they have a pretty crazy tunnel system going on it appears, but I am lucky if I get to see the goby's head before he ducks back in upon spotting me! lol I still really like them though, they are cool!

 

[cynicechoes]

Hi everyone! It's been way too long since I last posted! Everything is going well with our tank... our xenia has branched off in about 5 different ways and is getting huge. We need to learn how to trim it down or something! We are planing on taking the tree corals to the LFS b/c we aren't fans of them and so they are taking up valuable space. We got new rock and re-aquascaped. we managed to catch the LFS after they had gotten rock from someone breakng down their fish tank! It was amazing rock! well i guess that is enough for now... talk to you all soon

 

[Dentoid]

Welcome back! Show us some pictures!

 

[Craig Manoukian]

Welcome back! Show us some pictures!

Ditto!:bouncer:

 

[cynicechoes]

HOLy Crap I'm BACK! It has been a rediculous amount of time since I last posted! I am neglecting my RS friends! Sorry guys! Things have been so busy with school and work and everything that this just slipped my mind... that is no excuse tho, you guys helped me out so much starting out our tank... so I will get better! PROMISE!

I am proud to say that our tank is going beautifullly! All the hard work and research has really been paying off! I really love our tank. I get so annoyed sometimes becuase my hubby isn't doing his maintenance part of the job and I'll tell him that we never should of gotten it, but then I turn around and am out buying something for it soon after. He just rolls his eyes at me now. lol

Our current stock is:
Coral:
1. Silver Branch Xenia
2. White Pom Pom Xenia
3. A hammer coral frogspawn hybrid... can't remember the exact name
4. Open Brain
5. 2 colors of Zoas
6. Evergreen Starburst Polyp
7. Another coral very similar which I am leaning toward being another starburst polyp but we just call it grass...
8. Yellow Leather Coral
9. SPS coral - i believe its a Montipora,(could be a stylophora... i dnt kno the difference) but I am not positive because I cannot remember what they called it at the LFS and a few of the pora corals look too much alike


Livestock:
1. Orchid Dottyback
2. Ocellris Clownfish
3. Green Mandarin
4. Hi Fin Red Banded, or Shrimp, goby
5. Pistol Shrimp
6. Several Dwarf Hermits
7. Various Snails to include: bumble bee, turbo, astrea, nassarius, cerith, nerite
8. Electric Blue Tip Hermits (2)
9. Green lettuce Nudibranch
10. Several Peppermint Shrimp
11. Feather dusters
12. Porcelain Crab
13. 2 Emerald Mythrax crabs in fuge (1 red(dnt kno why an emerald crab is red but it is) and 1 green)

We also are adding some different types of macroalgae... we have maidens hair and halimeda, but plan to add more...

We moved to a bigger apartment and had to move the tank so that was interesting! Everything moved successfully, we lost a tree coral that fell to the back of the tank under the rock work, haven't seen it since, but no biggie. Our hang on back fuge wasn't workinf for our macro, the chaeto and halimeda and another red one we had didn't make it. So that is why we are starting over with the macros in our bigger fuge.

I will post pics later tonight of our new set up, but I gotta take them first!

Later guys!

 

[cynicechoes]

New Pics!

Here are the pics as promised... my hubby went photo happy so there are way too many! He insists I post them all! lol So here it goes:

Full tank Shots:

Side View

One Side

Our Refugium Rigging:
We first bought a HOB Fuge but that was not enough...

So we did this too... Our Fuge is on left and main tank on right... Yes, the fuge is sadly larger than the main tank... we learned too late that we needed more water volume!

The Fuge Overflows into main tank

Pictures of Main Tank:

Xenia owns all... can't control it! & this is after 3 trimmings... we've made about 200 bucks selling frags to our LFS!

It even owns the poor little white pom pom xenia that is struggling for light... Dotty wanted in on this pic

Zoas

Hammer/ Frogspawn Hybrid

Porcilliapora ( I found the paper with the name! YAY me!) & Xenia of course

Yellow Leather Coral... its not the greatest specimen and something is wrong with it

Looks like parts of it are dying... see the brown at the top... i think its decay? Any thoughts?

Green Lettuce Nudi

This is our pride and joy... Choice, the Green Mandarin (chinese food restaurant that we like is named choice of mandarin... so we have Choice) He is camera shy and this pic is blurry...

This is why... Nemo's a butthead

Top View of Open Brain and Zoas

Another top view

Porcelain Crab in Starburst Polyp

Electric Blue Hermit crab... shhh He's hiding!

Choice Again... Hiding Again... Nemo can't stay out of pictures

I think this is some type of encrusting sponge... it came on the LR... Am i right?

Any ideas as to what these red bubbles are? Also came on LR

Pics of Fuge:
Fuge Shot

Maiden's Hair Macro & crab

Small Halimeda

Emerald crab... but its red?

Feather Duster

That is finally it! I hope you all enjoy... a lot of change and progress since i last posted pics! Gotta love reef tanks! Let me know what you guys think about everything and if you have any ideas about my questions or any suggestions Please! Happy reefing ev1!

-Casey

 

[cynicechoes]

1234

 

[Craig Manoukian]

Casey, everything looks like it is happy and healthy! Glad you guys are enjoying your tank and thanks for the update!

 

[cynicechoes]

Thanks Craig! We just had a pretty good scare. Everything in our tank suddenly got droopy and the leather is dieing. We talked to our guy at the LFS and he thinks we probably hit the threshold of too much Iodine. So we did a water change and things seemed to perk up a little, we are going to do another one and hopfully everything will be ok.

 

[Craig Manoukian]

Oh yes, iodine can be very toxic and most iodine tests can be dicey. I would dose iodine with regular water changes. What other test parametrs did you have?

Glad everything is doing better.

 

[cynicechoes]

That is what threw us for a loop! When we tested all of the basic tests came out fine... calcium, ph, alkalinity, nitrites, nitrates, ammonia... we don't have a test for iodine and the guy at the LFS said he didn't recommend we bother with buying one for the same reason you said. He said the best bet was to just do a large water change and then another later that night or next day and see if things improve and to not add any iodine for a while as well as reduce the amount to a half to 1/4 of what we were dosing when we started again. He said some systems will just used more iodine than others and that is why even though we were following the directions we might have created too high of levels. He also said we should watch our calcium levels carefully since we had started adding magnesium and that the proper balance between the two could be hard to find. Everything seems to be looking better gradually, except the Leather. It still has spots that appear to be rotting... we are going to try to remove it from the tank which might be a little hard cuz we used putty to attach its rock to our rockwork and it is a pretty solid bond. We are going to take a closer look at it once we get it out to see if we want to try to save it or just cut our loses and chunk it.

 

[Craig Manoukian]

Sounds good, atta girl Casey!

 

[lcstorc]

Looking good.
I wouldn't ditch the leather but I would be sure to run lots of carbon. Leathers release toxins that can harm other corals and the carbon removes them.
Love the fuge. It looks sparkly clean. Mine is a mess but mine is under the tank so that is ok.
Try putting some cheato in the fuge. The stuff is great.

 

[cynicechoes]

Thanks guys! Yeah we did end up ditching the leather... I think we waited too long as I didn't realize that it could have been poisoning the tank. Since we got it out things seem happier!

It is really funny that you mentioned my fuge being clean Lynn Cuz its not anymore! lol We have been trying but it doesn't like to stay clean! For some reason we are having real issues keeping macro algae alive! I don't get it. Every piece we bought has died. We had chaeto and it survived somewhat, but always seemed to come appart and clong up our pumps to a rediculous amount. I was so mad becuase even our maiden's hair, which i really liked is on its last limb. There are like two little tufts of algae left and I think that is dieing as well. So I don't get it. Any suggestions?

Also, we found out that although we have MH lighting on our main tank it isn't strong enough because the stony coral we bought died. The skin just gradually started coming off in sections until there was no more. So that really sucks. We are also noticing an increase in nuisance algae so we are trying to reduce feeding.

Finally, has anyone ever heard of a nuisance algae or something that spread these little orange dots all over the rock? We notices it start gradually on the side of our tank with the mushrooms and we though it was baby mushrooms, but then it began to be more and more of them and they don't seem to grow, just spread. Any ideas? I will try to get a pick up later.

 

[cynicechoes]

Hi Guys,

We recently did some Xenia mowing. We usually just glued the frags to rocks and took them right in because we had no place to put them to wait for them to fully attach with our tank being so small, but the LFS requested that we keep them a week and we have been having HELL! Our fuge is not a good place for xenia as we found out when we first put them there and they all seemed to be dieing. They do not stay attached to the glue so we tried putting a mesh to block them in but still lost a few to the pumps and ended up reglueing before we moved them to the main tank kind of scattered wherever we could fit them. They are healthier looking in the tank but still detaching from teh glue so it is like fighting trying to keep them from blowing around the tank. I think we found a sweet spot with just the right amount of flow to keep them from moving around too much so that they attach though. I am just kind of circulating them into that spot as they dont all fit there at once. It is a pain! Anyhoo hope everyone is doing well LATER!

 

[Craig Manoukian]

Thanks for the update! Any new tank pics?