Shaun's 2000 Litre (530 USG) Living Reef & Red Sea Max S 650 LED Design & Build

SPR

SPR

Well-Known Member
I’ve got a green and a red sand anemone in the tank about 8 inches apart.

I’m not sure but I think they have fallen for each other. They have always been tucked down into the sand, and last night especially the red one, rose up about an inch and then the display began.

Captured in glorious video............

So here you are, anemones spawning ?


 
SPR

SPR

Well-Known Member
I’ve used the Red Sea Nitrate Pro test kit for over 2 years but I just can’t tell the correct readings anymore with the pink colour. Its in date to 2019.

So as you know I’ve got the NYOS nitrate and i can say it’s very easy to use, takes 5 minutes and for me the yellow result is much easier to read or make an estimate for in between results. The last test was midway between 5 and 12 so around 8 as an estimate.

I won’t be using the Red Sea one again.
 
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Nobbygas

Well-Known Member
The only Red Sea test I now use is for Calc. However, as soon as that is used up I shall switch to Salifert.

*correction* I bought a Salifert Calc test kit today, so the Red Sea one has been binned.
 
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SPR

SPR

Well-Known Member
Pancho75 said:
Very nice amigo, I can see the GSP is still there and winning, congrats [emoji41].


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Click to expand...
Yes it’s starting to slowly grow back and win the battle, I think anyway. The number of asterina starfish has definitely decreased but it’s something I will just need to keep an eye on and either kill them off completely or keep them under control
 
SPR

SPR

Well-Known Member
Nobbygas said:
Are you still using the Red Sea light settings?
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Yes, the only variation being I go ‘blue’ from 7pm with random storm effects, but apart from that the corals all do very well.

I don’t wish to study lighting to be honest, or par (apart from my constant battle when playing golf! Lol) so if Red Sea say those are the best then that’s good for me.

I was watching the Triggers last night and the female was pointing head downwards on the left hand side of the tank again as if guarding something and became quite aggressive to any fish that came to close. Strangely the male, was hovering at the side of a coral in the middle of the tank for ages, just hovering. Maybe keeping out if her way!

I have absolutely no clue about fish behaviour or what they think, and I wonder if anyone does!
 
N

Nobbygas

Well-Known Member
My triggers basically stay at opposite ends of the tank most of the time. If you imagine splitting the tank into 'thirds', they each have one third, and now and again they meet up in the middle third. I get the impression that it is not the world's greatest love affair !
I think the actions of your female trigger show that even in the animal/fish world, females are female.

She Who Casts No Shadow once told me that I had to embrace my feminine side..........so I crashed the car, burnt the dinner and totally ignored her all day for no reason !
 
Pancho75

Pancho75

Well-Known Member
Nobbygas said:
My triggers basically stay at opposite ends of the tank most of the time. If you imagine splitting the tank into 'thirds', they each have one third, and now and again they meet up in the middle third. I get the impression that it is not the world's greatest love affair !
I think the actions of your female trigger show that even in the animal/fish world, females are female.

She Who Casts No Shadow once told me that I had to embrace my feminine side..........so I crashed the car, burnt the dinner and totally ignored her all day for no reason !
Click to expand...
LOL!!!


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SPR

SPR

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I have been away in Spain for a week (hitting a white ball as far as I can, and then searching for it!) and came back and the tank was looking like I’d never been away, apart from the glass needing a clean.

I’ve tried to automate as much as I can, with a large ATO reservoir, Apex autofeeder and general monitoring from Apex and a HD Camera. Apart from my mother changing the filter socks once, the tank wasn’t touched for 7 days.

I’ve decided to remove the last 2 Brightwell NO3 bricks as they are still breaking down and have made a right mess in the sump and I’m not convinced there actually doing anything.

I added 6 litres of Seachem Matrix a few weeks/month ago and I can say this is very good stuff. I’ve reduced the Nopox dosage down slowly to 18ml per day and the Nitrate is currently at 7ppm (from around 18).

The system and water just looks so much clearer since I added the Matrix and because of its make up, it’s stone, apart from maybe a quick wash it should never need replacing.

I have enough Matrix in the system for 1000’s of litres of water volume so this should keep Nitrate under control and I can feed a bit more which I enjoy.

I’ve taken a few different pictures of the sump, and there is still some residue from the Brightwell bricks as you can see, and this will get removed during water changes which I’m tending to do around 18% each month. Mainly to keep the sump reasonably clean

I also cleaned the NYOS Quantum protein skimmer today. To be honest the pump and impeller weren’t that dirty to say the last clean was around 8 months ago and I only cleaned it because on a few ‘restarts’ the pump seemed to be struggling and hence the clean.

Anyway pictures.......

Full sump, clean NYOS and down shot.

e3b971270b6dcafb4ce5a980d184c566.jpg
aaa6e9e39de554bc9ec68aed7b31e9ec.jpg
8a746860baac5b4fb246fd96db6ff0e1.jpg
 
Pancho75

Pancho75

Well-Known Member
Good to know you were on vacations playing my friend, it is also good you decided to remove those two awful bricks!! LOL...

I am also using Seachem Matrix and it is indeed really good stuff it made my tank water clearer and maintained the nutrients low.


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Nobbygas

Well-Known Member
SPR said:
I have been away in Spain for a week (hitting a white ball as far as I can, and then searching for it!) and came back and the tank was looking like I’d never been away, apart from the glass needing a clean.

I’ve tried to automate as much as I can, with a large ATO reservoir, Apex autofeeder and general monitoring from Apex and a HD Camera. Apart from my mother changing the filter socks once, the tank wasn’t touched for 7 days.

I’ve decided to remove the last 2 Brightwell NO3 bricks as they are still breaking down and have made a right mess in the sump and I’m not convinced there actually doing anything.

I added 6 litres of Seachem Matrix a few weeks/month ago and I can say this is very good stuff. I’ve reduced the Nopox dosage down slowly to 18ml per day and the Nitrate is currently at 7ppm (from around 18).

The system and water just looks so much clearer since I added the Matrix and because of its make up, it’s stone, apart from maybe a quick wash it should never need replacing.

I have enough Matrix in the system for 1000’s of litres of water volume so this should keep Nitrate under control and I can feed a bit more which I enjoy.

I’ve taken a few different pictures of the sump, and there is still some residue from the Brightwell bricks as you can see, and this will get removed during water changes which I’m tending to do around 18% each month. Mainly to keep the sump reasonably clean

I also cleaned the NYOS Quantum protein skimmer today. To be honest the pump and impeller weren’t that dirty to say the last clean was around 8 months ago and I only cleaned it because on a few ‘restarts’ the pump seemed to be struggling and hence the clean.

Anyway pictures.......

Full sump, clean NYOS and down shot.

e3b971270b6dcafb4ce5a980d184c566.jpg
aaa6e9e39de554bc9ec68aed7b31e9ec.jpg
8a746860baac5b4fb246fd96db6ff0e1.jpg
Click to expand...
Glad to hear you're still shanking the balls !
The second from last picture...but...um.....don't you have to take the Seachem Matrix out of the plastic bags? :)
How are your Marine Pure blocks standing up? Are they breaking down as well? Now you lot are using the Seachem Matrix you've got me all in a flummax. Do I just add another Marine Pure block, or do I go with the Seachem Matrix? In what way is the Seachem Matrix better than Marine Pure?
 
SPR

SPR

Well-Known Member
Nobbygas said:
Glad to hear you're still shanking the balls !
The second from last picture...but...um.....don't you have to take the Seachem Matrix out of the plastic bags? :)
How are your Marine Pure blocks standing up? Are they breaking down as well? Now you lot are using the Seachem Matrix you've got me all in a flummax. Do I just add another Marine Pure block, or do I go with the Seachem Matrix? In what way is the Seachem Matrix better than Marine Pure?
Click to expand...
Hahahaha!!! I’ve put it in the Seachem large zip bags so it’s contained to make it easy to move around for cleaning but you can just dump it in the sump. The bags have very large holes in so won’t hold carbon or the like.

The Marine Pure is holding up fine with no breaking up as you can see from the picture, but is it making a difference, probably, but it’s not particularly brilliant.

Is the Seachem Matrix making a difference, definitely and it’s very noticeable but then I’ve added ‘a lot’ of it. You can see from their web site the stats and I’ve got 6 litres. So that’s for about 4800 litres!

Having tried all 3 methods, marine pure, Brightwell and Matrix, I can say Matrix wins no comparison and I’ll take the marine pure out if and when it starts to deteriorate.

You can see how bad the Brightwell bricks are from the sand still in the sump and I’m thought I’d cleaned most of it out!

And as @Pancho75 says to, the water looks much clearer

I’m actually surprised it’s not more widely advertised as here in the UK, I stumbled upon it when reading up on Purigen, which is also excellent.
 
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Pancho75

Pancho75

Well-Known Member
SPR said:
Hahahaha!!! I’ve put it in the Seachem large zip bags so it’s contained to make it easy to move around for cleaning but you can just dump it in the sump. The bags have very large holes in so won’t hold carbon or the like.

The Marine Pure is holding up fine with no breaking up as you can see from the picture, but is it making a difference, probably, but it’s not particularly brilliant.

Is the Seachem Matrix making a difference, definitely and it’s very noticeable but then I’ve added ‘a lot’ of it. You can see from their web site the stats and I’ve got 6 litres. So that’s for about 4800 litres!

Having tried all 3 methods, marine pure, Brightwell and Matrix, I can say Matrix wins no comparison and I’ll take the marine pure out if and when it starts to deteriorate.

You can see how bad the Brightwell bricks are from the sand still in the sump and I’m thought I’d cleaned most of it out!

And as @Pancho75 says to, the water looks much clearer

I’m actually surprised it’s not more widely advertised as here in the UK, I stumbled upon it when reading up on Purigen, which is also excellent.
Click to expand...

The Seachem Matrix is really good, it is now my standard, I don’t have to add even NOPOX (never been a fan anyway).


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