Akwar'eum

[framerguy]

I guess I'll start the Chronicles of Akwar'eum This is the land where Pistol Pete the Defender battles Evil Seahares and such. If you read the story Of Petey and Goliath you'll know that Petey lives on the right side of Akwar'eum near the Hall of The Golden Polyps. Any way...

The aquarium is a 75 gallon 48x18x21 built into our living room wall. I have a 10'x6' maintenance room behind the tank. I recently, last month, replaced the floor underneath the aquarium after 20+ years of floods and spill. This time I put down tile that was given to me by a friend. They are brown, green and yellow. It looks like a harlequin exploded in there but my wife loves it. Leaving the tank in place was an engineering nightmare but everybody made it through the process. At the time of the repairs I had a 55g FW set up to the left of the SW, also built into the wall. It was dismantled and is now the refugium which replaced the previous 30g fuge. The water enters the overflow which is behind the rock wall center left. I have plastic mesh over the top to prevent any more critters from hiding in there. There are two outlets at the bottom. The 1" drains to the 20g sump directly below the tank, and the 3/4" line drains into the refugium. Durso stand pipes route the water to both. The sump contains a turboflotor skimmer which I like but am not sure it's working as well as it should. I cleaned it before reinstalling it after the rebuild, but....I don't know. The water from the fuge also drains into the sump. For a return I have a mag9.5 which feeds a seaswirl wavemaker. I've been pretty happy with the flow they give but am thinking of adding a SCWD to the mix, I have a small eheim 158gph pump I'm not using since I dismantled my calc reactor, and this will feed the SCWD. Coming off of the return line I have a slow flow chemical reactor which houses my purigen, carbon, and phosgard. This water is returned to the sump.
For lighting I'm using cannibalized parts from an old light system. I have two 150w MH HQI, four 65w PC's powered by an Icecap 660 ballast, and four blue moonlights. The PC's come on at 8:00am and go off at 11:00pm. The MH's come on at 10:00am and go off at 9:00 pm. For lighting in the fuge I have two clamp on work lights with flourescent curly Q bulbs that stay on 24/7.
Filtration is accomplished with 75+# LR in the MT, 20+#LR in the fuge, a sock in the sump, and sponge in the baffles, not to mention the skimmer.
I change two gallons of water/day which works out to a little over 10%/wk. To this water I add 1/2tsp Seachem Iodide, which is safer than Iodine for those concerned. I also add about 2tsp strontium, -1/8c magnesium, and 10ml calcium. My params hover around 410c, 1325m, 8sr, .06io.
For livestock I currently have
Fish:4 pajama cardinals (one is missing his tail completely, it was eaten by a serpent star), 1 Tomini tang (Tommy), one occelatis clown (Bobo), 1 pink spot goby (Shreck), 1 skooter blennie (Trixie, her namesake was a dog I had for 19yrs.), 1 mandarin
Inverts:2 serpent stars I wish I could catch to banish to the refugium, 1 skumk cleaner shrimp, 1 fireshrimp, 6 peppermints, 1 camelback, 6 scarlet legs, 6 bluelegs, numerous cirith and 50 nassirius', 2 seahares (both named goliath, I cant tell them apart), 1 tridacna, 1 pencil urchin.
Corals: 1 colt, numerous pumping xenia, 1 pompom xenia(also pumping but different), 1 elegance, 1 porites, 1 large plate, 1 small plate, 1 tracyphyllia, 2 goniopora, 1 daisy polyp cluster, 1 golden polyp cluster, 1 green eagle eye, 1 unknown brownish red polyp cluster, 1 turibina, 1 frogspawn, 1 torch, 2 tubastrea, 1 carnation, 1 fuzzy green acro, 1 yellow fiji, 1 devils hand, 1 cluster Green star polyps, 1 three headed trumpet.
Volunteers: cluster of red kelp, various other macro algae (the desirable kind)
I may be forgetting somebody, but that doesn't mean I love them any less! In my photo gallery are some other pics of the tank. I will try to post some here when I can. Thanks for reading

[GeeWizzItsMe]

Cool setup! I want a 75 gallon! How much has everything cost not counting livestock, live rock, etc.?

[Kazzy]

The only things that caught my eye were the carnation and goniporas. You do know that they pretty much always die off in the home aquarium? Both of them I mean. I would know, my dad and I made the mistake of getting both of them at some point.

[Dentoid]

Hey Greg, I just noticed the urn in the middle of the tank. It's like the lost ruins of Atlantis.

[framerguy]

I got the goniopora with my eyes open and information at hand. I have a website about them bookmarked and am diligent in my care for them. We'll see... . Now the carnation on the other hand is a different story, he just happened to be attached to a cluster of tubastrea I wanted, also purchase with eyes open. That cluster is also attached to two large oysters that causes the carnation to wave when they open. I give the best care I can, and have learned a lot in the past year+.

[framerguy]

Cool setup! I want a 75 gallon! How much has everything cost not counting livestock, live rock, etc.?

I got completey ripped on the skimmer and pumps and bought them at LFS before I knew how to buy online so I've got more in the setup than I should. All in all, just for the hardware I've got about $1800+ in it

[kathywithbirds]

Oh yeah, more on Petey and his adventures!!!!

[boozeman]

nice reef

[cheeks69]

Very nice tank Greg ! It looks like you have plenty of caves within the rockwork, can you give us some closeups ?
No doubt you have some very difficult corals, just keep them well fed and at least the Gonioporas should be ok. How long have you had the Elegance ?

[framerguy]

Originally Posted by cheeks69

Very nice tank Greg ! Thanks It looks like you have plenty of caves within the rockwork, Yeah, I finally got it right, I have so many caves I never see some of my fish, especially Tommy can you give us some closeups ? I don't have a close up lense but am trying to borrow one from a friend
No doubt you have some very difficult corals, just keep them well fed and at least the Gonioporas should be ok. they seem to be. I've only had them for about 2 months but I'm diligent with them How long have you had the Elegance ? about 5 months. He seems to be doing OK but has spells of discontent. I think I've finally placed him where he's happy and I changed the sand bed from a course grade to a sugarfine grade and pushed his skeleton into it so that only the fleshy part is exposed which is how I believe they live in the wild. He seems to be content lately. He ate about half a silverside last night with gusto (hasn't been eating well lately) and seems very happy today.

Here's a pic from about 4 weeks ago:

Thanks guys, I'm having tons of fun and frustration in this adventure! Gotta love it.

[blue_eyes53813]

Tank looks great

[Kazzy]

It looks like everything is under control, but make sure you watch the goniporas. Mine died in somewhere between 3 and 4 months so you aren't in the clear quite yet. Still, at least you bought them AFTER you knew what they were lol.

[framerguy]

I caught one of the serpent star @#%&*! I got up to go to the bathroom at 1pm and thought I'd check the tank and there he was! Right at the front. I scooped him up and tossed him in the refugium. One more to go. Never put serpent stars with fish you care about! Learned the hard way.

[Kazzy]

eep I better watch mine then!

[reefman420]

what about bristle stars.