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30 Hex up and running

  • Thread starter RamPuppy
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RamPuppy

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Up and running 2 weeks with 3 pieces of live rock, (formerly dead rock that was once alive (someone let it dry out, so I bought it as base rock) and almost 4 inches of live sand.

SG has been pegged at 1.022 for over a week now, and all my levels have stabilized.

So, saturday morning i am going to go out and purchase a nice load of Tonga Live rock to put in, not a lot, just about 60 bucks worth. And a couple of crabs probably.

nice and slow.
 
well, I couldn't resist... yesterday I ran across an ABSOLUTELY GORGEOUS piece of Tonga Live rock, it looks to be 100% old coral.    It has only been out of the ocean/water for a efw days I think as it amazingly, still smelled great (uncured), I bought it almost right off the truck (They still had the boxes it came in laying around the store.).  For uncured rock, amazingly enough, it still smelled like the ocean, instead of a funk that makes you run away.  it was 17 pounds, and after tax cost me about 95 dollars.  It will be the centerpiece rock in the tank.  I can see macro algaes on it that I hope will re-establish, as well as red, pink, and orange coraline.  There also seems to be something that looks like VERY small thin colt coral, not sure what it is...

I added it to my tank and figure It will have to cycle again... so I shall wait, and enjoy. (I am positive some ide off will occur.)
 
Good luck (skill) with your tank / rock! The bacteria may have an extra load to deal with if there is die-off. Ah, to have salts again....
 
I am pretty sure the rock is going through it's curing cycle, as i have seen some bio-mass (who knows what it was) slough off in the tank... Also, noticed when I got home the apartment had a slight funk this afternoon... nothing near as bad as I have ever smelled before.

At this point, I am estimating it will be cured and the tank will be cycled within a month, allready some of the coraline is coloring up well, which leads me to believe it was not in that bad of a shape... I thin the unidentified bio-mass might have been sponge to tell you the truth, and I hear it is the worst smell... and, since if you expose sponges to air they are toast, well, heh...

we shall see... Nothing int here but rock and sand and I find myself staring at the tank for long stretches of time.
 
Funny you should mention staring at a tank for long stretches at a time... when my daughter was a baby/toddler we used to put her in view of the guppy tank to get her to calm down. Some of us probably stare at our CP's for long stretches at a time as well. Hopefully, the worst is over as far as die-off.
 
I am hoping the same. (As far as die off goes.)

You know they say that children exposed to aquariums at a young age have a higher level of curiosity and do better in the sciences? cool.

I think my staring comes along the lines of... what am I going to do next in there?
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obviously, Need more rock... I am only about half way there (tonga is much lighter than most rocks, and therefore the ration should be 2 around 2 pounds a gallon, give or take a little.)

I need two pieces to come around the side, and maybe a few smaller pieces to build up in back, then put this on on top of them, that will give me a nice little mountain to work with.
 
Not my kids - 3 out of 4 are starving artist types. The fourth kid is going to be mathematician and nerd. anyways, Did you mention any Pacific corals & anemomes?
 
not yet, I am taking it slow. I have not installed the metal halide fixture as of yet, and I am concerned about the evaporation rate. I may have to rig a small top off system before I can add the corals and anemones, (I have been fiddling with the idea of using an old 8 gallon hex in the stand as a refugium, so it's there (forever!) if I need it.)

I want to make sure, essentially, that my Specific Gravity is not going to fluctuate wildly with that metal halide on there, it's the first one I have used, so I am only partially sure of what to expect.

In the end though, probably about 6 months from now, I will probably drop in some mushrrom corals to start.

I am really torn about wanting to add my maroon clowns as soon as possible, but also wanting to add the anemone I hope for them to host in BEFORE I put the clowns in, so that it is settled and happy... if I add the clowns before, there is every chance they will never host in the anemone (as there is every chance they won't if I add them after too.)

I also need to 'safen' up my eqipment before I add the anemone. THey have a tendency to try and get on powerheads, another reason I am thinking about a refugium... If I eliminate the power head INSIDE the main tank, and put a MAGdrive pump as the return pump, with a SCWD on the return pipe, I think I might be able to avoid having two power heads (one for the return, one for the SCWD.)

regardless, it is an experience!
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Steve: Guess what! You just surpassed my limit of expertise. We (the wholesaler) didn't have your level of equipment sophistication. We got as advanced as purchasing a "system" of interconnected tanks for the fish, but never got beyond individual tanks, protein skimmers, and outside filters for the inverts. Also, seven years removed from hobby
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probably put me significantly behind in the technological advancements. I'm much better at scientific names, variety of livestock, nitrogen cycle, and medications. But please DO keep on sharing your enthusiasm. Never understood why why Premnas biaculatus isn't Amphiprion, like the other clowns. See, that's what I know from poring over textbooks and availability sheets. Oh well.
 
  • #10
Ahh, I wouldn't say I am so much advanced, a SCWD is a simple device it's been around for a year or more I think... it has one inlet, two outlets, pressure builds up inside, and switches flow from A outlet to B outlet, timing depends on the strength of the pump driving it. this produces a wave action that is beneficial to corals and anemones. Also makes a nice vigorous current for your fish to navigate.

Refugiums are the next generation of the SUMP, which I am sure you are familiary with. Sumps were created to take the equipment out of the tank, your drain water out of the tank, filter it, heat it, skim it, run through a calcium reactor, you name it, and then use a pump to send it back up into the tank. The refugium is taking this method, and returning to a naturalistic approach. (as far as you want to go.) you add lights to the setup as if it were a main tank, your skimmer and other equipment can still run off of it, but in addition, now you add a THICK live sand substrate, and organisms that will keep it stirred up. Live rock and macro algae are also used here, liverock being the best Bio filter ever imagined, and macro algae can be A) harvested and traded/destroyed, or fed back to your herbivores. Some people have gone completely away from the technology, removing protien skimmers and all filtration, and just use powerheads to circulate the water. THey grow mangroves out of their refugiums, that suck up the nutrients in the water.

In addition, regugiums provide a nice breeding place for amphipods and copepods, these little critters, free from predation in the main tank, reproduce, and get sucked into the return and deposited in the main tank, where fish, anemones, feather dusters and corals eatem up.

I love the bio-diversity capable of being achieved in a reef system. It is quite simply, awesome.
 
  • #11
All this is new to me, but very impressive. And I thought the "system" was the next best thing to replicators and holodecks. I'll tell ya one thing, though, when I first got involved with the saltwater department we had all individual tanks - mostly 70 & 30 gallons. Every time (which was a couple few times a week) a shipment came in, partularly with the inverts, we "held our breath." Even though you pull out what you think was obviously d.o.a., there stood a good chance that either you missed something or something else, on the verge, did die. It also set off a chain reaction and the tank just had to be drained and filled again. There were times when you unintentionally exceeded the tank's capacity for fish, and the next morning you discover - wipeout. It was ennerving to leave work with everything seeming to be fine and coming in the next morning to have a tank be wiped out. The system eliminated THAT experience and you can stock 2-3 times as many fish per gallon as the independent tanks. It also made a tremendous difference between shipment receipt and morning after mortality. Reluctantly, I was also finally convinced to keep a low concentration of copper. Never experienced cryptocarian again. We never did anything advanced with the inverts. I DO remember bringing Tonga rock once, as well as Florida live rock, on occasion. However, we weren't geared toward creating reef tanks. When you are a wholesaler, you just bring 'em and move 'em out as fast as you can. I do remember live sand. Protein skimmers were fairly new. We brought in our corals from Indonesia and the fish & some inverts came from the Phillipines (only because you had to for variety and price), Bali, Hawaii, and Sri Lanka. We also brought in tank-raised clowns (percula & tomato) from Florida. As with freshwater, the livestock travel for days and one never knows just how stressed or alive they will be on arrival. So we were constantly dealing with meds, acclimation, and bacterial diseases. Wholesaling is significantly different that the local petshop, which is also different from the home tank. Well, that was my experience.
 
  • #12
sadly it seems as if the phillapino's have 'hunted' their reefs to the verge of extinction with their collection practices. They aer cyanide bombers, and don't realize while it may make a fish easy to catch, the fish usually dies, and they irrepreably damage the reef around it.

Most importers will not bring in livestock from the phillipines anymore, in hopes the pressure will yield to better collection practices. Hopefully, the phillipines will can the industry all together for the next 20 years and allow their beleagured reefs to re-build.
 
  • #13
Last I knew there have been attempts to rebuild reefs, artificially. But it may be too little too late. As with the clownfishes, I believe there have also been attempts to do "tank-raised" damsels. Who knows - maybe there will be more success in this area, akin to the Florida fishfarms and what the folks in Singapore have done with freshwater fish. We can only hope.
 
  • #14
in recent years there have been great successes in tank raising quite a few species of salt water fish. The ones that remain elusive, are the ones such as the lion, that go through a planktonic state of existence... kind of hard to re-create the level of precision needed for that.

UPDATE: Tank is completely cycled.

Nitrates: barely registering
Nitrites: Not registering on the kit at all. 0.0
PH: 8.6 (perfect for reef)
Amonia: Non existent. 0.0
Salinity: 1.023 (need to adjust to 1.022) but other than that, oh happy day.
 
  • #15
Ah, there you are! Yup, the tank is cycled. One thing that I noticed about salinity is that people have their favorite levels, just as CP folks have their favorite soil mixtures. A textbook I read through listed fish according to their pictures (juvenile & adult), their location, temperature, and salinity. Nearly everything was listed as being 1.022. Bearing that in mind, the pet shop owners would swear by what they did. Some liked it ~1.020. Others as high as 1.025. Apparently, the lower the salinity, the less active the fish. Conversely, the higher the salinity, the more active the fish. However, parasites are less happy in lower salinity. But a less active fish is more susceptible to parasites. Higher salinity = more activity for both fish and parasite, but less susceptibility. Go figure! Corals, though, like a higher salinity. None of this information is anything I've actually observed from taking care of them. I am only parroting what I've been told. However, I can speak from personal experience about the philosophy and approaches to ridding of parasites. But that's another topic. I remember a pH of 8.3 -> 8.4, but that might have been for the fish. Planktonic state? They eat plankton, too? BVy the time I see them they are eating feeder guppies (Dwarf Lions) and comets for the Volitans & Antennata. So, what's your next step?
 
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