40 breeder clam paradise

[jsanchez]

So I shut down my 20 gallon lagoon tank and decided to upgrade to a 40 breeder with a 20 long sump.

Originally I was going to run the tank with biopellets, hi-cap gfo, rox 0.8, and my skimz sm143 DC skimmer.
Well I've ditched that idea and am instead going to run the skimmer with the rox and a waterfall style algae scrubber.

Lighting will come from a 6x39w aquatic life t5 fixture. Bulbs are 4x blue+ and 2+ coral plus. I might switch out a blue+ for a true actinic bulb for more coral pop.

Flow is from 2x Jebao rw4 running max power on alternating mode. More flow will be supplied from my Jebao DC 9000 (2000+ ghp) return pump running somewhere around 900gph.

Stocking:
1.5" Frostbite clownfish
2" Wyoming white clownfish
.5" Blue hippo tang. Rescued from petco, was covered in ich all over and had a horribly pinched stomach. I was able to convince the manager to give me the tang. It is now fully quarantined and 100% recovered.

2.5" Flame angel

I also want a either a tiny copperband/Niger trigger/ dwarf golden moray. I know those guys will all outgrow my tank but with my new job I've tripled my income and will be upgrading to a 220 within the year.

Coral will be 3/4 sps and 1/4 LPS. I'm also going to have 5-7 clams. So far I have two 5" maximas one blue the other green with blue and gold mixed in. One 1.75" purple/blue maxima and a 2.6" derasa.

So let's get to the actual build. Sorry for yapping on.

Here is how I've painted the tank.

Originally I used acrylic paint but that crap sucked... So I switched to krylon spray paint. Looks great and with no mess. I wanted to go black but my fiancé said if I was going to add another tank that it would have to be blue.

I got my overflow from eBay. It measures 18"wide x4"deep x5" tall

I went for a herbie style overflow but added a third drain incase I wanted to do a bean animal. Figured if I stayed herbie style I'd at least have a 2nd emergency drain. This was my first time drilling a tank and man I was scared. It wasn't hard at all but like the idiot I am on one of the return lines (3/4") I started the hole with the 1" bit. I only went in 1/16" so hopefully it doesn't leak.

 

[jsanchez]

Reserved spot.

 

[reef_grrrl]

Following along! But I really commented to say that is the cutest ity bitty tang I've ever seen [emoji7]

 

[jsanchez]

Yeah she's a beauty. I would have been really sad had she not mad it through qt. I'll update the thread later on today.

 

[jsanchez]

Completely forgot to update this as I was updating my other thread on my local forum...

Guess posting the initial build is a little pointless since tank has been up and running for some while now. Here was how the tank looked before I switched out the clams.

I've since switched out the clams and traded them for a bunch of sps.

This tank will be very overstocked. So long as I see the fish are thriving and not showing signs of stress I will be keeping the fish. My plans are still to upgrade to a 220 when I move into my new house next year.

Current fish are still the clowns and baby hippo tang. I now also have a 1.75-2" powder blue, 2.5" male blue throat and 1.25" African bluestreak cleaner wrasse.

I removed the bio pellet, and gfo reactor and also took my protein skimmer offline. The algae scrubber I installed is handling the Filtration so well the others where not needed. The scrubber is sized for 7 cubes a day and I feed 1.5 cubes a day to fish that cannot eat more than five 1mm pellets each. I'm doing this anticipation of the larger bioload. Nitrates and PO4 are a constant 0 for the past 3 week. Coral growth and coloration beyond my expectations at this time.

I'm still running rox carbon. I dose 7ml of alk and 8ml of calcium 2part a day. I also dose 3ml a day of amino acids.

PH 8.05 ~ pH meter
NO3 0 ~ red Sea and salifert
Po4 0 Hanna
Cal 420 Hanna and red sea
ALK 7.8 dkh or 141 ppm hanna
Mag 1400

I'm ordering the red Sea coral colors kit as well as KZ amino acids and KZ phol coral vitilize. Hopefully this will improve upon my already wonderful polyp extention and help color up some of the sps that lost color when I transfered tanks.

Such as this one

I'll keep this thread updated as often as I can. Please leave any tips and comments you guys have to help improve.

Also yes I know that keeping the fish I have currently will be difficult and a challenge to have them all thriving. This tank will only be a home for them till next summer. All the fish should still be small enough to not be cramped in the 40b till then.

 

[jsanchez]

Forgot to add that the powder blue has come down with ich, surprise huh?

I knew this would happen nearly instantly so as soon as she went into the qt I began my copper treatment. The ich is no longer noticeable however she has was looks to be scars from scratching all over her body.

I removed the copper for now and began dosing furan2 to prevent a bacterial infection. When this clears up I'll begin dosing cupramine again to eradicate the ich.

 

[jsanchez]

Noticed the tang was getting skinner even though she eats like a pig. I assume with is some type of intestinal parasite and have begun dosing prazipro. I now soak her nori in tank water with an extra drop of prazipro.

ON a good note my algae scrubber if working like a charm. Feeding over a cube of food a day for 3 fish under 1.5" and nitrates/phosphate are at .25 and. 02ppm.

 

[revhtree Verified Admin]

Any new photos of the hippo?

 

[jsanchez]

I'll post them tonight. She hidea so much in the display it's so dang hard to take a pic now. She's still less than an inch, maybe 7/8". She does appear to be coming down with HLLE. I stopped my carbon last night and began using selcon and vita Chem. Hopefully that will take care of the issue.

 

[Shep]

Nice looking tank! Glad to see you beat the ich!

 

[jsanchez]

Best looking pic I could get of her

She just moves to fast for me to get a clear shot.

 

[Reef kid]

I really hope you get a new tank soon, I don't think this will end well otherwise.... That's a lot of bioload and little space for those tangs, especially the powder blue. Kudos to you for saving that blue tang though, and you didn't even benefit pet co because you got it for free!

 

[jsanchez]

So long as everything goes according to plan the new tank will be up and running soon enough to keep all the fish happy and coexisting. My filtration can more than handle this bioload. It's aggression that will be the hard part to control with the powder blue. Thankfully they're all small enough right now that it should be a non issue. But time isn't on my side in this one. Worst case scenario I will set up the 220 and a bare fish only system. I know I should wait but patience has never been my strong suit.

 

[Reef kid]

I know it can be tough to be patient.... I'm only thirteen lol, fourteen in several days haha. I'm not so much worried about water quality as having a powder blue in that small of a tank, I have a yellow in my 75 and feel somewhat concerned. Powder blues need tons of space to swim so we'll see! The best of luck to you and I feel we should all take up the standard of trying to save fish like you did! I've been tempted to ask my Local chain multiple times if they would let me take them and save them.

 

[tj w]

I know it can be tough to be patient.... I'm only thirteen lol, fourteen in several days haha. I'm not so much worried about water quality as having a powder blue in that small of a tank, I have a yellow in my 75 and feel somewhat concerned. Powder blues need tons of space to swim so we'll see! The best of luck to you and I feel we should all take up the standard of trying to save fish like you did! I've been tempted to ask my Local chain multiple times if they would let me take them and save them.

Very well said!! Awesome to hear this being said from a young adult. Many adults here could learn from u. I agree as well for the tangs they need a lot more swim space than a 20 g offers even at a small size.

 

[jsanchez]

Very well said!! Awesome to hear this being said from a young adult. Many adults here could learn from u. I agree as well for the tangs they need a lot more swim space than a 20 g offers even at a small size.

It's a 40b. The way I see it is its all promotional. A 12" blue tang should be housed in a 6' foot tank, hopefully around 180 gallons. Which is about 15 gallons per inch. A 1" blue tang in a 3' 40 gallon is promotional for its size. Once she's bigger it does get harder.

 

[Reef kid]

Very well said!! Awesome to hear this being said from a young adult. Many adults here could learn from u. I agree as well for the tangs they need a lot more swim space than a 20 g offers even at a small size.

I should add that some of this is from bad choices when I originally had a thirty seven gallon involving a snowflake eel who was sent away when I upgraded, since then it's been going great lol.

What a lot of people don't realize is that this stunts the growth of the fish because it doesn't have the capacity. The blue tang isn't who I'm worried about, it's the powder blue tang. These fish love to swim... Oprah Winfrey Gif insert, " I...love...to...swim" sorry couldn't resist lol. If you get your tank upgraded wishing a couple months all the more power to you, I just know from experiences these things get delayed a lot.... Me and my thirteen almost fourteen two cents lol.

 

[jsanchez]

Short of unemployment there isn't much that can delay it. And if I do go unemployed the tank will be the least of my problems haha. I do appreciate the concern and I will take it to heart.