Bubba's SPS Journey

[bubbaque]

Agree, highly doubt my V. Strigata will be allowed in my upgrade tank... He's buried LPS a couple of times
I'd consider something from the Cryptocentrus genus tho, as they rarely leave the sand surface before releasing the sand. They're much more static though, so might not be as useful for the sand sifting purpose.

@bubbaque which ones have you considered?

None, lol. There will be no sand sifting gobies in my tanks. I’ve done that before and what a pain. If they aren’t covering corals they constantly sift the which adds tons of particles in water.

I will be the sand sifter. I have a long stick that’s like a spatula on the bottom that I will stir it up once a week with. I did it this morning and it took less than 5 minutes to do the whole tank.

 

[blackizzz]

None, lol. There will be no sand sifting gobies in my tanks. I’ve done that before and what a pain. If they aren’t covering corals they constantly sift the which adds tons of particles in water.

I will be the sand sifter. I have a long stick that’s like a spatula on the bottom that I will stir it up once a week with. I did it this morning and it took less than 5 minutes to do the whole tank.

Good call! And that's a good tip about just doing it manually, if your tank takes 5 mins mine probably takes 22 seconds

 

[Fudsey]

I like having a couple tiger conchs to stir the sand and they don't make a mess. Although they do like to push things on the sand around

 

[Jettareefer223]

Sand sifting gobies? That’s one purchase I regret until this day. I hate coming come to acros covered in sand. I had to buy an 18” baster to keep things clean, and my hands out of the tank. Hate those a holes.

I feel your pain for sure! I made the mistake of adding a bunch of Bella gobies to my a good number of my clients tanks for that very reason. It comes with trade off, and I regret every time I’m meticulously leveling the sand bed then the gobie ruins it within ten minutes lol.

 

[cFloor]

Just finished going through your whole thread. You truly have a "blue" thumb. You have some of the nicest corals I have seen. The new tank is looking great, can't wait to see it a year from now. After reading what you are doing, I've made some changes to my system such as raising the lights on both my main display and frag tank. The main change to my coral QT is that its FULL! haha. When the time comes, I'd love to shoot you a PM for a frag pack. Also, any chance you have the TSA triple sec? I just bought a frag of it and would love to see some pics other than TSA's.

 

[bubbaque]

Just finished going through your whole thread. You truly have a "blue" thumb. You have some of the nicest corals I have seen. The new tank is looking great, can't wait to see it a year from now. After reading what you are doing, I've made some changes to my system such as raising the lights on both my main display and frag tank. The main change to my coral QT is that its FULL! haha. When the time comes, I'd love to shoot you a PM for a frag pack. Also, any chance you have the TSA triple sec? I just bought a frag of it and would love to see some pics other than TSA's.

Read the whole thread!?! That’s impressive.

How high were your light before? I think people way over light their tanks. I remember when I went to WWC’s farm their lights were so high I was kinda shocked.

I don’t have the Triplesec but it’s one I want after seeing their colony in person.

 

[cFloor]

Read the whole thread!?! That’s impressive.

How high were your light before? I think people way over light their tanks. I remember when I went to WWC’s farm their lights were so high I was kinda shocked.

I don’t have the Triplesec but it’s one I want after seeing their colony in person.

yup, read the whole thread. Like I said a couple pages ago, very inspiring stuff.

I had my ATI/reefbrite combo about 4 inches above my display which is 28 inches deep. I had my Radions/T5 combo about 12" over my frag tank. I raised the frag tank lights to about 22 inches and I'm acclimating them from 60% to 80% and then likely to 100%. I raised my display lights to about 10 inches.

I'm not finding many pics of the triple sec other than TSA's photo. Mine shows up on Wednesday but it'll go into qt for a while and likely lose most of its color while in there.

 

[bubbaque]

yup, read the whole thread. Like I said a couple pages ago, very inspiring stuff.

I had my ATI/reefbrite combo about 4 inches above my display which is 28 inches deep. I had my Radions/T5 combo about 12" over my frag tank. I raised the frag tank lights to about 22 inches and I'm acclimating them from 60% to 80% and then likely to 100%. I raised my display lights to about 10 inches.

I'm not finding many pics of the triple sec other than TSA's photo. Mine shows up on Wednesday but it'll go into qt for a while and likely lose most of its color while in there.

I think they released the triple sec a month or two ago so probably not many out there yet.

 

[bubbaque]

Color is starting to come back pretty fast so I figured I will start sharing pics again. Since I cut all my corals off from the base I basically had to start most of corals over like they were frags.

I will start off with one of my favorites.
Mattv Psycho asylum

 

[SneakyTortuga]

Color is starting to come back pretty fast so I figured I will start sharing pics again. Since I cut all my corals off from the base I basically had to start most of corals over like they were frags.

I will start off with one of my favorites.
Mattv Psycho asylum

This has been on my hit list for so long

 

[lbacha]

So it looks like you cut the frags off at the base then glued them to a frag plug then the rockwork. Any reason you didn’t just glue them straight to the rockwork. Was it so you can easily move them if they didn’t like their new location? I would think encrusting the rockwork would make them more secure in the long run.

 

[bubbaque]

This has been on my hit list for so long

should be on everyone’s list!

So it looks like you cut the frags off at the base then glued them to a frag plug then the rockwork. Any reason you didn’t just glue them straight to the rockwork. Was it so you can easily move them if they didn’t like their new location? I would think encrusting the rockwork would make them more secure in the long run.

After years corals encrust more than you ever think they are going to so I mainly did it to be able to place more corals on the rocks. If you mount directly to the rock you may fit 3 corals before they touch bases while I may be able to fit 10.

I use glue and putty to mount the corals so it’s pretty stable. Sometimes I struggle to break them free when I want to move them.

 

[bubbaque]

WD is looking pretty good.

 

[drawman]

WD is looking pretty good.

Looks great Bubba! You are really giving me the itch to get some test frags in my new tank.

 

[Epic Aquaculture]

Great to see the beautiful colors again Bubba!

 

[bubbaque]

Looks great Bubba! You are really giving me the itch to get some test frags in my new tank.

Get something cheap to test out.

I have learned through setting up this new tank that tank maturity doesn't matter.

Great to see the beautiful colors again Bubba!

Thanks!

It feels good to be able to take pics again. Not everything is colored up but since the cloudiness is gone I am seeing colors come back fast.

 

[ryshark]

@bubbaque very nice! Did you cut everything off from the base because of the mini vermetids?

 

[bubbaque]

@bubbaque very nice! Did you cut everything off from the base because of the mini vermetids?

Yes. They never caused me any issues but were unsightly.

 

[ryshark]

Yes. They never caused me any issues but were unsightly.

I’ve got the same issue and I’m upgrading to a bigger tank now with all new rock because of them. What did you do with nub acros that all they have really done is encrust so there’s not a good way to cut off base?

 

[bubbaque]

I cut the nub off and mounted it to a plug.