Corey's irresponsible 16 biocube

[moretor1]

Finally found where to start this. instead of filling up the skip cycle thread. Gonna dump all of my decent photos here and use this for updates

Eventually I see this tank becoming an anemone only tank in a few years but I don't have room for any more tanks atm so this is it

(Yes it is dead, it came from the LFS and I imagine it died when they dipped it)

The hammer has been doing absolutely great and I swear I see a new polyp every day

 

[moretor1]

Some video and a photo of my frilly arrow crab (Podochela spp)
Love this guy so much and knew I had to have him when I saw him on sale as a decorator arrow crab (Stenorphynchus sp.)
(After looking at both again I am now unsure. I was thinking it wasn't it was a decorator because the only photos I saw were red. But it may just be less exotic)

 

[Rjukan]

Finally found where to start this. instead of filling up the skip cycle thread. Gonna dump all of my decent photos here and use this for updates

Eventually I see this tank becoming an anemone only tank in a few years but I don't have room for any more tanks atm so this is it

(Yes it is dead, it came from the LFS and I imagine it died when they dipped it)

The hammer has been doing absolutely great and I swear I see a new polyp every day

What's in with the zoas? It's too big and fuzzy to be a zoa eating spider isn't it? Wild looking!

 

[moretor1]

What's in with the zoas? It's too big and fuzzy to be a zoa eating spider isn't it? Wild looking!

It is a zoa eating spider, it was long dead and half absorbed into the zoa. I ended up prodding it out of curiosity and I had to physically pull it off the zoa after crushing it on the plate

 

[moretor1]

Added another skunk cleaner shrimp. Actually properly acclimated this one and got a larger one so my pseudochromis can't pick on it too much

 

[moretor1]

Night 4(?) Coral and tank update

Caught my neon worm toadstool fully open tonight. Anyone have tips for getting phone camera to catch actinct and fluorescent light better? Using an s23 ultra

My duncan has finally started to open up well and the dead spot on the plug is getting smaller

I caught my neon worm toadstool fully opening its polyps up but before I could get a picture my Crab came running across the tank and scared it back inside.

Guess he just really likes to be in pictures

My yellow watchman goby has decided to make his home inside the slats of my upper filter intake. At first I thought he was stuck but I saw him run out and eat some floating food so oh well

One more photo of my shrimp because I love shrimp so much and they're what got me into the aquarium hobby in the first place

 

[moretor1]

Day 5

Skunk shrimp is doing ok
Got her to eat off my hand a bit but shes still a bit skittish. I was right to get a larger one because my pseudochromis did not appreciate the new creature in his area.
Luckily he isn't that aggressive, just territorial. I haven't seen him actually bite anything, he just scares them off

My arrow crab didn't seem too interested in her either but I'm 99% confident the shrimp could easily escape the crab if needed.

Noticing a bit of a bacterial/algae bloom on my rock, not that surprising as my phos is quite high and how new the tank is.
Will do a small water change tonight but overall I'll just let it sort itself out as I don't expect 1 to dominate the rock

Noticing more hitchhikers on my rock as the days go by. Mostly isopods and small snails. I absolutely love the microfauna as well. Hopefully there's enough small snails to sustain my hermit crabs. May pick some more up with my water tonight

Wish my gsp would come out. It was active in the first few days but I placed it in a bad spot where algae would land on it and when moving it I accidentally scraped the base a bit. Saw a bit of fluorescent light from it last night so I think it'll start opening up soon

 

[Gumbies R Us]

Glad the shrimp is doing good!

 

[moretor1]

Day 6 update

Remember when I said I was gonna wait a few months until getting another anemone? Well that was a lie

Picked up a condy today I might end up putting my corals in cups with holes tonight if he hasn't picked a spot yet. I got this one because of the purple tips. Any tips for these guys? I've heard they're basically the same as other anemones

 

[Gumbies R Us]

Day 6 update

Remember when I said I was gonna wait a few months until getting another anemone? Well that was a lie

Picked up a condy today I might end up putting my corals in cups with holes tonight if he hasn't picked a spot yet. I got this one because of the purple tips. Any tips for these guys? I've heard they're basically the same as other anemones

Nice looking anemone!

 

[moretor1]

Well looks like I'm going to take my psuedochromis to the lfs to exchange today

No matter what I do I cannot get him to leave my yellow watchman goby alone. I have taken my time to build a rock cave and seal every possible entrance from it just for it to dig under the rock to attack the goby

He only wants the goby's tail. Gonna exchange him for a pistol shrimp or something that isn't going to seek and destroy anything remotely similar to it

 

[moretor1]

So the LFS did not have any pistol shrimp in stock sadly

Had some other stuff to return including the fish so I ended up spending only about $30 and got a green bta

He did not want to get off the rock he was on at the lfs and after waiting ~40 minutes for him to move after relocating the rock I gave up and very slowly pried him off of the rock

I could see a gap in where he was holding it and slowly worked my finger nail under and slowly worked him up like a $70 sticker

I really waited so long because I didn't want to stick my hand in the LFS tank but they were starting to close and I know the owners decently well.

Plus the employee seemed more hesitant to handle the anemone than I was to stick my hand in their tanks

 

[moretor1]

Week 3(?) update
In the midst of a heavy ugly/bloom phase, not that I mind that much

If I notice cyano creeping on my coral I blow it off And that holds it back for a while. Just gonna let it do its thing while phosphate keeps going down

There's some good news, some bad news and some undecided

My gsp has finally started to open up again. Only the smaller outer polyps so far.
Is each polyp an individual organism or is it all one? Because the large center piece hasn't opened up yet or for a while. Guess we'll see

My hammer coral is not dead... yet. Since my help post it continued to recede for a few days before very slowly starting to make its way out
The only way I know its not dead is because every time I feed the tank it'll poop a few hours later
I've noticed that the skeleton will darken up depending on how far out the coral was. At first I thought it was the bone decaying but I noticed the dark lines that went to the top ended at tiny little polyps barely coming out.
It wasn't losing many polyps for a while but when it started to creep back out I noticed some would be dangling by the slime strings. I think they may have already been detached

I found my arrow crab today, unmoving and not responding. I moved him a bit and he has not changes position since. I'm hoping that it is just a molt, but with crabs it Is very hard to tell because they arent as translucent as shrimp

Ive noticed growth on my duncan and i think ive seen some on my toadstool

Here's the poor hammer coral, I believe the darker pigmented skin is where the mouth is hiding, entirely inside

I want to do a sniff test but I dare not take it out of the water for even a second

My bta is doing good. I think they look like little watermelons half the time lol

 

[moretor1]

Alas!
I have found out what my issue is with keeping LPS alive

I'm simply a moron who vastly underestimated their calcium consumption and needs

Been dosing kalkwasser for 3 days now and I'm back up to around 360ppm.

Started dosing magnesium as well. Don't have a test for it yet (coming Tuesday) so

I'm doing small doses but I am def noticing improvements in my gsp coloration as there was basically no green and all pink but now I see the green

 

[moretor1]

Finally got my calcium back up to normal levels (~420ppm) and am currently going through the mother of all phytoplankton blooms

Gonna let it be as it is because I move next week and my corals seem to love it

If it lasts over a month after I move I might consider a clam of some sort

I couldn't help myself with the recent riptide sale and got a couple frags at a great price

They've all opened up except the green people eater zoa but it was open in the bag so it'll probably be open in the next few hours

Look at how green it is!
Also can anyone tell if that is a new head or a hitchhiker on the macromussa?

 

[moretor1]

Going through a massive phyto bloom and getting towards the end of a 3 day blackout.

I got a refractometer that wasn't calibrated out the box.

I was super confused at first because it said I was way off but when testing with some rodi water it was at where -.02 mightve been

I calibrated it really quick to the rodi water and it was a lot closer to normal. Going to lfs to use theirs to calibrate mine in the morning

 

[moretor1]

Long time since last update but I finally have my tank under control

I went through a huge bacterial bloom that lasted about a little over a month. It was so bad that I couldn't see halfway into my tank through the worst of it

After trying consecutive WC's followed by a blackout. The answer ended up being a cheap 3w sterilizer bulb which undid months of growth in just under 4 days!

I lost my toadstool frag sadly and my gsp lost about 90% of its mass and all it's polyps (I suspect it survived though)

My other coral were very unhappy with all of them (except the ricordea) showing tissue recession and skeleton damage

From my understanding, without enough light they are unable to extract calcium through the water and they slowly atrophied

Now I have set up my circulation pump that I was scared of causing too much flow and thought it killed my hammers (I now know it was mainly magnesium)

With the increased flow it is slowly rearranging my sand bed but it's not blowing it everywhere.

It does kick up macro algae but the amount it decreasing and I am seeing much more and longer polyp growth on my corals

I don't know why I thought my measly 125gph pump was too much for my system, but then the suction cup broke on it so it went in the drawer and was used for mixing salt.
When I got my skimmer I took the long clip that came with it and attached it to the inside if the ball joint on the pump so it clips onto my tank divider

I have also increased my magnesium from 1300ppm-~1400ppm and am aiming for around 1420ppm (exactly .05ml on the syringe)

I have been trying to raise my calcium by dossing kalkwasser and it's a very slow process as it can easily raise my kh to >12° in this tiny tank. Now I dose about 460ml of tank water with about 1/6th of a teaspoon of kalk

Anyways thanks for reading this if you have and here's some pictures

 

[moretor1]

Heres a video I got showing the flow as it is now

 

[moretor1]

Got a Randall's pistol shrimp today!!

This Little guy came on a free piece of dead acropora that also came with a free Hawaiian feather duster and a bristle worm

I managed to pull it off the rock (after ripping it in half) and used the carcass as a freshwater shrimp snack

I cannot get any good photos as my white lights went out before I got home but here's what I got

He has since moved from the acro piece to my other feather duster and has dug himself a little burrow

 

[moretor1]

Haven't spotted my pistol shrimp today but I went to the LFS after dropping my girlfriend off and look what I picked up!!

I will be monitoring my pod population for a while, i might split the chaeto and put it in my other corner too

Dropped him in and he immediately went to work hunting the isopods off my glass and sand

I would love anyone who has success keeping mandarin dragonets in nano tanks to share their tips. I have a bunch of bio-balls in my return chamber that pods are also breeding in and I rinse my filter floss out in my display before dumping it but I wanna do everything I can to stay on top the pod population

He is a very calm fish too. Didn't even run from my hand when I was cleaning the front of my tank