Deep-water NPS biotope - pico style!

[biophilia]

This weekend I started a build I've been wanting to do for quite a while. The game-plan is to create a tiny, deep-water biotope featuring non-photosynthetic corals primarily from lower mesophotic zones in the Caribbean with a few exceptions.

My hope is that the tank will be somewhat unique, challenging, and an experiment in pushing the limits of what can be done with a small volume of water.

Equipment:
3.7 gallon "Imagitarium" Petco tank
Heater: Marina 25w (set to 74F) (Inkbird temp controller and cooling fan down the line)
Actinic-heavy lighting for about 5 hours per day (21ledusa.com)

Hydor Pico Evolution Mini 300gph
Jebao Dp-4 for dosing phyto, rotifers, various NPS foods every few hours -- as well as topping off freshwater and carbon dosing
Sharper Image wine bottle chiller to keep food reservoir refridgerated

Biological Media:
3/4 liter Siporax in back chamber for rapid ammonia processing (my understanding is this is equal to roughly 7 lbs of live rock)
1/2" inch CaribSea Fiji Pink sand (aggressively stirred up w/ each water change)
2.5 lbs dry Real Reef rock w/ a bit of live rock seeded from my established nano reef

Water Quality Management:
Weekly 2 gallon water changes using W/C water removed from my 10 gallon reef tank (typically ~5ppmm NO3, 0.03ppm PO4)
lanthanum chloride drip for PO4 control (has been working great on my very high-bioload 10 gallon mixed zoa/LPS/SPS/NPS nano)
carbon filter floss changed every few days
carbon dosing (vinegar) combined with silica dosing as needed for sponge growth.

Livestock:
Undecided. Tubastrea and Dendrophyllia for sure, probably a gorgonian or two (Diodogorgia?), Nephthyigorgia possibly, maybe some ornamental Porifera, maybe feather dusters
Lots of polychaete worms, brittle stars, copepods, and other benthic scavengers and detrivores as well as some snails and hermits for cleanup
Possibly a shrimp or two
(no fish)

Feeding:
Artemia nauplii + adults (I culture these already for my mixed reef)
rotifers (I culture these as well)
copepods (ditto)
Oyterfeast
PhytoFeast
cyclops
Reef Roids
frozen Mysis
maybe more?

 

[Kelso]

I already love this....

 

[biophilia]

Now that the basic game-plan has been convered, here's what I've done so far:


Stock 3.7 gallon tank:

The SpinStream nozzle is extremely bulky in such a small display footprint so I bored the return hole carefully with a drill and razor blade to hide the bulk of it in the return pump chamber:

Also made a little removable holder out of corrugated plastic to hold carbon filter floss:

Glued a piece of acrylic behind the lower portion of the "overflow" slots to get the water level higher and aid in surface skimming (I did this same mod on my Nuvo 10 AIO tank and am happy with it)

Hung the Siporax in my other tank to help colonize with bacteria:

 

[ndrwater]

This is going to be epic... Pun intended...
Keep the updates coming!!!

 

[biophilia]

Made a rock structure with lots of walls and a big overhanging cave/ ledge on top (dry Real Reef rock, epoxy and a ton of superglue)

Added 3/4 liter of Siporax to the back (this will be siphoned and stirred aggressively with each water change and periodically removed to clean further).
The benefit to such a small tank is that I can literally pick it up when full and carry it out to the kitchen to clean.

Added the sand and water (including two gallons from my other tank as well as a bunch of brittle stars, polychaete worms, copepods) as well as a small piece of rock and a handful of sand from my other tank. Now just waiting for things to clear up and (possibly?) cycle. At this point it will be a week or so before much happens so I'll be trying to figure out lighting. I'm hoping to do a directional source that is very blue and fairly dim for a dramatic, deep-water look.

 

[leahfiish]

Great start, following!

 

[Kelso]

any updates?

 

[biophilia]

any updates?

I have a 4 port Jebao dosing pump and a tiny Reef Glass Nano skimmer being delivered tomorrow so I'll post some pics once I get that set up.

I also ordered a light (9W 12" 453nm actinic blue ReefBar LED). From playing around with the AI Prime on my other tank, I think that's the spectrum that will look best as a dim, blue light suitable for an NPS tank. I got a dimmer with it because I'm guessing I'll end up running it at only 6W or so. It should be here in the next few days as well!

I've made a few changes to the general game plan... sorry about the giant wall of text w/ no pictures!

1. I upgraded the return pump to a Hydor 300gph because the flow on the 180 seemed too low.

2. I took the innards out of the SpinStream nozzle and superglued it permanently at an angle that makes a more powerful and laminar flow pattern which will be more suitable for gorgonians and other filter feeders.

3. I'm going to be running three lines from the dosing pump to the tank. The first will dose a carbon source (and kalk if needed) and function as a sort-of-ATO (the rest I'll top-off by hand for now). The second will dose a few mL every hour or so from an aerated bottle that will contain a slurry of phytoplankton, rotifers, Artemia nauplii, and maybe some copepods. I know those won't keep as a stable culture long-term and there will be lots of predation, so it's basically just going to be a tiny container that I'll be rinsing and refilling every couple days from the separate cultures I already maintain. I'm hoping this allows me to avoid having to set up a complicated stirring mechanism or refrigerated feeding system. The third line will pull an equal amount of water out of the tank each time the food culture is dosed and drain it into a waste jug. This way I can hopefully avoid salinity swings with such a tiny volume of water.

Finally, as for livestock, I have three Dendrophyllia heads in my other tank that I'll be putting into the pico as the first inhabitants -- along with probably a coral banded shrimp since those can be found at 140+ foot depths in the Caribbean. I'll be waiting to do that for probably another two weeks because I want to build up the nitrifying bacteria more first (basically just feeding skimmate and random food to the tank right now and dosing Dr. Tim's Eco-Balance every few days). Once I get things dialed in, I'll be adding the Diodogorgia, Tubastraea, and sponges down the line. Trying to take things slow, though (which is hard when I'm excited to get it going!)

 

[biophilia]

A few items came today.

I quickly ran into some space issues trying to get everything into the rear chambers. I ended up hacking up one of the two filter inserts that came with the tank and gluing about 1/2 liter of Siporax to it in a honeycomb pattern so as to use the space a little better. The Siporax has been in my other tank for almost two weeks so I did the work mostly under saltwater in a tray to avoid killing any of the colonized bacteria. The second filter insert is between it and the overflow and filled with carbon filter floss.

Everything fits!

 

[NY_Caveman]

A few items came today.

I quickly ran into some space issues trying to get everything into the rear chambers. I ended up hacking up one of the two filter inserts that came with the tank and gluing about 1/2 liter of Siporax to it in a honeycomb pattern so as to use the space a little better. The Siporax has been in my other tank for almost two weeks so I did the work mostly under saltwater in a tray to avoid killing any of the colonized bacteria. The second filter insert is between it and the overflow and filled with carbon filter floss.

Everything fits!

Interesting, any difference in flow through the return?

 

[biophilia]

Interesting, any difference in flow through the return?

It didn't seem to make any difference. I do have the 300gph Hydor turned down to about 60% until I get corals in and start experimenting with it, but even turning it up to 100% doesn't seem to have any restrictions.

 

[Devaji]

oh man this is very interesting! I love cool stuff like this. is fun to push the boundaries I think this is gonna be a sweet system.

 

[Dr. Dendrostein]

Awsome build thread. Thanks for sharing

 

[Dr. Dendrostein]

Is tank cycling

 

[hart24601]

Some clever mods. Can't wait to see it. I wish I had the dedication for NPS.

 

[biophilia]

Is tank cycling

The tank never truly "cycled" in that I've not seen an actual ammonia reading with my test kits, which I'm guessing is because the Siporax and some of the rock was in my really high-bioload nano for a few weeks before moving to this tank and 100% of the water has come from my other tank as well. At this point, I've been ramping up feeding slowly to build up bacteria and am currently feeding a squirt of Reef Nutrition R.O.E. and PhytoFeast daily and a few mL of Dr. Tims EcoBoost twice a week. I also have the dosing pump set up to top off freshwater with a little vinegar as a carbon source which is working surprisingly well. I have it tuned so that I haven't had to manually top off water for almost a week now. There are hundreds of copepods swarming the glass and lots of polychaete worms and micro brittle stars in the rocks so that's a good sign.

I had held off ordering a batch of NPS corals and sponges because I was out of town last week, but now will wait until next week because the vendor I'm using (Aquarium Depot) is in Florida and I want to make sure shipping doesn't get interrupted by Hurricane Michael. This weekend I plan to tackle getting the doser set up for feeding zoo/phytoplankton.

Another issue I've found - the 453nm light I ordered works pretty well for the low-light/actinic look, but makes it completely impossible to photograph the tank. I'm ordering some orange gel filters to see if that helps.

Slow going, but should have coral in the system by the end of next week...

 

[Dr. Dendrostein]

The tank never truly "cycled" in that I've not seen an actual ammonia reading with my test kits, which I'm guessing is because the Siporax and some of the rock was in my really high-bioload nano for a few weeks before moving to this tank and 100% of the water has come from my other tank as well. At this point, I've been ramping up feeding slowly to build up bacteria and am currently feeding a squirt of Reef Nutrition R.O.E. and PhytoFeast daily and a few mL of Dr. Tims EcoBoost twice a week. I also have the dosing pump set up to top off freshwater with a little vinegar as a carbon source which is working surprisingly well. I have it tuned so that I haven't had to manually top off water for almost a week now. There are hundreds of copepods swarming the glass and lots of polychaete worms and micro brittle stars in the rocks so that's a good sign.

I had held off ordering a batch of NPS corals and sponges because I was out of town last week, but now will wait until next week because the vendor I'm using (Aquarium Depot) is in Florida and I want to make sure shipping doesn't get interrupted by Hurricane Michael. This weekend I plan to tackle getting the doser set up for feeding zoo/phytoplankton.

Another issue I've found - the 453nm light I ordered works pretty well for the low-light/actinic look, but makes it completely impossible to photograph the tank. I'm ordering some orange gel filters to see if that helps.

Slow going, but should have coral in the system by the end of next week...

I went the cycling method. But filter medium was seeded with bacteria somewhat. Any way, kept an eye on NH3, used ammonium chloride to cycle . Should only need 5mL ,it turns out it can consume 24mL within 6-12 hrs. That's alot. Hopefully helps with feeding
Part of my food recipe has phyto feast. In food, now in a 5 gallon container I add Prime 20mL just in case.
Keep forgetting LR way to cycle

Also I ordered 20 dendronephthya, hope they come
Thanks for updates

 

[biophilia]

I went the cycling method. But filter medium was seeded with bacteria somewhat. Any way, kept an eye on NH3, used ammonium chloride to cycle . Should only need 5mL ,it turns out it can consume 24mL within 6-12 hrs. That's alot. Hopefully helps with feeding
Part of my food recipe has phyto feast. In food, now in a 5 gallon container I add Prime 20mL just in case.
Keep forgetting LR way to cycle

Also I ordered 20 dendronephthya, hope they come
Thanks for updates

Looking forward to reading the dendronephthya update!

I'd been considering adding a little Prime or Amquel to my feeding reservoir -- so glad to hear you're having some success with both that and the PhytoFeast. I'm really hoping to avoid having to culture phyto because of the extra hassle and equipment needed, so was hoping to just add a little squirt of PhytoFeast to the feeding reservoir every day or so to keep the live zooplankton in it fed and keep lots of extra phyto in suspension to feed anything in the tank that can consume it.

 

[Dr. Dendrostein]

Looking forward to reading the dendronephthya update!

I'd been considering adding a little Prime or Amquel to my feeding reservoir -- so glad to hear you're having some success with both that and the PhytoFeast. I'm really hoping to avoid having to culture phyto because of the extra hassle and equipment needed, so was hoping to just add a little squirt of PhytoFeast to the feeding reservoir every day or so to keep the live zooplankton in it fed and keep lots of extra phyto in suspension to feed anything in the tank that can consume it.

Culture small container pods, add very little raw egg. You'll get crazy bloom of pods, for feeding main take. Phyto feast should work, if not culturing phyto. Algagen has good products too

 

[Ranjib]

Awesome build. I love my imagitarium pico reef. Hope your one turns beautiful as well.
I am wondering if the high flow will make the siphorax less effective and cause aluminuum leaching. Another thing I am wondering is about the water pressure , which is lot less in pico form, and may be a factor for deep water corals in particular.

I am planning to take a similar journey next year , but I’ll focus on entry level sps only . I am considering using 12v dc pumps powered by with reef-pi for wavemaker, and couple of commodity grade dosing pumps for continuous water change .

Lessons learned here will be very valuable. Thank you for sharing the build details and I’ll look forward for updates