"Dropout" 10 Gallon Nano
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Makena95GT
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Alrighty. Updating the thread.
Marley the clownfish jumped again. But this time did not survive. It hit me pretty hard.
Went to Aquatek and found nothing. Then swung by Nikos Reef and ended up with a Royal Gramma and a Yellowtail Damsel :3
FTS from about a week ago. I have since also built an auto top off!!! Whoooooooooooooooooooo!
Anywho. The two new finned additions are playing nice now. At lights out they both went into the rockwork to sleep and right when the actinics came on this morning they emerged.
After I order my new LED light I think my next project will be to get a new powerhead, probably the new RW-8 and see how that works out.
Just so were all on the same page as to how this tank has progressed..
One year ago August 2013:
August 2014:
Marley the clownfish jumped again. But this time did not survive. It hit me pretty hard.
Went to Aquatek and found nothing. Then swung by Nikos Reef and ended up with a Royal Gramma and a Yellowtail Damsel :3
FTS from about a week ago. I have since also built an auto top off!!! Whoooooooooooooooooooo!
Anywho. The two new finned additions are playing nice now. At lights out they both went into the rockwork to sleep and right when the actinics came on this morning they emerged.
After I order my new LED light I think my next project will be to get a new powerhead, probably the new RW-8 and see how that works out.
Just so were all on the same page as to how this tank has progressed..
One year ago August 2013:
August 2014:
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Makena95GT
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Birthday pics.
Lights on.
Actinics only
Update on my new duo. Seems like the Royal Gramma is the agressor with these two. Throughout the day they both swim around, but are shy to me still. When the white lights go off the return to their hidey holes behind the rockwork. And the Royal Gramma chases the Yellowtail away from his area.
Fed frozen mysis to them and the nem. They didnt clearly eat.. since they both swam away to hide. But ill give them another fasting day then try again.
I did do a 20% water change finally. And this prompted my Tuxedo Urchin to start spawning. Dirty freak. Idk if pics do his dirty deed justice but I tried..
So yeah. Im aware theyll spawn under severe stress.. But all parameters are fine. I know the salinity of my new batch of water was spot on at 1.025 but when poured I got that weird swirly mixy water you get when you mix two different salinties together. Which I didnt worry about. The tank read 1.026 yesterday so I firgured that out oretty quick. The sudden salinity change might've rustled his jimmies
Lights on.
Actinics only
Update on my new duo. Seems like the Royal Gramma is the agressor with these two. Throughout the day they both swim around, but are shy to me still. When the white lights go off the return to their hidey holes behind the rockwork. And the Royal Gramma chases the Yellowtail away from his area.
Fed frozen mysis to them and the nem. They didnt clearly eat.. since they both swam away to hide. But ill give them another fasting day then try again.
I did do a 20% water change finally. And this prompted my Tuxedo Urchin to start spawning. Dirty freak. Idk if pics do his dirty deed justice but I tried..
So yeah. Im aware theyll spawn under severe stress.. But all parameters are fine. I know the salinity of my new batch of water was spot on at 1.025 but when poured I got that weird swirly mixy water you get when you mix two different salinties together. Which I didnt worry about. The tank read 1.026 yesterday so I firgured that out oretty quick. The sudden salinity change might've rustled his jimmies
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Makena95GT
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Hapoy birthday to me. I turned 21 and spent the day going back and fourth between fish gallery and nikos reef deciding on corals.
Ended up with a frogspawn from Nikos for dirt cheap.
Yellow colored Zoas
And bright green zoas from fish gallery.. that havent ooened just yet
Also forgot to announce that last Thursday I fragged some polyps from my Green Bay Packers zoas..
Im thinking about buying some frag plugs or waiting till I do my fuge and have rubble, and fragging some zoas for people. Just to see if I can do it. My GBP have been growing almost on the underside of the disk they are on
Ended up with a frogspawn from Nikos for dirt cheap.
Yellow colored Zoas
And bright green zoas from fish gallery.. that havent ooened just yet
Also forgot to announce that last Thursday I fragged some polyps from my Green Bay Packers zoas..
Im thinking about buying some frag plugs or waiting till I do my fuge and have rubble, and fragging some zoas for people. Just to see if I can do it. My GBP have been growing almost on the underside of the disk they are on
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Makena95GT
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Fragging station.
Me being the lazy person I am, I ordered some cheapo frag plugs on ebay. Theyre super bulky -.- next time I'll just go to the store. I also ordered a tiny frag rack but I know theres no way these plugs will fit on it lol I might be able to dremel the plugs down to fit but that seems like a bit too much work for me.
Anywho.. finally fragged the Green Bay Packers for the frag swap.
All done. 10 frags of varying sizes depending on how well I could get my blade under the polyps. Ranging from one head to 10. Ill probably keep the one polp frag just so I can watch and document it grow.
Fun times when I have time to do things before work!
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Makena95GT
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Light should be here hopefully before I go in to work tomorrow at 5!! Whooo! I am a little scared because ill be gone all day saturday and dont want the new light to cook my corals just bevause I accidentally started it off too bright. Eek.
Frags are looking good and opening up
Mother colony is doing well too! Yay! My Royal Gramma and Yellowtail Damsel are becoming less shy as well
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Makena95GT
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Yesterdays FTS
My nem is throwing a fit and hiding behind the rocks today. So im going to take a wild guess and say I managed to mess up the salinity again as hes the only one who responds to my stupidity lol
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Makena95GT
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Sad to say I ended up getting rid of the nem. He was unhappy and seemed like if I left him in there hed die and take everything out with him. But hey.. more room for corals now!
My light finally came in amd boy is it heavy! Too heavy for the original light stand I bought.
So me being me I improvised with a metal lid.meant for a reptile cage. I removed my HOB filter for the time being till I can either dremel/cut slots for this lid or find a new stand/hanger for the light. I live in an apt so I cant hang from the ceiling. Ill probably have to DIY something. Maybe go to Lowes later to check out the conduit and price things.
As if now I used that lid.. which is leaning because of the ATO bracket and superglued a sropper to keep the light from sliding off.
So now the light is literally sitting a few millimeters from the water -.-
I have it on the lowest setting possible and it still seems brighter than the old ghetto lights :3
And omg when I played with the blues.. amazing.
Blues and whites/reds/whatever other colors both at 100%
Blues 0%.. whites 100%
Blues 100%.. whites 0%
Bith at lowest setting
Gawww them colorsss
Just blues on lowest setting
Idea of how close the light is to the water
Ill take a pic of hos I have the light sitting. Aside from my hanging issues im super happy with this giant light. Itll be useful even if I upgrade :3
My light finally came in amd boy is it heavy! Too heavy for the original light stand I bought.
So me being me I improvised with a metal lid.meant for a reptile cage. I removed my HOB filter for the time being till I can either dremel/cut slots for this lid or find a new stand/hanger for the light. I live in an apt so I cant hang from the ceiling. Ill probably have to DIY something. Maybe go to Lowes later to check out the conduit and price things.
As if now I used that lid.. which is leaning because of the ATO bracket and superglued a sropper to keep the light from sliding off.
So now the light is literally sitting a few millimeters from the water -.-
I have it on the lowest setting possible and it still seems brighter than the old ghetto lights :3
And omg when I played with the blues.. amazing.
Blues and whites/reds/whatever other colors both at 100%
Blues 0%.. whites 100%
Blues 100%.. whites 0%
Bith at lowest setting
Gawww them colorsss
Just blues on lowest setting
Idea of how close the light is to the water
Ill take a pic of hos I have the light sitting. Aside from my hanging issues im super happy with this giant light. Itll be useful even if I upgrade :3
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Makena95GT
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K.. im scared out of my mind but im using the hanger. Maybe im just paranoid. Left the lid on there in case it does fall. And I dont have the arm extended all the way. I think ill get a couple feet of conduit and reinforce it so I feel better lol
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Makena95GT
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Got to visit KimP and Bigsby on the way home from San Antonio and came home with a few things. Got what I need to build the net top from KimP and my first acans!!
From Bigsby I aquired some Cany Canes and BamBams. Whooo colors!
I did notice some bleaching from my birdsnest frag so I moved it to the sandbed and also decided to remove the 90 degree optics from the LEDs I dont mind light spillage. I think it looks neat
Also started moving my corals to their semi final positions. This is the green side
Middle yellows (must find moar yellow corals)
Left reds
FTS
More pics:
ALSO
I got new frag plugs and a little cheapo "coral propagation kit" from ebay. And uhh when recharging my purigen I totally used dishwashing fluid instead of bleach cause the bottles looked similar.. so I tossed that and just got a bag of Phosguard
From Bigsby I aquired some Cany Canes and BamBams. Whooo colors!
I did notice some bleaching from my birdsnest frag so I moved it to the sandbed and also decided to remove the 90 degree optics from the LEDs I dont mind light spillage. I think it looks neat
Also started moving my corals to their semi final positions. This is the green side
Middle yellows (must find moar yellow corals)
Left reds
FTS
More pics:
ALSO
I got new frag plugs and a little cheapo "coral propagation kit" from ebay. And uhh when recharging my purigen I totally used dishwashing fluid instead of bleach cause the bottles looked similar.. so I tossed that and just got a bag of Phosguard
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Finally went and got a little $3 hacksaw and the corner pieces to make the screen top.
During the time from removing the old top a few days ago and making this one.. Royal gramma jumped out and died -.-
But I also devided to get what I needed to build something more proper to hang the lights with.
Finished product above. I think it looks so much more clean. I may paint the shelf and componets black. But of course id need to buy some paint first
so thatll come in the next couple of weeks. It feels really solid and I did it all myself so im stoked.
During the time from removing the old top a few days ago and making this one.. Royal gramma jumped out and died -.-
But I also devided to get what I needed to build something more proper to hang the lights with.
Finished product above. I think it looks so much more clean. I may paint the shelf and componets black. But of course id need to buy some paint first
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Makena95GT
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FTS
The whole shabang
Red People Eaters
New zoas. Need to ID
Older shot of the RPEs with the cinnamon grandis paly
Acans and Xenia
Green Bay Packers frag
GBP colony
More new zoas. Greenish blue. Need to ID
Scavenging hermit
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Makena95GT
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Holy rockscape, Batman!
Guess who has two thumbs and finally used an hour of her life to make my rocks look less like a boring pile? This kid.
The further two rocks on the right are puttied togetger. As we speak im squishing up some more to attach the right portion of the "bridge" to the top right rock. It looks super sketch in the photo, but I wigfled it and it didnt budge.
But better to be safe than sorry.
Been battling cyano even with purigen and phosguard. And somenof my zoas look meh, so tonight will be the start of my half dose chemi-clean treatment. Im too scared to do a full dose.
Will have two air pumps running with limewood stones for a week. Then dropping to just one air pump for a nother week to be super safe. Id be devistated if I lost my Watchman Goby or Urchin. The damsel.. meh lol
So dosing tonight, water change in two nights, and hope all goes well.
Been getting 0ppm for nitrates and less than 1ppm for Phosphates on the API kit. So we'll see how this goes
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Makena95GT
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Thanks guys! But of course all good things never last long with me.
Im not sure if it was the ChemiClean treatment (was only a half dose for about 30 hours) or some sort of physical trauma but my Tuxedo Urchin (Larry) is injured. He has what appears to be a hole in his side. Yesterday he was up near the water line right after the water change spewing all his manly stuff everywhere, and I didnt think too much of it till I have him a good look over today.
The photo makes it look much deeper than it really is. He hasnt dropped any spines and hes still holding his hat of camo shells. He does seem a little lethergic today, at least when I just got home at 2pm
He wasnt waving any of his feelers around. I thought he mightve been a goner but after I ramped up the lights a bit he started waving all his feelers around like normal, but he doesnt appear to be actually moving anywhere.
If I didnt know any better I would say it looks like hes breathing. I guess if you could imagine what a ball would look like taking a small long breath then letting it out. But I could just be seeing things.
Question is.. would it be better for me to keep him in the display tank with frequent water changes to help him out, or set up a small 2-3ish gallon Critter Keeper isolation tank for him? I dont want to stress him out further by moving him but hes my favorite invert.
All the crabs and the shrimp appear fine. Same with my lone snail. Fish are also good and eating
Im not sure if it was the ChemiClean treatment (was only a half dose for about 30 hours) or some sort of physical trauma but my Tuxedo Urchin (Larry) is injured. He has what appears to be a hole in his side. Yesterday he was up near the water line right after the water change spewing all his manly stuff everywhere, and I didnt think too much of it till I have him a good look over today.
The photo makes it look much deeper than it really is. He hasnt dropped any spines and hes still holding his hat of camo shells. He does seem a little lethergic today, at least when I just got home at 2pm
He wasnt waving any of his feelers around. I thought he mightve been a goner but after I ramped up the lights a bit he started waving all his feelers around like normal, but he doesnt appear to be actually moving anywhere.
If I didnt know any better I would say it looks like hes breathing. I guess if you could imagine what a ball would look like taking a small long breath then letting it out. But I could just be seeing things.
Question is.. would it be better for me to keep him in the display tank with frequent water changes to help him out, or set up a small 2-3ish gallon Critter Keeper isolation tank for him? I dont want to stress him out further by moving him but hes my favorite invert.
All the crabs and the shrimp appear fine. Same with my lone snail. Fish are also good and eating
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Makena95GT
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I had a dream that I had to put my urchin down. Literally woke up crying. ***.
Thankfully as of last night and this morning hes still kicking it. I put some seaweed near him. He decided to wear it.
Working on making a fresh batch of SW today for a little mid week water change. Ive been up at work since 4am, so itll be a struggle to stay awake
Thankfully as of last night and this morning hes still kicking it. I put some seaweed near him. He decided to wear it.
Working on making a fresh batch of SW today for a little mid week water change. Ive been up at work since 4am, so itll be a struggle to stay awake
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Makena95GT
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Urchin is still with us.
I stopped by PetCo for crickets. And because apparently the food ive been feeding my reef fish and betta.. has been expired for two years. Eek.
Got new NLS pellets. I was going to get the fancy marine formula but I like being able to have one food for bith my reef and Betta.
I also FINALLY FOUND IT. A curly cue anemone!!!! Ive been looking for one sincei found out my pistol shrimp will host it or vice versa.
For $6.. yea.. I got it. Jesse swindled me into getting a fighting conch as well. His name is Sheldon. Im uploading a video of how stoked the shrimp has been since he saw the nem. Its awesome to watch.
I stopped by PetCo for crickets. And because apparently the food ive been feeding my reef fish and betta.. has been expired for two years. Eek.
Got new NLS pellets. I was going to get the fancy marine formula but I like being able to have one food for bith my reef and Betta.
I also FINALLY FOUND IT. A curly cue anemone!!!! Ive been looking for one sincei found out my pistol shrimp will host it or vice versa.
For $6.. yea.. I got it. Jesse swindled me into getting a fighting conch as well. His name is Sheldon. Im uploading a video of how stoked the shrimp has been since he saw the nem. Its awesome to watch.
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Pistol Pete Meeting His New Friend: Pistol Pete Meeting His New Friend - YouTube
I have NO idea what hes doing spinning his antennae in the nems tentacles. Hes never come out of his hidey hole before till today so this is interesting to watch.
Also going to do daily documenting of my battle with this area/rock.
To get a foothold I got API Marine Algaefix. I tried removing as much as I could by hand and scrubbing yesterday so it def looks better. Another water change is in order for the weekend.
I have NO idea what hes doing spinning his antennae in the nems tentacles. Hes never come out of his hidey hole before till today so this is interesting to watch.
Also going to do daily documenting of my battle with this area/rock.
To get a foothold I got API Marine Algaefix. I tried removing as much as I could by hand and scrubbing yesterday so it def looks better. Another water change is in order for the weekend.
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Makena95GT
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Sheldon the Fighting Conch
Pete (Pistol Shrimp) decided he loved the new nem so much.. hed yank it into his hole.
Its really cool to watch. Theres not a ton of info or people that seem to have these two guys in their tank. I guess cause the nem isnt super pretty. But I have never gotten to see a symbiotic relationship like this so in my eyes its amazing. It made me sit back today amd realize what a cool little thing I have going in the corner of my room.
Most people only get to see stuff like this on TV. I get to watch it every day right before my eyes. How cool is that??
Oh.. and a hermit crab that is not afraid to climb..
