Jar of Rocks

[Tokash23]

Its full power and currently sits about 8 inches from the water. The lid i would imagine reflects a good bit of light which is why i moved it closer but it hasnt made a difference for that torch. Nor did having it in the shade for awhile either.

 

[Tokash23]

Dang stuff looking pretty bleek this morning. The cyphastrea is awfully pale, my mushroom in way pinched up it hasnt looked like that in awhile, zoas are clammed up completely, and my torch is ticked as usual, and if im not mistaken my water looks a little cloudy. Could the new additions have caused a bacteria bloom of some sort?

As much as i like this new jar im considering moving back to the smaller one things dont seem to have adjusted very well.

 

[Tokash23]

Back in the office this morning the new cyphastrea is completely bleached (could be a goner i dont know) i just tucked it under some shade maybe too much light im not sure. The acan still has color and looks ok from what i can tell, they arent really plump per se but they look ok i am going to try and feed and do a water change later today. Torch ofcourse is always looking crappy i moved it to some shade as well it had been in the same spot for over a week and its looked worse everyday. Even the mushrooms look shriveled this morning. I am at a loss for what i could be doing wrong...

 

[brandon429]

Agreed on water change, run the light partial blocked like we did a while back for a month is my recommend. Reduce light by about 40% sustain a month even if they seem better in a week

if this is office reef how can you rule out cleaners being sprayed

 

[Tokash23]

100% no cleaner sprayed around the tank. Its my office and i clean it myself with like the lysol wipes n such. So should i reduce light by raising it or putting something over it? I have white tissue paper i could use to put on the light, but that seems like it reduces the light by a ton tank looks really dim. Maybe i could start with that then gradually remove the tissue paper over a months time span.

 

[brandon429]

I like black electrical tape strips over the lid

 

[brandon429]

This is my planted tank at work, see how liquid electrical tape was painted over half the lights, even my planted tank required 60% block to scale down to size of tank

 

[Tokash23]

Ok interesting so if i tape off the ill put tape directly on the light should i focus on taping off mostly the white and colored LEDs?

 

[brandon429]

Leave more blue than white is best but reduce overall after the new water

 

[brandon429]

One other minor detail for the future: any new bowl is a new wash of sand, moving sand among tanks without full reset is risky due to upwelling of waste compounds

it seems counter productive to tap rinse but it’s not, we must do it with any tank transfers for total safety. Reducing light after new water is a nice safety move for this setup, low light is most likely help after all new water is in place

 

[Tokash23]

Hmm i didnt do that i was wishing that i did but when i swapped the jars out i was in a time crunch. When i do my water change i will more or less do a fully rip clean to reset and get the light dimmed down. Maybe i can bring this thing back around.

 

[Tokash23]

Did a full rip clean it has all new completely rinsed sand and clean rock. Took the time to add some air line suction cups to hold the air line in place hopefully that helps distribute the flow some more. I felt that before i had hardly any flow at the front of the jar. I also taped off the a few of the leds on my bulb to reduce the light a bit. The cyphastrea has to be a goner i dont see any sort of glow or color to it and its completely white. I kept it in there just in case im wrong and it trys to make a recovery but im not holding my breath. Heres to hoping i get this thing turned around!

 

[brandon429]

wrangled back into shape, the acan is looking better and glad it survived, I think you took good measures here to coax it back now with extra feeding + half water changes / cpr

 

[Tokash23]

Thats exactly the plan i fed it this morning it had a response to the mixture or rods coral blend and some reef roids added just for kicks. 100% new water and i think going forward ill feed on day 3 after water change then again on water change day with about a 50-75% water change.

Do you think i taped off enough of the light? Also i remember last time i did a rip you told me to add a small amount of food to reintroduce protein into the water, should i go ahead with that or leave it?

 

[brandon429]

yes lets add a little agreed. so handy on the small systems, we can't over pollute since a catch up change is so so easy and fast.

light looks great, we brought it down to a practical degree lets see how they do now this week. nice pico CPR!

 

[Tokash23]

I hope so its tough not to get discouraged especially when i burn 25 bucks on a coral and it dies in 4 days lol. Oh well theres a learning curve i guess.

 

[brandon429]

its pricey but the fact the others keep surviving and that's only first true loss really speaks small details. you don't have poisoned water, bad feeding, bad pH etc or they'd all succumb

testing for that stuff with today's approximation kits wouldn't give much better insight than the pics and known history...after all, each water change are the params that match up from that particular brand of water, and they're all ok to reef with no matter slight variations.

I bet that light was it/those par's are a real directional cannon I bet this w help

 

[Tokash23]

I hope so. I have been thinking for awhile it was a light thing and i moved it up and down and never really saw any sort of positive effect. This is the first time i have actually taped it off like this so we shall see what happens. I agree on the water issue because other stuff has hung on throughout the last few months (i set the tank up in my office in October) just looking rather poor but hanging on none the less. Ill post back at the next water change to let you know how things are progressing.

 

[Highway reefer]

Interesting read.
I have a suggestion for a fish, that you possibly could keep in your jar.
Discordipinna griessingeri.
I had 3, some 10 years ago, with my first attempt of keeping a reeftank. The moment I put them in the tank, was the last time I ever seen them.
when I gave up, and cleaned the tank. They where al 3 alive under the rock work, that was about a year later, the tank was 50 liter

 

[Tokash23]

Just looked it up thats a cool looking fish. Not for $100 beans though lol i am way to cheap for that. Would love to put a clown goby in there or a war paint. Maybe a blenny of some kind but my LFS hasnt really had anything of the nano/pico variety lately. Really dont think i can fit a hippo tang in this tank