Matt's SCA 150 repair and redesign

[Matt Carden]

I added some Pajama Cardinals, some Trochus snails, an Astria snail, some various hermits including a blue leg and a scarlet, and a feather duster.
The Xenia definetely and the Daisy Polyps seem to be multiplying.

 

[Matt Carden]

I think I have a little case of dinos. I only have 2 fuge lights in my sump and that's the only place they are growing. I have yet to install a DT light and the display is pristine white rock still.
You can see the "strings" caught in the Polyps and around the frag base. These photos were taken after cleaning off most of the nest that was wrapped around the entire frag.

 

[Matt Carden]

Well it's been awhile since I've updated anything about my tanks startup progress so I'll try to do a recap. I started tank with 3 Chromis for Stingray Bay in Roseville, MI, a Kenya tree, Xenia, and Daisy star polyp from WWC and some live rock from gulfliverock.com .
The 3 Chromis died after about a week form unknown cause maybe stress. I went back to Stingray Bays and got 2 Pajamas and some snails and hermits and a piece of live rock. After about a week both Pajamas also died. All other livestock seemed to be fine except I found 1 empty hermit shell. The Xenia and Kenya were growing so the water couldn't be that bad so I decided to try fish again. I got 2 baby clowns and 2 Micromussa and a Candy cane from Tropicorium with some live rock from their tanks. After about a week 1 of the clowns died.

It is now 6 weeks later the remaining clown is still alive. All of the coral have been doing well with the Kenya and the Xenia noticeably growing. I think there are Xenia Polyps on the Daisy polyp frag downstream from the Xenia.

I had/have a bought of Dinos. I have done nothing except last weekend I manually scrapped all the dinos I could get to and filtered the water with a 10 micron sock. The bought is not over, there has been a build up on the glass under the 2 fuge lights.

I discovered Apstasia on the new coral frag plugs from Tropicorium. I have noticed that all of the LFS near me have had Apstasia in their tanks but the frags from WWC and AquaSD were clean and pest free. Both shipments I've had spanning 3 years from gulfliverock.com have had what appears to be some type of Apstasia like Anenome but in the first shipment they never seemed to multiply like traditional Apstasia. If I have an outbreak I will get a CBB. I want to get one anyway I just know I need a more mature tank to keep one.

I am working on my Display light. Hopefully will be done with that in the next few weeks then I can start stocking more coral!

 

[Matt Carden]

I really have been slacking on updating my build thread! I guess I'll start by posting new additions. I got a Finger leather, Toadstool, Kenya tree, 2 dark grey Ricordia mushrooms and a green Reicordia, an orange Discosoma(?) Mushroom rock with 4 shrooms and a red Discosoma single mushroom both supposedly from Vietnam. I have 3 flame Scallops and 3 cleaner shrimp. We got a starfish also from Vietnam. An Anenome (type unknown) who ate a Sea Cucumber i bought same day who split next day so now I have 2! We got a Royal Gramma Basslett, a Bicolor Angel, a Scopas Tang, a Flame Hawk, a yellow watchman, and a purple firefish.

Now for what we don't have anymore! Obviously the Sea Cucumber ate by the Anenome. I found the firefish apparently stuck(dead) in a hole in my rock. It seems like he got stuck because i had a hard time getting him out of the hole. Same thing seemed to happen to one of my Green Chromis. I haven't seen the Starfish for a few weeks and the Royal Gramma is MIA. The Flame Hawk did well for a couple weeks then turned pale white and died a week later. We lost the last Green Chromis. The yellow Watchman was MIA after a couple days. I have a not so perfect overflow net preventing fish from going down to my sump.

Overall the Anenome's seem to be doing well. The Clownfish seemed to bond with one of them for a couple weeks until 2 days ago. That same night that Anenome appeared to be one large bubble at night then back to normal next morning. The clown isn't back to be hosted so there must be an issue there.

The last of the Dino outbreak was removed a couple weeks ago. There is a brown algae continuing to grow but it is being kept under control by the Scopas and/or the hermits. My cleanup crew does such a good job cleaning that they seem to eat the rock it's so white when they move on. I have a recent cyano outbreak that started a couple weeks ago. It's not really bad so I haven't touched it yet and nothing seems to be eating it.

My 3 LPS haven't been doing the greatest. I suspected the Bicolor of nipping so I moved them to my Xenia Lagoon. The Acan's(?) seem to be doing Slightly better but the Candy cane is barely showing any color. I wasn't thinking about the chemical warfare of Leathers so I think I will start to run carbon to absorb the toxins maybe that will help.

 

[Matt Carden]

I find it so hard to update these days for some reason but here we go. We lost the Scopas, the firefish, Royal Gramma, 1 clown, the flame Hawk, all green Chromis, the Anenome, the 2 Acans, the Candy Cane, the Duncan, the Daisy Polyps, the orange Discosoma shrooms also lost a hitchhiker LPS Caribbean coral that came with my live rock.

The system has been cycling for 10 months. I am trying to not use a skimmer. I have not Changed the water since day one. I have not had any ALGAE outbreaks, only had 3 Dino outbreaks which I treated by manually removing and running filter sock for a day each time. Otherwise I don't run any form of artificial filtration. My fish/hermits/ snails clean the rock so well that the highest lighted surfaces of my aquascape are white from being picked clean.

I started running a carbon reactor about a month ago to remove toxins that may be released by the multiple softies I have. I planned on having a Xenia fuge as the second chamber in my sump after the return. It hasn't exactly worked out as planned but that's OK nature does its own thing. I added the Kenya tree to the Xenia chamber which has been dropping trees starting to takeover. The Xenia really hasn't grown off the frag plug. I bought a rock with feather dusters from SeaWorld in Roseville and added to the first chamber. They have absolutely exploded spreading into the second chamber with the Kenya and Xenia.

There are dark spots all over the rock and glass that could be the beginnings of Coraline growth. There are about a dozen small patches of what appears to be purple Coraline but not on the dark patches so maybe a different strain or something else .

There was an explosion of Pinapple sponges about 2 months ago. There are still some now but nowhere near as many as before. There are other growths that appear to be sponges. There is a hair like growth on most surfaces that appears to be spongelike.

My Ph has been running a little low according to Salifert around 7.8 everything else is on par. I did an ICP test recently and the only thing off was Aluminum was 120.

 

[Matt Carden]

My Scopas had an issue with his color shortly after introducing him. This persisted for a couple weeks then seemed to normalize. He would appear to be his true color while lights were on and when the lights were out he seemed to turn opaque? A couple weeks ago he appeared to be going through something again with his coloration . Also the Bicolor Angel seemed to turn white around his mouth and eyes. They were buddies from day one so could be related.

Two days ago I found the Scopas sucked up to the powerhead return.
I can't get a good picture of the Angel .

 

[Matt Carden]

I got a couple new additions over the weekend.

Alveopora
Halicheros Melanarus Wrasse
He came out Sunday and was chased back in hiding as they do by Blue my Bicolor Angel. Monday he was still hiding. Tuesday he was out swimming around with only one noticed chasing by Blue. All seems to be well today so hopefully we're good.

Blue has lost color in his face. I would say it's been at least 6 weeks since I first noticed along with the Scopas had discoloration in his skin. The Scopas died 3 weeks ago.

 

[Matt Carden]

It has now been 2 months since I noticed discoloration in my Bicolor Angel and Scopas Tang. The Tang passed but the Angel seems to be doing just fine. He constantly grazes and chases frozen when offered. We'll see how long he lasts?

The Halicheros Wrasse has several vertical stripes forming on both sides from mid body to tail. The seem uniform thickness and spacing so it seems like something natural? The stripes are like a fading of the horizontal stripes.

The Goni I got in the beginning of October '22 started sulking around the middle of last week.