My Foray Into Reefing In The Mountains

[TheShrimpNibbler]

How's your tank coming along? Haven't seen an update in a while. I hope everything is good.

I updated my build thread earlier today, so you can check that if you want. I would give you some more details here, but I don’t want to get your thread off track.

 

[Ippyroy]

My tank is doing pretty good still. Most of the hard green algae is gone and coraline is beginning to come in. All of my fish are doing good and seem happy. I will be testing NO3 and PO4 tomorrow after I do my water change of about 15% in the morning. I have around a dozen corals showing up tomorrow afternoon. A few montis, plating and encrusting. I also ordered a couple of birdsnest. I am excited to get these new corals in.
My fuge is really growing like crazy. I need to harvest a lot of chaeto tomorrow. My temp swings have gone down, but I am having problems with the BRS controller drifting. My Apex temp is correct, but the BRS controller was off by 1.5 degrees today. I will BRS tomorrow if I have a chance. i have finally dialed in my skimmer. Lots of dry nasty stuff coming out. Hopefully my NO3 and PO4 are good. I almost have my ALK dialed in as well as my calcium. I will start testing my magnesium this week.
The $35 washing machine I purchased might wash a single sock at a time. It is not capable of washing a filter sock. Not even close. I might keep it to wash tshirts and underwear this winter.

 

[TheShrimpNibbler]

Wow, things have really turned around! I’m glad to hear that everything seems to be going right. Be sure to post pictures of your new corals when they get here.

 

[Ippyroy]

Here are some pics of my tank and my new corals.

 

[Ippyroy]

I added a new light to my tank. I am now running 2 Kessil a360we. I am starting them off at 30% intensity and will increase them by 10% each week till I am at 60%. All of the new corals are still on the bottom. I made a quick frag rack out of egg crate to stop the snails and crabs from burying them. They all seem much happier. I need to order something to mount them on the rocks. Super glue won't cut it for a few of them because of where I plan on mounting them.
My PO3 and NO4 are still good. My Alk is being used at a .5 DKH daily. The coraline is barely growing but it is there. I have a bunch of vermitid snails. They are all over my Alien Candy Cane. I will be breaking them off this weekend. Hopefully that will help it grow.
Because of the already cold weather I am not able to order anymore livestock; therefore, I will not be ordering my larger tank until March or April. I would go nuts looking at a 120 gallon tank with 4 fish and very few corals.

 

[Ippyroy]

I had a small mishap when doing my water change and I got my EB832 wet and it has been offline for a week. My new one should arrive on Tuesday. I will do an entire reset of Apex. I will also be setting up my control board for it and hang it up on the wall. This was the original plan, but I was waiting till I went down to only one job, which is 3 weeks away. Buying a new EB8 32 changed that. I will take it apart and I hope I can clean it and get it to work. I need a second one for my other tank anyway.
All of my fish are doing good minus the Yellow watchman goby which is MIA and presumed dead. I am not thrilled with some of my new corals from AquaSD. There was some STN on a couple but they look much better now. A lepro is looking horrible and I am pretty sure it won't make it. A couple of the montis also look questionable. None of them looked great from the beginning. I will not order from them again. All of my Zoas and Palys look awesome and are growing like crazy. I need to remove a rock from my DT and pu it in my sump so that the zoas can go lower in the tank now that I have increased the lights.

 

[TheShrimpNibbler]

I had a small mishap when doing my water change and I got my EB832 wet and it has been offline for a week. My new one should arrive on Tuesday. I will do an entire reset of Apex. I will also be setting up my control board for it and hang it up on the wall. This was the original plan, but I was waiting till I went down to only one job, which is 3 weeks away. Buying a new EB8 32 changed that. I will take it apart and I hope I can clean it and get it to work. I need a second one for my other tank anyway.
All of my fish are doing good minus the Yellow watchman goby which is MIA and presumed dead. I am not thrilled with some of my new corals from AquaSD. There was some STN on a couple but they look much better now. A lepro is looking horrible and I am pretty sure it won't make it. A couple of the montis also look questionable. None of them looked great from the beginning. I will not order from them again. All of my Zoas and Palys look awesome and are growing like crazy. I need to remove a rock from my DT and pu it in my sump so that the zoas can go lower in the tank now that I have increased the lights.

I hate to hear the bad news about the eb8 and corals, but I don’t doubt that you’ll get it straightened out soon enough. I would love to see some pics of any of everything, including the controller board once it’s set up.

 

[Ippyroy]

I installed to new EB8 32 and cleaned the old one so I now have two. I also mounted everything in a place where nothing will get wet. I am debating on a false wall to hide the cables and building a cabinet to hide the sump since I will not be upgrading until the Spring at the earliest and I can't take it much longer.

The coraline algae is beginning to come in nicely. I scraped off the rear glass. My zoas and palys are takiong off nicely, their rock should be covered soon.

I got new refracto juice in and the old stuff was off. I am currently trying to elevate my SG. It was down to 1.023, not horrible, but not good. I am slowly adding about a 1/2 gallon of 40 to the tank once and hour three times. After I get it back to 1.026 I will test my Alk and Calcium.

 

[Pkunk35]

Watching as I have the same tank, but wow I wish I had that sump.
Nice job on that algae battle! Thanks for sharing!

 

[Ippyroy]

Watching as I have the same tank, but wow I wish I had that sump.
Nice job on that algae battle! Thanks for sharing!

The plan was to upgrade this month but I am wore out from this summer. The town and park set records for visitors. It is still going full bore with no end in sight. Plus the cold weather came early. It is below freezing almost every morning for the last 7 - 8 weeks so I can't safely order anything alive until May probably. I would hate looking at an empty tank for months. So I think I might build the stand this winter and hide the sump. That way I can the new tank in April and put it up and have it running in no time.
I really like the tank. It looks great and is solidly built. I am currently running 2 Kessil a360 we. Good luck with your tank!

 

[Ippyroy]

My new corals are all on the bottom. Here is a quick pic.

 

[Ippyroy]

I just got the Sicce SDC 9.0 return pump and the Neptune Trident. I will calibrate the Trident on Tuesday morning. I might swap out the return pumps tonight. It will be so nice to have a pump that is not so oversized. I also got a couple of BRS dosing pumps to go along with the Neptune Dos. The Dos will be for Alk and Calcium, and the BRS pumps will handle the Magnesium and Tropic Marin part C. I have decided to do the BRS/Tropic Marin Balling method. I need to change from soda ash to Sodium Bicarbonate. My PH is staying at 8.3 and I am going though .6 to .8 DKH every day which causes my PH to raise over 8.4. I have been manually dosing so I will see what happens with the DOS before I make the switch.

My Pygmy Cherub jumped out of the tank last week. He was my favorite fish. I have not seen the Yellow Watchman Goby for a few weeks so I presume he didn't make it. I have a Firefish, a Linespot Wrasse, and a Hawkfish coming in on Tuesday. Should be a fun busy weekend.

 

[TheShrimpNibbler]

I just got the Sicce SDC 9.0 return pump and the Neptune Trident. I will calibrate the Trident on Tuesday morning. I might swap out the return pumps tonight. It will be so nice to have a pump that is not so oversized. I also got a couple of BRS dosing pumps to go along with the Neptune Dos. The Dos will be for Alk and Calcium, and the BRS pumps will handle the Magnesium and Tropic Marin part C. I have decided to do the BRS/Tropic Marin Balling method. I need to change from soda ash to Sodium Bicarbonate. My PH is staying at 8.3 and I am going though .6 to .8 DKH every day which causes my PH to raise over 8.4. I have been manually dosing so I will see what happens with the DOS before I make the switch.

My Pygmy Cherub jumped out of the tank last week. He was my favorite fish. I have not seen the Yellow Watchman Goby for a few weeks so I presume he didn't make it. I have a Firefish, a Linespot Wrasse, and a Hawkfish coming in on Tuesday. Should be a fun busy weekend.

Sounds like things are going great besides the Pygmy angel. I’m sorry to hear that you lost it. I’d love to see pictures of everything once the fish come in.

 

[Daniel@R2R Verified Admin]

I just got the Sicce SDC 9.0 return pump and the Neptune Trident. I will calibrate the Trident on Tuesday morning. I might swap out the return pumps tonight. It will be so nice to have a pump that is not so oversized. I also got a couple of BRS dosing pumps to go along with the Neptune Dos. The Dos will be for Alk and Calcium, and the BRS pumps will handle the Magnesium and Tropic Marin part C. I have decided to do the BRS/Tropic Marin Balling method. I need to change from soda ash to Sodium Bicarbonate. My PH is staying at 8.3 and I am going though .6 to .8 DKH every day which causes my PH to raise over 8.4. I have been manually dosing so I will see what happens with the DOS before I make the switch.

My Pygmy Cherub jumped out of the tank last week. He was my favorite fish. I have not seen the Yellow Watchman Goby for a few weeks so I presume he didn't make it. I have a Firefish, a Linespot Wrasse, and a Hawkfish coming in on Tuesday. Should be a fun busy weekend.

Sounds like you've got some nice new toys!! Sorry to hear about the cherub. It sucks to lose any of them but especially a favorite.

 

[Ippyroy]

I now have the Trident controlling the DOS for Alk and Calcium and the BRS 1.1ml dosing pump for Tropic Marin part C. I am still doing a 15 - 20% weekly water change. My original SPS coral, I think it's a cats paw, bleached a little. It seems to already be getting better. I didn't dose anything for 3 days to figure out how to dose. I lose about .65 dkh a day. I am dosing 24.4 mls of soda ash and calcium chloride along with 48mls of Tropic Marin Part C.

I now have a Line Spot Wrasse. I just set up the Wyse PanCam and watch my tank while at work. Everything is going pretty good. Had a slight hick up with my skimmer. Had to clean it very good and now it dry skimming like a champ. I will test PO4 and NO3 today. My fuge is still growing chaeto and ulva beautifully. I am starting to see more pods in it.

I am currently running the tank at 421 Calcium, 9 Dkh, and 1350 magnesium. I dose magnesium by hand.

I will be attaching the corrals permanently this coming weekend. All of the new ones other than the lepto look good. My tank is a lepto killer for sure. I will not another one.

 

[Ippyroy]

Finally got sg to 1.026. Deep cleaned half of my sand bed. ORP is up around 300. Fish are all looking good. Trident is doing good. Have to dose magnesium and need to bring up my calcium a bit. It is around 300. Trying for 321. All is stable at 9.0.
Here are a few pics.

 

[JayinToronto]

Thanks for sharing your build and being honest about your trials and tribulations. Seems like you are on a good path now! Good luck!

 

[Ippyroy]

It has been a while. I made my first LARS mistake shortly after the last update. I didn't harvest my chaeto. Don't make this mistake. It caused a large GHA outbreak. It was below zero for most of October and November so I couldn't buy more CUC. The GHA steadily took over. I also started having something grow on the bottom of the rocks. I think it was chrysophites. Ugly nasty stuff. I did dose some more pods. I switched to only dry food and hooked up the Avast Marine Plank Auto Feeder. I cut my lighting down to a total of 6 hours a day and ramped down the intensity. This cause m=a couple of my Acros to get mad and die. The GHA started to become prolific. In early December I pulled each rock out and scrubbed it in the water from the water change and put back in the tank. NO3 and PO4 stayed steady the entire time, which was near 0 but we all know that was nothing but a lie. They were hiding in the GHA just biding their time. My tank looked really pretty for almost a week. Then the GHA came back. It was not happy with me. It choked out my Montis and killed my favite. I cut the feeding down in half and started dosing MB7. Two capfuls a night everynight for 2 weeks. After the 2 weeks I learned I was supposed to turn off the skimmer for 5 hours after dosing. The Chrystos had mostly gone away and the GHA stopped getting worse so I just kept on dosing it at 2 capfuls once a week. The chrstos came back in plague like fashion. Those things are really gross looking. Waving snot. I decided that I would finish the job once for all. I bought a bottle of H2O2. I once again scrubbed every rock outside of the tank. This time I used a stiffer brush. I was determined to be rid of these things. After scrubbing them I sprayed them down really good with the H2O2. Back in the tank they went. Corrals were all mad and angry. I bet the zoas would have spit on me given the chance. I then dosed Flucanazole. I now have very little GHA and no Chrystos. Instead I have a nice plague of what I think is Dinos.
The lesson I learned is to take your time and swing the hammer lightly at one problem at a time. Don't take a jack hammer to a finishing nail.

 

[fishguy242]

looking good..only 2hrs left..!!!

 

[Ippyroy]

looking good..only 2hrs left..!!!

I can feel my bed calling me. I can't wait to get my scope and find out what I have now. I am almost certain it's dinos. I am hoping they are the kind I can beat by adding silicates and growing diatoms to beat. Hopefully I can get an ID quickly tomorrow. After the dinos are done it will finally be warm enough hopefully to buy a new CUC. I am just don't want the GHA coming back before then.
It's almost fishing season and I didn't touch my fly rod at all last year. The river is calling and I must go.