Naturehold's 60 Gallon Cube (First reef tank build)

[NatureHold]

Update. I am battling diatoms and what I think are dinos at the moment (new tank syndrome I suppose). I've started skimming less to hopefully up my po4 count. I checked last week and it was at .02.

On the plus side, my tank produced its first little speck of what looks like coraline algae. Pic attached.

My monti is bouncing back. I moved it down about 6 inches in the tank and had great PE the next day. Color is coming back as well.

 

[member 99594]

Update.

RMA'd the noisy dry side of the mp10 back to Ecotech. They did a great job with walking me through the process and had a new dry side to me in 3 days total. Big time Kudos to Eco.

Anyways. I ended up getting an 18x18x16 3-chamber trigger systems sump as the dual baffle sump that came with the tank was very subpar. Re-plumbed everything to accommodate the new sump and i'm very happy with it so far. I dumped a nitrite brick into the fuge and am waiting for the tank to cycle to add chaeto and pods.

The wiring for the full neptune setup was an absolute nightmare and I still have to setup my trident and DOS pumps. There is probably about 150+ feet worth of cable that I am managing right now. But I am happy with the clean "wireless" look so far after adding in some cable management conduit. My top off is run from a 5-gal bucket from the adjacent stand, as well as a waste bucket for the trident.

I started the nitrogen cycle last week with turbo start and Dr. Tim's ammonium chloride. Had 0 ppm ammonia on Tuesday of this week but still high in nitrites and no nitrates yet. Dosed a second round of ammonia up to 1.5 ppm to force feed the bacteria again. Hopefully will be close to cycled by next week or so. Really excited to get fish and clean-up crew.

Pics attached... tank is dirty, but you get the point

How many lbs of rock is that?

 

[NatureHold]

How many lbs of rock is that?

Hindsight being 2020, too much. But I did the pound per gallon. It Is right at 65 to 70

 

[member 99594]

Hindsight being 2020, too much. But I did the pound per gallon. It Is right at 65 to 70

I am looking at doing a scape with Marco rock. Do you think 55lbs would be enough? 5lbs of one side flat for a base and build the NSA scape on that?

I will probably put marine pure in the sump too.

 

[NatureHold]

I am looking at doing a scape with Marco rock. Do you think 55lbs would be enough? 5lbs of one side flat for a base and build the NSA scape on that?

I will probably put marine pure in the sump too.

How big is your tank?

 

[member 99594]

How big is your tank?

60cube. But I have the corner overflow.

Worst case I go back and grab 10 more lbs

 

[NatureHold]

60cube. But I have the corner overflow.

Worst case I go back and grab 10 more lbs

If you do live sand and have media in the sump I'm sure you'll be fine!

 

[member 99594]

If you do live sand and have media in the sump I'm sure you'll be fine!

I’m going to use the ocean direct sand.

 

[NatureHold]

That's what I used. Good choice!

 

[member 99594]

That's what I used. Good choice!

I used it on my 80 Gallon Lagoon.

 

[Nigel35]

Incredible Tank! Love the Clowns. Keep us posted!

 

[NatureHold]

Incredible Tank! Love the Clowns. Keep us posted!

I will post some FTS tomorrow. My tank is still going through the ugly stages sorting everything out. I have a mix of GHA and Bubble algae at the moment. I waited a bit too long to bulk up on CUC so they are playing catch up chowing down in GHA.

On the plus side my coral are all happy and growing.

 

[NatureHold]

Here are some update pics on the corals. I have added a RBTA, a few different types of zoas, 2 additional maricultured SPS colonies (still coloring up, excited to see what they turn out to be) a flame hawkfish, a small gold brimmed bristletooth tang, a crap ton of CUC (should have been done a long time ago), a green bubble coral, rhicordea shroom, peppermint shrimp, and a small hector's goby. The Goby came with a small nano tank that I bought, and I felt sorry for him being in a tank with no skimmer and proper lighting. So I drip acclimated and dropped him in.

As you can see from the pics, I am battling bubble algae, bryopsis, and some unknown type of green algae. I have another thread up in the nuisance algae page trying to get an ID on it. Definite lesson learned, I am almost 100% sure that these algaes all came in on frag plugs; cut all of the corals off of the frag plugs and reglue to new plugs before going into your DT!!! I dipped all of these corals in reef dip, but I guess that is does not kill algae.

Other than the temporary uglies, all corals seem to be happy and growing and the tank overall is doing well. I was able to save my montipora that I thought I toasted with too much light. It bleached, but after lowering it, it slowly came back and is starting to encrust.

I did lose my cherry limeade millipora (maricultured) and a small unknown named acro frag. They just never really did well in my tank like some of the others and slowly degraded to the point of STN. I suspect that the maricultured frag was a toss up anyways, but it sort of bothered me that I lost the other unknown acro frag as 2 of the other frags I got from the same seller are doing fine, have encrusted, and are growing.

I was also today years old when I learned that acans will eat hermit crabs. I was a little worried about the outcome, but it seems that it is doing fine lol!

 

[Jenuvio]

Cubes are awesome. Check mine out!

 

[NatureHold]

My oh my. What a difference dosing Vibrant for a month has made in my tank. The only negative effect i have seen, is that i had some tiny instances of cyano pop up and one of my larger SPS frags (tricolor) did brown and pale quite a bit. That could be from also moving it up too high too quick. Not sure. Attached is an updated full tank shot.

Also the tank has started growing coraline algae rapidly. I have little specks all over the tank! I am starting to actually become proud of the tank because it's no longer just a glass box full of algae lol.

 

[NatureHold]

I almost forgot to add in my loss of fish.... My male clownfish went carpet surfing a couple weeks ago suddenly. I had never seen him so much as dart across the tank much less jump... I dont know if something startled him at night or what, but that was pretty depressing. I noticed a slight decline in the female's energy after her mate suddenly disappeared. I also noticed that the flame hawkfish had started becoming more aggressive towards her and would nip at her occasionally. I finally caught the flame hawkfish a few days ago (now a sump lord until I can rehome him). She ate fine all the way up to when I found her dead on the sand bed yesterday. My CUC had already started picking it her, but I could find no obvious signs of Ich, flukes, or other outwardly apparent signs of illness. The bristletooth, hawkfish, and goby, still appear to be fine with no signs of illness.