Petes 40 barebottom... Letting it all hang out!
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More sps are in now, and a few have lost the intensity they had in the 29. I had been feeding extremely heavily for a few weeks and finally broke down to dosing kno³ (stump remover). It has worked in increasing the nitrate, its now around 0.5ppm.
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The tank is having some issues with phosphate, and I have lost a couple nice pieces. I have moved some back to the 29 to save them. Its just going to take some more time to get everything settled down.
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A few of them were going downhill and looking bad and I lost interest for a while. Now they're recovered and looking great. The colors have improved quite a bit actually. I still don't trust it completely. I had forgotten to turn the air conditioning on during a hot week and the temp was up to 86°f a couple days. Some of the acro took a hit because of it. But within a couple weeks they have fully recovered.
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Dosing nitrate really turned this tank around. The cheato in the sump really seemed like it hadn't grown at all and all of the sudden my fuge was full. I had to trim back a ball about the size of a souvenir basketball. One strange thing about it was that its covered in coralline algea. Seriously, my cheato is solid pink!
I keep finding pics of acro that have lots of pale color between corallites and they look great. I have also purchased a few that are colored that way and it doesn't last. I'm just wondering what I could do to have that coloration. Maybe I need to cut back on my light cycle and see what happens.
The barebottom was really being a pain so I added 30 lbs tropic eden reef flake. I'm pretty happy with how it looks now, especially because I don't have to look at piles of detritus any longer. After a couple days I noticed the yellow eye kole tang was nowhere to be found. I figured he was hiding under a rock when I put the sand in and was buried alive. Total bummer for the poor guy. But oh well... it will give the hermits something to munch on and I shouldn't have to dose nitrate for a while. Six days went past and I went to change the aquascape. I picked up a rock and that tang shot out from under the rock all the way to the other side of the tank and BAM hit the glass. Poor guy was in time out for 6 days!!! He's just fine now, and acts like nothing happened other than not looking at me in the eye anymore. I figure with time he will get over it and once again like me.
I have moved over just about every sps I own, and they are looking good for the most part. I changed out the bulbs 2 weeks ago and a few are not liking the new bulbs, and others are. I guess the haters can just deal with it.
I moved the tank and just threw it back together. I'm really not happy with the scape, so I just put the majority of the corals in the sand. My phone takes really junky photos, but its all I have at the moment. Someday I will break out the dslr and get some decent pics.
Full tank
New guys
Just a little pe
I keep finding pics of acro that have lots of pale color between corallites and they look great. I have also purchased a few that are colored that way and it doesn't last. I'm just wondering what I could do to have that coloration. Maybe I need to cut back on my light cycle and see what happens.
The barebottom was really being a pain so I added 30 lbs tropic eden reef flake. I'm pretty happy with how it looks now, especially because I don't have to look at piles of detritus any longer. After a couple days I noticed the yellow eye kole tang was nowhere to be found. I figured he was hiding under a rock when I put the sand in and was buried alive. Total bummer for the poor guy. But oh well... it will give the hermits something to munch on and I shouldn't have to dose nitrate for a while. Six days went past and I went to change the aquascape. I picked up a rock and that tang shot out from under the rock all the way to the other side of the tank and BAM hit the glass. Poor guy was in time out for 6 days!!! He's just fine now, and acts like nothing happened other than not looking at me in the eye anymore. I figure with time he will get over it and once again like me.
I have moved over just about every sps I own, and they are looking good for the most part. I changed out the bulbs 2 weeks ago and a few are not liking the new bulbs, and others are. I guess the haters can just deal with it.
I moved the tank and just threw it back together. I'm really not happy with the scape, so I just put the majority of the corals in the sand. My phone takes really junky photos, but its all I have at the moment. Someday I will break out the dslr and get some decent pics.
Full tank
New guys
Just a little pe
OP
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OP
OP
Those SPS frags look sweet! Very healthy and colourful too
Thanks....
Dosing nitrate and having a small amount really turned this tank around. The colors are actually a bit off right now because I just changed out 11 month old bulbs haha. I'm sure they will be much nicer in a few months
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I'm using spectracide stump remover (potassium nitrate) and I can't remember exactly how much I used. I want to say 3 or 4 tbsp per 1 gallon rodi. I may have dosed a pint all together. A little goes a long ways. I tried to increase nitrate by feeding 8 times per day with no luck. All that accomplished was raising the phosphate level. While I was overfeeding nothing would grow. I would have to use the magnet about once a week during that time. I started dosing nitrate and the film algea was terrible! I could magnet the tank and see a haze within 2 hours. The cheato in the fuge exploded in growth during that time. Once the phosphate was consumed and the tank settled down I started adding the corals and they have been doing great. I really need to get some more fish to see if it will help. I still have not started removing the skimmate, and allow it to drain back into the sump. The biopellet reactor I have is still sitting here without ever having one drop of water. I really wanna do something crazy, like having 15 fish in this tank just because its biosystem can handle it. The only concern with this is overcrowding the fish and some becoming aggressive.
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Everything was starting to color up real nice and all of the sudden it went south fast. The tank is currently crashing. Lots of corals are having tissue loss. I changed 20 gallons on Saturday night and is still crashing. I really don't know what's going on with it
JMSKI333
Valuable Member
Was the alkalinity of the fresh salt water the same as your tank? That is a large water change and if the params weren't perfect, it could really speed things up for the worst.
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Adding the 1" of sand seemed to make a difference. Also the nitrate dosing helped tremendously. I can't exactly say what made it have a small crash a couple months ago, but I have my suspicions. I just did a few water changes and let it run its course.
