Pico Jar

[ragreefer]

Hi Everyone,

I am excited to start a thread here for my coral only 2 Gallon Anchor Hocking Jar that has been setup for almost 6 weeks. This is my first ever salt water tank, I have kept fresh water in the past.

Equipment:
2 Gallon Anchor Hocking Jar
Reef Smart Pico Pro Led Light
Reef Brite Led Moonlight
Cobalt 10W Mini Therm Heater
Ink Bird Controller
Hydor Pico Evo 100gph Centrifugal Pump

Rock:
About 2-3 lbs fully cured LR from LFS

Coral:
Sunny D Zoas
Everlasting Gobstopper Zoas
Green Bay Packers Zoas
Fire and Ice Zoas
Unidentified Paly
Meteor Shower Cyphastrea
Hammer
Rainbow Montipora
Green Acan Lord

Other Inhabitants:
3-5 Brittle Stars, and numerous babies as they have been spawning
3-4 inch Bristle worm
1 Trochus
2 Astreae
Baby snails from one of the above

Maintenance:
100% water change every 1-2 weeks
Reef Roids a few hours before water change

I decided on this setup due to its, hopefully, ease of keep. The Reef Smart light keeps evaporation to a minimal amount, which is very nice as I travel alot for work and dont want to have to worry about topping off. I hope to be able to go up to 2 weeks between water changes, but so far have only gone 6 days.

My aquascape consists of a big rock, with a smaller rock on top of it, ha. I actually dont like the aesthetics of it but I feel it makes my water changes easier, and I have plenty of space for coral.

I originally ran with an airstone for about 3 weeks, this did not create enough flow so it was switched to an 80GPH aquarium pump, then to the current Hydor. I had an algea outbreak around week 3, which the snails took care of quickly.

The Zoas are growing fast with multiple new heads on my first bought ones. The hammer seems happy, as does the acan, which has his feeders out nightly and greedily accepts spot feeding of Reef Roids. The cyphastrea has been moved a few times, I think I have him in his permanent spot now and hopefully it starts growing. The Monti, and other zoas are recent additions which will hopefully do well.

My LFS recommended removing the bristle worm, as he is too large for the tank and may start eating coral, what do you all think of this?

The tank survived its first unattended stretch as my wife and I went on vacation for 6 days, everything was fine except for a zoa frag that was knocked over, the trochus is the prime suspect.


FTS

Everlasting Gobstoppers with Unidentified Paly

Brittle Star Orgy on the night I setup the tank

 

[NY_Caveman]

Pretty cool! Welcome to R2R!

 

[damselindistress]

Sweet little set up - following along!

 

[reeferKen]

How do you get the reefsmart light. I'ts been saying preorder for a long time on their web page. Thanks in advance

 

[ragreefer]

How do you get the reefsmart light. I'ts been saying preorder for a long time on their web page. Thanks in advance

I emailed them and they had a few of their first batch left, its possible there are gone and they are on pre-order, they were very responsive so I would recommend reaching out.

 

[fulltang]

I'm thinking about setting up a jar almost exactly like yours. How do you like that pump, do you find it puts off a lot of heat on its own?

 

[Gw2kpro]

Hi Everyone,

I am excited to start a thread here for my coral only 2 Gallon Anchor Hocking Jar that has been setup for almost 6 weeks. This is my first ever salt water tank, I have kept fresh water in the past.

Equipment:
2 Gallon Anchor Hocking Jar
Reef Smart Pico Pro Led Light
Reef Brite Led Moonlight
Cobalt 10W Mini Therm Heater
Ink Bird Controller
Hydor Pico Evo 100gph Centrifugal Pump

Rock:
About 2-3 lbs fully cured LR from LFS

Coral:
Sunny D Zoas
Everlasting Gobstopper Zoas
Green Bay Packers Zoas
Fire and Ice Zoas
Unidentified Paly
Meteor Shower Cyphastrea
Hammer
Rainbow Montipora
Green Acan Lord

Other Inhabitants:
3-5 Brittle Stars, and numerous babies as they have been spawning
3-4 inch Bristle worm
1 Trochus
2 Astreae
Baby snails from one of the above

Maintenance:
100% water change every 1-2 weeks
Reef Roids a few hours before water change

I decided on this setup due to its, hopefully, ease of keep. The Reef Smart light keeps evaporation to a minimal amount, which is very nice as I travel alot for work and dont want to have to worry about topping off. I hope to be able to go up to 2 weeks between water changes, but so far have only gone 6 days.

My aquascape consists of a big rock, with a smaller rock on top of it, ha. I actually dont like the aesthetics of it but I feel it makes my water changes easier, and I have plenty of space for coral.

I originally ran with an airstone for about 3 weeks, this did not create enough flow so it was switched to an 80GPH aquarium pump, then to the current Hydor. I had an algea outbreak around week 3, which the snails took care of quickly.

The Zoas are growing fast with multiple new heads on my first bought ones. The hammer seems happy, as does the acan, which has his feeders out nightly and greedily accepts spot feeding of Reef Roids. The cyphastrea has been moved a few times, I think I have him in his permanent spot now and hopefully it starts growing. The Monti, and other zoas are recent additions which will hopefully do well.

My LFS recommended removing the bristle worm, as he is too large for the tank and may start eating coral, what do you all think of this?

The tank survived its first unattended stretch as my wife and I went on vacation for 6 days, everything was fine except for a zoa frag that was knocked over, the trochus is the prime suspect.


FTS

Everlasting Gobstoppers with Unidentified Paly

Brittle Star Orgy on the night I setup the tank

Cool setup! Do you have a pic from farther out that shows lighting setup, etc? Always like to see other builds.

 

[ragreefer]

I'm thinking about setting up a jar almost exactly like yours. How do you like that pump, do you find it puts off a lot of heat on its own?

At the start of summer I had some heat issues. I put 2 layers of airline tubing around the rim of the jar to raise the lid, and create an airspace, and pointed a fan which I have connected to the cooling output of my ink bird, at the gap. This kept the temp from going above 81.5. Outside of summer no heat issues. The increased flow is great too.

 

[ragreefer]

Cool setup! Do you have a pic from farther out that shows lighting setup, etc? Always like to see other builds.

Here’s a pic I just took of the right side, front, and the left side

 

[xxkenny90xx]

Love it! Did you decide to keep the bristle worm? Has it been behaving? Fwiw I'd recommend more frequent smaller water changes (but hey, don't fix it if it ain't broke).

 

[xxkenny90xx]

Here’s a pic I just took of the right side

Awesome! Anyway you could do a price breakdown of all of your equiptment?

 

[ragreefer]

Love it! Did you decide to keep the bristle worm? Has it been behaving? Fwiw I'd recommend more frequent smaller water changes (but hey, don't fix it if it ain't broke).

I actually ended up removing the bristle worm. But there are smaller ones still in the tank. The brittle stars as still doing great and reproducing, as are my snails.

 

[ragreefer]

Awesome! Anyway you could do a price breakdown of all of your equiptment?

Let’s see;
Light-$150
Pump-$15
Heater-$20
Inkbird-$36
Supplemental LED’s-$80
Jar-$15
Led mount-$15
2 light timers-$15

So that’s $346. I added the extra LED’s because I wanted sunrise/sunset, but they are not necessary.

 

[Gw2kpro]

Wow! That is really cool!

 

[Guy714]

Cool looking tank!

 

[brandon429]

Standing bravo for first round sps keepers that is really an artistic build

You have broken like nine reefing laws depending on where you get your rules from we think that looks like a top shelf happy pico. Truly with ongoing pruning and guiding that can be passed down generations because it's 100% accessible in all areas you'll always be able to have final say in what expresses

Those can be guided into very very old systems they never do unpredictable things

You arranged it where it already looks old to scale!

 

[fulltang]

Looks amazing. You're making me consider going sandless..

 

[ragreefer]

Standing bravo for first round sps keepers that is really an artistic build

You have broken like nine reefing laws depending on where you get your rules from we think that looks like a top shelf happy pico. Truly with ongoing pruning and guiding that can be passed down generations because it's 100% accessible in all areas you'll always be able to have final say in what expresses

Those can be guided into very very old systems they never do unpredictable things

You arranged it where it already looks old to scale!

Wow, thanks for the kind words!!

I had a scary battle with sea spiders a couple months ago, but besides that the tank has been great. I even put my first acro in a few weeks ago and am seeing growth.

 

[brandon429]

Make a YouTube video and put lots of common tag words you'll get a ton of views

 

[fulltang]

Make a YouTube video and put lots of common tag words you'll get a ton of views

Brandon, how do you feel about bare bottom jars like this from a practical standpoint, does it simplify things even more? For some reason I feel like the bare bottom looks good with this jar + lid/light combo.