ritter6788's 75 gallon sps

Trijer · Aug 3, 2012

Beautiful, what enjoyment you must get from that!

ritter6788 · Aug 3, 2012

Pkunk35 said:
Yes, those blue polyp populations are intense...how long did it take to cover that much of your rock?

Short of taking the rock out and fragging/scrubbing I can't see how you would get those polyps to specifically decline.

Honestly tho, I think it looks kinda awesome! hahah, its so not my tank tho...they do look like they are choking out some buttons.

I bought the original blue snowflake rock about 4 years ago. They really exploded last year when I switched to leds. The bad thing is that they are brooders and can pop up anywhere in the tank. You can't isolate them on a rock like GSP or Xenia. They release larvae that actually swim until they settle somewhere and form a new colony. I even have some in my sump. It's a pretty fascinating coral but they can take out sps. It's almost like they nuke themselves and take out the sps with them. I use a toothbrush to brush them back from the bottom of the sps. I read a thread about using fluke tabs to get rid of them but I don't have the guts to try it. They will also grow around some zoas like you pointed out but I've never seen them kill them.

Trijer said:
Beautiful, what enjoyment you must get from that!

Thank you. It's loads of enjoyment when everything is going smoothly.

Aquaph8 · Aug 3, 2012

Happy Birthday Gabriel, your tank is looking awesome. The fluke tabs work but they were really hard on snails and shrimp IME. They take out the cloves, xenia and GSP in no time though.

ritter6788 · Aug 3, 2012

Aquaph8 said:
Happy Birthday Gabriel, your tank is looking awesome. The fluke tabs work but they were really hard on snails and shrimp IME. They take out the cloves, xenia and GSP in no time though.

Thank you Brett! I remember reading your thread about the fluke tabs. I may get brave and try it one day.

ritter6788 · Aug 16, 2012

I got this thumbnail of a frag last year and it's the slowest growing thing ever. It's looking like it's getting ready to take off finally though. It was given to me as a Crazy Purple Efflo. I've never heard of it anywhere else except from the guy that gave it to me and I'm not sure where he got it.

I need some of that good R2R MOJO to get this thing growing!

This was it when I got it.

This is it last night. It just recently sprouted the branches. It's been slowly encrusting.

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revhtree · Aug 16, 2012

Looks like it's taking off now! Congrats!

Pkunk35 · Aug 16, 2012

Interesting that it encrusted so much before it decided to branch up. Maybe the blue polyps influenced that?
Great PE on him, looks nice!

bige · Aug 16, 2012

That's cool. That thing has really grown.

ritter6788 · Aug 30, 2012

This isn't my horrible photography, it's Coralline algae. I had a few spots here and there but after a weekend vacation the front glass was almost completely covered.

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Loki · Aug 30, 2012

Nice tank! Even if the glass is terrible lol

ritter6788 · Aug 30, 2012

Loki2902 said:
Nice tank! Even if the glass is terrible lol

Thanks! It's clean now I just forgot to take a pic after all that scraping.

ritter6788 · Sep 6, 2012

After seeing the thread about the organized stand earlier I decided to take a pic of mine. :xd:

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Pkunk35 · Sep 6, 2012

My favorite is the power strip suspended in air. Been there.

ritter6788 · Sep 25, 2012

Did some rearranging and rebuilding and I'm finally getting the tank back like I want it. I can't for the life I me keep montiporas in this tank and I can't really pinpoint why. Several of them looked damaged after the tank move but had healed up nicely for the most part. The only monti left in my tank is a sunset and it's growing and colored up nicely.

I'm in the process of switching up my dosing. I've been dosing baking soda in my ATO for years now and recently dosing calcium with a BRS dosing pump. I'm changing it out so the alk will be dosed with the pump and the calcium with the ATO. I'll eventually get dosing pumps for all of it but for now I figure this will keep the tank the most stable.

I've decided that with the blue polyp invasion that a full blown sps reef will be impossible in this tank so I'm going with the ultimate mixed reef. I added a monster sinularia colony and have plans for an anemone coming soon.

Pics are coming later today.