ritter6788's 75 gallon sps
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ritter6788
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I take a lot of heat for keeping tangs in this tank and have had several over the years. I'm partial to blue hippos. This is the 3rd or 4th one I've kept in this tank over the years and it doesn't take long until they need more space. Behavior wise they always do well and never appear stressed or unhappy as everyone says they will. They don't get ich in my tanks either like everyone says they will. Blue hippos are very skittish at first but become puppy dogs if you take good care of them and they are parasite free. They eat a ton of food and always end up eating out of my hand after a short while. I think only a few tangs would do well for their lifespan in a 75 and blue hippos aren't one. This one was about the size of a quarter when I got it last summer and it's already pushing 4 inches. I found a home for this guy and he's on his way to a bigger tank. This one took all of about 1 hour to catch. He loves his nori!
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ritter6788
Coral Fraud Private Eye
Big changes!
Removed EVERY rock from the tank. Removed and chiseled every scrap of Acro I could see and dipped and moved to the frag tank. Removed and chiseled every nuisance paly, mushroom, vermetid snail I could find. Re-aquascaped the entire tank. The rocks are all a mass of caves and tunnels now. My royal gramma loves it! I'm leaving the tank Acro free for a month or 2 to starve out any remaining AEFW. It's hard looking at the tank with no Acros but I'm loving the new rock work and I am looking forward to be able to return the Acros. They all survived the dips and are looking great in the frag tank. Hopefully I'll be able to return them redbug/aefw free soon.
Removed EVERY rock from the tank. Removed and chiseled every scrap of Acro I could see and dipped and moved to the frag tank. Removed and chiseled every nuisance paly, mushroom, vermetid snail I could find. Re-aquascaped the entire tank. The rocks are all a mass of caves and tunnels now. My royal gramma loves it! I'm leaving the tank Acro free for a month or 2 to starve out any remaining AEFW. It's hard looking at the tank with no Acros but I'm loving the new rock work and I am looking forward to be able to return the Acros. They all survived the dips and are looking great in the frag tank. Hopefully I'll be able to return them redbug/aefw free soon.
revhtree
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My Tank Thread
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Sorry you had to do that but it things like this that get you excited about your tank again. It's nice to change it up!
TJ's Reef
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WOW! Gabriel that's quite an update. Huge undertaking I know all to well from experience (less the Red Bugs & AEFW's insert Mojano and Bubble Algae)
looking forward to seeing your new aquascape. Was this a SOLO affair or do you allow help...lol
I'm in the beginning process of building a new larger tank upgrade and will take advantage of the breakdown process to eliminate all of some invasive Paly's and any nuisance algae the Tangs cannot get to as well.
Cheers, Todd
looking forward to seeing your new aquascape. Was this a SOLO affair or do you allow help...lol
I'm in the beginning process of building a new larger tank upgrade and will take advantage of the breakdown process to eliminate all of some invasive Paly's and any nuisance algae the Tangs cannot get to as well.
Cheers, Todd
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ritter6788
Coral Fraud Private Eye
And it needed a good cleaning! Even with a BB tank there were spots of trapped detritus. The sps I have in there now are growing faster since I did a deep cleaning.
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ritter6788
Coral Fraud Private Eye
It was a one man operation. I got lucky and my wife was out of town for the evening. I got a ton of it done while she wasn't here to see the mess I made. I have enough coral scraps and live rock chips that one day scientists will swear that a reef once ran through East Texas. It took several days of work to remove all the live coral that I didn't want back in the tank. I even found a healthy blue acro colony that had fallen down in my rocks. I have no idea what it is or where I got it. Needs a bit of coloring up but a bonus.
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ritter6788
Coral Fraud Private Eye
I actually enjoyed it. Quite interesting to see what all is under those rocks that haven't been moved in years. One of them stank, bad. It must have not been getting any water flow. The new rock work has more space behind and no rocks are stacked like before. Every rock makes an arch or a cave. I actually have more liverock in the tank now than before. It's all hollow throughout the structure though.
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ritter6788
Coral Fraud Private Eye
Made a bridge across the rock islands I'm going to cover in chalices with my big toadstool in the back and my big clam in the open space in front.
I don't like iphone blue led pics so these are whites only so it's easier to see the rock work. I have some pukani rock bigger than basketballs in there.
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ritter6788
Coral Fraud Private Eye
I almost have the overflow covered in sunset monti. I plan on trying to cover the back glass in mystic sunset, sand dollar and whatever other encrusting monti I can find. I won't put them on my rock work anymore. Too aggressive and invasive.
Aquaph8
Love The Fish
Way to get in there and take it back man. It's not hard to understand what causes old tank syndrome when you see how much trapped stuff accumulates over time. Happier healthier things to come!
Mike&Terry
Wrasses, Angels, & Tangs, Oh My!
I am likin all the caves in your new scape and glad to see you took charge and removed your acros so you can rid your system of those nasty little parasites once and for all!
-Terry
-Terry
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You mentioned putting chalices together. Will they grow close together with each other or do they need a ton of space between each other like they do from other corals?
VB68
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Looking good. I've got some of that mystic sunset on one of my rocks. I have been scraping it off for months. Might try putting some on the overflow box, if you don't mind me borrowing your idea.
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ritter6788
Coral Fraud Private Eye
I've been at the lake and I haven't seen my tank in a week! I went home and checked on it last night and it's doing great besides needing a good glass cleaning and a ATO refill. When you see it everyday you don't always notice the growth. After being away from it for a week the corals have shown a ton of growth.
Thanks Brett. I'm thinking of doing a planned breakdown once a year or so after seeing the growth improvement of my sps after a good deep cleaning.
Thanks Chris. I had a good sized colony of MS but it started getting covered by rics. I removed it and gave most away. I'm starting over with a tiny frag now.
Thanks Terry! Hopefully I don't get any back in the system. I'll hopefully be red bug free also.
I'm not sure. I have 2 that are overlapping each other without issues. The others are smaller frags so I don't know how they will react once they grow closer together.
Thank you. I decided I was just wasting time by not doing anything about it. Having a good sized frag tank up and running has made this process 1000x easier.
Thanks buddy!
Thanks. I've always loved the colors of encrusting monti but they can be invasive. My sunset has killed a few Acros. The back glass or overflows is a great place for encrusting montis. If I didn't have some of the LPS I have and my clam, I would grow some on the bare bottom glass. I think that would look really cool too.
Thanks Brett. I'm thinking of doing a planned breakdown once a year or so after seeing the growth improvement of my sps after a good deep cleaning.
Thanks Chris. I had a good sized colony of MS but it started getting covered by rics. I removed it and gave most away. I'm starting over with a tiny frag now.
Thanks Terry! Hopefully I don't get any back in the system. I'll hopefully be red bug free also.
I'm not sure. I have 2 that are overlapping each other without issues. The others are smaller frags so I don't know how they will react once they grow closer together.
Thank you. I decided I was just wasting time by not doing anything about it. Having a good sized frag tank up and running has made this process 1000x easier.
Thanks buddy!
Thanks. I've always loved the colors of encrusting monti but they can be invasive. My sunset has killed a few Acros. The back glass or overflows is a great place for encrusting montis. If I didn't have some of the LPS I have and my clam, I would grow some on the bare bottom glass. I think that would look really cool too.
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ritter6788
Coral Fraud Private Eye
My chalice garden didn't last long. When I got back from a week at the lake the toadstool was open so big it covered most of the chalices. You could see one corner of the toadstool that was closed up, likely from the chalice stinging it at night. I redid it into a zoa garden instead. This, the ric garden and the ORA sinularia will likely be the only softies in this tank. I do plan on adding a rock on the bottom for an isolated patch of xenia, maybe. Not much better than pulsing xenia IMO. I scattered the chalice frags in various places. This is about all that is going in the tank until I can add Acros again. Still waiting!
I found Green Star polyps today sprouting up on a piece of liverock. I haven't kept GSP in my tank in years!
I found Green Star polyps today sprouting up on a piece of liverock. I haven't kept GSP in my tank in years!
