Smite's 180 gallon

[Smite]

I've added diffusers to all my radions, also added a 5th. I've turned the lights down after I realized my par was 750+ in some areas. Now most of my tank is in the 300-550 range and everything has responded well. I've also backed off my whites. Its now AB+ with no modification @ 75%
Current FTS
DSC_0598

Unnamed Tenuis from TGC. Showing some blushes around the new growth.


Vivids 4 Loco making me waaaaiiiiiiittttt for recovery. Seems like its been a year since it originally bleached on me. Slight signs of happiness now.


ASD Doomsday Center, My StrangerThings acropora top right, hot pink millepora bottom (sold from RRUSA as rainbow but never seen it. Why I'm trying it super low now)


WD starting to branch out for me. Looking good for a "daylight" picture too

 

[Smite]

Lost 2 pieces while getting rid of bryopsis and most lost some of their pop, some turned completely brown. Something in reeflux my tank didnt like. After doing a few water changes its starting to color back up and come around. The ReefFlux worked and my bryopsis stayed gone. I've got a few stragglers of aiptasia hanging on but the nudis are at work.



I've added a few fish:

Exquisite back in the tank

Pencil Wrasse

RedHead Solon Fairy Wrasse

Yellow Fin Fairy wrasse

Pintail (died from fear of the larger fairies)

Copperband Butterflyfish was eating great in the store but my tangs are spooking him. Trying a few homemade feeders with no luck so far. Also trying live black worms shot into the rockwork but he shows no interest.



I've lost 5 pintails in my attempts to keep them. I'm thinking that will be my last attempt. Once i get a group of bartletts anthias or lyretails I'll be done adding fish.



Anyway, here are a few pictures of some of the fish in the tank:

Lineatus is officially the boss of the tank. Looks like this most the day, pretty awesome.


DSC_0633 by matthew schueneman, on Flickr



Yellow Fin Fairy Wrasse





Pencil Wrasse





Solon Fairy Wrasse





RIP Pintail



Blue Star Leopard Wrasse
DSC_0643

Yellow coris
DSC_0644

Blonde Naso
DSC_0628

Scopas
DSC_0627

 

[Smite]

My tank hit a major slump for the last few months. Lots of ongoing rtn/stn issues. Elevated nutrients and low ph. Still battling them today but overall the health of the tank seems to be improving. I've started tracking my parameter using the moonshiners guide/elements and ATI ICP tests. I've also swapped from my g3 pros to a 72" giesemann spectra fixture running 3x250w radiums and 4 ATI blus plus bulbs. I really love this light and the natural look it puts out. Much quieter than the 5 g3 pros fans running all day as well. My wife prefers the whiter spectrum and my sticks seem to as well so far. I believe the moonshiners method is playing a major role in that as well though. Hopefully in 6 months time everything will have leveled out and filled in some. For now a few pictures with my phone radiums+t5s

 

[CoralWealth]

looks good!

What is low ph and high nutrients? What were your readings?

 

[Blackice615]

Naso is looking great also

 

[Smite]

looks good!

What is low ph and high nutrients? What were your readings?

Still stuck 7.7-7.95 with a recently calibrated ph probe.

Nitrates 26-28ppm
Phosphates 0.2

 

[Smite]

Naso is looking great also

Thanks, I love naso tangs. He's a gentle boss of the tank, keeps everyone in check.

 

[Smite]

I removed my "bridge" from the rockwork. It was shading the tank a bit too much and giving it a dark look. The tank is responding well to the mh lighting and moonshiners trace element program. I'm getting nice growth now. I do miss my blue LED viewing and am trying to find a way to work that back into my system cleanly.
I was stressing with this whole COVID shutdown and rehomed a good amount of my coral to a fellow reefer, in preparation for breaking down. I've changed my mind and am planning on riding it out for now.

Current FTS:
20200329_080851

I'm considering retrofitting some noopsyche k7 pros between my mh reflectors for blue ramp/viewing if i can do it without permanently altering the fixure. If not, I'll be looking into a supplemental bar but that's gonna take away from the esthetics of this fixture.

 

[Smite]

Quick top down video of my tank. Reflections pretty intense but some of these pieces are looking pretty good.

Soundtrack - Mayday the AB snoring featuring two chaotic kids

 

[Smite]

I have some ebay all blue led strips showing up next week. I'm looking forward to seeing some blue only on some of these pieces. I'm hoping the super actinics plus the blue strips are gonna really make the tank pop during all blue.

Vivid's Orange Crush is looking pretty promising in daylight

 

[Smite]

Got some Ebay all blue led bars mounted to the spectra. Also picked up a coral filter for my phone. Stuffslooking good

 

[lilchris_357]

Looking pretty awesome. I love your selection of fish, it seems we have the same taste in fish. The Lineatus looks awesome. You said he's the boss of the tank, is he a bully? I heard when they get bigger and established they can become a bully. Great job on your tank! I know this COVID pandemic was life changing but glad you chose to stick it out as this hobby can take the stress of our everyday worries away. Last question, what's the moonshiners trace elements program?

 

[Smite]

Looking pretty awesome. I love your selection of fish, it seems we have the same taste in fish. The Lineatus looks awesome. You said he's the boss of the tank, is he a bully? I heard when they get bigger and established they can become a bully. Great job on your tank! I know this COVID pandemic was life changing but glad you chose to stick it out as this hobby can take the stress of our everyday worries away. Last question, what's the moonshiners trace elements program?

Thanks lilchris!
The lineatus and my exquisite wrasse really had to battle it out for a bit. Eventually the lineatus came out on top. He wasn't a bully but there would be a chase here and there and he would flash towards lights out. Unfortunately he disappeared on me about a month ago. I have a lid but searched under and behind the tank anyway and found nothing. I know they don't have the longest lifespans and he was already super male so it's possible he just passed or tried to jump and injured himself and got taken care of by my cuc.

I'm very glad I kept the tank running at this point. Hopefully numbers level off and our economy can start to repair itself while maintaining social distancing.

Reefmoonshiners has a great facebook group. If you go to Andre's reefmoonshiners website he has a guide to reef keeping for free that explains his method.

In short, it's based off a ATI ICP test. You send one in, add your results values into his calculator and it tells you how much of each trace element needs to be dosed and over how many days. He also sells trace elements, vitamins, liquid mud and now amino x from his site.
I always thought I was good on traces due to running a calcium reactor but many of my elements were depleted. A few weeks in on corrections and daily trace elements and some pieces that were dormant seem to have gotten unlocked. Now a few months in my tank is very happy. He is also the one who helped me figure out my low ph issue. That it wasn't due to cow in the home but to too much organic/inorganics in my water column. Ran carbon and got an immediate improvement.

Worth checking out for sure.

 

[Smite]

I call this one Toxic Waltz.

ASD Doomsday (front) & Reef Pets Ultra Violet (rear)

Millepora from TGC. I want to say it was called levitation? The teal polyps are coming back. This ones near the bottom, up top it was all pink

 

[Smite]

Got some fire from my LFS, drip and dip only to realize I have no glue!

 

[Capital J]

Tank is looking good dude. What are the frags you picked up?

 

[Smite]

Tank is looking good dude. What are the frags you picked up?

Thank you.

Those are no names. Just came in from Indo, my LFS gets amazing pieces in but they don't use the proper lights to show them off, they are just flesh colored under his lights. Took his word for which ones had color and was surprised when I got home!

Here's one I scored 2 years back in the 35 dollar rack, no color just liked the growth. Looks just like RR Shazam now to me. Top left is a tenuis from there I got last week all bleached out.

 

[Smite]

Mmmmmhhhmmmm

Favorite contrasting groups

Forget the name of these blastos

Happy clowns

 

[Smite]

Top down video of the tank from today. White noise is loud so probably want volume off.

 

[Smite]

This tank is going to be taken down soon so I wanted to get a few pictures incase everything goes wrong lol. I'm moving down to a 75g peninsula for ease of maintenance and to focus on higher end acropora. This is my first time trying to edit images with lightroom with RAW images. What a difference, these are very close to what these pieces look like under AB+.
Bizzaro Cyphrastrea

Pink Gonipora

Wild piece I've had for a while. Very hard to capture it's color

My Shazam knock off - I call it Kablowee. Why? IDK it makes sense to me

A millepora that just sold. This thing used to be hairy as can be, hpefully the next owner can get that going again.

My PC Rainbow has such cool yellow tones to it. Green on the backside where there is less light

Extremely vibrant wild piece. Love the blue rim contrasting the neon green base.

Daylight picture of my new RRU Rainbow Blossum

Another wild piece. The flesh color is a trip. I just love skinny polyps, cant wait to see what a colony of this looks like. Just bumped this up in par to see how it reacts.

Another wild piece Smite's Lure

Wild Piece, Smite's PsychoHoliday

Now, if I can figure out how to edit under royal blue led this will be awesome. I'm not sure why my snails and rockwork look like paintings, maybe that has something to do with the raw image or the camera settings?

Anyway happy reefing!

Matt