Zibba's Reefs -- ADA 90P & Envision 100g
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zibba
Valuable Member
Thanks Henry!
Fish update: The Orchid Dottyback looked strong but Royal Gramma wasn't looking good this morning when I was floating the bags -- it was face first in the corner of the bag and breathing heavy. I slowly acclimated them to the temperature and salinity (former owner's water was at 1.020 and my QT is set at 1.024). The Royal Gramma was really spastic right when I added it to the QT, then just stayed in the corner and continued to breath really heavy. I'd give him a 10% chance and really hoping it pulls through.
Really bummed out about it, it's a beautiful fish. The dottyback looked and acted just find the entire time.
Fish update: The Orchid Dottyback looked strong but Royal Gramma wasn't looking good this morning when I was floating the bags -- it was face first in the corner of the bag and breathing heavy. I slowly acclimated them to the temperature and salinity (former owner's water was at 1.020 and my QT is set at 1.024). The Royal Gramma was really spastic right when I added it to the QT, then just stayed in the corner and continued to breath really heavy. I'd give him a 10% chance and really hoping it pulls through.
Really bummed out about it, it's a beautiful fish. The dottyback looked and acted just find the entire time.
Aquaph8
Love The Fish
No not yet, I've always wanted to. My wife works 24hr shifts as an EMT and we have two small kids, makes it hard to get out most of the time. I'll get up one day for sure though. The club scene up there is so much better than Tucson, I hope one day we can organize something like you guys got going.
sorry to hear about the RG. hope he pulls through. at least the OD is doing good. good luck.Thanks Henry!
Fish update: The Orchid Dottyback looked strong but Royal Gramma wasn't looking good this morning when I was floating the bags -- it was face first in the corner of the bag and breathing heavy. I slowly acclimated them to the temperature and salinity (former owner's water was at 1.020 and my QT is set at 1.024). The Royal Gramma was really spastic right when I added it to the QT, then just stayed in the corner and continued to breath really heavy. I'd give him a 10% chance and really hoping it pulls through.
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zibba
Valuable Member
I can understand that. My girlfriend is a nurse and works a few 24hr shifts -- they're brutal. With two small kids, I'm sure it's exponentially harder. From what I've seen around R2R and RC, there are some great tanks down in Tucson, yours definitely included! There's not much to look at in my tank yet, but if you're ever up in the area and want to talk reefing over a beer, let me know!
Thanks Marvin. Keeping my fingers crossed!
I wanna play golf in AZ. :bigsmile:
oh yeah. see both of your reefs in person too. :wink:
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zibba
Valuable Member
I'd definitely like to have another Goldflake. Whether that happens with this system, I'm not sure. The Envision is only 36"Wx30"D so there's not a ton of room to stretch out. A local store near me, Aquatouch, had one for sale for several months and there's another shop in town, The Aquarist, who has one in his frag tank. It's fun to see them in stores and I think they are one of my all time favorite fish. Here are a few pictures of one I kept in the past:
I think the Flagefins are awesome too. Some people said that Flagfins are more prone to nipping compared to Goldflakes, but I'd say the risk is the same. I've had two golflakes in the past, one nipped and the other was fine. So, it's really a personal preference and the colors you prefer.
I haven't played golf in a few months, but I'll dust off the sticks! The golf courses are in primo condition.
Perfect! And, I will!
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Lilmatty5dimes
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That gold flake is such a beautiful fish. Haven't seen any of those in any lfs around me. Sorry about your lucky with the RG. Hopefully he'll pull around for ya.
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zibba
Valuable Member
Thanks! The RG is still hanging in there. It even at a little piece of mysis mid-afternoon and started swimming around a little. There was a local club meeting today and I picked up some great new pieces to start the reef! Lots of pictures to update with but heading out the door now so I'll try to get them up tomorrow. Cheers!
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zibba
Valuable Member
Fish QT Update: Well both fish were pretty active yesterday and ate a little more mysis in QT. I'd say the RG has a much better chance now. After taking a closer look, it seems that its right pectoral fin was badly damaged during transport. I'm going to have to watch that for infection but I'm hopeful that it will regrow and he'll be near 100% soon. Certainly not my best work because the lighting over the QT is really bad (just enough so I can observe) but I snapped a few pictures:
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zibba
Valuable Member
The BRS order came in too. I got the 2-part kit, test kits, a BRS Carbon/GFO reactor (and carbon/gfo -- which I likely won't run for awhile), filter socks and refractometer calibration solution.
I ran all the test over the weekend. I'm using Instant Ocean because it's tried and true. In the past, I just brought the Ca/Mg levels up using the two-part and it worked out pretty good. Using the Red Sea Kit, my readings were as follows:
Alk = 8.2 dkh
Ca = 360
Mg = 1280
I also have a Hanna checker for Alk, which read 9.74 dkh. I'm not sure which to trust, but I've remember IO having pretty high alk, so I passed on adding any of the Alkalinity 2-part solution. I used the BRS reef calculators to bring my levels up (i.e., Ca 420 and Mg 1400). I'll re-test tonight to see where I'm at and then monitor it for awhile to see what I need to dose. I don't expect that I'll have to dose much since I just have a few frags.
I'll post an update with the frags that I got at the local club meeting soon. Right now the tank still has a lot of microbubbles from the skimmer so the pictures aren't very good. I'm hoping it won't be too much longer until these die down. I will say though, that the ATB is starting to quiet down a lot.
I ran all the test over the weekend. I'm using Instant Ocean because it's tried and true. In the past, I just brought the Ca/Mg levels up using the two-part and it worked out pretty good. Using the Red Sea Kit, my readings were as follows:
Alk = 8.2 dkh
Ca = 360
Mg = 1280
I also have a Hanna checker for Alk, which read 9.74 dkh. I'm not sure which to trust, but I've remember IO having pretty high alk, so I passed on adding any of the Alkalinity 2-part solution. I used the BRS reef calculators to bring my levels up (i.e., Ca 420 and Mg 1400). I'll re-test tonight to see where I'm at and then monitor it for awhile to see what I need to dose. I don't expect that I'll have to dose much since I just have a few frags.
I'll post an update with the frags that I got at the local club meeting soon. Right now the tank still has a lot of microbubbles from the skimmer so the pictures aren't very good. I'm hoping it won't be too much longer until these die down. I will say though, that the ATB is starting to quiet down a lot.
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Flipside
Well-Known Member
Not too sure about IO salt, but I know Reef Crystals had some pretty similar numbers to your Hanna Alk reading.
Glad to hear about the RG!
He'll likely make it, at this point. Good work!
BRS 2 part... ah... memories. LOL! So set and forget! Love the system, myself. I even had a pump for the Mg mix, but I never used it. I would just dump it. I would check my parameters once in a blue moon to make sure my levels were stable. Took me a week to do an initial dial-in. Their online calculator made it pretty easy.
Glad to hear about the RG!
He'll likely make it, at this point. Good work!BRS 2 part... ah... memories. LOL! So set and forget! Love the system, myself. I even had a pump for the Mg mix, but I never used it. I would just dump it. I would check my parameters once in a blue moon to make sure my levels were stable. Took me a week to do an initial dial-in. Their online calculator made it pretty easy.
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zibba
Valuable Member
Not too sure about IO salt, but I know Reef Crystals had some pretty similar numbers to your Hanna Alk reading.
Glad to hear about the RG!
BRS 2 part... ah... memories. LOL! So set and forget! Love the system, myself. I even had a pump for the Mg mix, but I never used it. I would just dump it. I would check my parameters once in a blue moon to make sure my levels were stable. Took me a week to do an initial dial-in. Their online calculator made it pretty easy.
The fact that the RG is eating and swimming around a little is certainly a great sign. They're normally pretty resilient fish so I think it will be all good.
The BRS 2-part is pretty straight forward. I've been researching calcium reactors though and will add one to the system down the road. I plan to manually dose the 2-part for awhile and will just use it to bring my water change water up to preferred levels once the calcium reactor is online.
