New Set Up 4 x 2 x 1

[nicreef]

Bro, ur maroon bta is AWESOME.

pain in the ass when it mvoes around as it can sting the sps...candle light almost went up lorry thanks to its sting.

had to rescape tank 4 times to try and get it away from sps but yet again it has manage to move up close to them.

Your scape is awesome!

The top down shot is able to accentuate the scape too

Especially love the lilac carpet!

May I know which clam species is that? Was it from LCK's previous shipment?

thx.

The clam is from irwana. think it is blue spotted squamosa.

Nice color sticks!!

thx bro.

Ocean deep passion creates an awesome reef.

Great tank, Nick!

YT.

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thanks uncle mike. Still new tank (3 mth old) hopefully i can let it mature without problems.

[Kayakkite]

Your bta close proximity to wp40, wouldn't it get suck by the wavemaker the moment it start shifting location?

[nicreef]

Your bta close proximity to wp40, wouldn't it get suck by the wavemaker the moment it start shifting location?

indeed. Just had a anemone shake incident earlier lol. So far this is the first. the bta and carpet has shifted a few times and each time they got blown away from the wp 40 (prolly luck since it is on w1 mode - pull n push). now thinking of how to do the scape again when free..

[ReDDeviLs]

i like the scaping, very nice!!

[nicreef]

i like the scaping, very nice!!

thanks bro

[nicreef]

Been 2 1/2 years. Kinda neglected the tank during this time due to work, other commitment, lost of interest after my chiller decided to not stop chilling at 25 degree but went down to close to 10+? cant remember was too long in the past. Add to that the travelling distance since the Tank was in the west while i stayed in the east i was almost out of the hobby.

However as life has it, i now have the tank in my home while working from home. As such, i really do not have much of an excuse to not commit myself to the hobby.

This is the same tank with a slightly different scape though kinda of a rush job as i can see my fish and corals are getting stressed from the moving (thanks to the guys at sgbros for the nice service) and being cramped into those small Styrofoam boxes. The whole scape was basically just trying to glue back bits and pieces of what i had of the old scape and pray for the best. Also since the view is only 2 side instead of the previous 3 side, i moved all the rocks towards the back (good and bad move...more space in for fishes to swim but now i have no way of cleaning of the algae on the back screen).

I guess reading this thread from here on should serve as a reminder to imho not neglect but rather de comm so as to allow other reefer to take care of your life stock/corals competently but still with all the issue this guys been through with me i wonder if i can ever let them go .

During the time i neglected my tank the major issues that my tank encountered was: dosing pump went down, chiller went down, lights went down too, downflow pipe dropped out. I think the main problem was the lack of a proper dosing pump for about a year. The lowered mg probably did encourage the growth of gha? ( i am not sure but since i am combating gha now i read some interesting method regarding using mg or kent magnesium tech m to battle them). Looking back at the picture it does seem that the problems really came in when dosing pump went down. 

If i am to put the whole journey into a time line, i stopped being that active ever since my last post (if i am active i probably would still be snapping and posting but base on my phone record i would say yeah i stopped around there +/- 1-2 months.

therefore:

Approx Jan 2014 (pump etc all still working just no hardworking weekly WC become monthly WC/parameter reading or dosing of polylab reef rash - used to do it daily or max once every 2-3 days if buzy probably did it once every 2 week or so now. Also stopped feeding frozen food since it is really troublesome to pack and bring it down with me)

Between end of 2014 - mid 2015 dosing pump broke down and probably once to every 3 months i will do a 20 litre WC. dosing without a pump was basically using the 50 ml scope and manually dosing it based on mood (yeah very bad husbandry duty) Below are some pictures of the decline:

Zoas:

Oct 2014

april 2015 -the poker chips zoas (hope i got the right id) kinda become more of a pest as it grows all over the place, as for the rest of the zoas u can see them slowly disappearing due to parameters? or their own fight vs the poker chips and GHA  (as can see from the fruit loops - which i had thought had disappeared completely but to my surprise i noticed a single polyp remanding from the whole colony now. see pic below...really tiny little one but iphone photo so abit blur)

 

Current June 2016:

on top of the green hair algae, the zoas now have to compete for space with the metallic green star polyps (again unsure if i got the id right). Even the troublesome poker chips are losing their ground

 

Another big casulty of the tank, 1 of 3 sps (well 2 if you consider that its 2 different poci and 1 reverse sunset monti) surviving from all the light sticks frag in the past, i present to you my current poci vs old poci)

 

Become (abit small picture hope can see ar...)

 

Another casualty, my lilac carpet anemone which i so loved along with the other coral beside it which i got from uncle yellow tang

became: (which is already recovering. post moving it was just a 50 cents coin with colour fading)

and the coral basically left 2 heads so i am using it for my yuma now

 

on the bright side, the reverse sunset monti grew really well during this period. along with the yumas that survived and the green star polyps on the flat rock behind and last but not least the blue tear drop squamosa ( i guess the huge dose of CA helps )

Below is a picture of the squamosa when i just got it:

 vs 

also you can click the picture to view my clown hosting onto the clam! Thought i saw wrongly when the clown tried to do it a few days back but it seems as of today the clam has gotten used to it (use to close up when the clown keep going to it). It's not like there are no other anemones for it. In fact, currently the clown is either with the clam or the bubble anemone just behind hidden by the rock. as seen in pic below

also in the above pic, you can see the other reverse sunset monti. Both came from the same frag but broke apart and did well despite the KH fluctuation ( i have no idea how bad the kh condition was during the time i neglected the tank but my first test after moving the tank into the home and doing a 50% water change showed 4......)

Took me awhile to write this so gonna end it with a fts

Forgive the messy wiring as i have just added the t5 tubes to my AI.

 

 

 

 

 

[seepeygoaluck]

nice..

[josephwzr]

Nice!

[Allan]

Very nice tank!!

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[hammy]

Yes. Indeed a very nice humble reefer with a heart to care for his tank. Seeing the actual tank is actually very beautiful, calming and nice. 

 

[Kelvin Ang]

Nice tank setup

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[Nick Ang]

Nice tank!

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[nicreef]

On 14/06/2016 at 10:00 AM, seepeygoaluck said:

nice..

 

On 14/06/2016 at 10:46 AM, josephwzr said:

Nice!

 

On 18/06/2016 at 5:24 PM, Allan said:

Very nice tank!!

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On 20/06/2016 at 6:35 PM, hammy said:

Yes. Indeed a very nice humble reefer with a heart to care for his tank. Seeing the actual tank is actually very beautiful, calming and nice. 

 

 

On 20/06/2016 at 7:23 PM, Kelvin Ang said:

Nice tank setup

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On 20/06/2016 at 11:08 PM, Nick Ang said:

Nice tank!

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Thanks bros. Been lucky that the same tank has been with me for the last 4 years with only some mishaps. Slowly restocking and clearing of the unwanted stuff 

 

[nicreef]

Been a busy week as i did quite a lot of stuff to the tank while finishing up the final moving in of the stuff to the new home. 

1. my cyno problem was actually solved when i stopped using bio pellets some time back but came back again. Been using mild dosage of ultra life red slime gone (not on purpose to do it mild but than realize i remembered the capacity of my tank wrongly. kept thinking it is 25 gallon but it is actually 75 gallon with the sump included.) did 1 x recommanded dose for 2 days and added in 1 more times of recommanded dose for 1 more day for a total of 3 days).

2. did a re arrangement of my sump yesterday - removing Cheetos and sand. Rinse all media. Added a mini frag station. More on this later. 

Below are some pictures i took before the dose just in case. This time the photos are taken with a proper camera not a iphone as such there are some that are a repost of the above pics but just taken with a better camera. Also did some white balancing to remove the blue tint). added a old and new tag so i can rmb which 1 is bought after i "restarted" the hobby.

Zoas:

Alien eye with a sps survivor (colour balance focus was on the zoas. the sps is slightly lighter on the green) - new

La lakers (growing all over the place in my tank zz) and the other not sure name but not emerald on fire (only difference to me is just this 1 under blue light not red skirting). -old

Radioactive dragon eye? - old

dunno the name of this any help with id? and 2 poly of sunflower lol - old

Red hornet zoas (1 of my first new frag to the tank. Fast grower. came with 4 polyp currently 11 within 2-3 months or so)

Prometheans zoas? - old

Rics and Yumas

new to the tank

1 of it is slightly bleached zz

old yuma that has been with me almost since the beginning of the tank. Yuma rarely split so i am not too sure if this did coz i never bought 2 of this before) base on old photo too also only got 1 not sure where the other came from.

 

Sps:

reverse sunset monti that grew from a small little frag. 

(this piece lost it colour under my ai lighting - not brown but rather like cannot see the yellow but the colour started to come back after adding t5) 

dino monti (with a small view of a orange chalice and blue tear drop squamosa) - new

got from irwana not too long back

same got from irwana not too long back. Chilli pepper monti not really colouring up =x and my loyal green/purple acan whom has been with me for a long time.

[nicreef]

Now for part 2: sump re arrangement 

This was done just yesterday after a talk with a trusted and friendly reefer. 

Changes number 1: Re location of items and addition of media block

The old area for the skimmer and chiller pump is now use for media block and chiller pump. Refugium area is now converted to skimmer with life rocks in front. Return pump outlet is done with a elbow to blow onto the bottom area of the rocks to prevent any build up of debris. 

Changes number 2: Adding of marine pure media block. You can see them in the first pic as i threw them into the water first in hope that the pods that i shake out can fill into the media block. Below the blocks in the before pic is where my phosphate remover/carbon goes.

Changes number 3: changing of ugly green flexi pipe to pvc pipe. still not to what i wanted as i realize i have bought too little pipe. wanted to bend it to back of tank than to chiller for a tidier look. Currently still have 4 elbows unused zz

Changes number 4: additional area to keep frag plugs

Before and After look:

vs

So all in all, flow of water used to be: 

Down pipe -> filter net -> bacteria king media ring -> skimmer -> chiller ->  Refugium filled with rocks/sand/cheetos -> carbon/po4 removal and bacteria king + coral chips. 

current layout: 

Down pipe -> filter net -> bacteria king media ring + Marine Pure media block -> chiller -> live rocks -> skimmer -> carbon/po4 removal and bacteria king as well as frag station.

The rational of my skimmer being placed there was because of what i recalled on using biopellet where the outlet goes to the skimmer. since most of media are placed in front, i thought it would be better to place the skimmer as the final check point (except for 1 packet of bacteria king as there is a lack of space up front liao).

The skimmer positioned there has another advantage i realized. This is because anytime my skimmer goes crazy (for example: epoxy or dosing of medication such as ultralife red slime gone) in the past i had to manually remove the water as the discharge pipe is too short. Right now with it being on the outside, i can just open up the cap and let it flow into a pail. 

Below is a closer pic of the new "refugium" area that used to be filled with sand and cheetos

-end on sump re arrangement-

 

[nicreef]

Parameter monitoring:

Forgot to mentioned that i had change the use of salt from DD to red sea coral pro yesterday too. Coupled with the refugium removal and also the expected lost of water due to skimmer going crazy thanks to the dosing of ultralife redslime gone, i am currently monitering my parameters carefully. 

25/06 before work start:

kh: 8.24

ca: forgot to measure

no3: 2

po4: 0~0.03 (very slight transparent blue shown in salifert test)

25/06 after all work done (10pm):

kh: 8.73 - probably due to the water change of approx 40 litre. Also red sea coral pro kh is higher (12.2 according to what is written on the tub) than what i used to maintain in the tank.

ca: dint measure again 

no3: 2-5ppm (salifert test kit showing a slightly deeper pink but than again the slight difference might be due to tester aka me).

po4: 0.03 (the blue is much more obvious this time round and matches the colour chart)

26/06 after all work done (1am):

no3 and po4 still the same as 10pm

26/06 after all work done (2pm): - did a slight top up of salt water as the water lvl in the fragstation is a little low compared to before as i had not enough di water to replanish the water lost yesterday by the skimmer going crazy with this top up the total water change volume is about 65 litre

kh - 8.96 - coral pro salt? last dosing time for kh was set at 12noon ( 2 hour difference) the result taken yesterday was also the same 2 hour difference from last dosing time since my dosage is done every 4 hours.

ca: 450 - a increment over my last test done on the 22nd of june which showed 435. 

no3: 5ppm (pretty sure there is a increase in no3)

po4: 0 (surprisingly the test showed a very clear result)

-monitering will be done mainly for no3 and abit on po4 the other test would go back to normal schedule-

26/06 - 10.30pm just tested as i typed this:

no3: still at close to 5ppm. 

 

[nicreef]

Lost of Corals

As i observed my tank today at 2pm, i noticed my cherry blossom having abit of stn (but this is a pretty new frag so maybe nothing to do with the work done). Some of my older coral whom has been with me through a lot seems stressed. I kinda use them as my observation corals as they have been through so much with me and survived and each time they showed about the same symptoms when unhappy.

 my orange and green yuma isn't opening up as well as it usually does by 2pm (my lights on at 12 noon). Before i left home at about 3-4pm. it was about half it's usually size. 

The purple and green acan was deflated (below pic showing it deflated) instead of it's usually puffy self.

my reverse sunset monti red polyps is about 50% of what i am used to seeing.

other sps around the tank also seems to be losing its colour abit and poly extension is not as good as it used to be. while worried i had no choice but to leave my home. I was pretty puzzled too as my last parameter test seems ok except for the slight increased in no3 but this guys have been through worst reading than this! and i do find 5 acceptable actually =p

Reach home around 7pm and while looking at my tank the corals looks the same.. stressed! (both the coral and myself).

The cherry blossom is about 80% gone. 

As i had a guest around, i couldn't ignore them and just go to test the water parameters (which turn out to be a blessing in disguise). All i could do was look at the tank wondering what went wrong. Took me about 30 minutes of monitoring (my dining table faces the tank so i was basically looking at the tank instead of my guest) when i realise that my chiller is not showing the temperature! I am pretty sure i had turn on the chiller plug power yesterday but somehow it is not on...

The result was the side switch of the chiller was turned off probably caused when i was squeezing some stuff between it and the sump.By the time i had turned it on the water temperature is at 31.5 degrees.

So far list of coral lost

1 x aussie sps 

1 x cherry blossom 

1 section a lime green sps

The rest of the sps seems ok for now except for the polyp extension and colour. the lps and softies seems ok and i am pretty confident they should recover but who knows.

 

[JMW]

Sorry to hear about the losses but really good that you figured out what was causing the corals to stress out. Considered investing in a temperature controller which can turn on a contingency fan/chiller or switch off your lights when temperatures increase?

[seepeygoaluck]

its an expensive hobby....keep driving u crazy  cant help falling in love  ..sigh....

[nicreef]

On 25/06/2016 at 11:40 PM, JMW said:

Sorry to hear about the losses but really good that you figured out what was causing the corals to stress out. Considered investing in a temperature controller which can turn on a contingency fan/chiller or switch off your lights when temperatures increase?

Hi bro. will read up more on this when i can. sounds like a good idea....kinda feel pretty dump to monitor so much only to have such a obvious reason fail me.

On 27/06/2016 at 10:58 AM, seepeygoaluck said:

its an expensive hobby....keep driving u crazy  cant help falling in love  ..sigh....

lol yeah it goes 1 circle in the mind.

1. This is creating a hole in my pocket got to stop spending

2. too much time (and pain) to maintain this dam tank

3. Sits down after the hard work and you go ahhhh.....i will do this all over again if i had too =p

 

Updates

Another 2 new casualties in the sps

lost the yellow on this at first. Love it as it is the one piece that justified adding in the t5 to the set up.

 27/06 RIP

Parameters update:

Been testing the last 2 days still 0 for po4. no3 also maintained at 5 hope it would drop soon.

KH and CA have not fluctuated much at 8.7-8.9 and 450 respectively for the last 2 days

 

[seepeygoaluck]

17 hours ago, nicreef said:

Hi bro. will read up more on this when i can. sounds like a good idea....kinda feel pretty dump to monitor so much only to have such a obvious reason fail me.

lol yeah it goes 1 circle in the mind.

1. This is creating a hole in my pocket got to stop spending

2. too much time (and pain) to maintain this dam tank

3. Sits down after the hard work and you go ahhhh.....i will do this all over again if i had too =p

 

Updates

Another 2 new casualties in the sps

lost the yellow on this at first. Love it as it is the one piece that justified adding in the t5 to the set up.

 27/06 RIP

Parameters update:

Been testing the last 2 days still 0 for po4. no3 also maintained at 5 hope it would drop soon.

KH and CA have not fluctuated much at 8.7-8.9 and 450 respectively for the last 2 days

 

Life is too short for a bad wine..just go a head..do watever u like   that's the way 

Who care?? Devil may care ..hehehehe..

 

[JMW]

Well we learn as we go along.. That's the beauty of this hobby! Temperature & water flow would be the most impt things to monitor IMO.

[nicreef]

3 hours ago, JMW said:

Well we learn as we go along.. That's the beauty of this hobby! Temperature & water flow would be the most impt things to monitor IMO.

lesson learnt focused too much on kh n ca 

 

[nicreef]

Some update after a long time. Tank has settled well for last few months sump rearrange. Scape redone po4 and no3 under control. Sad thing is a China algae scrubber broke down after 2 month of use. It was working so well... But o well

Millie from irwana some
Month back:




Bta that was suffering coloring up and growing now with proper feeding:


Bta corner.. Somehow the flow and light there must be attracting them as the had all moved there themself and has since not moved. Ended up with 3 different bta together



Forever growing blue teardrop squamosa. Running out of space for to grow soon.



Yuma corner:




Just some Zoas:









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[nicreef]

simple video of the tank as of today using iphone.