FuEl's 5 gallon pico reef

[FuEl]

A challenge to keep. Hope I will be able to sustain this stunning tunicate.

[MarcoVan]

A challenge to keep. Hope I will be able to sustain this stunning tunicate.

wow, this one is really challenge! not easy i heard.

ever got a reefer who gave it a dedicated tank. up end still lost to mother nature. hurhur.

[FuEl]

Been too busy to keep up with the manual dosings, especially with the SPS load. Decided to get a dosing pump, meaning I should be able to stock more SPS in this tank. Still doing daily 10-20% water changes. Started using ultralith system to reduce nutrients, zeolites are placed in the hang-on filters.

Front tank shot

Left side shot

Right side shot

Unfortunately lost my favourite birdnest "colony" at the right due to salt mix not dissolving properly, managed to salvage a fragment though.

[FuEl]

Top down shots

Invasion of the encrusting montipora.

[kueytoc]

How is ya Blue Tunicates doing ?

[Digiman]

Nice full moon goby and yellow line shrimp!

[peacemaker]

Alamak, bro! Hide the glass thermometer lah... Spoil the overall beauty of your tank.

[FuEl]

How is ya Blue Tunicates doing ?

The blue tunicates are still alive, however they are in my other system with higher nutrient levels. I suspect they do need dissolved organics at some level as they started shrinking in this pico tank even with daily feedings of live phytoplankton.

My urocaridella shrimp is gone, I suspect it jumped out.

[Zac]

The blue tunicates are still alive, however they are in my other system with higher nutrient levels. I suspect they do need dissolved organics at some level as they started shrinking in this pico tank even with daily feedings of live phytoplankton.

My urocaridella shrimp is gone, I suspect it jumped out.

bro NIce tank!! lots to learn from u..

anyway nice meeting you and joe today at irwana.

[ambystoma82]

tiger goby is small size? notice the eviota was rather big..

[FuEl]

Zac -- No worries. Small tank has its own "fun". You do learn things that you do not find out from larger systems. Like for my daily water changes I use water that I mix to only 1.018. It seems that this compensates for the daily evaporation rate somewhat. Factor in the sodium input from sodium bicarbonate dosing via dosing pump in such a small volume of water, the salinity kinda balances out. No need to dilute daily with distilled/di water whatsoever.

Amby -- Yes the tiger goby is quite small, bred and growth controlled by me.

[FuEl]

I discovered today that my skimmer had not been skimming. Somehow either the air pump is weak or the airstone became clogged. Corals looked fine though. Decided to take down the skimmer since the tank had been running fine with such inefficient protein skimming. Added 2 croceas few days back, guess they should be able to help with the water quality by absorbing DOCs as well as inorganic nutrients. I am so glad I went with a dosing pump.

[peacemaker]

Daily water changes for such a small volume of water should be better than skimming. Maybe that's the reason why there are hardly any DOC to remove due to the daily WC.

[wilsontantw]

I am so glad I went with a dosing pump.

Yeah!!! Agree! Dosing pump rocks!!

[FuEl]

Updated FTS. Added one more liverock to break the scape and to have more space to stick SPS. Removed skimmer so the tank looks less cluttered now. Dosing pump still sits above the tank.

New corals go into this tank as well, I kinda use it as a quarantine tank. Fish diseases can come with corals too. Some people call me paranoid but I rather be safe than sorry.

[FuEl]

New resident. Urocaridella shrimp.

[FuEl]

Invasion of Chilli Pepper Monti.

[FuEl]

You can see the staghorn frags growing in the direction of light. And that purple thing, is still purple as Barney!

[FuEl]

Supposedly some rare SPS given to me. Not sure what it is though. It had turned brown previously. Now with dosing pump and running ultralith the colors are slowly coming back. Anyone who says LED can't bring out SPS colors obviously has'nt done it right.

[FuEl]

My filtration "room". Hopefully these 2 croceas will do the job of keeping water quality good. Read that they can uptake ammonia & nitrates, as well as DOC. I would never have dared to get them if I was still dosing manually. I got them small, should be safe against spawning events. Will still be supplementing their diet with phytoplankton given their small size.

[FuEl]

A stylo which I like very much.

[FuEl]

Need to find a spot to transplant this hot pink stylo soon. The encrusting monti will be overwhelming it soon. For some reason the digitatas have not opened as much as they used to. Still trying to figure out the reason. They are growing fine though, just that polyps don't seem to like to come out as much.

[FuEl]

Tenuis I think..

[FuEl]

One of my favourites. Blue polyp digitata.

[Eniram]

Fantastic sps you have there, do keep the pictures rolling