SeeCrabRun's first reef

[seecrabrun]

time stamp on forum may not coincide with actual time of original post written. The beginning of this build thread is an archive added after the fact.

This build thread has a bit of an archive at first, but I plan to continue to update it in real time as it progresses.

In the beginning of January I moved my 6 month old 10 gallon FOWLR into a 20 gallon high. In the 10g had been a yellowtail damsel who went to live in my 29g instead. I wanted to make the 20H a peaceful tank with some little fish.

Moving the contents over to the 20, I used most of the sand from the 10, but I picked out the gravel. I added a bag of live sand to the existing sand and ordered some dry rock. I only use dry rock in my tanks, sans the few pieces of live I got when I started the hobby. I have this little DIY HOB refugium and in tank power filter. The tank currently has no lights.

 

[seecrabrun]

About a week later, the dry rock arrived. I think I like this formation. I added a broken power head to get the flow up, but it's too much flow. It's blowing the sand all around.

I've ordered the supplies to make my own RODI reservoir. I've had my unit since last August or so, but I'd been using a water jug for storage.

I've been thinking what fish I want to put in the tank. It is fully cycled, didn't have a mini cycle with the move. Everything is testing very low, nitrates are testing 0, which is a first, but not surprising since the only inhabitants are snails.

 

[seecrabrun]

My 20 gallon brute trash can arrived!! I built a stand for it and got the ASOV kit installed. I made sure to clean the can well and I installed a spigot on it myself. I made sure to leak test that. I'm really impressed with myself! I'm not very handy, but I'm loving how this turned out!

 

[seecrabrun]

It's been almost 2 weeks since the move. I added a background to the tank. I was thinking this would be better at blocking the light from the window than painting it.
I added another in tank power filter that I had. Current occupants are some snails and a dwarf hermit.

 

[seecrabrun]

3 weeks since the move and I've removed the filter part from the power heads and added the old HOB filter with a surface skimmer. I got a little bit more CUC for the tank. Just some more snails and dwarf hermits.
I'm trying to play with the location of the power heads. I can't seem to get the flow right.

Here's the little refugium. I can't keep chaeto alive with such low nutrients, but the gracilaria is doing good!

 

[seecrabrun]

It's been a month now. I've got a light that I'm trying out. It's a compact fluorescent and there is a daylight and actinic. It seems to put off nice light.
I've added a canister filter now and am still playing with the flow. This darn powdery sand will be the end of me!

 

[seecrabrun]

It's February 21st and we have a new occupant! Scarlet skunk cleaner shrimp! What personality they have! I've been thinking about fish and I think I know what I want to do. I think I'm going to go with 2 firefish first. I'm not sure which species exactly. Then a neon goby and finally a scooter blenny. I've ordered some pods to start seeding the tank. I'm thinking by the end of summer I should be able to add the scooter blenny.

I've ordered the testing kit for calcium, magnesium, and alkalinity. When I switched to the 20 I also switched salts from Instead Ocean to Reef Crystals. So now on to the next step to creating a reef tank.

 

[seecrabrun]

Well my test kit came and after a lot of troubleshooting and talking it over with some people on facebook, we've realized I had a bad batch of Reef Crystals. My calcium was 565, magnesium 1600, and alkalinity 11.5. I mixed some new water and let it sit for 24 hours and tested it. It tested at calcium 625, magnesium 1660, and alkalinity was over 14.

I ordered more and tested it upon arrival and it was much better. I'll have to do a few water changes to get the levels lower.

 

[seecrabrun]

March 1st here and things are going well. I found some mysid shrimp in my HOB refugium LOL! That was weird! At first I thought they were really big amphipods, but nope! I'm guessing they hatched from eggs in the frozen mysis I have been feeding the cleaner shrimp. I also feed it to my 29g.

I ordered a larger box for my HOB refugium and so I've got 2 refugiums running at the moment. Still not enough nutrients to keep the chaeto alive but my gracilaria is growing like a weed. I've put a bunch of rock rubble in the larger box as well.

Yesterday I picked up some softies from a lady a few towns over. My first coral! I'm not sure how I feel about them though. I thought I'd be eager to put them in the tank, but I'm iffy about the way they look. Also it turns out she gave me some zoas and I want to avoid all toxic corals like them because I'm way too clumsy and forgetful!

Currently they are in a coral QT I set up. I'm thinking I'm not really a fan of softies and I want to go a different direction with this tank.

 

[seecrabrun]

I did something really impulsive yesterday, I brought home a scooter blenny, eek!!! I've started a thread about it and it's a long read now, so you may want to catch up. https://forums.saltwaterfish.com/index.php?threads/scooter-blenny-ich-or-not.399244/

I also brought home a duncan and am very happy! He isn't though, because I dipped him. I think LPS is the direction I want to go with this tank. Which means I'm going to need different light. For now I'm going to put the Current USA Orbit Marine LED that is on my 29 onto the 20 since the fish don't really care about the light.

 

[seecrabrun]

I love how beautiful this shrimp is!

 

[seecrabrun]

If you notice in the last picture, I'm starting to see strange red spots on my rocks. They are just random little dots and haven't grown any. My first thought was cyano, but aside from the color I don't see any other symptoms.

 

[seecrabrun]

I posted a thread asking for help on adding a dedicated refugium to this tank to help cultivate pods and remove some of the equipment from the display. I have no plans on getting a skimmer or reactors or dosing, so it will mostly be a refugium.

It got pretty long as well, but you can read up on it here https://forums.saltwaterfish.com/index.php?threads/help-me-make-a-sump-refugium-for-this-situation.399296/

Here's my setup currently, but it isn't going to stay like this.

Yesterday I went out of town to a saltwater store to pick up more pods and I ended up bringing home an Acan Lord and Coco Worm. I also got a bag of heavier sand so mine will stop blowing around and it's done the trick.

Here is a closeup of the Acan and a picture of the tank.

 

[seecrabrun]

Oh I use gravity fed ATOs with a float valve, so I built a cabinet above my 29 to hold the reservoir and then I did the same for the 20. Here's how that turned out.

 

[pegasus]

My, my... someone has been busy! LOL!!! Looking good! I hope you have good luck with the coco worm. I say this because the system is still young, and the coco (typically described as difficult to maintain) is a filter feeder. It'll probably need supplements of filter feeding food. I fed mine Marine Snow, and it lived about 1 1/2 years. Good lighting and an occasion meal of mysis should keep the duncans happy. Keep up the good work!!!

 

[seecrabrun]

My, my... someone has been busy! LOL!!! Looking good! I hope you have good luck with the coco worm. I say this because the system is still young, and the coco (typically described as difficult to maintain) is a filter feeder. It'll probably need supplements of filter feeding food. I fed mine Marine Snow, and it lived about 1 1/2 years. Good lighting and an occasion meal of mysis should keep the duncans happy. Keep up the good work!!!

Thanks I'm posting a lot of backlog and trying to date them accordingly, so there are more updates to come. I meant to start this build thread months ago but I kept getting distracted with other things!

It might be a little confusing at first as I'm posting today, but actually posting about months ago, just doesn't have the right time stamp for the forum.

As for the coco worm, it has been 2 months this Saturday since I brought it home. It has been doing well. It gets really temperamental about alkalinity, which I knew beforehand. When I dose the copepods, the water they are in contains phytoplankton, but I also add phyto directly to the system. Then I'm assuming it'll get some dissolved organics from the frozen food as well.

 

[seecrabrun]

After a lot of research I decided to go with the Kessil a160we for the light. I had some very specific requirements, the biggest one (aside from being the right light for LPS and possibly SPS) was that it had to tank mount but not directly above the water's surface (like the orbit does). So I narrowed it down to the smallest radion, kessil, or the new AI Prime. The Prime was still unknown to the exact date of release and I just felt like on this tank I'd probably need 2. I just didn't have high hopes for the Prime, so I went with the Kessil, as I didn't see a benefit to the extra cost of the Radion.

I also decided with the flow issues that I have and the fact I already had 3 sources of current and was about to purchase another power head to see if that helped, that I was going to get a Vortech MP10 and see if it was worth the price. I got the original wired series that is now on deep discount since the quiet drive was just released. So far I'm loving it! I replaced all the power heads with it, so now I just have the MP10 and return.

And then I was having a lot of trouble with my eheim heaters. I went through 2 100w heaters, both malfunctioned. I have a 125w in my other tank that has never caused an issue! So I'm figuring it was a bad batch of 100s. Still, this made me very uneasy and I started looking into heater controllers. After realizing I was going to spend nearly $100 on a reliable heater only controller, I decided to go with the ReefKeeper Lite, as it was only $110 and would do more than just control a heater.

 

[seecrabrun]

I started developing green hair algae on the dry rocks I added back in January. I realized now they are leaking phosphates and after fighting with it for quite some time, I've decided to just let it be. But the cyano is beginning to spread and that bothers me.

 

[seecrabrun]

Here are some update pictures as of March 15th.

First is my coral QT that still has the softies in it. Then my copepod and phytoplankton culture setup. and finally a couple of tank shots. This is with the Kessil and MP10 in the tank.
The scooter blenny, now rightfully being called the ocellated dragonet, is doing well!

 

[seecrabrun]

This post will hold a few diary updates:

April 1st So my next big step is to upgrade my 29 gallon tank so I can take its stand for this 20 and fit the sump in the cabinet. For the past couple of weeks I've been running the sump to the side where the canister filter used to be. The cabinet that it currently sits on won't hold any sort of sump.

I've been looking into upgrading my 29 for some time. I was thinking of going 75, but I've now decided that is more tank than I am ready for. So I am going for a 40 and building the stand.

April 3rd- picked up the 40 today and will start working on the stand this weekend. It's my birthday this weekend and to celebrate I'm traveling a couple hours and a state over to go to a really nice saltwater store. I'm excited!! I'm going to also put some of that stick on window privacy film and curtains up in the room with the 20 to help with all the sunlight it gets.

April 8th- this building your own stand is CRAP! Everything is going wrong! I don't think I can do it. Been working on it pretty much every waking hour for the past few days and it is killing me!

April 9th- I am throwing up the white flag! This stand has done me in... FINALLY got it all put together and it is unlevel and the tank doesn't sit flush. I'm going to shim it up and call it a day, if it explodes in the next year then I'll just clean up the mess. Also... I'm NEVER doing this again!!!!

April 10th- Got the 20 moved onto the new cabinet and after working into the middle of the night, everything is finally put together, turned on, and working fine. Man this was way too hard!

April 12th- YOU'VE GOT TO BE KIDDING ME!!!! The stand the 20 is on is leaning to the left and there isn't any way for me to fix it... this has been the worst week ever! I haven't even mentioned the drama going on INSIDE the tank... I'm about ready to throw in the towel...

April 13th- I realized an old butcher block kitchen island I got but never used might actually work as a stand. Plus it is made out of solid wood. It's been in my garage used for storage. I've started reinforcing it and sanding it and tomorrow I will paint it and put laminate paper on the inside to protect the wood from any splashes.

April 15th- Well that kicked my butt but the 20 is officially moved onto its new new stand! This thing is rock solid, so it should be just fine. I leveled it a little with some shims and hopefully it will last a long time. The wiring and stuff still needs to be figured out. I think I might make a little cabinet to hide the controllers and wires in.

Now here are a bunch of pictures to go with the updates. 40 on its new stand with the 29 to the side. Working on 20's new new stand. 20 on its new new stand finally! and sump in the cabinet.