So I realized I probably should start one of these, as I love reading other people's build threads.
Have a 29g biocube (coralife) that I set up Christmas of 2015. I had been reef-sober for about 10 years, and I blame Mike for making one comment at parent-teacher conferences and making me relapse.
Equipment:
The tank/stand/equipment was all given to me (arranged by my husband) for Christmas on a relatively short schedule, so I didn't get to research as much as I wanted to before hand. But I'm really happy now. We set it up with live sand and some quality live rock that cycled the tank pretty much instantly. When I reefed last, protein skimmers were the "must-have" for any reef, and my family bought the small coralife one for me (this is where I wish I'd researched more). I've got it in the first back chamber with my heater. And though it will obviously never skim like the nicer/more expensive ones, I do have it nicely calibrated and it pulls a fair amount of wet skimmate from the water - I have to empty it about once a day. It pulls out enough gunk that I'm convinced it needs to stay in there, as opposed to pulling it completely out.
Second chamber has a media rack with filter floss, purigen, and chemipure elite. I'll switch that out for chemipure blue when its time to switch out. The second chamber also has a mini-fuge with calupera fed by a 24-hour led puck light I picked up from Lowe's. Last chamber hasn't been modified (just the return pump).
I change the water once a week, filter floss every other day, and skimmer cup daily.
Running the stock PC lights because the bulbs were brand new when the tank was purchased on craigslist. I'll upgrade them eventually, but no need at the moment.
Stocking:
Current fish is a pair of beautiful occelarris clowns that I picked up from a member - they're pretty large (3 inches) and beautifully active. They also constantly rearrange the sand bed in the two places they've designated as "home", which means I've always got a small bit of cloud in the water.
There's also a royal gramma who was released into the tank and immediately dove into the big porous rock and hasn't been seen since. Not sure if he's alive or not.
Corals/inverts:
- A green hammer which just recently finished branching its second head
- Fire and Ice zoas which the clowns don't like
- Pink zoas
- A beautiful rose BTA that immediately put its foot down and has been doing marvelously for the 4 days I've had it (I've kept them before so I had a fairly good idea where it was going to want to be). The clowns have ignored it, which is fine because it needs to grow a bit before they start beating it to death.
- And handful of hermits and snails, many of which came on the live rock (and a snail-eating bristle worm that's hiding somewhere in the big rock that I have yet to catch). Most of the hermits have molted in the last month.
There are several macro algae that came on the live rock which I have not bothered to identify.
And there are snail eggs and tiny pods all. over. the glass. You've got to use the mag-float if you want to look at anything near the sand bed because they are so densely packed. I didn't realize they were pods (tank is so young) until I was cleaning them off and saw them jumping away. The male clown picks all the snail eggs off the rock, but neither fish is interested in the pods.
The diatoms, GHA, and cyano all came and went. Fingers crossed they don't come back (or just stay relegated to the small back corner of the tank where my flow is low).
There we go. A current picture, which will surely change as I am constantly tinkering. I have a lot to catch up on that I've missed in the last 10 years (hello acans!), but its been a ton of fun so far!
Have a 29g biocube (coralife) that I set up Christmas of 2015. I had been reef-sober for about 10 years, and I blame Mike for making one comment at parent-teacher conferences and making me relapse.
Equipment:
The tank/stand/equipment was all given to me (arranged by my husband) for Christmas on a relatively short schedule, so I didn't get to research as much as I wanted to before hand. But I'm really happy now. We set it up with live sand and some quality live rock that cycled the tank pretty much instantly. When I reefed last, protein skimmers were the "must-have" for any reef, and my family bought the small coralife one for me (this is where I wish I'd researched more). I've got it in the first back chamber with my heater. And though it will obviously never skim like the nicer/more expensive ones, I do have it nicely calibrated and it pulls a fair amount of wet skimmate from the water - I have to empty it about once a day. It pulls out enough gunk that I'm convinced it needs to stay in there, as opposed to pulling it completely out.
Second chamber has a media rack with filter floss, purigen, and chemipure elite. I'll switch that out for chemipure blue when its time to switch out. The second chamber also has a mini-fuge with calupera fed by a 24-hour led puck light I picked up from Lowe's. Last chamber hasn't been modified (just the return pump).
I change the water once a week, filter floss every other day, and skimmer cup daily.
Running the stock PC lights because the bulbs were brand new when the tank was purchased on craigslist. I'll upgrade them eventually, but no need at the moment.
Stocking:
Current fish is a pair of beautiful occelarris clowns that I picked up from a member - they're pretty large (3 inches) and beautifully active. They also constantly rearrange the sand bed in the two places they've designated as "home", which means I've always got a small bit of cloud in the water.
There's also a royal gramma who was released into the tank and immediately dove into the big porous rock and hasn't been seen since. Not sure if he's alive or not.
Corals/inverts:
- A green hammer which just recently finished branching its second head
- Fire and Ice zoas which the clowns don't like
- Pink zoas
- A beautiful rose BTA that immediately put its foot down and has been doing marvelously for the 4 days I've had it (I've kept them before so I had a fairly good idea where it was going to want to be). The clowns have ignored it, which is fine because it needs to grow a bit before they start beating it to death.
- And handful of hermits and snails, many of which came on the live rock (and a snail-eating bristle worm that's hiding somewhere in the big rock that I have yet to catch). Most of the hermits have molted in the last month.
There are several macro algae that came on the live rock which I have not bothered to identify.
And there are snail eggs and tiny pods all. over. the glass. You've got to use the mag-float if you want to look at anything near the sand bed because they are so densely packed. I didn't realize they were pods (tank is so young) until I was cleaning them off and saw them jumping away. The male clown picks all the snail eggs off the rock, but neither fish is interested in the pods.
The diatoms, GHA, and cyano all came and went. Fingers crossed they don't come back (or just stay relegated to the small back corner of the tank where my flow is low).
There we go. A current picture, which will surely change as I am constantly tinkering. I have a lot to catch up on that I've missed in the last 10 years (hello acans!), but its been a ton of fun so far!
