a bag of it's Aquatic Adventure

[a bag of it]

Hey guys, this thread is long overdue, but my computer decided to die on me and I hadn't been able to post a thread until now. My adventure officially started just over two weeks ago, Friday May 11th, when I drove down to Lafayette to pick up my 58g Oceanic tank. For $200, I got most of what I needed:

Tank (36.5Lx18.5Wx21H)
Stand
Lighting fixture w/175W MH and 2 65W PCs
20g sump/refugium with in sump skimmer (not sure what brand)
Plumbing, return pumps, etc...
and a bunch of other misc. items (test kits, scraper, grabber, siphon, etc...)

Next stop was in Brighton at majicmike's house. There I picked up the rest of what I needed to get up and cycling:

~50lbs of live rock
50lb bag of sand
bucket of salt mix

When I got home that night, I started the cleaning process, as everything had been broken down for over a month and had not been cleaned beforehand. Here's a shot of the tank after a quick initial clean, unfortunately I forgot to get a before pic.

These shots of the sump should give you an idea of what it was like, not horrible, but still a decent amount of work.

After the tank was cleaned, I started washing the sand, a process which took forever and didn't really end. After a couple hours, I called it good and into the tank it went.

My rodi unit is still in the mail now, so I had to buy water from the store. They must've thought I was a doomsday prepper or something. lol

I decided to fill the tank just under the overflow in hopes that some of the cloudiness would dissipate as I was cleaning out the sump.

continued in next post...

 

[a bag of it]

Cleaning out the sump proved difficult without a hose, luckily my roommate had a hose thing for the shower for washing his dog.

Once everything was as clean as I could get it, I filled up the tank with the rest of the water until in overflowed into the sump. No leaks or anything...yay! I also fired up the skimmer and pump, everything seemed to be working without issue.

Then I added the live rock. This poor guy didn't make it.

Here's two shots of the initial aquascape.

And another two after some minor tweaks.

By the next day, the tank had mostly cleared up, here's a couple daytime shots.

Over the next couple days, I stared at more rock than I ever have in my entire life. It was cool to see the little pods running around the rock. It was also fun trying to ID all of the little worms and other creatures within the rock. For a while, the highlight of the tank was definitely the friendly bristle worm, who would poke his head out during the day. For a while we thought he was the only one, but using a flashlight at night proved there were several more. It's crazy how much the rock comes alive once the lights go out.

 

[a bag of it]

After a few days, I saw that the little blue flowers on the rock perked up and they looked a bit like xenia. I would later find out these were clove polyps.

We also found this little guy hanging out on the glass.

After that, there wasn't too much excitement until this past tuesday when I added the CUC. I asked John at reefcleaners.org for a recommendation and this is what he suggested:

50 Dwarf Ceriths
21 Nassarius
17 Florida Ceriths
14 Assorted Hermits
9 Large Nerite and 7 Small to medium Nerites

After talking to people on the forums, I decided to cut the order almost in half, and ended up ordering this:

25 Dwarf Ceriths
15 Nassarius
10 Florida Ceriths
7 Assorted Hermits
7 Large Nerite and 5 Small Nerite
15 Empty Shells
1 Ball of Chaeto

When I received the order, I didn't count everything, but John hooked me up with way more than I ordered. 13 hermits, almost double what I ordered. Probably close to 50 Dwarf Ceriths, over 20 Nassarius, and well over 50 empty shells. I was very surprised, and would definitely do business with him again and recommend him to anyone.

After acclimating, I added everyone. To my surprise, the hermits started fighting over the empty shells right away. There were about 5 big white empty shells, and within the first 15 minutes 3 of them were occupied. I was definitely glad I got the empties. The snails on the other hand weren't very active. The nerites were the first to move, making their way onto the glass.

This guy decided to get an aerial view of the tank.

I really like the shell on this guy

By the next day, all of the snails were active. A couple of Dwarf Ceriths even made their way into the overflow. All was well until thursday night when I discovered this little guy.

I quickly identified it as aiptasia. After a bit of research, I decided to add three peppermint shrimp. I went down to aquatic art, as I had never been before and picked up the three peppermints. After talking to one of the employees (don't remember is name) I made a bit of an impulse buy and picked up a tiny Royal Gramma. After acclimating and adding them to the tank, they all immediately went into hiding. I later found them all hiding under the mushroom rock. Here's one of the peppermints poking his head out.

and the royal gramma, the next morning he came out of hiding

The next day I was extremely happy to see this

The peppermints went to town after I went to bed. That was yesterday morning, this morning I woke up to find the aiptasia completely gone!

next friday I'll be in denver again, and I think I might pickup a pair of cardinals or a pair of clownfish...what do you guys think?

 

[RuRoo]

Nice. We have the exact same tank. Love mine. I'll be following your thread.

 

[SAZAMA]

nice and welcome

 

[Wicked Color]

Very nice descriptions and details! Looking good so far, I bet the water was expensive that way.

 

[Cake_Boss]

Is that a ReefDynamics skimmer? If so, sweet grab for under $200

Sent using Forum Runner

 

[a bag of it]

Judging by the logo on top of the skimmer cup, I'd say yes, but it doesn't look as complex as any of the ones that come up on google. Water was definitely more expensive than it had to be, but I wanted to get the tank up and running and didn't have any other way to get water fast. Thanks for all the kind words everyone. RuRoo do you have a build thread or any pictures of your setup?

 

[ShelbyJK500]

Off to an awesome start!! I would definitely vote for a couple of clowns. Maybe try and find a pair hosting something, anything. Mesmerizing to watch when they host something. Cardinals just seem boring and aren't very active that I've ever seen.

 

[JNG]

Nice grab, that skimmer probably costed twice as much as you paid for the whole setup. I have had a euro reef skimmer for almost ten years now and still works great. Hope you have fun along the way building up your reef tank with every fish and frag you add.

 

[RuRoo]

RuRoo do you have a build thread or any pictures of your setup?

Unfortunately, I don't have any pictures to start a thread. I have pics of my tank now and you're welcome to see it when you're in town.

 

[a bag of it]

Well I'm back with another update after what seemed like another rushed trip down to denver. I started my day at the aquarium, it was pretty cool, but smaller than I expected. Then I made my way over to CRW Reef's house to check out his tank and pick up some corals. Chad is a really cool guy with a really cool tank, I could've stayed there for hours, but I was already late meeting 09bumblebee to pickup some frozen food. Right as I got to aquatic art my phone died, so we missed each other in the store and I had to make a quick decision to leave because I was still trying to get to aquamart before closing. I got there with only a few minutes before closing, but I was on a mission for one thing in particular, a pair of clownfish. I was hoping they still had the pair of snowflakes I saw the week earlier and to my surprise, they did! After that it was back to Breck. New corals with rocks means new aquascaping. I was going for somewhat of a mountain on the left with more open space on the right with just that mushroom shaped rock. This is how it turned out:

 

[a bag of it]

A couple more pictures since the latest additions. These mushrooms have really opened up since they've been in the tank. You can also see the royal gramma hanging out.

This frag is also looking great, so is that cute little clown face.

Here's the clearest shot I could get of them, very active little guys.

And swimming through the arch.

These guys haven't fully opened up yet, but they open more and more everyday.

 

[tlsrcs]

Looking good. I like the rock work

 

[a bag of it]

This is a bit of a delayed update, but I'm sad to report my first loss since I set up the tank. My hammer coral fell victim to my evil peppermint shrimp.

In other news, I picked up a couple frags from gonzo's live sale. I got a small colony of eagle eyes and a bright orange acan colony. I'm also probably going to add a couple other frags to the order since I'll be paying for shipping. Anyone have any opinions on what else I should add?

 

[09bumblebee]

Sry to hear about the hammer. I'd get it out of the sand though. Put it on a rock a few inches away from the sand.

 

[jahmic]

Sorry to hear about your hammer. My peppermint had feasted on my leptastrea and it looked BAD for a few days...but was somehow able to bounce back and recover.

Do you still have the shrimp? I tried placing mine in the sump til I found a home for him...but I think he either escaped or got sucked into a return and fed my tank, lol.

 

[a bag of it]

I do still have the shrimp...all three of them. I plan on trading them in for a cleaner shrimp when I get a chance to make it down to aquatic art again. I'm not in a huge rush though since they haven't gone after anything else now that the hammer is dead and gone.

 

[RuRoo]

Shrimps and hermit crabs usually start picking on corals once they detect that coral is dying.

View attachment 7540

Here's my crab picking at my dying torch.

 

[a bag of it]

I'm sure they started by picking at the dead tissue, the frag wasn't super healthy to begin with, but they definitely sped up the dying process. Once they got a taste they didn't stop and once they started picking it never opened again. I witnessed them tear off the green tips until it was gone. The hermits never showed interest though. Either way, I'm not taking my chances and they're being removed. They took care of all the aiptasia as far as I can tell and that was why I got them in the first place. Cleaner shrimp look cooler anyways lol