The build thread: 430gal. display

jntcox

jntcox

Turbo Snail
#501
#501
Ahh.. those butterflies were beautiful... that sucks. Do you run a UV sterilizer at all between the tanks? I always wondered if that helps out even in the slightest way with ich (in the water column of course). I have one that runs 24/7 and (I’ll have to knock on wood) I never quarantine. I mean I have one set up (one may say it’s wasting electricity) but never used it. I never had a problem with ich.

Hey Andy, if you had a smaller tank like the rest of us, you wouldn’t have problems with losing fish J
 
Ummfish

Ummfish

Dolphin
M.A.S.C Club Member
#502
#502
The 90 the butterflies was in hasn't been connected to the rest of the system since I got them. So, now I could just bleach the tank and have done with it. In fact, I might as well since all the inverts have died from the lowered salinity.

I'm talking myself into believing that the cleaner shrimp masked most of the external symptoms for quite a while, giving the parasites in the gills time to do lots of damage.

I've moved the banggai from there into a hospital bucket. Hopefully that one will make it. I haven't seen any symptoms there, but want to be safe.

Still no sign of the clown. The second has been frantically circling the tank all night as if searching for the buddy. :(

Hey Andy, if you had a smaller tank like the rest of us, you wouldn’t have problems with losing fish
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Yeah, when I had a smaller tank I never lost any fish.... Still kills me every time, though. I keep thinking that I'll get better at this one of these days.
 
Ummfish

Ummfish

Dolphin
M.A.S.C Club Member
#505
#505
No, these were a couple of juvenile aquacultured. Your clowns were looking great in my old water trough but I had a powerhead die on me and lost your two clowns and my female banggai, probably to low O2. :( I'm really excited to have the backup generator and other backups (two return pumps to keep water moving if one dies, etc.) in place now to hopefully alleviate those sorts of issues. That kills me. Those were some gorgeous clowns. Man, this hobby sucks sometimes.

I would like to try some butterflies again at some point. They were some gorgeous fish even if they never managed to eat all the aiptasia. They were getting pretty aggressive with each other near the end--which probably contributed to the ich--so I doubt I wound up with a male-female set.
 
Ummfish

Ummfish

Dolphin
M.A.S.C Club Member
#508
#508
No, never did. Sorry about the lack of updates. Company in town yesterday and I spent most of today with my kid in the ER. Fortunately it looks like it's just a virus. Unfortunately it looks like I'm getting it, too.


Well, I hate to tell you all this, but I decided that it would be better as a planted tank.



Man, that's some crazy hair algae, huh? It went from nothing to this in two days flat.

So, I apparently have an herbivoury issue. Well, a non-herbivoury issue to be more precise. So, I placed an urchin into the tank yesterday. I didn't realize until later that it had brought a friend.











Maybe something along the lines of Zebrida adamsii? It's a very cool crab. It hides down in the urchin's mouth region when its afraid.
 
jntcox

jntcox

Turbo Snail
#509
#509
Great pics. Yeah a planted tank is a better option. It’ll never get old watching it sway in the water. Almost hypnotic! That’s a pretty crab.. Did you purchase it? Or was it attached to the urchin when you bought and had no idea? Do they have a symbiotic relationship other than hiding when afraid?
 
Ummfish

Ummfish

Dolphin
M.A.S.C Club Member
#510
#510
It's a complete hitchhiker. I noticed that the urchin's mouth had different color stripes when it was in acclimation, but then the different colors started crawling around.

Here's a movie I found: http://www.seadb.univpm.it/flash/player.php?idv=248

That one looks a little different than mine. (Stripes on mine are straight. That one, they make Vs.)

To answer your question, I haven't finished doing the research yet. I the crab is what I think it is, the have specially modified rear legs that have little hooks on them, designed to hold on to the spines.
 
jasonh

jasonh

Angel Fish
#512
#512
Ummfish;11357 said:
Well, I hate to tell you all this, but I decided that it would be better as a planted tank.

[
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Hahahaha. Well if you made it planted you wouldn't have to worry about keeping nitrates and phosphates down :) (heck, I used to DOSE nitrate and phosphate to my planted)

Dude, that crab is really cool looking. Totally interesting hitchhiker. I think you might need a little more than that one tiny urchin to take care of all of that though :)
 
Ummfish

Ummfish

Dolphin
M.A.S.C Club Member
#515
#515
Oh, yeah. They are great little fish. Much like watching pipes or seahorses, although once these finally learn how to eat they seem to actually go to it with gusto. They seem to like the long tank, whizzing down the length all day. The female was displaying to the male tonight. He wasn't paying much attention, so she gave him a shot to the abdomen with her snout. "Look at me!" :)
 
Ummfish

Ummfish

Dolphin
M.A.S.C Club Member
#517
#517
No, the files are staying in their own little tank in the basement. It's a 40XL and it seems to fit their size well and gives me a lot of control over their tankmates.
 
Ummfish

Ummfish

Dolphin
M.A.S.C Club Member
#518
#518
Not a whole lot to update. I moved the purple tangs up to the display tank to help with the algae problem. Despite my clear directive they choose to mostly chase each other around instead of eating. The chasing hasn't resulted in much 'til last night. This morning the small one had some scratches. We'll see. It might be off to separate tanks for them.

Given the lack of cooperation I've had from the tangs, I took it upon myself today to become an herbivore. I filled one of my planters outside with plucked algae. Good compost!

In other news, and most incredibly, the barrel downstairs continues to hold water. The six lines in there continue to get along without much problem. I got a couple of pretty bad photos, but they're fast.

The large wrasse:


The smaller wrasse (much more skittish):


The files continue to do really well. Day 80 for these guys.


Again, for comparison, the top file (male), day 1:


And the bottom fish (female), day 1:
 
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