40g SPS

[reeflover62]

Nice system everything looks great and that lokani is sweet.

 

[ifarmer]

very nice
i also recently started using zeovit as well. can't wait to see some color on my tank
really love the size of your tank

 

[afernandez]

Looks great! I almost lost my 30k with my transfer...first it was getting too much light then It was-sent getting enough but now it seems happy with PE even during the day..either way the tank is looking great.

 

[sahin]

Latest coral shots show very nice colours. Tanks looks VERY NICE!

 

[NJKayakAngler]

Wow that sunset monti is amazing

 

[fscbishop]

Nice tank

 

[Arkayology]

Nice system everything looks great and that lokani is sweet.

Thanks! Ya, it is pretty sweet. Not much PE during the day, but it shows some at night. It is still acclimating to my system, but there seems to be a color shift to a more solid/vivid purple with a blue/brown base. I'm interested to see where it goes from here.

very nice
i also recently started using zeovit as well. can't wait to see some color on my tank
really love the size of your tank

Thanks a lot! I actually stopped using zeovit and started biopellets and recently (1 month ago) stopped biopellets. It was just too much for my tank and growth was suffering. I am now using only a skimmer and 1/4 cup GFO run passively in my sump. Growth has started again and colors have improved since stopping carbon dosing/zeovit.

Looks great! I almost lost my 30k with my transfer...first it was getting too much light then It was-sent getting enough but now it seems happy with PE even during the day..either way the tank is looking great.

It's a really awesome coral. I love the growth pattern. It should really take off in a few months judging by the mother colony that I saw.

Latest coral shots show very nice colours. Tanks looks VERY NICE!

Thanks man! I appreciate it!

Wow that sunset monti is amazing

Ya, I have had it for over three years and it has been fragged a ton. It is just getting too big! I can't give frags of it away... lol so I end up throwing the pieces I have to frag away.

Nice tank

Thanks!

 

[biggles]

It really blows me away that you're getting such stunning colors using just a gen1 Radion Matt. The saturation level is not what i'd normally associate with LED only lighting, going to be an amazing SPS display mate. :thumbsup:

Is the pink tipped green acro in the middle a SSC mate, the colors look almost identical to one of mine when it's in lowish light.

 

[Arkayology]

It really blows me away that you're getting such stunning colors using just a gen1 Radion Matt. The saturation level is not what i'd normally associate with LED only lighting, going to be an amazing SPS display mate. :thumbsup:

Is the pink tipped green acro in the middle a SSC mate, the colors look almost identical to one of mine when it's in lowish light.

Thanks a lot biggles! The pics that I take usually have a white balance of 7k and the iso of around 400. It is a little dark, but it captures the true colors of the corals. The one in the middle that you linked is my SSC. It was about twice as big but I had to frag it when I had some low nutrients issues. It is bouncing back though and is getting better PE every day.

 

[Arkayology]

I moved my green mille to front and center to give it some more light. I think it fills a spot that was previously empty. The only problem was that I wanted to put a different mille there lol.

 

[Arkayology]

I upgraded my gen1 radion to the gen3. Things are responding well already.

SSC, tyree ultimate blue stag

red dragon

pearlberry

joe the coral

group shot of cali tort, joe the coral, pearl berry, green slimer, pink lem, red robin stag

red planet, ora hawkins, steve elias stag

purple tri-color, 30k lokani starting to encrust, garf bonsai, browned out palmer's blue milli, and a "golden nastuta" that is more greenish right now

no name green tablet

turquoise stag

FTS 02/16/14

 

[sahin]

Looking awesome Matt. This tank is looking better each time you post photos. :thumbsup: keep up the good work. . Plus you have the whole LED thing pretty much sorted and its working well for you.

 

[afernandez]

Looks great!

 

[Arkayology]

Looking awesome Matt. This tank is looking better each time you post photos. :thumbsup: keep up the good work. . Plus you have the whole LED thing pretty much sorted and its working well for you.

Ya, I have been tweaking the tank lately to get the nutrient levels stable and I think I have found that spot. Growth is showing up now and I am seeing some corals that were dormant or sickly looking come to life now.

Looks great!

Thanks man! Now that I have found the sweet spot for nutrients and params, growth has returned to the reef!

 

[sahin]

Ya, I have been tweaking the tank lately to get the nutrient levels stable and I think I have found that spot.

Can you please explain this part to me. This is the problem I am having...how did you arrive at this stage? Did you measure things? Observe corals? Feed extra? What foods?

You mentioned a while back you cut back on the Biopellet amount...was it that which helped?

Are you using any GFO?

Would appreciate some detail/discussion on this...its an area I am finding difficult to grasp fully.

Many thanks.

 

[Arkayology]

Can you please explain this part to me. This is the problem I am having...how did you arrive at this stage? Did you measure things? Observe corals? Feed extra? What foods?

You mentioned a while back you cut back on the Biopellet amount...was it that which helped?

Are you using any GFO?

Would appreciate some detail/discussion on this...its an area I am finding difficult to grasp fully.

Many thanks.

Ya, it is kinda hard to explain. This tank has been a huge learning curve. Previously, I used biopellets on my 60g cube SPS tank with great success. I couldn't trim my SPS fast enough to keep them from growing into each other. Ever since I started this tank over 16 months ago I have been trying to get back to that with some extreme difficulty.

I started this tank only using biopellets and tried that for a few months. My SPS started to STN, so I quite biopellets (the same that I used in my 60g cube) and started zeovit. I tried zeovit for about 6 months with some STN and bacterial slime issues, so I stopped that. I went back to biopellets and a new reactor again about 4 months ago, and while that went ok I wasn't getting the growth I wanted. I suspected that I had too low nutrients, even though my test kits (salifert and hannah) said that I had some within the .02-.04ppm P04 and 5ppm nitrate. Clearly it was not enough since my growth sucked.

So, about 4 months ago I stopped the biopellets cold turkey and ran the tank without any mechanical or bacterial filtration, just the skimmer and water changes. Well, growth returned and while I always had ok color, the color became better. So about 1 month ago I started using a small amount of GFO @ about 1/4 cup on a very slow tumble in a reactor. I am very pleased with the results. I am getting some awesome PE on my acros, colors are improving daily, and I am getting some good encrusting and growth on acros that did nothing for months or more. This is what I mean when I say "the sweet spot". The spot where I am getting good a prolonged period of good PE, color, and growth, with minimal ugly algae.

What did I do to get here? Strong flow from my mp40 and mp10, strong lighting from my now gen3 radion, and strong skimming with some GFO. I also feed about 2 cubes of frozen daily and dose some amino acids, zeovit sponge power, and some coral foods. I also stopped chasing numbers, sold my phosphate test kit to force myself to not chase numbers, and just let the tank do it's thing.

I'd love to discuss all this. What have I learned in the last year or so? Well, I learned that I will probably never go back to bacterial filtration if I can help it. I also learned that I should not blindly trust test kits and try to instead just use my corals and algae growth as a way to determine what to do.

 

[sahin]

Matt, many thanks for that. :thumbsup:

 

[echopiece]

Ya, it is kinda hard to explain. This tank has been a huge learning curve. Previously, I used biopellets on my 60g cube SPS tank with great success. I couldn't trim my SPS fast enough to keep them from growing into each other. Ever since I started this tank over 16 months ago I have been trying to get back to that with some extreme difficulty.

I started this tank only using biopellets and tried that for a few months. My SPS started to STN, so I quite biopellets (the same that I used in my 60g cube) and started zeovit. I tried zeovit for about 6 months with some STN and bacterial slime issues, so I stopped that. I went back to biopellets and a new reactor again about 4 months ago, and while that went ok I wasn't getting the growth I wanted. I suspected that I had too low nutrients, even though my test kits (salifert and hannah) said that I had some within the .02-.04ppm P04 and 5ppm nitrate. Clearly it was not enough since my growth sucked.

So, about 4 months ago I stopped the biopellets cold turkey and ran the tank without any mechanical or bacterial filtration, just the skimmer and water changes. Well, growth returned and while I always had ok color, the color became better. So about 1 month ago I started using a small amount of GFO @ about 1/4 cup on a very slow tumble in a reactor. I am very pleased with the results. I am getting some awesome PE on my acros, colors are improving daily, and I am getting some good encrusting and growth on acros that did nothing for months or more. This is what I mean when I say "the sweet spot". The spot where I am getting good a prolonged period of good PE, color, and growth, with minimal ugly algae.

What did I do to get here? Strong flow from my mp40 and mp10, strong lighting from my now gen3 radion, and strong skimming with some GFO. I also feed about 2 cubes of frozen daily and dose some amino acids, zeovit sponge power, and some coral foods. I also stopped chasing numbers, sold my phosphate test kit to force myself to not chase numbers, and just let the tank do it's thing.

I'd love to discuss all this. What have I learned in the last year or so? Well, I learned that I will probably never go back to bacterial filtration if I can help it. I also learned that I should not blindly trust test kits and try to instead just use my corals and algae growth as a way to determine what to do.

Nice explanation!! I too have been struggling with nutrient levels and SPS colors for about 17 months. With help from others on this forum, I did the following. For the past month and half I have stopped testing PO4 (using hanna which I am about to throw away) and I have upped my feedings significantly (feeding fish generously twice a day with pellets/flake and frozen mysis), skimming dry, and removed GFO and GAC from my sump. I have been doing 10% WC's about every two weeks. My corals slowly started to darken up and the color is slowly coming back! I was starving my corals and my tank for so long. Something else I recently noticed is my LR looks alive again, its not sterile looking! I still have a ways a to go, but I am finding that balance.

When I first started this hobby almost 5 years ago I basically had a softy tank and I wasn't crazy about testing and chasing numbers, and the tank flourished. I then moved into SPS and read and read online and did a lot of research. I kept thinking in my head I have to keep my water super clean etc, while all along I was just starving my corals. I'm not promoting not testing your water or to not strive for 0 PO4 and NO3, I am just saying I have seen a positive effect on my corals with small amounts of nutrients present. I am starting to just observe my tank and I know when I'm feeding too much or need to skim more wet. I look for daily brown diatoms on the glass as a key indicator.

Anyway, just my 0.02. Nice tank Socal, your corals look great!

 

[Irshhooligan]

Nice explanation!! I too have been struggling with nutrient levels and SPS colors for about 17 months. With help from others on this forum, I did the following. For the past month and half I have stopped testing PO4 (using hanna which I am about to throw away) and I have upped my feedings significantly (feeding fish generously twice a day with pellets/flake and frozen mysis), skimming dry, and removed GFO and GAC from my sump. I have been doing 10% WC's about every two weeks. My corals slowly started to darken up and the color is slowly coming back! I was starving my corals and my tank for so long. Something else I recently noticed is my LR looks alive again, its not sterile looking! I still have a ways a to go, but I am finding that balance. When I first started this hobby almost 5 years ago I basically had a softy tank and I wasn't crazy about testing and chasing numbers, and the tank flourished. I then moved into SPS and read and read online and did a lot of research. I kept thinking in my head I have to keep my water super clean etc, while all along I was just starving my corals. I'm not promoting not testing your water or to not strive for 0 PO4 and NO3, I am just saying I have seen a positive effect on my corals with small amounts of nutrients present. I am starting to just observe my tank and I know when I'm feeding too much or need to skim more wet. I look for daily brown diatoms on the glass as a key indicator. Anyway, just my 0.02. Nice tank Socal, your corals look great!

This is great insight from both SoCal and echopiece. I'm not running anything comparable to this tank, but the simpler I keep my tank the more improvement I see. But needless to say I always end up getting caught up in the new trends.

 

[Arkayology]

This is great insight from both SoCal and echopiece. I'm not running anything comparable to this tank, but the simpler I keep my tank the more improvement I see. But needless to say I always end up getting caught up in the new trends.

Ya... I got caught up in some very expensive trends that in the end I regret doing. GFO and a skimmer seem to work for me pretty well.