700 gallon tank, or how i spent my daughters inheritance

[MTH]

Can't beat the view of your recent job. Hope everything is going well with the tank and coral. I especially enjoy seeing the Crosshatch.

 

[hihikeke]

Thts one big *** skimmer

 

[Reefski's]

if only these were as easy to kill as corals. they are still proliferating all over the tank. i think Ron Shimek says they are a type of colonial stage of a jellyfish.

i am trying to figure some material to combine with CaOH and then smother them. i was thinking something like silly putty or clay. some thing that could be removed or maybe smothered in two part epoxy with CaOH mixed into the two part.

the tangs keep the algae grazed short and you can see the white bare rock that has been grazed by the urchin.

some corals were mostly unaffected by the recent tank events.

 

[Reefski's]

the good old days when i had a bunch of monti caps in the tank.

a friend gave me some frags last week. they are still alive and well and will get into the tank one of these days.

 

[Reefski's]

the circus is in town again. if you ever get the chance to see Cirque du Soleil it is a lot of fun. it was a great day to be at the beach. temps in the low 70's. just beautiful.

he rode this bike about a mile down the crowded boardwalk and then back again.

 

[melev]

Hey Carl, what did you end up doing about those hydroids on the rocks?

 

[Matias Ilhabela]

Hydroids these you can try to control with some butterfly striatus, here in Brazil a friend was doing tests on them to eat the Hydroids not know about that, another option is to put kalk with an applicator on top of them.
the kalk will take a lot more work, but you will slowly killing

 

[Reefski's]

Hey Carl, what did you end up doing about those hydroids on the rocks?

i haven't done anything yet. i am going to pull out a couple of the rocks that are easy to get to and then try to cover the rest with two part mixed with CaOH.

it will be slow. i won't have time or energy to do them all at once. i just need to get started slowly doing it and see it it even works. i am ready to start putting some corals back in the tank and see if they live.

i don't trust a butterfly in the tank except the Copperband. i am told the Kilini (sp) will eat the aiptasia. don't know about the others. they are not really hydroids but are a form of jellyfish.

Matias is my next door neighbors name. whatever they are they are the most successful thing in the tank except maybe the mini brittle stars which are not really a pest but there sure are a lot of them.


Carl

 

[melev]

Carl, they are definitely a filterfeeder, and you are no doubt giving them plenty to eat which is why they grow so abundantly in your system.

Hermits and Emerald crabs maybe the way to go with getting them under control, and perhaps limiting some of the amount of food they capture daily.

 

[Reefski's]

Ron Shimek and Eric Borneman don't know of any natural predators for them. i have a blue legged hermit that has shown no interest.

they are a lot of hungry mouths aren't they?

as far as an emerald crab, when you buy them they are small but get a LOT bigger. the last one i had disappeared for about a year and then when i moved that tank i found it and it scared the crap out of me when i dislodged the rock it was under.

so i don't think so. i still have the black tipped white crab in the tank. i don't know what it eats as it never leaves the one rock it has lived in since it went in the tank, (unknown at the time). it is only visible with a flashlight after dark when it comes out of it hole in the rock.

Carl

 

[Matias Ilhabela]

i don't trust a butterfly in the tank except the Copperband

striatus really eat corals, but before you take the coral it will eat Aiptasia and maybe eat hydroids


I thought the jellyfish reproduced in its make adult only, and not in their way when they are sessile imprisoned in the seabed

""sessile (ssl)
1. Permanently attached or fixed and not free-moving, as corals and mussels.""

 

[melev]

Yes, all those mouths are eating plantonic-sized food. Phytoplankton, rotifers, golden pearls, cyclop-eeze... and fish poo of course.

If you were keeping a lot of non-photosynthetic corals like gorgonians, I could see why a lot of feeding would benefit your tank, but it seems like the feeding process has really done a number on your tank. I don't mean to be negative at all, but you lost a lot of corals that you loved. You've got your water under control now, and I know you have a bunch of fish. What corals are still doing well in your tank? It might be time to focus on purer water conditions, feeding a little less, and removing those pest hydroids (wannabe jellies).

I know money is tight, but if you ordered a couple of hundred tiny hermits from Keys Critters, they might be the ones to check up those things. They also sell emerald crabs that aren't scary-sized.

 

[Matias Ilhabela]

ilhabela here do not have the emerald crab, we have what we call red emerald is the mitraculus forceps is an excellent algae eater and loves Bubble Algae.
but to eat hydroids and jellyfish think that only some kind of fish or Nudibranquio

I'm sorry if I'm writing something wrong, I use the translator google and most times I have to correct some things that are wrong

 

[crsandoval]

That is a cool photo of him/her being hand fed... literally.

 

[Matias Ilhabela]

another crab that is very similar to the mithraculus forceps, and the Mithrax hispidus, but he eats coral, the difference is that in the thorns hispidus has double-ended.

 

[Reefski's]

great pictures.

i have a few bubble algae that one of the fish eats. i think it is the Foxface Rabbit Fish.

 

[Reefski's]

 

[melev]

With that coral load, I think I would focus on feeding only the fish and let their poo feed your corals. The elegance is the only one that would actually need to be target fed.

 

[Reefski's]

the parts of the ATS that is getting the most flow has a good growth on it. too much water though is going over this part and not all the way around so as to flow over all the screen. it needs adjusting of the gap and i need more time.

a potential catastrophe is looming. the NaOH i use for recharging the DI unit has leaked onto the floor and eroded part of the sump framwork. i don't think it has affected the integrity of the container portion.

 

[MrineLfRlz]

what are you going to do then just clean it up and keep an eye on it?
how bad did it eat into the plastic base?