A Splash of Color

[biggles]

Biggles..awesome pieces man. Really enjoy all the sps-porn you post, also the stories you tell keep me coming back to see what you are up to. Keep it up buddy!
Also if you can post up FB pages to follow there too!

Thanks a lot mate

Go back to just before Xmas when Dave was talking about going into SPS big time and look at the pics up until present day.

Deer Park aquarium - acro porn site......

What the phone captures

Very basic post processing to remove the majority of blue wash

Going to Deer Park today to pick up my sock plates and 4" socks. :dance:

I will also pick up the two fresh cut frags Christian sent me from Sustainable Reef's aquacultured stock - Dave took a snap for me :dance:

Flo failed to pick up the pieces i asked Dave to hold for him, obviously not pretty enough for Flo..........

I kinda feel obligated to pay for the bloody things myself now Flo......... that's right my little Austrian friend - they are really sitting there waiting for you and as long as you can get to Deer Park aquarium before me today they will be yours.

International Acro Race

Round 1.

Australia versus Austria

First team to post pics of these pieces wins and the loser country is expelled from further competition !

Run Flo, runnnnnnnnnnnnn ! :smokin:

 

[glaukos]

There's only one thing i can do when i see porn like this...get some corals for my puritan self
You little devil andrew...i was raising my purple stylo from a frag...no she has to go to make some more space

 

[biggles]

Latest pics made me feel sooooo Willy-Wonka-ed up:hmm4:
Thanks for sharing man

I've most of the corals i want in my tank atm.Only want a pink lemonade and a pearlberry....that lasts only until the moment i get in your thread man...after that i...i...i...i want many many more:uhoh3:

Hey Mike, you and i both want a pearlberry buddy......... :beer:

300 bucks for ten acros, holy crap! That would buy me one decent colony here... And most of the time a box coming in is about 5 pieces. Not much to choose from
Keep posting these pictures man its great to see what you have to choose from out there! Any luck getting your phosphates leveled out?

When the skimmer was down for a week i added another mesh bag with 250ml of phos minus - 3 x 250ml bags in good flow areas. Over that week with no skimmer i did a couple of 10% water changes - 20 gals each.
I saw the glass algae drop back to very heavy wavy growth only at the end of a full day light cycle. It was doing this in 3-4 hours when bad.

Within four days of the skimmer running normally again saw the glass stay spotlessly clean for an entire day - shocked the sh$t out of me when i came home to nothing on the glass. :uhoh3:

Since adding the new anthias a week ago i've been adding 5 mysis cubes, 2 large pellet feeds and half an A4 size sheet of nori a day which is why they are all fat colorful pigs lol. I soak the mysis in garlic oil and or KZ Immun Stabil Fish which Dave gave me to use and then rinse in a net under the tap.

I always feed mysis from a small fish net placed in the display and slowly released. My fish are suicidally unafraid of fish nets and i have to shake the bloody cardinals out since they've worked out that if they dive head first into the net they'll be swimming in mysis. This can be extremely helpful if and when a fish needs removing due to an attitude change or whatever.....

So at the moment the glass gets a very slight haze after 11 hours of lighting which is way better than before.

The acros are beautiful as always.....It's hit the point of expectation for you to post beautiful acros made of Unobtanium.

But those Monsoon Wrasses!!!

Wow....!

Those moon fish do look pretty nice in real life Max.

Yeah, I see this in Bali Aquaculture colonies a lot. The new growth looks nothing like the "wild" growth. It can make it awfully difficult to ID what the species may be! I'va also seen the same thing in regards to color - they get super color saturated in their "old" growth, and the new growth is significantly lighter. However, this makes a nice contrast in larger colonies when there is a darker base an lighter growth tips. Besides, every Acroholic knows white growth tips means you can grow an Acro like nobody's business.

I have a nasuta with those sweet dark purple/blue polyps too - I'm not sure what it's doing in my tank yet, it's been stagnant for a long time, but I'm seeing a couple of growth tips popping up at the base in the last few weeks.

Hey Mindy, i have a greened out nasuta that is supposed to look like that new blue polyped piece but it's gone to sleep like yours. It's also waking up at the base with a few new shoots but the rest of the colony is still gross
Your piece sounds interesting, i shall look for a pic on your journal

It's always a treat popping in here and checking out all the gems. A pikachu is high up on my want list too. Great stuff as always Andrew.

Hey Conor, it mightn't end up looking like a pikachu color but even if it doesn't i think it'll look nice regardless

 

[biggles]

Andrew,
I'm trying to see what you look for in acros for coloration and potential. I've not been successful with acros or sps in the past long term due to constant PO4 issues. Scrapping the rock which came loaded with PO4 and starting the tank over again has resolved that issue, so I'm looking forward to phase 2 of my rebuild which is stocking with acros....which is why I'm trying to see what you look for in acros.

I wont be buying this piece since I'm ready just yet for it......but I'd like to get your take on it:

http://www.liveaquaria.com/diversden/ItemDisplay.cfm?c=2733+2&ddid=323606

I see nice pinks and yellows there....but is that a pastely acro cause it's starved of nutrients, or is that a good one to look for?

Thanks for your time.

Hi Max, that piece is a good one. It will be very similar to this bit and i would buy that based on one important factor i see in the pic. You see how far down the branches the pinky/orange tip pigment runs on that particular spath - if you see the mighlight pop color extend down to branch forks you have a AAA capable spath. A piece like that will be stunning and needs high light, if it doesn't look beautiful after a month from that state of mildly washed out it's you not the acro that is causing the lack of color.

# Tip pigments down to the branch forks = at least half the color covering the entire colony will be the crazy tip one that you want lots of. Don't buy any spath that does not possess this pigment attribute and you should end up with all AAA spath's :thumbsup:

I will get pics of any spath in the shop today and show you why i would or wouldn't buy them if i get a chance, depends how busy it is at the shop. I might put the closed sign up while Dave isn't looking.......

@MaxxII

To me, it looks like a light pink on new growth, orange or red polyps (they look white up top though), Flouro green around the corallites with blue internal corallite "pedals", and a green body.

So basically. Green with some specs of blue with flouro green. Polyps may be orange, red, or green/flouro. The flouro green rim may turn yellow. I do not have enough experience to say.

It looks like they heavily manipulated the color, since there's absolutely no definition to the black background sand (also a tactic to create more contrast and make a poopy coral pop)

It's a winner i'd buy if i didn't already have plenty of pinky/red/orangey looking acros Tim

me like!

how much is a plan ticket to down under?

can´t be a problem to get a box of corals into the hand luggage :lolspin:

Cheers

You have about 3 hours left Flo - then they're mine........

:bounce3:

Hey did you ever get your phosphates to level out to a lower level? They were high for a bit right? Start any new AF products yet?

I have them dropping as i said but the new fish have slowed things down a bit. For the last two weeks i have dosed nothing but AF DIY comp 123 mixed exactly as AF instruct. I dose 0.5ml of both zinc and manganese every night using the Triton elements i bought a while back.

Now that we have our heads (some of us, anyways) out of our butts, Andrew I have a question:
Are you seeing any new growth recently and if so, I'm wondering if it may be on the newer pieces or is it general?

Curious if your new regimen has changed anything and if the newer pieces are being affected first..

Hey Matt, draw has gone from 190ml last weekend to 225ml today to maintain my parameters so something is definitely starting to work hopefully. I have noticed all the new stuff i add starts tip growth with little encrusting. All my older phos soaked acros are still less active and have little action going on at the tips so far.
I think phos puts acros to sleep.............

Andrew is such a tease.
He says he is shy. Who would of know with those photos?

I can be shy with colorful pics Kevin lol.

There's only one thing i can do when i see porn like this...get some corals for my puritan self
You little devil andrew...i was raising my purple stylo from a frag...no she has to go to make some more space

Kill the stylo, kill the stylo, kill the stylo Mike............:wavehand:

 

[reefmutt]

why do you say phos soaked?
i don't remember you ever really having elevated phos.. not like MY phos!
so, you have begun the 123 components?
No ca reactor anymore?
you were using a ca reactor, weren't you?

 

[maxxII]

Thanks for the information about the Spath Andrew.

I'm still trying to get NO3 and PO4 under control and down to good levels.

I transplanted a number of fish from an existing system to a reboot of my 120.

The fish eat well, and the NO3 and PO4 levels reflect that. My algae reactor is up and running and should be making more and more of a dent in those levels as time goes on.

Adding Siporax will help as well. I've currently got 3 liters and according to the manufacturer, should use at least a minimum of 4 liters for my 120.

What is the Biggles siporax coefficient again?

Total system volume is about 170 gallons.

 

[reefmutt]

Don't the components contain some zinc and manganese?

 

[biggles]

why do you say phos soaked?
i don't remember you ever really having elevated phos.. not like MY phos!
so, you have begun the 123 components?
No ca reactor anymore?
you were using a ca reactor, weren't you?

The problem with simply relying on the kit readings for phos levels is you only get the water borne amount present rather than the amount being processed and or bound up daily. If we both had say 0.03 phos and 5 nitrates when we tested our water but i had to clean my glass twice daily and you had to clean your glass every 3-4 days - i have a lot less efficient phos management/export than you imo Matt.

I've never owned a calcium reactor mate, just drip the comp 2 over 24 hours with 2L RO water. The comp 1 goes in the ATO and gets delivered over about 12 hours as i top it up with more RO before the ATO is empty. I just pour the comp 3 in the overflow every morning.

Thanks for the information about the Spath Andrew.

I'm still trying to get NO3 and PO4 under control and down to good levels.

I transplanted a number of fish from an existing system to a reboot of my 120.

The fish eat well, and the NO3 and PO4 levels reflect that. My algae reactor is up and running and should be making more and more of a dent in those levels as time goes on.

Adding Siporax will help as well. I've currently got 3 liters and according to the manufacturer, should use at least a minimum of 4 liters for my 120.

What is the Biggles siporax coefficient again?

Total system volume is about 170 gallons.

I have 16 liters of matrix in the sump and my total system water volume is 200 gallons. I think the display is about 160 gallons so 1 liter matrix for every 10 gallons of display volume.

4 liters in a 120 gallon hardcore SPS system............... ya dreamin ! :blown:

Don't the components contain some zinc and manganese?

Yes Matt, i'm experimenting to see if they put enough in that's all.............


I went to Deer Park and boy oh boy......... I want to show you one of the two frags Christian sent me. I have tried hard to show you what your eyes see in person regardless of anything else.

It is already one of my tippy top favorites Christian, thanks mate

Coffee and then i'll show you what was left from Christian's deep water collected shipment........... it's pretty silly........:hmm5:

 

[wheelman76]

Wow !! That's a stunner Andrew

 

[plyle02]

So catching up on this journal take a minute, I had to go back a few pages, finally catching up on my mates threads! So, you are the biggest acro porn hoarder I have yet to see, lol... What a collection Andrew! I now know why they had to dedicate such a large area in your sump to frags, or back up colonies, or whatever slick move you have up your sleave, lol. I am very impressed as always, some of these corals you are scoring are simply amazing, here in the states, when we see these, they are small, and have a lofty price tag. Cheers Mate, looking freaking awesome

 

[reefmutt]

Beyond silly.
Did I hear you say deep water collecting??
And I thought this thread couldn't get more depraved!!
Still not talking to you Andrew but uh.. I'll be waiting for the pics.
Are you using AF phos minus?

 

[biggles]

Wow !! That's a stunner Andrew

Thanks Jess

So catching up on this journal take a minute, I had to go back a few pages, finally catching up on my mates threads! So, you are the biggest acro porn hoarder I have yet to see, lol... What a collection Andrew! I now know why they had to dedicate such a large area in your sump to frags, or back up colonies, or whatever slick move you have up your sleave, lol. I am very impressed as always, some of these corals you are scoring are simply amazing, here in the states, when we see these, they are small, and have a lofty price tag. Cheers Mate, looking freaking awesome

Hey Perry, the quality of acros Christian is sending to Dave is staggering. I doubt any store in the world could hold a candle to Deer Park at the moment in relation to high end acro stock.

Beyond silly.
Did I hear you say deep water collecting??
And I thought this thread couldn't get more depraved!!
Still not talking to you Andrew but uh.. I'll be waiting for the pics.
Are you using AF phos minus?

Lower left in the pic above is 25mtrs + collected according to Dave - i always ask if he knows where a shipment comes from Matt.
I have 750ml of phos minus in mesh bags in the sump mate.

The three lower left are in my display now.

 

[reefmutt]

Man, that makes my stomach feel like it did when I was in love with my first girlfriend and I was going to see her for the first time in a long time..
Those deepwaters are whispering sweet nothings to me.. Several pieces from the bottom right of the left hand side are saying things to me that no acro should whisper to a grown acro whore, like me. It's not right... Dammit..

So, phos question. My phos has hovered between .08 and .17 (yes, not a decimal mistake) for at least the past year. I have always had to clean my glass daily.. And I've had every type of algae problem there is- aside from dynos (knock on wood). Recently, both bryopsis and bubble are way better, I must say but I am still fed up.. Recently I started feeding more to raise n and of course p has climbed as well but I am seeing better colours. I'm going back to gfo. I can put 250ml of rowa phos and it will extend my need to clean the glass by a day... For only one day! Then the algae comes back daily. Basically, 250 ml will pull p down for about 36 hours- that's it!
How would you compare phos minus to rowa? Grain size especially, no matter how much I rinse the rowa, there is always the fine particles getting into the tank.

 

[biggles]

Those three pieces are........

this one

and the two at the front in this pic

I haven't seen A. caroliniana in any color other than green or yellow before. Baby blue is............ deeeeeeeeeeeeep

I'll make a coffee and talk phos Matt

 

[Enrysps]

The problem with simply relying on the kit readings for phos levels is you only get the water borne amount present rather than the amount being processed and or bound up daily. If we both had say 0.03 phos and 5 nitrates when we tested our water but i had to clean my glass twice daily and you had to clean your glass every 3-4 days - i have a lot less efficient phos management/export than you imo Matt.

I've never owned a calcium reactor mate, just drip the comp 2 over 24 hours with 2L RO water. The comp 1 goes in the ATO and gets delivered over about 12 hours as i top it up with more RO before the ATO is empty. I just pour the comp 3 in the overflow every morning.



I have 16 liters of matrix in the sump and my total system water volume is 200 gallons. I think the display is about 160 gallons so 1 liter matrix for every 10 gallons of display volume.

4 liters in a 120 gallon hardcore SPS system............... ya dreamin ! :blown:



Yes Matt, i'm experimenting to see if they put enough in that's all.............


I went to Deer Park and boy oh boy......... I want to show you one of the two frags Christian sent me. I have tried hard to show you what your eyes see in person regardless of anything else.

It is already one of my tippy top favorites Christian, thanks mate

Coffee and then i'll show you what was left from Christian's deep water collected shipment........... it's pretty silly........:hmm5:

Hi Andrew,
I see you got the little gems ... hows the little blue going
I told dave today that i am going to top that shippment last week with the news im getting on Tuesday it will be even better then the last lot
Cheers Christian
Ps last shippment was collected 23m down blue clear water one of the best reefs i have been two

 

[tripdad]

:spin2::inlove: Those new ones are spot on to my taste Andrew, that tank of acro's is just ridiculous! I think you guys are living in heaven and there's an acro God. Interesting thoughts on reading the glass for phos. management, I may try that idea. Thanks for sharing the pics from your side of the world, really enjoy them.

 

[Jim Z.]

Hi Andrew,

Your acros are looking good. You certainly have some nice acro species available in your area. The only shops that are in my area have a limited selection, but with some looking you can find some gems. I have been looking for a small frag of Pearlberry, but have yet to find a fairly priced one. On one trip to the shop, I did purchase an acro that looked and was colored like a Pearlberry and I thought my quest was finished. However, after the tank crash, I found the little brown frag covered by hair algae and buried by an avalanche of dead acro branches. Today, the same frag is a nice yellow green base color with bright magenta polyps and pink tips on the branches--another "Holy Grail" species, Acropora microclados. Not bad for 15 bucks................Jim

 

[biggles]

So, phos question. My phos has hovered between .08 and .17 (yes, not a decimal mistake) for at least the past year. I have always had to clean my glass daily.. And I've had every type of algae problem there is- aside from dynos (knock on wood). Recently, both bryopsis and bubble are way better, I must say but I am still fed up.. Recently I started feeding more to raise n and of course p has climbed as well but I am seeing better colours. I'm going back to gfo. I can put 250ml of rowa phos and it will extend my need to clean the glass by a day... For only one day! Then the algae comes back daily. Basically, 250 ml will pull p down for about 36 hours- that's it!
How would you compare phos minus to rowa? Grain size especially, no matter how much I rinse the rowa, there is always the fine particles getting into the tank.

Phos minus is similar grain size but very clean of particulate compared to rowa which takes ages to rinse. The AF stuff rinses clean in about 15 secs when i jiggle the bag under the tap.
I would say it's about 75% as potent as rowaphos but that's a big guess. I'm sure it's a bit weaker but not when you compare the price per liter.

It's really serendipitous that you described what you see when using a phos absorber. I had a long talk with Dave about my phos theory and we decided if i was right i might burn through quite a bit of phos absorber until i got out what was in the sand, rock and algae etc. As it turns out i peaked at glass clean 48 hours but it's getting worse again after about two weeks of phos minus. Less than a day again before i see colors lose shine due to dirty glass :hammer:

I think you just have the same thing going on but at much higher load levels throughout the system but that's just a guess really. I'm going to replace the 750ml soon and keep doing that until i see the glass stay clean for two days continuously. Then i hope to see the amount required to maintain that drop over time to a point where the phos minus is only needed to deal with phos i add daily through feeding the fish.

That's what i'm going to do for a few months and see if i can get phos well and truly under tight control. :beer:

 

[Usernam Invalid]

That's it I'm packing up and moving to OZ. my commute to work would suck but would all be work it. Can't wait to see those new pieces in the display [emoji16]

 

[gregkn73]

Phos minus is similar grain size but very clean of particulate compared to rowa which takes ages to rinse. The AF stuff rinses clean in about 15 secs when i jiggle the bag under the tap.
I would say it's about 75% as potent as rowaphos but that's a big guess. I'm sure it's a bit weaker but not when you compare the price per liter.

It's really serendipitous that you described what you see when using a phos absorber. I had a long talk with Dave about my phos theory and we decided if i was right i might burn through quite a bit of phos absorber until i got out what was in the sand, rock and algae etc. As it turns out i peaked at glass clean 48 hours but it's getting worse again after about two weeks of phos minus. Less than a day again before i see colors lose shine due to dirty glass :hammer:

I think you just have the same thing going on but at much higher load levels throughout the system but that's just a guess really. I'm going to replace the 750ml soon and keep doing that until i see the glass stay clean for two days continuously. Then i hope to see the amount required to maintain that drop over time to a point where the phos minus is only needed to deal with phos i add daily through feeding the fish.

That's what i'm going to do for a few months and see if i can get phos well and truly under tight control. [emoji481]

Andrew what had made you, not using gfo, for such a long time? What happened lately, and you started using it again?