Anyone here give up on keeping SPS?

[know-it-all]

to answer the original question,
Yes I did, everthing I seemed to put in died.
Softies, LPS, and SPS
the only thing that survived was my LPS/SPS Hydnophoria
(see I do read the entire thread)

then I tore the tank apart to remove a fish
(coral beauty to be precise)
that's when I noticed a gorilla crab
I took it out, added 2 m620 sieos, and changed my bulb,
I picked up some sps from a fellow reefer, and tried again

after that, every thing took off.
my theory is:
the coral beauty was nipping at all my softies
the gorila crab was picking at the LPS
everything wasting away was killing the SPS

 

[CeeGee]

I have been looking at the tank for hours on end and have never even seen a hide nore hair of a crab.

I have a crab in my tank that is quite large (gonna move him to the fuge as soon as I get it going.) and I didn't see him for over 6 months. It is out all the time now, but this dude survived the curing process with no food. It is a crazy looking motha too!

I will admit my AquaC Remora has not been skimming very good at all for quite sometime. I have the cup all the way down and it colllects maybe a third of a cup every 2 weeks. Although I wonder if this is because of the Chaeto in competition.

I have a Remora Pro with a Mag 3 and I think it is a horrible skimmer. I used to get more skimmate out of a Lee's skimmer that ran off of a wooden airstone back in the day.

are you not running a DI on the end of your RO? that would really clean up your water. I change my DI when I hit a TDS of 2. In all actuality I try to keep it at O and as stated above I don't think the remora is worth it's weight in sh__.

 

[10" Red Devil]

Well for a 20 gallon though?

 

[10" Red Devil]

Well I dont think a tds of 2 is a bad thing. I mean someone more experienced may chime in, but it seems as if 2 is not bad at all. I was told by a expert local sps keeper and lfs manager that has amazing looking sps that I only needed a R/O filter for our tap and that a TDS of 2 is fine.

 

[CeeGee]

I am just throwing some ideas out there trying to help you. I have a 38 gallon (which to me isn't all that much larger than your tank) and I would rather go skimmerless (which I have been)than to run my remora pro. I hate it that much. That is all going to change soon as I am setting up my ASM G3 in the next few weeks. I can't wait.

I am by no means an expert SPS keeper. I am still very much a newbie.

Why can't these "experts" tell you what is wrong and help you get your tank in order?

BTW I am not being a jerk that just appears to be something that they could help you with if they are as good as you say.

 

[10" Red Devil]

CeeGee,

Sorry if I offended you. I appreciate your ideas, but it is like the thousandth conflicting piece of advice I have gotten on here and I am a little confused right now.

 

[CeeGee]

you didn't offend me in any way. Believe me when I say that I understand your frustration.

 

[Floridiot]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=6447087#post6447087 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by Hef
Increasing water flow is one of those things that it is hard to convince people that it really makes a difference, I believe it does, not just for the health of corals, but the color of them.

Well said.

 

[10" Red Devil]

Okay so I cannot really afford a Deltec or Euroreef but, what if I added a mag5 to the Remora instead of the Maxijet 1200 would this make it perform as well if not closet to the deltec or Euroreef?

I can get a Mag5 from somone for $25.

Thanks.

 

[clkwrk]

if its a remora and not remora pro then the mag 5 will be too much and no even if you put a mg 3 on it it wont perform near what a er or deltec will.

 

[10" Red Devil]

Yeah it is a Remora and in the DIY section I was told that you can put a Mag5 on the Remora.

 

[10" Red Devil]

Okay another question and thanks for answering my previous questions. What about getting the coralife needle wheel skimmer? I have heard this outperforms the Remora. I am just trying to make a compromise at the moment as the Euroreef and Deltecs are just way out of my budget now and for a few years really.

Thanks.

 

[clkwrk]

That would do great . Here is a picture of my buddies

 

[mntl]

10"--I can relate with much of your situation, I have the same skimmer, different tank (see sig) and a 10gal sump, with everything comes to about 25 gallons. I do not think the skimmer is really the issue. I had a 10 gal with 175w mh in a pendant style reflector, kept it about 12" off the water, everything was great with growth/color etc. all stony corals/sps. I moved it all to the current tank, same rock, more flow but upgraded to a luminarc mini. Got massive bleaching initially, I had to move the light up to around 18-20", and it stopped and what I have kept is starting to turn back to the way it was. But visually it looks much dimmer than my old tank?

I am thinking about possibly changing my lights to a higher K, sinse i do not use supplimentation and I keep my lights on for 9hrs. I currently use a 175w Hamilton 14k.

The skimmer works but I find that if I add water directly into the tank with the skimmer, it will kill it's production for some time. If I add it to the tank connected to it, it will not kill it's production (make it not foam).

Also, with my smaller tank I had imo, poor color/growth/minor stn for some time but could not figure out why. I found that from day to night my temp was swinging a few points. Sinse i couldn't keep it even at lower temps I decided to raise my heaters to hold it at 80 (prior it would hit 80 in the day then drop to my heaters set-78 at night) This made a very fast drastic difference in sps color/growth/and stopped stn issues in that tank. Also, I use to allow some minor salinity fluctuation from time-to-time (in small tanks 1 gallon can throw you a couple points if not watched, so can evaperation). After finally giving in and automating the water top-off and getting top-off salintity ratio's dialed in this also made very noticable improvements in the tank.

Fluctuation, even very minor, is constant in small tanks like these. And most people do not relise that the small tanks can change 1pt in salinity in a single day just do too evaperation. If you find heat and salinity fluctuates, even slightly, Iwould address it. This might mean running the tank a little hotter than you would prefer or salinity a little lower.

just some info on how I made some issues for myself, everyone else kept telling me it was probably unmeasurable phos or nitrates or lack of food (I dont keep fish or feed). You might be doing it all right, but fluctuaion in good ranges is still fluctuation, and these tanks wouldnt be nano's without it

---john

 

[10" Red Devil]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=6456240#post6456240 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by clkwrk
That would do great . Here is a picture of my buddies

What size tank is that on?

Thanks. Also I got that kind of skimmate months ago, but for some reason production of that magnitute can take a month or more to accumulate as opposed to the 2-3days it use to take.

 

[10" Red Devil]

John,

Thanks for your input. Well I do have a ato (float type). I also have a titanium heater on a controller. The temp does fluctuate, but not much 80.2-80.8 if that in a given day. I do run a fan at night on high to help evap water for kalk drip over night. I do about 2teaspoons of kalk to one gallon and probably administar about 3/4 of the mixture overnight. The heater is oversized a 250watt to accomadate for the extra cooling from the room and the fan. But again it does not fluctuate hardly at all. Not like the 1-3 degrees I see alot of these colorful sps system fluctuate.

 

[mntl]

Did a quick re-read. Are you still dosing amino-acids or anything other than salt/kalk? This affected color in my 10 gal and sinse removing I swore not to dose in such a small tank. Also when you asked what is considered slow cheato growth, get it to where it wont grow. I found that it eventually stopped growing and just sat there trapping crud. I was worried for a long time about removing it, and finally I just ditched it, have not used it sinse. My sandbed tanks had 0 on the common levels (phos/trates/etc) and so do my BB, when it gets to that point, short of buying some really expensive meters you can look at the haze that eventually grows on glass.

For example (and it is not too clear from the pic but you get the point) this is a new 4 month old tank, the rocks are a couple of years old and it was just a transfer from an old tank. It is not stocked but If you look at the glass on the left hand side of the tank, you can see a couple of slight hazee patches. this takes about 7-10 days to get to this point inbetween cleanings with my mag float. on some of my older tanks, that also had all of their parameters at 0, this took only a couple of days. These same tanks had a hard time coloring up sps, but due too their shollow (12") depth, they could bleach them all day long . There are 6 snails in here, and I am kindof coraline anal so i scape any sign of it. If your parameter are below hobby-test-kit range, try to clean your glass and look at the panes from an angle on a daily basis. count the days it takes to become visible and try to get it to atleast 3-4 days. Doseing stuff greatly shortens the days from my experience, especially phyto.

[/IMG]

--john

 

[10" Red Devil]

I have barely enough snails and it takes about 2 weeks to get any kind of fogging on my glass. Of course that was with just the tank on a 4 hour photo period and chaeto on a 24/7 photo period.

 

[finneganswake]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=6445711#post6445711 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by 10" Red Devil
Oh I forgot to mention that I have one of those clip on lamps from Home depot with a 27watt screw in 6500k curly-Q bulb. It is about 3-4" from the chaeto.

Corraline growth is great on the rock, and my old 1400gph CPR overflow, but does not grow on the bottom or the back of the glass I suspect because it is painted black (on the outside of the tank).

Well I sent back my SEIOS because I saw that I could have the same amount of flow from the two maxijets for about a 1/8th of the SEIOS price, plus they are a ton more reliable and will work on a wave maker. Another benefit is less heat given off. When I had the SEIOs I actually had one stop working on me.

Anyway they were two 620s and if the maxijets modded are slightly more powerful then the output of the 620s that is over 1200gph flowing around the tank in addition to the 200gph or so from the return pump, in a 20 gallon tank. I couldnt imagine adding anymore powerheads in this small a tank I mean with the mod the maxijets stand out enough on their own.

Kinda like a Mac Truck parked inside a Target.

I know this is going to sound like heresy but for SOME sps you can have too much waterflow. It's not many of them, but I do have a few in my tank that started to lose tissue until I moved them to an area with lower flow. I don't know how you'd find an area of low flow in a tank as small as yours with that much flow, however.

 

[MiddletonMark]

Finneganswake ... I dare say, I might agree.

Since re-doing my flow [increasing overall flow radically] - I've had issues with a few sps [seriatopora, one Acropora] that do not seem to be taking the change positively.

Might be rare - but to lump all these corals as wanting the exact same flow is probably imperfect, as you suggest.

But shhh ... that would be against the rules