Chasdb Starfire 225g economic stimulis build

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=13660855#post13660855 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by Phillybean
Looks great, going to look amazing when those frags grow out more!

I'm gonna drop some of the aquascape lower, but yeah can't wait till all signs of the bugs are gone and I'm sure growth will increase.




<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=13661347#post13661347 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by naz420
Dude,that new florescent colony is such an eye catcher!

I like that one too, seems like it has it's own batteries.

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=13664881#post13664881 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by drpo21
oh man, you have an Achilles and a black tang, very nice, I've always wanted an Achilles. too bad your in cali. great looking tank. thinking about putting any actinics in there?

The Achilles got stuck to the pump Fri night so he has a scar on his side. Yeah, got to put them up soon.
 
<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=13666912#post13666912 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by bwbixby
Boy does that black tang look amazing in your tank!

I'll try and get a better pic. It is an amazing fish, my tangs are interacting so well now, all ez going. You said he eats everything and you weren't't kidding, flakes, pellets, nori, mysis, brine all yummy.

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=13667143#post13667143 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by knucklehead562
sweet tank dude where have u getting all of your stock from I'm looking for an honest lfs close to me

I go and look everywhere. Different shops buy livestock from different wholesalers, some get imports direct, some trade with local reefers for drygoods to maintain their tanks so you can find LE at some, great selection of ORA at others. Some have tanks in back not normally open to the public. Problem is pretty colors carry a higher price and if you don't get it you may loose your chance at finding that piece for sometime. If you haggle price over small frags they probably not gonna invite you back to see the hot high dollar stuff. MY favorites: SoCalTropicalFish in Fullerton, OC Aquatics Fountain Valley, Mystic Reef in Riverside, Amazing Aquariums in Orange, Tongs in FV. There are many local reefers who have beautiful stuff that they need to keep pruned too, just keep an eye out on the So Cal club forum.

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=13667790#post13667790 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by FOSELONE
nice...I have one too...heres mine...

74738fish_002.jpg

Nice one! Is your really ez going to? Mine will take turns at the algae clip with the others.
 
I swear! Im so envious. LOL when will I have a nice light rack like yours? Hell when will my tank finally be up and running? Hahahah

Charles everything looks great!
 
<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=13695955#post13695955 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by Eels&Lions
I swear! Im so envious. LOL when will I have a nice light rack like yours? Hell when will my tank finally be up and running? Hahahah

Charles everything looks great!

With that new fuge/sump, I know you are making progress, it never seems to go as fast as we all would like though. You find any rock yet?
 
Well my circuit breaker tripped last week. I reset it and my internal skimmer overflowed sending 3/4 of my skimmer's cup of skimate back into the tank. Kenargo helped with a command for my AC3 to prevent this from happening again. Also ich is back in the tank and the Black Tang looks awful. I set up my frag tanks and pulled/ dipped all coral and transferred them. No AEFW were found and corals look good and color is improving. I was also able to catch my harlequin shrimp and move him and started dropping the salinity on the display tank. I have green algae appearing also. Between the hyposalinity treatment for ich and by reducing the light cycle I hope to take care of several problems. I dropped my salinity from 1.025 to 1.020 Sat night and down to 1.015 Sun afternoon. I'm making more water which I buffer up with Kalk and then match temp. I will try to do it before I go to work Mon morning so I will get up at 4am. The fish seem unaffected by the treatment so far. All are active and eating, even the pipefish. I cleaned my Vortech which has the new Gen 2 upgrade and the magnet's coating has cracked and rust is visible. Now I need another magnet, I'm not having much luck with powerheads right now.
 
Wow that sucks Charles. Hows your fish so far now. hope there doing better.

Im going to call you tomorrow arount 10am want to ask you something.

Good night
 
Good job and yes ton of hard work but at the end all well worth it. Lmk if I can help yu in any sort of way and will be talkinfg to you soon as it is almost time.:)
 
Uhg!

I don't chime in much, but I've been following this thread since day one, and really hate to see you troubles. Hang in there !
 
I got the salinity down to 1.009 and fish were feeding and acting normally. I saw some flukes on the eyes of the Hippo Tang so I decided on a Prazipro treatment. I bought the Prazi with the original intent to use it for a complete tank treatment for the AEFW I was dealing with earlier but decided not to since I read this thread.
http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=1486941&highlight=prazipro
The next day, my Blue Spot Jawfish started having trouble breathing and died, I couldn't find the body till later in the evening. His skin/ scales looked bad, I thought he may have had heavy flukes in his gills and maybe bled out. Tuesday my Achilles died, he was breathing heavy but was active and eating. When I took him out his skin was discolored. I believe it was Velvet. My Blonde Naso was becoming reclusive and not eating normally. If there was ever nori on the clip he would be there. He is 6-7" long and maybe 1 1/2 thick and very personable. I didn't see one of my Purple Queens and one Dispar. I did a 40 gallon water change, added 3 cups carbon and put the cup back on the skimmer. I removed the cup before but kept it running to help keep up oxygen levels. The skin on the Naso started looking worse. I set up another 60g tank with new water and matched salinity and ph, temp. I moved him over after a FW dip in Methylene Blue and Acrifavine but then decided to medicate the water too. I wanted to treat in Cupramamine but cant since they are in Hyposalinity. The next day after work I started catching and moving over all the remaining fish. My large Yellow Corris jumped out of the treatment tank, I got the pair after Christmas last year from Ali. My last Purple Queen- the male started having breathing problems too and died. I have been doing water changes on the treatment tank and doing a slow drip to raise salinity daily. I hope to get it in a safe zone to be able to treat the fish. I know the copper is harsh also. I can only blame myself. After much more reading I really need to QT each fish individually for 6 weeks. At a SCMAS meeting Lee spoke about treating fish so I did quite a bit of reading on Reef Sanctuary and read his posts (leebca) in fish disease and treatment forum. I value his info as he is the business end of researching fish disease and treatment. I've heard it time and time again but know I have to deal with my practices which are not up to par.

Fortunately at least the SPS are AEFW free and doing well. Reeftanks can be overwhelming when things don't go right and it's usually the hobbyists fault. The 225g is dark and lifeless- well except for green algae, ich, flukes. There are classes at Saddleback College, I'm gonna see about enrolling in the future.
 
I planned on going but didn't feel up to it. I needed to do a waterchange and catch up on some maintenance. I'm now back to 4 tanks in the house about 600g.
 
Charles,

I just got done reading the whole thread. Wow! It was great meeting you today with Eels and when I saw the tank I was green with envy.

I was unaware of what you've been through with the tank, but I'm still impressed with the what I saw. Hopefully, I'll be invited again.

Semper Fi,
Mike
 
I haven't posted any updates for quite sometime as I've been working pretty hard to bring home the bacon in these tough times. The tank is going quite well. My numbers are good phosphates .03 on colormeter and nitrates <20 so things are coloring up and getting some growth. Fish are doing well too, a little ich and will need to do a prazi treatment for flukes, but otherwise healthy and active. I used to do a lot of freelance photography back in the day so my Canon lenses function ok but am still learning to use my crop body 40D. I used to burn up a lot of Fuji Velvia, and have resisted the digital age so I have some learning to do. I'm not even gonna try photoshop as I'm having a tough time just getting pics in focus these days...... :p

Left
IMG_0498.jpg


Middle
IMG_0499.jpg


Right
IMG_0500.jpg


Left side
IMG_0492.jpg


Efflo
IMG_0503.jpg


Pink Lemonaide
IMG_0510.jpg


Rainbow Acan
IMG_0519.jpg
 
With all those fish losses and coral pests I was half expecting to hear you throwing in the towel. Glad to see that isn't the case. :)

Suprised to hear you still have ich after emptying the tank of fish and doing a hypo cycle.

QT is something I am crazy about. All new fish go through 2 months QT. It can be brutal and I've lost many fish in quarantine but I've never had an Ich outbreak in my main tank. The fish I've lost have been jumpers or starved and my Emperor Angel died of a bladder infection. If you still have Ich then there's no point in hypo'ing new arrivals I guess but always good to medicate at least.

Good luck and following now. :)
 
Back
Top