Chiefnreefer's 20 gallon long (10g fuge/6g sump)

[ChiefnReefer]

After about 6 months of building and DIY projects I have finally gotten to the point where I'm ready to start a tank thread! Over the past few months, I have built a custom stand to hold my 20gallon long display along with a 6 gallon sump that holds my heaters and skimmer and a 10 gallon refugium. Also I made a custom overflow, and did all the plumbing, not to mention all of the acrylic work for the fuge, overflow, sump, and mounts for various things.

I have 15 lbs of live sugarsize sand in the fuge (about 3 or so inches worth), and 20 lbs of crushed coral in the main tank. Also I have 16 lbs of dry rock (from BRS) and 8 pounds of liverock (global aquatic importers) shared between the display and the fuge.

As far as water flow, I have a mag 3 return pump (pump in fuge, return is on left)as well as a koralia nano 240 (back wall left) and a koralia nano 425 (far right) in the display. Is this too much?

Let the cycle begin! What would you recommend as far as lighting goes during the cycle? Over the display I have a powercompact (1 actinic, 3 regular) and a standard compact flourescent white bulb over the fuge.

Also, I have the protein skimmer running (aquatic life internal mini 115 which is commonly used in the 29 gallon biocube), and 2 100w heaters set to 81 to get the cycle going a little quicker.

Let me know what you think! All comments/questions/criticisms are more than welcome!

 

[ange062]

Looks like a solid start! Once the cycle is done I am looking forward to stocking!

 

[ChiefnReefer]

thanks ange! as I was just staring blindly at the rock doing its thing just now I found a baby mantis shrimp in my sump!!! I tried to get some snapshots of it but they didnt turn out at al...i found a picture online though that looks exactly like it...

It's way too small to try to catch right now, but maybe it will survive the cycle and i can snag it out when its bigger and build a nano mantis tank!

 

[ChiefnReefer]

Found another hitch hiker! Anyone know what it is? its really small and moves pretty quick.

I also found a TON of little feather dusters on the big piece of tonga branch in the center of the display. I just don't have a camera good enough to actually get a good shot of them

After the rock settled in and it cleared up a little bit (two days or so) I took a turkey baster and blew off all of the live rock to clean it off a little. It settled pretty quick though and cleared up in only a couple hours.

How often should I be cleaning the sump and overflow? I took the baster to them all today to blow off all of the fine dust from the sand and such and there was a lot! Is it bad to do this weekly once the tank is done cycling? it got pretty cloudy in there.

 

[ange062]

Its an asterina starfish.

 

[ChiefnReefer]

Thanks! Thats what i was thinking, you think it will become a problem? A lot of people say that they start to get out of hand, but I've only seen one so far...

 

[ChiefnReefer]

Found another starfish! This time it was in my fuge. Sand sifter?

 

[dixiedog]

I have asterinas in my 29, they cause no problems for me - yet, anyway. I think there may be more than one kind of them.

Very nice tank setup BTW.

 

[ange062]

They have been in my tank from day 1 and never been an issue, I wouldn't worry about them.

 

[ChiefnReefer]

Great! because as of now they're the only moving thing I get to look at while it cycles besides those feather dusters haha. I found the little mantis dead today stuck on a powerhead in my display. Guess the return pump killed it. Any guesses on how long it will take to cycle? Everyone in my family has a week long span of when we get to see a hint of nitrates and the winner gets to pick the first livestock haha!

 

[ChiefnReefer]

Diatom starting to show up possibly? I have had my tank running for about two weeks now, and I have added live rock from two local LFS's over the course of that time. I noticed that there are really small brown dots forming on the substrate, could this be a diatom bloom coming on? I have been taking a turkey baster and blasting all the live rock, and stirring the crushed coral every two or three days and leaving the lights on for about 4 hours/day so that i dont lose EVERYTHING that came on the liverock that I purchased. Any opinions?

 

[ChiefnReefer]

Question: Now that I have some macro in my fuge, I'm going to be running the light 24 hrs/day. What type of clean up crew can I throw in my fuge that won't harm my sand bed and will take care of the diatom thats starting to build up?

Fuge with new macro (caulerpa)

Diatom starting to build up (compare to previous photo of starfish in fuge higher up in thread)

 

[ChiefnReefer]

Just got 2 more pounds of AWESOME liverock today along with 6 pretty big nassarius snails from a local aquatics warehouse. Tomorrow I'm paying a visit to a friend who has an awesome 4 year old 75 gallon whose going to give me some frags to throw in the tank. I think there may be a couple small aiptasia on the liverock I just put in, but nothing a peppermint shrimp can't take care of! stay tuned...

Huge nassarius'!

New liverock

Does anyone know what these are on my liverock? Looks like some type of sponges...Let me know if you have any ideas...

 

[ange062]

Looks like sponge to me! Itll most likely die off, and eventually new ones will grow under your rocks

 

[ChiefnReefer]

First couple frags are in from a friend looking to clean up his tank a little bit.

His corals were growing too large and began to sting a frogspawn he had in his tank so he gave it to me! you can see on the right side it is damaged, but already shows signs of possible regrowth.

I also got a purple finger leather. This one took a while to open up a little bit, he cut it pretty roughly. It's doing much better now though. Here are the pics after introduction and about 8 hours later:

He also gave me a pice of monti cap that had been growing out of control!

More updates to come!

 

[cdrewferd]

Good looking tank. How about a FTS with those new corals? What are your plans for fish?

 

[Robbie Reefer]

Really like your rockwork.

 

[DreTheReefer]

Nice I like the seperate sump and fuge

 

[ChiefnReefer]

Good looking tank. How about a FTS with those new corals? What are your plans for fish?

Thanks, I'll get a shot of the whole tank when I get a chance for sure! As far as livestock, I'm thinking a peppermint or coral banded shrimp and a pair of true percula clowns. I don't want to over do it with such a small display tank. I think I'm gonna get some small bristle worms for the fuge sometime soon also.

 

[ChiefnReefer]

Really like your rockwork.

Thanks a ton! I think I'm having more fun doing aquascaping and buying liverock than I am actually stocking the thing haha. Its awesome to see all the cool hitch hikers that you get with the liverock, unfortunately I had to remove a couple pieces only hours after I put them in because I had noticed some aiptasia and don't want to have to deal with them so early on...