Dawn's seahorse garden!

Nice video Dawn. Lots of serpent stars and chubby fish! The tank looks good too. I like the rubble zone. The Red Grapes look very happy. I wish I had as much luck with them as you do. Nice!
 
I love having chubby fish. I try to keep myself, my hubby and my dog lean but I like my fish chubby, LOL. I am really happy with the rubble zone. I am hoping I can see amphipods tunneling and such.

Yes, I have had good luck with red grape as long as I keep the green grape and caulerpa prolifera pruned back. I can tell that I am due for a WC however. I think the coral are either getting too much PO4 or not enough nutrients because they have browned out a bit.
 
Today I gave all the tanks some overdue love, but especially the 56 high nutrient tank. I did a bigger than usual WC because I never got to it last week. I also did a good job on the glass rather than just using the magnet cleaner. I removed a few bubble algaes that I saw, pruned back the grape caulerpa and removed all the caulerpa prolifera I saw except the one area I am allowing it to grow. I like that Marmalade eats some of it and maybe the linear blenny does too. It stays pretty short anyhow which is great. I also dosed coral vite, strongium and iodine. Finally I changed the filter floss. Tonight I hope to check PO4 and NO3 just to make sure they are not crazy out of line.
 
I loved both videos Dawn, and your tank. The aquascaping is really well done, and the rubble is a nice touch. The fish look very happy, and of course, your blennies are so fun. The barnacle blenny is so cute!!!
 
Monkeyfish said:
That tank is just so FULL of life. Well done!
Click to expand...

Thank you Eric. What I really enjoy about a marine reef is all the diversity. I am endeavoring to pack as much in this tank as is safe for the inhabitants. Someday when I hook it up to the sump where water changes are a breese, I will add more creatures. For now I am enjoying what I have. 😊
 
Chasmodes said:
I loved both videos Dawn, and your tank. The aquascaping is really well done, and the rubble is a nice touch. The fish look very happy, and of course, your blennies are so fun. The barnacle blenny is so cute!!!
Click to expand...

Thanks Kevin. Both tanks are doing well. I also love the aquascape of the 56g. It has a lot of rock and sand without feeling crowded. Mostly it was just dumb luck but hey, I will take it.

The blennies are so much fun, especially the 2 barnacle blennies and the 2 combtooth blennies. I never get tired of watching them.

Thanks for the tips on the jawfish. I will probably go for dusky jawfish after reading your comments in Michael's thread. I would expect a jawfish to build in the rubble zone, or at least that is my hope.
 
That's nice of you to say, but let's face it, you've got Red Grapes dialed! Most of my macros are still in the 'potential' stage. Your's look better than people who sell them!
 
The dusky jawfish might be a threat to your tiny fish, I don't know. They're not aggressive, but, they have a large mouth. There are some smaller species out there for sale on-line that might be promising though. It seems like the tiger (or yellow, or black cap) jawfish doesn't get that big, according to fishbase. I posted more info on other species on Michael's thread.
 
Chasmodes said:
The dusky jawfish might be a threat to your tiny fish, I don't know. They're not aggressive, but, they have a large mouth. There are some smaller species out there for sale on-line that might be promising though. It seems like the tiger (or yellow, or black cap) jawfish doesn't get that big, according to fishbase. I posted more info on other species on Michael's thread.
Click to expand...
I never even considered that a jawfish might pose a tbreat to my barnacle blennies or green clown gobies but I do need to think on that. Maybe a small jawfish is what I should consider.
 
Here a a couple of notes from Michael's thread that I'll repost here for future reference to help you in your research. I put in the vendor's name this time for the ones that are sponsors on RC:

There are some other smaller jawfish species that might be worth considering too. The tiger (aka yellow or black cap) jawfish intrigues me. According to Fishbase, they only get to be 2.5" long.

Live Aquaria has a chinstrap jawfish that only gets to 3" and looks pretty cool. It has a similar morphology to the dusky, so perhaps their behavior might be similar.

Blue Zoo Aquatics has a "red devil jawfish" that they say only gets to 1.5-2" long. I couldn't find that fish on Fishbase, so can't confirm that.
 
Chasmodes said:
Here a a couple of notes from Michael's thread that I'll repost here for future reference to help you in your research. I put in the vendor's name this time for the ones that are sponsors on RC:

There are some other smaller jawfish species that might be worth considering too. The tiger (aka yellow or black cap) jawfish intrigues me. According to Fishbase, they only get to be 2.5" long.

Live Aquaria has a chinstrap jawfish that only gets to 3" and looks pretty cool. It has a similar morphology to the dusky, so perhaps their behavior might be similar.

Blue Zoo Aquatics has a "red devil jawfish" that they say only gets to 1.5-2" long. I couldn't find that fish on Fishbase, so can't confirm that.
Click to expand...

Thank you Kevin. These notes will be very helpful when I am ready to get a jawfish. My plan is to leave the fish load on the tank as it is for now. However, when my seahorses live out their natural lives, I plan to set the 30 gallon up down stairs next to the sump. The drain will flow into it and the overflow will flow into the sump. Not only will it increase my overall water volume but it will give me a place to QT new fish before the UV sterilizer. I should probably have a Y and valves to isolate it from the entire system just to be safe. Anyway the main point is once the display is hooked up to the basement sump system, I wont have to carry 5 gallon buckets up the stairs to do WCs, so I will be able to feed even heavier than I do now thus I think the display could handle a few more docile fish.
 
After yesterday's WC I did some long overdue parameter testing. Some of the results surprised me since I am not dosing Alk, CA or Mag.

My last test was April 4th and the Alk went down from 9.9 to 7.7. That was not surprising but CA stayed the same at 450 and shockingly the Mag went up from 1350 to 1500. Instant Ocean is typically low in Mag so for it to go up is crazy. I am buying my salt in bulk from Chewy.com since I do so many WCs on the seahorses so I don't know if that has something to do with it. I intentionally use IO because it is so consistent. My test kit is fairly new so it should not be that. I plan to test again and also test the newly made saltwater. If I get the same results, what should I do if anything?

I guess I should mention that everything looks great in the tank. And I do dose strongium and coral vite. I need to see if either of those have Mag.
 
I like Instant Ocean too. Or if there is anything else on sale for cheaper, then I like that, but generally IO is usually the cheapest. For my type of tank, it's not critical.

Getting your next tank closer to your sump sounds like a good idea. Five gallon buckets are heavy! Carrying those up stairs sounds like a good workout.
 
Michael Hoaster said:
I like Instant Ocean too. Or if there is anything else on sale for cheaper, then I like that, but generally IO is usually the cheapest. For my type of tank, it's not critical.

Getting your next tank closer to your sump sounds like a good idea. Five gallon buckets are heavy! Carrying those up stairs sounds like a good workout.
Click to expand...

The sump now is actually connected to the seahorse tank, (which is in the livingroom next to my 56 gallon tank). I have it that way because I much prefer to carry 5 gallon WC for the 56 gallon (AIO at the present time) rather than the 20+ gallons WC a week for the seahorse tank. 5 gallons is a good work out, 20 gallons is insanity! I am training for a Tough Mudder the beginning of September but its counter-productive if the training kills me, LOL.

Instant Ocean usually being the cheapest also has influenced me.
 
I did another WC last night. I had not mentioned just how crazy high the NO3 and PO4 were...50-60 ppm and 2. - 2.5 ppm respectively. The WC brought the NO3 down to 25-30 ppm but the PO4 is still 2 ppm. I have a phosphate sponge that worked well once before. I added a small amt in a mesh bag and will check again Sunday. I am hoping for 1 or just under by then.

I will say the coral looked fantastic after the WC before the lights went out last night so I do not want to do anything too drastic.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Similar threads

VWD
Pictures of one of my seahorse tanks from about 17 years ago.
Replies
6
Views
673
FlamingHeart
FlamingHeart
D
Isn't that a lot more work?
12 13 14
Replies
264
Views
5K
griss
griss
P
75 gallon seahorse, pipefish, dartfish and dragonet tank.
Replies
5
Views
424
VWD
VWD
Paul B
Earthworms as fish food
Replies
4
Views
342
xLennie
xLennie
Minorhero
Planted Seahorse Tank
Replies
9
Views
534
vlangel
vlangel
Back
Top