dcmartinpc
Member
It has been a while since I have posted anything about my setup. It is largely because I have been beyond frustrated with my system and it is all my fault! 
Very very long story short, my QT procedures were non-existent and I am overrun with aiptasia, vermatid snails, and a nasty gaggle of coral eating asterina starfish. I have reached my wits end and I have decided the best course of action is burn it to the ground and let it rise again from the ashes!
A little background on the system. I currently have a Marineland 150DD in my main level living room and a 225g 5x3x2 miracles built in to the wall in my basement. They are both plumbed in to a common sump in the basement. The 150DD will not be part of the new system but will play a crucial role in the rebirth.
The new system will consist of the 225 in wall and adding 60 cube in the wall next to it which will serve as home to a harem of clownfish and likely a nice centerpiece carpet anemone. I will also be adding a 36x18x13 frag tank as I believe I will be growing coral this time! The 150DD will serve as temporary holding space and will be severed from the new system and run on an isolated sump and skimmer. All fish from the 225 will be placed in the 150 temporarily while everything is being prepared for the new setup. Once the current main system is empty and the 150 is isolated. I will be circulating a bleach and fresh water solution through the 225 and sump to kill any critters hiding in the pipes and areas I can't get to.
But this is only part of the story. I know to be successful this time around, my QT has to be well planned and executed. I am adding to separate tanks for QT. One for coral and one for fish. The coral QT is a 20 long (30x12x12). It will have a Tunze 9004 skimmer for filtration and be lit by 2x24w T5 (ATI BLue+ and ATI Coral+). The fish QT will be 48x15x17 and will have a Tunze 9004 DC skimmer and will be lit by a Reefbrite Lumilite Duo just to keep the fish in their rhythm. I am still working out all of my QT procedures, but will likely mostly be copying a good friend who has had great success in keeping most pests out of his system. He helps keep me in check and has been great moral support through all of this ;Happy
The last piece of the puzzle was rock and sand. I don't necessarily dislike the rock I have, but, it is currently covered in plenty of pests, and I didn't want to tear everything down and not have any bio filtration left for my livestock. I decided to make the switch to Pukani and Tropic Eden Reef Flakes.
I made the trip down to our sponsor Premium Aquatics @Premiumaq to hand pick the 200 pounds of rock and pickup sand and other necessities. They were awesome and made sure the bins were fully stocked with fresh rock for our arrival! I can't say enough good things about Premium Aquatics and their staff! Thanks Luke, Brandon, Michelle, and the rest of Premium Aquatics staff! You all went above and beyond and made my trip phenomenal!
So, enough back story, on to the good stuff!
I made some purchases at my local hardware store to get things started!
(On a side note, I am pretty sure I am on some sort of list now!)
As you have probably figured out, I putting the rock through bleach and an acid bath.
I decided to do 2 bleach baths to get out as much of the organic material as possible as I have heard and seen just how much bio material is on these rocks!
I loaded up all the rock in a 150 gallon rubbermaid and threw in a couple heaters, a cheap propeller pump, and dumped in the bleach!
Here is a quick video of what my friend referred to as "Witches Brew"
This is the crud in the container after the first bleach bath.
And the rock set out to dry after I sprayed it off while I cleaned out the tub and got everything ready for the second bleach bath.
And now back in the tub ready for its second bath in bleach!
I got tired of waiting for it to gravity drain and decided to hook up an Iwaki 100 I had lying around to get the job moving!
Much less crud this time!
And another rinse..
All nestled in for its first soak in a 5x Prime.
Well that is it for now! I will be draining it again tonight and letting it soak for 24 hours again in Prime. Then Saturday I have some help coming over and we will be doing the acid bath and then moving the tub and rock inside for the curing process.
More pics to come and I welcome any advice anyone has!
Thanks for reading!
Don
Very very long story short, my QT procedures were non-existent and I am overrun with aiptasia, vermatid snails, and a nasty gaggle of coral eating asterina starfish. I have reached my wits end and I have decided the best course of action is burn it to the ground and let it rise again from the ashes!
A little background on the system. I currently have a Marineland 150DD in my main level living room and a 225g 5x3x2 miracles built in to the wall in my basement. They are both plumbed in to a common sump in the basement. The 150DD will not be part of the new system but will play a crucial role in the rebirth.
The new system will consist of the 225 in wall and adding 60 cube in the wall next to it which will serve as home to a harem of clownfish and likely a nice centerpiece carpet anemone. I will also be adding a 36x18x13 frag tank as I believe I will be growing coral this time! The 150DD will serve as temporary holding space and will be severed from the new system and run on an isolated sump and skimmer. All fish from the 225 will be placed in the 150 temporarily while everything is being prepared for the new setup. Once the current main system is empty and the 150 is isolated. I will be circulating a bleach and fresh water solution through the 225 and sump to kill any critters hiding in the pipes and areas I can't get to.
But this is only part of the story. I know to be successful this time around, my QT has to be well planned and executed. I am adding to separate tanks for QT. One for coral and one for fish. The coral QT is a 20 long (30x12x12). It will have a Tunze 9004 skimmer for filtration and be lit by 2x24w T5 (ATI BLue+ and ATI Coral+). The fish QT will be 48x15x17 and will have a Tunze 9004 DC skimmer and will be lit by a Reefbrite Lumilite Duo just to keep the fish in their rhythm. I am still working out all of my QT procedures, but will likely mostly be copying a good friend who has had great success in keeping most pests out of his system. He helps keep me in check and has been great moral support through all of this ;Happy
The last piece of the puzzle was rock and sand. I don't necessarily dislike the rock I have, but, it is currently covered in plenty of pests, and I didn't want to tear everything down and not have any bio filtration left for my livestock. I decided to make the switch to Pukani and Tropic Eden Reef Flakes.
I made the trip down to our sponsor Premium Aquatics @Premiumaq to hand pick the 200 pounds of rock and pickup sand and other necessities. They were awesome and made sure the bins were fully stocked with fresh rock for our arrival! I can't say enough good things about Premium Aquatics and their staff! Thanks Luke, Brandon, Michelle, and the rest of Premium Aquatics staff! You all went above and beyond and made my trip phenomenal!
So, enough back story, on to the good stuff!
I made some purchases at my local hardware store to get things started!
(On a side note, I am pretty sure I am on some sort of list now!)
As you have probably figured out, I putting the rock through bleach and an acid bath.
I decided to do 2 bleach baths to get out as much of the organic material as possible as I have heard and seen just how much bio material is on these rocks!
I loaded up all the rock in a 150 gallon rubbermaid and threw in a couple heaters, a cheap propeller pump, and dumped in the bleach!
Here is a quick video of what my friend referred to as "Witches Brew"
This is the crud in the container after the first bleach bath.
And the rock set out to dry after I sprayed it off while I cleaned out the tub and got everything ready for the second bleach bath.
And now back in the tub ready for its second bath in bleach!
I got tired of waiting for it to gravity drain and decided to hook up an Iwaki 100 I had lying around to get the job moving!
Much less crud this time!
And another rinse..
All nestled in for its first soak in a 5x Prime.
Well that is it for now! I will be draining it again tonight and letting it soak for 24 hours again in Prime. Then Saturday I have some help coming over and we will be doing the acid bath and then moving the tub and rock inside for the curing process.
More pics to come and I welcome any advice anyone has!
Thanks for reading!
Don
Please excuse the coralline algae overgrowth, summer time!
