drummereef's 180g in-wall build

[dzhuo]

Why GFO? what has your nitrate & PO4 been looking like.....
Do you plan to remove it long term.

Because of conventional thinking. If you have algae, dino or cyano, you have a nutrient issue especially N & P. And the single most popular advice to fight against algae is to use GFO. I would say this works maybe +90% of time except certain types of dino and cyano (or even micro algae) tend to grow in only nutrient poor environment when there is no other competition. In my case, it only makes things worse. Not only these type of pest continue to grow, the corals are taking a huge hit because the lack of food combined with the clarify of the water and the blast of the light. They bleach badly and turn into this electric blue you see. It's not natural and the corals become very weak. As the dino or cyano continue to use up whatever left over N & P in the water column, they started to attach to the rock, sand or glass or powerhead trying to extract nutrient direct from them. As a last resort, when the acros are so weak, they attack them as well one by one wipping out the weakest first and then moving on to another. That's my theory. I believe if the acros are healthy, the dino would not have a chance. In my case, it took months for the acros to become so weak that the dino can get a hold on the tip. The frag that had been killed took 6 month to die.

Oh, I am no longer running GFO. I have took them offline 3 weeks ago and I will take GAC offline as well when I turn my lights back on.

EDIT: Forget to answer N & P. I don't have a N test kit so I have no idea what it's. My phosphate has been mostly 0.00 from Hana Checker. When I fed heavy without GFO, the highest I have registered is 0.02. Now it's back to 0.00 that I have started RB treatment and 3-days lights out. From a pure observation point of view, my tank looks the "best" when phosphate is at its highest of 0.02. That's when I started to see more coralline algae and pods growing at a steady rate. This powdery and dino algae also grows slowest.

 

[dzhuo]

That is interesting that PO4 goes up & glass cleaning goes down....Hmmm

Yes I was surprise as well. I will admit I wasn't so worry about this phytoplankton at all. I want to have a measurable of phosphate for the SPS but as a side affect, the glass become clearer. It's a bonus. I assume that's just because the increased food promote more "filter feeders" in the tank which prey on the phytoplankton. When my tank is so sterile, there is nothing grows (I hardly notice any sponge even after 6 months for example) so nothing eats them. They just keep circulating and continue to die off and regrow.

Brett,
How is your pod population? Mine has been very low for a 150g tank at 6 months. When I feed heavier, I notice they are increasing steadily. But the interceptor treatment killed 90% of them.

 

[110galreef]

RB treatment= Red Bugs?

 

[dzhuo]

Yes Red Bugs. Wipe out about 80% to 90% of the pod population.

 

[110galreef]

is there a difference between RB & AEFW?

did you go the interceptor route for entire tank or remove corals infected?

 

[cromedogg33]

110,

Test kits do have their place no doubt, but I can basically look at my tank and feel like I know whats wrong most the time.

 

[dzhuo]

RB and AEFW is entirely different. RB is a parasite and AEFW is an acro predator. Being a parasite, RB is more irritating to the acros than anything. Acro is just a host to them. AEFW, on the other hand, will eat and kill the corals. Treating RB and AEFW is also very different because they have different life cycle. RB is one of the easily pest to treat with interceptor. AEFW requires more or less constant dipping (because you would have to wait until the egg hatches for the next treatment).

I did a whole tank interceptor treatment because it's difficult to get every single colonies out of my tank. Basically, I am taking the trade off of killing all pods vs. upsetting the acros by taking them out of the tank.

 

[henrystyle]

just my 2 cents.
I think you guys are adding to much stuff to soon. Keep it simple. Run carbon, a skimmer and grow some cheato. (gfo only if you really need it)
Remember skimmers strip the tank of nutrients so does that expensive carbon you guys are buying. Drummer's tank doesn't have a huge bio load yet. A few frags and one or 2 fish. All that magic brew - zeo stuff aren't needed at this point. I still think those bio pellets are screwing everything up. Water changes should be all you need at this point to make those frags grow well. No trace element dosing needed... To much to soon I think. I'm no pro but I know sometime you have to slow your roll. In this hobby we are always ready to try something new. Most of the time that something is not needed at all. (just messes up your tank even more)

FYI- dip everything. trust no one or you will be sorry.

 

[Tyrenlds]

just my 2 cents.
I think you guys are adding to much stuff to soon. Keep it simple. Run carbon, a skimmer and grow some cheato. (gfo only if you really need it)
Remember skimmers strip the tank of nutrients so does that expensive carbon you guys are buying. Drummer's tank doesn't have a huge bio load yet. A few frags and one or 2 fish. All that magic brew - zeo stuff aren't needed at this point. I still think those bio pellets are screwing everything up. Water changes should be all you need at this point to make those frags grow well. No trace element dosing needed... To much to soon I think. I'm no pro but I know sometime you have to slow your roll. In this hobby we are always ready to try something new. Most of the time that something is not needed at all. (just messes up your tank even more)

FYI- dip everything. trust no one or you will be sorry.

I have been thinking this from the very beginning. To much to soon. BUT if drummereef wasn't doing all this stuff we wouldn't have anything to talk about in the thread! Keep the innovations and experiments coming bud.

 

[gary faulkner]

Okay Brett, where the heck are you anyway?

Not like you to let all these posts go to waste.

 

[cromedogg33]

just my 2 cents.
I think you guys are adding to much stuff to soon. Keep it simple. Run carbon, a skimmer and grow some cheato. (gfo only if you really need it)
Remember skimmers strip the tank of nutrients so does that expensive carbon you guys are buying. Drummer's tank doesn't have a huge bio load yet. A few frags and one or 2 fish. All that magic brew - zeo stuff aren't needed at this point. I still think those bio pellets are screwing everything up. Water changes should be all you need at this point to make those frags grow well. No trace element dosing needed... To much to soon I think. I'm no pro but I know sometime you have to slow your roll. In this hobby we are always ready to try something new. Most of the time that something is not needed at all. (just messes up your tank even more)

FYI- dip everything. trust no one or you will be sorry.

I agree slightly and disagree with you as well. I think with what all of us including Brett are doing with bio-pellets is looking past today and tomorrow and even a year from now. I feel adding the pellets in the very beginning may cause problems those without pellets don't see...BUT IMO I see having pellets from the beginning will greatly make up for any troubles that we had and reap the benefits later on.

You can go read the multiple threads here on RC of failed attempts of pellets on established tanks. Again though you can see success stories just like with anything in this hobby.

 

[drummereef]

Wow, it's been a busy couple days! Sorry for not being able to check in, so much good input from you guys... Keep it up! :thumbsup:


Instead of addressing in quotes I'll try and add to the conversation here... As far as an update goes, things are stable at this point. 99% of the corals are happy. Growth is slow but some of the corals are growing faster than others, like the green slimer which has at least doubled in size since I added it to the tank. Encrusting is good and PE is good as well. There's a tiny bit of brown filamentous algae that is growing in the sand bed but nothing that regular maintenance doesn't take care of along with a little help from the Lawnmower Blenny. The rock is virtually spotless at this point.

Pod population is growing since I've been feeding Roti and Oyster Feast. Both copepods and amphipods are multiplying as I see them either crawling on the glass and floating in the water column.

I agree, my fish load is low for the size system I have. I'm looking into adding a dwarf angelfish and possibly a few anthias but I really don't want a crowded tank just for the sake of more fish poop - even though I love the smell of fresh skimmate. Visually I look at my tank and I don't want a fish larger than my Yellow Tang. I know it sounds strange but even with a 180g display I like the look of medium to small sized fish. I do think it's possible to have a successful SPS tank with minimal fish, as I've seen frequently. But I do think I'm well under what is considered even a minimum fish load for my system.

I can see the argument both ways with the bio pellets... Like chromedogg, I feel like I'm set up for the future as my nutrient levels are nothing and I can feed large amounts of food with virtually no impact. On the other hand, I've probably aggravated some of the algae/cyano issues by keeping the system so clean. I do think some of these aggressive cyanos thrive in these environments and it's hard to get rid of them once they've established themselves. But remember, I added the bio pellets after the large filamentous cyano cycle was in full bloom. So the bio pellets didn't cause any of that - it was destined to happen for whatever reason in my tank, presumably stored PO4 in the rock. I do think though, supplemental feedings and bacterial supplements are necessary when running a system with as little excess nutrient as mine.

The additives I've experimented with are really nothing other than coral food and biological enhancers. I have seen some real positive benefits to some of the products I've tried. Obviously starting with a sterile system has it's benefits in regards to unwanted pests but I felt I needed to supplement some things that were missing, such as a plentiful source of zooplankton and amino acids for the corals. Along with that, populating the tank with a plentiful amount of beneficial bacteria has been hugely successful, at least in my case. The only ZEO products I dose are Amino Acids and Bacteria products, nothing really special there. The Coral Snow and ZEOzym are just biological enhancers. My other husbandry practices are relatively traditional... Weekly water changes to replenish trace elements and replenish Ca, Alk, and Mag.

I did recently switch back to Lignite Carbon since I had some leftover from my last order. I may have caused some of the issue with the Blue Acro by adding too much carbon when I changed it the last month. I think it possibly could have stripped the water too clean, that along with too much flow could have caused irritation to the acro's tissue. Just a thought, I'm no SPS expert... I plan on cutting my usage in half starting tomorrow when I change it out. If the condition of the Acro get's worse I will definitely frag it but at this point it seems stable.

I appreciate all the input so keep the ideas coming. Great feedback everyone!! :thumbsup:

 

[drummereef]

UPDATE:


FTS for April 1, 2011

 

[drummereef]

Sorry for the Photobucket hiccup... Hopefully we are back in business.

 

[dzhuo]

Good luck Brett! I hope things turn around for you and the corals continue to improve. I agree 100% with your small fish thinking. I think an overly large fish adds an un-proportionally awkward dimension which destroy the aqua-scrape.

My current population is 18 and all of them are 1" or less. Eventually I want to be in the 30 to 40 range but with only 2 types. Basically 2 large group of active small fish among a few large SPS corals

I will follow along your build thread as I am pretty sure your tank will turn out to be a special one.

 

[drummereef]

Good luck Brett! I hope things turn around for you and the corals continue to improve. I agree 100% with your small fish thinking. I think an overly large fish adds an un-proportionally awkward dimension which destroy the aqua-scrape.

My current population is 18 and all of them are 1" or less. Eventually I want to be in the 30 to 40 range but with only 2 types. Basically 2 large group of active small fish among a few large SPS corals

I will follow along your build thread as I am pretty sure your tank will turn out to be a special one.

Thanks dzhuo.

 

[Taqpol]

Good luck Brett! I hope things turn around for you and the corals continue to improve. I agree 100% with your small fish thinking. I think an overly large fish adds an un-proportionally awkward dimension which destroy the aqua-scrape.

My current population is 18 and all of them are 1" or less. Eventually I want to be in the 30 to 40 range but with only 2 types. Basically 2 large group of active small fish among a few large SPS corals

I will follow along your build thread as I am pretty sure your tank will turn out to be a special one.

Dzhuo, do you have a build thread? Your vision for your tank sounds awesome to me, especially the part about the select few large SPS.

Brett, my opinion on fish load/fish stocking is that you don't want too much movement in the tank or it becomes distracting, yet you want enough fish to provide food for the rest of your organisms (miraculous fish poop is probably much cheaper then zeo products ). In my tank I have reached this limit with my five large fish, especially since besides the pair of yellow tangs they don't really stay clustered together. The other type of tank i think looks amazing, however, is one to three "show fish" and then one or two large schools of smaller fish. In a tank your size I think your one yellow tang and 11-13 Anthias or 13-15 Chromis would look amazing. maybe even a slightly smaller number of Anthias AND Chromis to really mix up the colors. Even though thats a fair amount of fish, they are fairly small and your level of filtration would easily take care of their waste.

 

[drummereef]

Dzhuo, do you have a build thread? Your vision for your tank sounds awesome to me, especially the part about the select few large SPS.

Brett, my opinion on fish load/fish stocking is that you don't want too much movement in the tank or it becomes distracting, yet you want enough fish to provide food for the rest of your organisms (miraculous fish poop is probably much cheaper then zeo products ). In my tank I have reached this limit with my five large fish, especially since besides the pair of yellow tangs they don't really stay clustered together. The other type of tank i think looks amazing, however, is one to three "show fish" and then one or two large schools of smaller fish. In a tank your size I think your one yellow tang and 11-13 Anthias or 13-15 Chromis would look amazing. maybe even a slightly smaller number of Anthias AND Chromis to really mix up the colors. Even though thats a fair amount of fish, they are fairly small and your level of filtration would easily take care of their waste.

Thanks Alex, I appreciate your comments. What about 5-7 Green Chromis and a Potter's Angel? I'm looking for relatively low maintenance fish that eat easy to feed foods. My current livestock's needs are right up this alley already.

I also am considering purchasing from Live Aquaria this time so I can get the fish I want. My LFS is great but their selection is extremely quick moving especially by the weekend when I have time to get there. My only hesitation is I don't want to quarantine. I had such a bad experience the first time around I'm very hesitant to repeat the same procedure - and yield the same result. I feel confident with the practice my LFS uses that the fish specimens are relatively safe and the few fish I've added that I've purchased from them have been exceptional. I know, I know... QT everything! But if memory serves you've purchased from LA before? What's your thoughts on their practices?

 

[Megabite]

I agree with a school of Anthias. I loved watching my Anthias hunting once the lights turned off and only the moon lights were shining. They would be extremely active for about 20 minutes attacking anything they could find in the water column. Quite entertaining.

The school of Chromis I had (blue) were very nice as well but got a little too big in my opinion for my tank. I think that the greens stay smaller.

I love to movement of plenty (responsively plenty) of fish in an aquarium. It really brings it alive.

Here's a pic of my small school of Anthias I had. I miss them and everything else for that matter.

 

[Megabite]

I alomost forget. FANTASTIC build/ tank. I've been following it for a long time now. Inspiring work. Good luck with it's progress.

PS - Flame Hawnfish is another one of my favorite fish. They are quite the character.