Hello, getting back in after 13 years, thought I'd say hi

[Reefing102]

Looks good! Only small critique, and is personal preference, I’d move it about an inch inward on each side to be able to clean the glass with a magnet scraper

 

[rottielover]

Yea, just like the elf on the shelf the rocks are going to move a bit once the kids go to bed

 

[rottielover]

Sign of the times here... I just had a conversation with ChatGPT to help me design my ReeFi light's schedule... crazy and a little scary at the same time

Scary - in that I gave it a sample of the text file and it generated a text file settings file that worked to update my light...

 

[rottielover]

So far so good, I started the fish less cycle in the cube, today should be the 2nd addition of ammonia. My QT tanks are setup as well. I went out and looked at some fish locally to see what’s out there and what the prices are like… gotta say I was a bit disappointed, lots of sick and dead fish at 2 stores

Think I’ll be ordering livestock online OR making longer trips to other stores.

 

[griss]

What stores did you go to? The Petco in Fenton actually has pretty good livestock at decent prices.

Unfortunately, here in Wildwood, I don’t have any really good LFS. While Aqua World has great freshwater and pond livestock, their SW is very limited and pricy. The Ellisville Petco is hit or miss on variety and health.

 

[rottielover]

What stores did you go to? The Petco in Fenton actually has pretty good livestock at decent prices.

Unfortunately, here in Wildwood, I don’t have any really good LFS. While Aqua World has great freshwater and pond livestock, their SW is very limited and pricy. The Ellisville Petco is hit or miss on variety and health.

Kinda afraid to say never know who’s getting offended or sued nowadays. Let’s just say I’m out West and one was a chain store and the other was a store I felt should be doing much better than that….

 

[rottielover]

I have to say how surprised I am by the bacteria in a bottle. I’m a couple days into this tank and I already have nitrite and even a tiny tiny amount of nitrate (barely changed the test color). Really shocked given that the last time I cycled a reef tank I feel like it took a month back then. I think this might really go in 9-12 days like they claim

 

[griss]

Did I miss it? What bacteria did you go with?

 

[michealprater]

I personally have had great success buying from the Corner Reef. One other thing I did, that we used to never do back in the day is bare bottom. I have did it on my last two tanks and absolutely love it. I will never go back to sand again.

 

[griss]

I personally have had great success buying from the Corner Reef. One other thing I did, that we used to never do back in the day is bare bottom. I have did it on my last two tanks and absolutely love it. I will never go back to sand again.

The one time I've been to Corner Reef they had a lot of livestock. Seemed like a good store. I'd probably be a regular there if it wasn't a 35 minute drive each way.

 

[rottielover]

I got the Dr Tim’s bacteria. I’m super surprised by it. I am not sure if it’s all the Dr Tim’s or if some of it isn’t the sand (got the pink reef sand supposed to have some bacteria in it as well). Had to get the dry rock of course. Not sure if it’s got any bacteria in it or not. At this point my display has got barely perceptible ammonia, but the nitrite has shot up somewhere north of 5ppm. There’s about the same 5ppm of nitrate already so I’m hoping those bacteria start catching up.

According to the fishless cycle guide I’m reading, no need to dose more ammonia right now, supposed to wait for the nitrite to come down. This fishless stuff is new to me when I did my tanks before it was grab live rock and fish and go.

 

[rottielover]

I went 40lbs of sand so basically a deep sandbed tank this time. My kids want a yellow watchman with pistol shrimp down the road

 

[griss]

Dr Tim’s is reputable.

 

[rottielover]

Hey all been a little bit The bacteria in a bottle is awesome. The tank tested zeros for ammonia and nitrite so the cycle is complete and I waited for Christmas to be over and moved the clowns from the QT to the cube just a few minutes ago.

They are checking out the new place. They had been cohabiting the same pvc elbow in the QT but now they seem to want to be separate with the big one in the back and the little guy up front.

I’m sure they will get used to the new space in a few days.

Meanwhile, just before Christmas my Galaxy Pods from Algae Barn came in, they seem to be doing very well on the phyto they came with.

Now I just need to get my macro for the refug and start thinking about where to pickup a few cleanup crew. I looked at the packs online but the problem with that is too many at once for a tank this new

 

[griss]

I’ve got 3-4 species of Caulerpa I’d be happy to share. But, you’ll want to treat for FWs before putting in your tank. It’s weird, they’re only in my fuge and not my DT. Assume one of the fish is eating any that make it into the DT.

 

[rottielover]

Hey @griss I went out to Petland in Lake St Louis. Limited to a handful of tanks of stuff but still a good selection of frags fish and inverts. Things looked decently clean and I didn’t see any dead fish.

I picked up 4 hermits, 1 nar snail, 1 cleaner shrimp and my son wanted 2 green chromis instead of cardinals.

So I have them all dripping now. The fish are going to the QT tank but I feel that I have to put the inverts into the display so that’s the plan.

I wanted to give a little hint for folks with all this modern tech. I got a USB 10watt heater from Amazon and a battery bank. Works perfectly to keep the drip bucket at temp!!!

 

[griss]

Hey @griss I went out to Petland in Lake St Louis. Limited to a handful of tanks of stuff but still a good selection of frags fish and inverts. Things looked decently clean and I didn’t see any dead fish.

I picked up 4 hermits, 1 nar snail, 1 cleaner shrimp and my son wanted 2 green chromis instead of cardinals.

So I have them all dripping now. The fish are going to the QT tank but I feel that I have to put the inverts into the display so that’s the plan.

I wanted to give a little hint for folks with all this modern tech. I got a USB 10watt heater from Amazon and a battery bank. Works perfectly to keep the drip bucket at temp!!!

Thanks for the scouting report on Petland. I’ll have to check them out someday.

 

[rottielover]

So I felt like the time had come to talk more about this light. And man I gotta tell you, these things are freaking awesome. Now keep in mind the last time I had a reef tank I had MH lights with t5’s on timers. The most complicated thing was setting the schedule.

These lights pretty well require a decent familiarity of computer concepts like IP addressing, web browser, and an understanding of the web app interface.

That said, I also found a way to get ChatGPT to help you program them… so once I get some time free I might sit down and try and write a guide for that.

So once you get over the learning cliff, these lights are absolutely have to be the best thing on the market. I joined the guys FB group and it’s clear he’s got a passion for the hobby and a good understanding of the science. He is even right now designing yet another reflector for the light (already comes with 2 angles).

For the moment I would say that if you were considering these lights, pull the trigger. You won’t be disappointed once you get them setup and tuned. Just be prepared to have to fight the learning curve cause there isn’t an easy button setting.

 

[griss]

Sounds complicated for a non-techie like me

 

[rottielover]

Pretty well on my way again. Tank was cycled fish were qt’d ….

Got most things from Cultivated Reef and Blue Zoo Aquatics, 2 fish from Petland in Lake St Louis.

Mostly Zoanthids, with a little GSP, a blue star polyp, and two LPS. Along with a cleanup crew.

At this point it’s maintenance, let the corals grow, and see how things go.