High Nutrient Macro Algae/Sea Grass Reef

The watchman and the blenny still did not eat this morning. I sure hope that they are feeding on pods. Usually by now I have gotten fish to eat for me and I do not like that these guys aren't. They look so relaxed and comfortable so I am leaning toward the idea that they are eating live food in the sump. Still I will feel nervous until I see them take food.
 
I hate that feeling.

It must be a big adjustment for them, coming from their natural homes in the sea. Then they have to learn to eat food they may never have seen. It's kind of surprising we don't see more hunger strikes.

Hang in there. They'll come around.
 
I hate that feeling.

It must be a big adjustment for them, coming from their natural homes in the sea. Then they have to learn to eat food they may never have seen. It's kind of surprising we don't see more hunger strikes.

Hang in there. They'll come around.

I know, I hate it too. Adjusting and acclimating new fish is always stressful.

You are right, it has to be very traumatic for them being caught and sent to a facility where then a lfs buys them and then we customers buy them. That is a lot of transition! It is amazing that we do not see more hunger strikes.

Hopefully today they will eat prepared food.
 
Notice any goby/pistol shrimp cooperation?

I don't think so. The pistol shrimp has undermined all through the underneath of my rock work. I am so glad that my rock is sitting on the glass so it has remained stable, ha ha! I only ever see one masked goby and it hangs out in the barnacle. I do not know what happened to the others. I wonder if the pistol shrimped preyed upon them because they were so tiny???? The firefish goby does go into a hole where the pistol shrimp is sometimes but it does not seem like a symbiotic relationship, just more of they tolerate each other in the same space.
 
Hooray, I just saw the watchman goby eat some flake!!!! The blenny still hasn't eaten any prepared food but it appears to be hunting all the time. There are still lots of copepods on the glass and no doubt larvae shrimp from the fuge find their way into the sump tank. Maybe the blenny is still preferring hunting live food over eating frozen or freeze dried?
 
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That's great. I have had one or two fish that never ate fish food, but got along just fine with what was available in the tank.
 
This morning I moved the yellow watchman goby and green canary blenny into the display. I fed the display prior to their move to hopefully diminish any 'hangry' attitudes.

The watchman is out in the open on the sandbed and nobody is bothering him. I do not see the canary blenny but the lights are off so I can't see a lot of places in the tank anyway. It does not appear to be any disruptions or skirmishes going on so I am just assuming that the blenny is laying low. I never did see the blenny eat prepared food which is a bit unsettling. Although the display is larger with a lot more rock, I do not know how much the pod population is flourishing. The tank has a lot of hungry mouths. Hopefully the blenny will take his cue from all the other fish and eat what is offered!
 
That is what I am hoping Michael. The lights are on and both blenny and watchman are out in the open, more or less. They are hanging somewhat in the same corner, ( the blenny up in the water column swimming around and the watchman on the sandbed below him). Both fish look relaxed and definitely do not look afraid. None of the other fish are paying any attention to them either so they should be ok.
 
Yesterday I did not see the YWG all day. I kept checking around the tank even though it is covered, worrying that perhaps it jumped through the netting. Dave kept telling me that perhaps the pistol shrimp dined on it, which was an awful thought, (although I did not think likely). I also checked in the overflow box as once I did see a damsel chase the goby up in that area. This morning I finally decided to look in the fuge and sure enough there it was looking just fine. I think I will just leave it there for now to get a bit bigger. Hopefully it and the blenny will not miss each other's company too much.
 
I am really concerned about the canary blenny. I have never seen it eat and he appears to be getting thinner. I almost always ask to see if a fish is eating at my LFS but I did not do that this time. Now I wished I had because I fear that it is going to just waste away. The watchman in the fuge looks fatter and I feel more optimistic about it. I am going to leave it in the fuge until it grows to a bigger size.
 
Well nothing has changed with the canary blenny. This is very hard to watch. It looks like a perfectly well adjusted fish that is beautiful but absolutely nothing I have offered it has tempted it into eating. It is just painfully wasting away and it makes me so sad.

The watchman goby on the other hand is doing great in the fuge. It eats anything, has a very nice bright yellow color and is not shy even when I am thinning caulerpa or cleaning glass. I still plan to leave it in the fuge until it gets bigger. Oh yeah, I have dubbed him Guardian!

In other fish news, everyone else is doing wonderfully. They are fat, active and have good color. The damsels get a little feisty with one another in the evening but do not seem to bother with anyone else. Tommy is king but he does not bother with anyone either. The tiny masked goby hangs out near its barnacle and looks good.

I see Rice Krispie's claws often in the openings of the tunnel systems under the rock. I caught a glimpse of his whole body once and he has definitely grown. My cleaner shrimp and Coral Banded shrimp are also huge, as is the peppermint shrimp in the fuge. It seems that I have hit on the right formula for shrimp!

I have done a bigger than usual WC on the system to hopefully encourage more growth in some of the macros and coral. I probably did 15 or more gallons. I also dosed Flourish, Coral Vite and 2 part. Its not that the tank looks bad but there are a few things that just seem to be stalled or even receding slowly. The Xenia and GSP are in that catagory as is the Shoal grass and maybe the Sargassum. The gracilaria is growing great and probably needs pruned back. The DT needs to have the detritus blown off the rocks and macro algae and then I should test NO3 and PO4 to see where the parameters are. I will be watching to see if these actions have any affects on the system and am hoping for the best!
 
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Sorry to hear about your Blenny. Keep trying. You never know what will work. Get creative. Have you tried live brine shrimp?

Sounds like everyone else is doing great. You have quite the enviable community!

I know what you mean about stagnating. My Dragon's Breath is looking pretty shaky. With your new lighting, everything can probably use more nutrients. The balance with lighting, nutrients and biomass is a moving target. With the fuge, you've got more plant biomass to feed.
 
I have not seen the blenny for over a day now. It was in one of the entrances of the undermined caves on Wed. night. I took that as a sign that it recognized that it was weakening to the point that it no longer wanted to be out in the open. I was preparing myself for its demise and I suspect that that is what has happened. Of course I am very sad but I offered a large variety of food, pretty much everything that I had access to and I never saw it eat. A case where you can lead a horse to water but you can't make it drink.

The watchman is still doing quite well so all is not bad news. Tomorrow the local club is hosting a frag swap and so maybe I will come home with some ricordia or feather duster worms. We will see.

I may stop at a lfs that is on the way home (but about an 1.5 hours from my house) to see if they have a fish that would be compatible with my tank. I hate to introduce Guardian the watchman all by himself. I would consider another canary blenny or even a coral beauty angel.
 
Some fish just won't eat. Such a bummer.

Otherwise it sounds like everything's going well! I look forward to hearing what you get tomorrow!

Anymore thoughts on CO2? I don't mean to push it. You may not even need it, with all the CO2 factories you have swimming around. I was just curious.
 
Hhm, I must be experiencing a Sr moment. I thought sure I posted on the frag swap a detailed description. Ha ha, maybe I did not hit quick reply after I typed it up, who knows?

Anyway the frag swap was a lot more fun than I anticipated. Usually I don't see the simpler stuff that I am interested in and although the high end stuff is beautiful, its a long drive just to look.

However I wanted some FL ricordia and there were some for a good price. My sharp eyed hubby saw one plug with 2 different colors on it and the vendor gave it to me for $20 and I was happy with that.
We also got quite a few free samples of Spectrum Life food for coming in the door. Food for both coral and fish. The fish food has a probiotic in it so that seems like a good thing. I bought a handbook on different fish species and although a lot of that info can be found online, this particular book was one we used at the lfs that I worked at from the 90s and I know that it is an oldie but goodie. Its just the right size and it was used and cheap too. I picked up some blue legged reef crabs and she gave me a very generous amount and they are doing a good job in both the fuge and display. I also got 2 peppermint shrimp to add to the fuge.

The most fun part of the day was the raffle however. If you bought a minimum of 10 raffle ticket you got a container of Spectrum Life food, which probably cost close to $10, (each ticket was a dollar). Dave and I each bought a string of 10. We had scoped out the prizes ahead of time and again my sharp eyed hubby spotted an inconspicuous prize of a wooden seahorse plaque. I had seen it too but was going to try and get more for my tickets. As it turns out though Dave noticed that a $50 gift card to one of the vendors that I liked came with it!!! Woohoo. There were very few tickets in it either. We put a few tickets in and then watched until it was almost time for the raffle before committing the rest of our tickets. It was so funny the 2 of us watching intently every person walk by that item. In the end, that gift got overlooked by most just like I had done. We added the rest of our ticket and waited for it to be raffled. And amazingly we won! So, I got 2 gorgs (sadly of which 1 died the next day) plus the seahorse plaque. I am going to add some color to the plaque and hang it in our enclosed screened porch where the hot tub is. That area has other seahorse decor so it will be nice out there. I was sad to see all the flesh of the one gorg on the sand the next morning which was a bummer. The bag it was in was cloudy by the time we got home so maybe it just was never healthy. The other one looks good however and is a nice addition. The new ricordia have also settled in nicely. So that is our frag swap experience.

Now to make sure I hit REPLY, LOL!
 
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