High Nutrient Macro Algae/Sea Grass Reef

As I was sitting on my sofa I heard a ruckus in the aquarium and looked up just in time to see the wrasse spazzing and almost jumping out of the tank. Someone must have spooked him big time so I decided to attempt to catch him and move him to the fuge. Ha! And amazingly I did! No doubt he will eat all my pods to the point of extinction but he will be safe there. While I was dropping him in the fuge I spotted the barnacle blenny that went over the overflow so I snag it and moved it back into the display. It looked kind of thin which surprised me so hopefully he makes it. New homes and hopefully happier fish!
 
Wow, lots happening! Gorgeous vids and pics! That's a beautiful community of colorful fish, in a vibrant setting. Loving your refugium too. It looks like a place in Nature. The grass looks good. With time, it will reproduce and spread widely.

Sorry to hear of your ruckus. Some disruption is to be expected with all the new additions. Maybe a temporary reefscape change would help reset territories. A rock here an macro there, might do the trick.
 
ThePurple12 said:
Looking good, are you going to get more seahorses or are you done?
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Never say never, but for now I am done. I do not do well when I am keeping more than 1 tank and my focus has shifted toward this high nutrient tank which is not compatible with seahorses who need a more sterile enviroment.
 
Michael Hoaster said:
Wow, lots happening! Gorgeous vids and pics! That's a beautiful community of colorful fish, in a vibrant setting. Loving your refugium too. It looks like a place in Nature. The grass looks good. With time, it will reproduce and spread widely.

Sorry to hear of your ruckus. Some disruption is to be expected with all the new additions. Maybe a temporary reefscape change would help reset territories. A rock here an macro there, might do the trick.
Click to expand...

I am loving how lush and vibrant the refugium is. The seagrass is really going to be a wonderful addition when it multiplies and fills in the front middle of that tank. The red grape caulerpa has really taken off lately too which contribute a new texture.

You are right in that when 7 new fish are added to a small-ish display there is bound to be disruptions. I never expected the wrasse to be involved however. Maybe I should have because he has always seemed a bit high strung. I think it is the damsels who are weirding him out and I am afraid to try moving him back in with them, even with a rockscape change. If he is happy in the the fuge then I think I will let him reside there in peace.
 
I checked on Plank (the name I gave the carpenter wrasse) this morning and he has settled in well. I fed some mysis and he came out and ate heartily so I guess he is going to bunk with the mollies!
 
Things are going pretty well with the high nutrient tank system. All 6 yellow tail damsels and the tomini tang are doing excellent, as are the original residents. There is a little cyano on the left front of the display where the sand bed is shallow. Other than that the display is looking good with healthy fish and healthy coral/macro algae.

The fuge also has a little cyano. The female molly has disappeared after she had transitioned to salt. The male still seems to be doing well. The carpenter wrasse is such a timid, easily intimidated fish. He is spooked by grass shrimp a third of his size and I am still worried that he is not eating as well as I wished. I could move him to the sump but he will not have near as much room and rock. I will continue to watch him and make a decision if I feel he is in peril of starving.
Some of the seagrass has died off but I can see that some seems to be growing which is exciting. I do have to manually remove cyano from some blades.

Even with these issues the tank system is doing well and I am happy with it.
 
A macro intensive seahorse tank was actually my original reason for developing algae scrubbers. Wanted tons of food in the water that would not get filtered out.
 
Sounds good Dawn. All those fish must be a feast for the eyes!

I remember manually removing algae from my grasses. It helps. Eventually my army of snails took over.
 
Michael Hoaster said:
Sounds good Dawn. All those fish must be a feast for the eyes!

I remember manually removing algae from my grasses. It helps. Eventually my army of snails took over.
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I do love watching all the fish! They make lots of activity and color.
I need to buy my own army of snails. Right now the refugium only has nassarius snails which are no help with algae.
 
Now I wish I'd thrown a few of the tiny mini strombus snails in with the shoal grass I sent. You didn't see any in there, did you? Even if you didn't, there's a chance that some eggs attached to grasses could hatch. As I said before, they are the only snails I've found that can climb and clean skinny seagrass blades, as well as delicate macro algae.
 
Michael Hoaster said:
Now I wish I'd thrown a few of the tiny mini strombus snails in with the shoal grass I sent. You didn't see any in there, did you? Even if you didn't, there's a chance that some eggs attached to grasses could hatch. As I said before, they are the only snails I've found that can climb and clean skinny seagrass blades, as well as delicate macro algae.
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I did not see any snails but like you said, there may be eggs that hitch hiked on the seagrass. I know one of my LFS will have strombus snails so I do access to some mature snails too.
 
I originally heard of them at Indo-Pacific Sea Farms (ipsf.com). They have tons of great 'ecosystem critters' available. Their prices are kinda high though. One day I was in my LFS, and spotted some in one of their tanks. They weren't really even for sale, and must've hitchhiked in on something. I quickly negotiated a price and bought eight on the spot.

As the months went by, their numbers gradually increased, and problem algae decreased. At one point, I seriously worried their population would crash, but it never did. At night they really go to town on the grasses, which is something I haven't seen with any other snail.
 
Michael Hoaster said:
I originally heard of them at Indo-Pacific Sea Farms (ipsf.com). They have tons of great 'ecosystem critters' available. Their prices are kinda high though. One day I was in my LFS, and spotted some in one of their tanks. They weren't really even for sale, and must've hitchhiked in on something. I quickly negotiated a price and bought eight on the spot.

As the months went by, their numbers gradually increased, and problem algae decreased. At one point, I seriously worried their population would crash, but it never did. At night they really go to town on the grasses, which is something I haven't seen with any other snail.
Click to expand...

Thanks for the info. To be honest I do not mind paying a bit high if they will help the grasses stay cleaner.
 
Yeah, it just adds up with shipping, to an amount that is rather high, for what you get. If you think of it as what you'll have in a few months time, it's easier to justify.
 
Michael Hoaster said:
Yeah, it just adds up with shipping, to an amount that is rather high, for what you get. If you think of it as what you'll have in a few months time, it's easier to justify.
Click to expand...

I checked them out but did not see strombus snails in any of their packages. Do they have a different name?
 
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