Isn't that a lot more work?

[Reefing102]

Glad you caught it! Something that may help, without an adjustment to salinity, is frozen water bottles.

As for Kenya trees, glue (as you found) usually doesn’t work. I’ve found lightly rubberbanding them to a piece of rubble works and then you can glue the rubble where you want. Some people also thread fishing line through the base (using a needle) and secure it that way.

 

[griss]

Glad you caught it! Something that may help, without an adjustment to salinity, is frozen water bottles.

As for Kenya trees, glue (as you found) usually doesn’t work. I’ve found lightly rubberbanding them to a piece of rubble works and then you can glue the rubble where you want. Some people also thread fishing line through the base (using a needle) and secure it that way.

Yep, I was going to say the same but Shane beat me to it

 

[Dustin07]

Glad you caught it! Something that may help, without an adjustment to salinity, is frozen water bottles

I don't have an auto topoff so adding fresh water nearly daily is a part of my normal routine, adding ice I think so far is seemingly a safe bet in terms of salinity but I LOVE this idea of frozen water bottles. I'm out of town on a fishing trip the next few days so I'll set that idea up for my wife so she can add one in the morning and evening while I'm gone. She said the torches looked much better this morning.

As for Kenya trees, glue (as you found) usually doesn’t work. I’ve found lightly rubberbanding them to a piece of rubble works and then you can glue the rubble where you want. Some people also thread fishing line through the base (using a needle) and secure it that way.

This is a great idea. coincidentally right after I posted I took a bunch of rubble I had already in stock and lined the floor of my nano with it, and placed the kenyas on there. I'll look at attaching them with line tonight possibly!

 

[Dustin07]

a while back my pink diamond zoas were looking bad, I had mentioned that I fragged them and gave them a revive dip. a lot of critters came off, including a ton of worms and many small bugs I couldn't identify. Since then, the frag has not only fully opened up, but multiplied. However on that same rock, my wifes playboy zoas have started showing the same signs. lots of great growth, but the original polyps struggling, some disappearing completely. so I took the entire rock out and gave it a revive dip last night. I'm optimistic that it will have positive results.

the interesting thing with the playboy zoas is that the new polyps have come out stronger and pinker than the originals so I'd really like to see that colony do well. everything else in the tank is doing very well I think.

I have cut back my feedings a bit though. I noticed some brown algae developing on the sand bed, and one of my rocks after I started dosing the reef roids. I did about a 10% water change (and have been doing about 1-2 gallons of water change per week lately on my 40g overall tank) and the brown algae has almost completely receded.

The only complaints I have is I do feel like coral growth is a bit stunted. aside from my huge and beautiful GSP and Kenya trees, I just dont' "feel" like things are growing as fast as they were. It might make sense to get my water tested and see if there are other trace minerals I need to start dosing?

 

[Dustin07]

The smear is because I hadn't cleaned the glass pre pic, lol.

But as you can see the pink diamonds to the right are flourishing since being dipped.

The playboys to the left have grown a lot, but the original frag is empty now almost on the surface. The frag was placed at an angle and coincidentally the "bottom" of the frag plug has many polyps on it that haven't been opening well, but have a much brighter color.

So I dipped the entire rock and got a LOT of sediment, bugs , and worms off it last night. I know the worms aren't problematic, but whatever else may have been on there hopefully was washed off as well. I have no lack of worms so I'm not worried about the 15-20 I lost in this process.

 

[Dustin07]

one of these days I'll get a new phone and take some decent pictures.....

 

[Dustin07]

Not a great pic but the torch made a full recovery so all I can figure was the water temp was too high. So far everything seems good for summer heat!

 

[Reefing102]

That’s awesome to see!

 

[Dustin07]

The only loss the tank has suffered recently was unfortunately my expensive LSOH Zoas. they had gone from 3 polyps to 6 in a matter of a month, then started to look like they were melting.

I had them lower in the water column at first, the frag was carefully place on the sand bed in a plug holder so it couldn't be knocked over, but my damsel kept kicking sand/rocks up on it so I moved it permanently to a rock my wife and I deemed the "safe rock" for expensive grow out zoas. As it turned out, it was anything but. I don't know if it the extra PAR or waterflow damaged it, but while half the polyps seemed fine, it looked as though a critter such as one of my emerald crabs really damaged it. I came back and all 6 polyps were clean missing from the frag as though it were scraped off. we pulled rocks and looked around behind everything but couldn't find them.

Of course its possible that they are in the sand bed are growing some $50 zoa polyps but I haven't seen them and I'm accepting the loss. I'd like to try them again but that's the first time I've experienced "Zoa melt" so it's bizarre and concerning.

 

[Dustin07]

I might be making a mistake.... my LSOH zoas... my prized zoas... doubled in size from 3 to 6 1/2 polyps in about 4-6 weeks. But that damn damsel kept kicking rocks up on them, so I moved them to a safer rock to grow in peace. after a couple days they started showing melt signs. I've never had a zoa melt before! a day later and they were completely gone. My emerald crabs have grown huge, I see them picking around zoas frequently but not actually hurting them. I don't know what happened but I just talked to my.............. dealer......... and he'll give me three more for 1/2 price. so I'm probably going to get them and give it another go. I really liked them!!


I'll likely start them back in the lower part of the water colum like my last ones since that went really well.

But a question to you guys... do you have a favorite glue? I recently started using a gorilla glue that I read is reef safe but I feel like it's not holding, and I suspect it's emerald crabs that are knocking a couple items loose. it's getting really frustrating. I thought I had all frags finally permenantly and safely securred and this week I found both a small zoa frag and my larger duncan colony upside down in the sand. THey're fine, but I have them just on the bottom now until I can figue out a better arrangement...

 

[griss]

Sorry to hear about the Zoas. Glad you are able to secure a replacement.

For glue, I've always had pretty too luck with Loctite Super Glue Gel.

 

[Dustin07]

Sorry to hear about the Zoas. Glad you are able to secure a replacement.

For glue, I've always had pretty too luck with Loctite Super Glue Gel.

awesome, thank you! non toxic? can you apply it to wet surfaces?
I can't remember the one I had great luck with in the past but it was a maroon colored tube. the gorilla glue seems OK but i'm having about 50/50 success with it. I really used a ton on that duncan so I'm surprised it didn't hold. especially since it DID hold for a few weeks lol

 

[griss]

I've used it for years with no ill effects.

I've used in on both wet and dry surfaces but it works best (IMO) on dry surfaces. I'm primarily and Acropora person so 99% of my fragging is that. I use a dry frag plug, put a small amount of glue on the plug, cut my Acro frag, gently pat dry the bottom of the frag and stick it to the plug.

For corals like Ricordea and Zoas, I usually let them attach to a bit of sand or rock first, then attach to the plug using the above method.

 

[Dustin07]

Just a little update on the "garden". I need to do some pruning....

 

[Dustin07]

Ha the blue ones in back all opened up fully right after I took and posted the picture.

 

[Dustin07]

Haven't really added anything or made any substantial changesto the tank other than a new mushroom. I have been playing around with some pruning/fragging here and there, if that pans out OK I'll be sure to grab a picture. My wife and I are planning to use our 4g AIO tank for a little frag grow-out tank but there is something about this tank that is a constant struggle.

I found someone else with the same little 4g nano and he said he added an HOB to his which seemed to do better than the factory sump/refugium setup so I might give that a try.

Looking forward to winter time when my wife and I get back into weekend fish store dates but I gotta admit the tank is a little full!

 

[Dustin07]

I told my wife not long ago that when I started increasing frequency of partial water changes, I felt like our corals were responding positively. things like our bubble, frogspawn, BTA, and mushroom were opening up much larger than usual and I felt like my zoas were spreading/growing faster again. So I have tried minimal water changes with frequent top offs, I have tried using various reef foods sparingly, and I've tried them frequently. I've tinkered with my lights here and there, but the thing that seems to be giving my corals more life is the increased water changes.

I saw this yesterday and it immediately received a ton of attention:

I think that there are trace nutrients I am not able to dose or test for easily that adding new salt water replaces. Maybe I'm removing some trace waste that is also irritating my corals, but its not anything coming up in my tests. (I've heard people talk about removing poisons that corals may release into the water though might be involved).


I am curious if people have a simple/standard method for water changes. Being that we have only a 40g, 10% is just 4g. I use a 1g bucket at the moment so that's basically manually emptying 4 times, then remixing 4 times. not a big deal, but I'm sure people have a better method especially when they're running 100g+ tanks.

Do you guys think brand of salt matters? Do you just throw in a measured scoop per gallon, mix it up and pour the mixed salt water in?
Do you guys ever buy pre mixed RO/DI water from your local LFS?

I have an LFS locally that sells it in 5g increments and I thought about picking his up for my office tank for simplicity sake but I wonder if the trace nutrient quality is the same.

I'm low on my Instant Ocean and curious if I should try a different brand for the DT at home...

 

[Dustin07]

I'm also struggling greatly with my little 4g AIO tank. I don't have anything in it but very simple corals. A couple kenya tree frags, some zoa plugs, and two kinds of GSP. But none of them seem to thrive in that tank so I may start a log on it to see where my disconnect is there. I'm sorta bound and determined to get that one to work...

 

[griss]

I told my wife not long ago that when I started increasing frequency of partial water changes, I felt like our corals were responding positively. things like our bubble, frogspawn, BTA, and mushroom were opening up much larger than usual and I felt like my zoas were spreading/growing faster again. So I have tried minimal water changes with frequent top offs, I have tried using various reef foods sparingly, and I've tried them frequently. I've tinkered with my lights here and there, but the thing that seems to be giving my corals more life is the increased water changes.

I saw this yesterday and it immediately received a ton of attention:

View attachment 32404792



I think that there are trace nutrients I am not able to dose or test for easily that adding new salt water replaces. Maybe I'm removing some trace waste that is also irritating my corals, but its not anything coming up in my tests. (I've heard people talk about removing poisons that corals may release into the water though might be involved).


I am curious if people have a simple/standard method for water changes. Being that we have only a 40g, 10% is just 4g. I use a 1g bucket at the moment so that's basically manually emptying 4 times, then remixing 4 times. not a big deal, but I'm sure people have a better method especially when they're running 100g+ tanks.

Do you guys think brand of salt matters? Do you just throw in a measured scoop per gallon, mix it up and pour the mixed salt water in?
Do you guys ever buy pre mixed RO/DI water from your local LFS?

I have an LFS locally that sells it in 5g increments and I thought about picking his up for my office tank for simplicity sake but I wonder if the trace nutrient quality is the same.

I'm low on my Instant Ocean and curious if I should try a different brand for the DT at home...

I'm also running a 40 gallon. I do a 5 gallon water change every other week using RODI and IO and my corals are doing really well.

As far as which salt mix, you're going to get a ton of different answers. I started out using IO in the 80's for a fish only tank. In the early 90s, I set up my first reef tank and started using Marine Environment. At some point, I switched to Coralife (back when their buckets of salt included a free Coralife t-shirt). I used Coralife for years until I got two bad buckets (to different batch numbers) in a row with super high Ca and Super low Alk. I switched back to IO and haven't had any issues since. The only things I dose are CA, Alk, Mg and NO3.

 

[griss]

I'm also struggling greatly with my little 4g AIO tank. I don't have anything in it but very simple corals. A couple kenya tree frags, some zoa plugs, and two kinds of GSP. But none of them seem to thrive in that tank so I may start a log on it to see where my disconnect is there. I'm sorta bound and determined to get that one to work...

The smallest tank I ever kept was a 15 gallon and I really struggled keeping corals in that one too. I don't know the answer but, I think keeping the log and adjusting one thing at a time slowly might help. Good luck.