Learning/rebuilding from my epic fail
- Thread starter reefmutt
- Start date
That pink caddy looks like mine -- ****ed off!
Where do you keep it in the tank? Higher up or lower, higher flow or lower. Mine is not the happiest camper, and he's in the upper 1/3 of the tank, with fairly strong flow.
And finally, my Fox Flame has recovered from Dinos and is growing like a weed. It's polyps are deep red, it's body is a pinkish/red color.
Where do you keep it in the tank? Higher up or lower, higher flow or lower. Mine is not the happiest camper, and he's in the upper 1/3 of the tank, with fairly strong flow.
And finally, my Fox Flame has recovered from Dinos and is growing like a weed. It's polyps are deep red, it's body is a pinkish/red color.
reefmutt
Active member
Thank you, Joseph. It is at the very bottom of my tank. So, doesn't play a big role in the aesthetics of the tank.. but you are right, it would be very cool to have it up higher.
Hey Richard, wow, where have you been? I can't even remember which tank you saw- if it was the 7 foot 265 or the 5 foot 300- which is the tank shown at the very beginning of this thread..
Well, if you are back in the hobby- and it sure looks like it with a 600g- maybe we should should be meeting again!
Thanks for the kind words. My door is always open, Richard.
Yeah, my pink Cadillac has so far been a big disappointment. If is up high in the reef so gets both solid flow and lighting. Until recently, it had a couple other corals encrusting up against its base and they were quite aggressive. I have removed them and am hoping it will do better now. We'll see..
I have another piece in my frag tank and it looks way better- better pe and growth.
Fox flame is a very pretty coral. Mine is growing pretty well, too.
I have a pair of Bellus angels, my pyramid butterfly and a dwarf golden angel who all like to eat sps mucus, so my pe is never fantastic in my display..
Hrm, sounds like your Pink Caddy is in similar conditions to mine. Maybe I'll take a little snippet of it and move it towards the bottom to see what happens.
I remember you were interested in seeing Fox Flames so I figured i'd throw that in haha. It *can* get that deep red.
I remember you were interested in seeing Fox Flames so I figured i'd throw that in haha. It *can* get that deep red.
i2ik
New member
Hey Matt, I think it was a 7 foot tank if I am not mistaken. It was the time where Otto (reefraft) helped me and presented me Greg I think from the store on Décarie. I was also at one point working at Worldfish.
Yes I kept the tank all this years with some water in there but nothing else. Currently cleaning everything and seeing what is still working and what is need to be changed. I quite several years ago after my tank crashed and lost motivation to started it back again. I couldn't keep my elements stable to found out when it was too late and after many water changes that the problem was my salt. Probably a bad batch of salt.
Yes I kept the tank all this years with some water in there but nothing else. Currently cleaning everything and seeing what is still working and what is need to be changed. I quite several years ago after my tank crashed and lost motivation to started it back again. I couldn't keep my elements stable to found out when it was too late and after many water changes that the problem was my salt. Probably a bad batch of salt.
I'm going to give mine a little more time before I move it.
Well let's see that fox flame, man!
I'd love to have a look. Post it up
It's a baby, but now that it's not being pestered by algae it's growing and coloring. Still hasn't regained the neon tips.. it will.
Pife
Active member
Here's mine.I'm going to give mine a little more time before I move it.
Well let's see that fox flame, man!
I'd love to have a look. Post it up
Sent from my SM-N920T using Tapatalk
reefmutt
Active member
Hey Rich, yep.. the 7 footer.. I should dig up some photos from that one..
I remember World Fish.
I hope you get your tank up and running again, soon!
it's funny because Greg just got beck into the hobby this summer, as well.
Nice, you can actually see the green just starting up again.It's a baby, but now that it's not being pestered by algae it's growing and coloring. Still hasn't regained the neon tips.. it will.
Very cool! I love the Sea of cyphastrea leading up to the Flame.Here's mine.
Sent from my SM-N920T using Tapatalk
Gotta get that in the display!
i2ik
New member
That's great!! I remembered Greg's tank, you guys have been pioneers in reef keeping in Montreal area and very inspiring to many reefers. Does Greg have a build thread on RC? I would love to see his progress!
Been working on the tank mostly for cleaning. There is so many new things in the hobby, I am really not up to date with all the news techniques and equipment. Will need some intense reading on that!
Been working on the tank mostly for cleaning. There is so many new things in the hobby, I am really not up to date with all the news techniques and equipment. Will need some intense reading on that!
reefmutt
Active member
I'm trying to get greg to start a build thread. He did a fantastic job on building the system and his stand but he's kind of busy and I'm not sure he ever will..
He's already loading it up with corals!
The hobby has changed pretty dramatically in the last decade, thats for sure!
But the basic principles are mostly the same...
Come on Richard! Get that tank going
He's already loading it up with corals!
The hobby has changed pretty dramatically in the last decade, thats for sure!
But the basic principles are mostly the same...
Come on Richard! Get that tank going
biggles
Premium Member
Congratulations on the ROTM recognition Matt, very well deserved mate
Your pics are just mind blowing to me buddy, all the growing acros contrasting against each others crazy colors. The Fox Flame is awesome, never seen anything like that in my travels.
Wonderful to see your reef hitting it's stride after all your hard work getting it there mate.
I love this pic the most, just awesome mate :thumbsup:
Your pics are just mind blowing to me buddy, all the growing acros contrasting against each others crazy colors. The Fox Flame is awesome, never seen anything like that in my travels.
Wonderful to see your reef hitting it's stride after all your hard work getting it there mate.
I love this pic the most, just awesome mate :thumbsup:
Wally.B
Active member
Hey Wally, thanks! It took me a bit to go back in my photos to find when I added the wave.. it was almost exactly 2 years ago. It's been through a lot.. a few setbacks, so not as much growth as it would have had in two years of perfect water..
Here..
Sept 2016 right below red wrasse.
January 2017 in left again.
Thanks for the Wave Sequence, it's growth and acceleration is amazing.
This Photo is great and shows the mix you have. And the various stages you have going in you tank.
I assume you introduced the SPS at different times, and some grow slower, while other Faster. Some could be colonies that survived from your previous tank.
Do you have a timeline of a Coral (Starting at Frag) that you would consider Medium Speed grower, and show what progress one should expect every 3 months or so.
That would help me set a degree expectation.
So 4 or more photo's over a period of a year of same coral.
I would greatly appreciated that, and it would help me with the Waiting Game.
codydemmel4
Active member
Hey Matt. I know you were struggling with high po4 and nitrates before but lowered them recently.
I just tested for the first time in a long time and my p04 is around 0.1 with hanna ulr and my nitrates are 64 and probably higher via the red sea kit.
How would you recommend slowly lowering these?
I just tested for the first time in a long time and my p04 is around 0.1 with hanna ulr and my nitrates are 64 and probably higher via the red sea kit.
How would you recommend slowly lowering these?
reefmutt
Active member
Hey guys, sorry for the late response, family stuff- my wife traveling and the holidays have sidetracked me a bit..
Hey Andrew, thanks! I’ll have to shoot some more fish pics with my zoom. It allows the fish to act normal because they done see me from across the room.
Yes, the tank has recently really hit a good patch. Not complaining!
Over the past month, I have had to double the kalkwasser dosing. My doser pushes - or was pushing 4ml/min for 14 hours/day - I have been raising the volume in response to higher and higher demand. I’m currently at 8.5ml/min and may have to raise it higher. Alk is just holding at 7. My ca reactor, I have set at a good level and don’t want to play with it much but I may have to increase co2 at some point.
Currently, I am adding a few heaping spoonfuls of kalk to my stirrer every weekend to keep it fresh and I’ll have to starte cleaning it out monthly...
Don’t get rid of that ca reactor! Nothing wrong with two part, that’s for sure but just keep the reactor, just in case..
Good luck with the cleanup
I don’t think I could give you any type of timeline as so many factors play a role in coral growth. Type and intensity of light to flow to nutrient and mineral levels will change things.. not to mention pests or picking fish.. sorry, I really think it’s impossible to give any type of timeline..
I have always been a bigger fan of the more traditional methods but I have also seen great results with carbon, but, generally, for my system in particular, carbon was never very effective.
Over the last several months, my cheato haze done an amazing job on nitrates and more recently, now that n has almost gone to 0, I have been adding back some n in hopes that the cheato will pull a little more p. As of last week, my p got below .1 for the first time in a very long time. We will see if it continues..
I’ll post a full cheato update this weekend I hope.
I believe that part of what is keeping the cheato so happy is the prodibio Bioptim because of its iron, potassium, zinc, manganese etc..
carbon dosing will rev up all sorts of bacteria in a system- good and bad- most of the time the benefits outweigh the risks as long as it isn’t over done.. but I think I’m still a bigger fan of macro algae.
The new(ish) products by Fauna Marin and Tropic Marin are also interesting. TM’s Reef actif or FM’s reef Vitality and coral balance may help a lot but not sure they could do the whole job..
If you are able to set up a cheato fuge, it can be extremely effective. If you can’t, carbon dosing - starting very slowly- will also help, no question.
I should add that for reasons I can’t explain, I feel that the way cheato pulls down nutrients is less stressful to Corals than how carbon/bacteria does it..
Congratulations on the ROTM recognition Matt, very well deserved mate
Your pics are just mind blowing to me buddy, all the growing acros contrasting against each others crazy colors. The Fox Flame is awesome, never seen anything like that in my travels.
Wonderful to see your reef hitting it's stride after all your hard work getting it there mate.
I love this pic the most, just awesome mate :thumbsup:
Hey Andrew, thanks! I’ll have to shoot some more fish pics with my zoom. It allows the fish to act normal because they done see me from across the room.
Yes, the tank has recently really hit a good patch. Not complaining!
Over the past month, I have had to double the kalkwasser dosing. My doser pushes - or was pushing 4ml/min for 14 hours/day - I have been raising the volume in response to higher and higher demand. I’m currently at 8.5ml/min and may have to raise it higher. Alk is just holding at 7. My ca reactor, I have set at a good level and don’t want to play with it much but I may have to increase co2 at some point.
Currently, I am adding a few heaping spoonfuls of kalk to my stirrer every weekend to keep it fresh and I’ll have to starte cleaning it out monthly...
Hey Rich, yes Greg’s tank is going like gangbusters..and he definitely set it up right.Working on the tank a little bit everyday. Hopefully, it will be up and running in about a month
Sounds like Greg took his time and he is off a great start!
Don’t get rid of that ca reactor! Nothing wrong with two part, that’s for sure but just keep the reactor, just in case..
Good luck with the cleanup
Hey Scott, furiosa was almost completely killed last October but I salvaged a few sections. I have a really nice frag growing out in the frag tank and the mother colony in my dt is doing fine but not well placed. It’s off to one side and I’m not crazy about it’s growth.. not sure what I’ll do but I am toying with the idea of removing the mother colony and adding the frag I have somewhere else in the reef.. I’ll try to get some shots of it up over the next week or so.
Thanks very much Tim! I find the Fox Flame is a pretty good grower in my tank, hopefully the same for you!
Hey Wally, thanks. I have 1 inch frags that after 2 years are still one inch and then in contrast, I have others like furiosa or the wave that grew like weeds. But depending on when I added them or what the conditions are/were in the tank, the Corals have/will grow differently.
I don’t think I could give you any type of timeline as so many factors play a role in coral growth. Type and intensity of light to flow to nutrient and mineral levels will change things.. not to mention pests or picking fish.. sorry, I really think it’s impossible to give any type of timeline..
Hey James, thanks!
Hey Cody, I have tried both carbon dosing and older methods like dsbs and macro algea.
I have always been a bigger fan of the more traditional methods but I have also seen great results with carbon, but, generally, for my system in particular, carbon was never very effective.
Over the last several months, my cheato haze done an amazing job on nitrates and more recently, now that n has almost gone to 0, I have been adding back some n in hopes that the cheato will pull a little more p. As of last week, my p got below .1 for the first time in a very long time. We will see if it continues..
I’ll post a full cheato update this weekend I hope.
I believe that part of what is keeping the cheato so happy is the prodibio Bioptim because of its iron, potassium, zinc, manganese etc..
carbon dosing will rev up all sorts of bacteria in a system- good and bad- most of the time the benefits outweigh the risks as long as it isn’t over done.. but I think I’m still a bigger fan of macro algae.
The new(ish) products by Fauna Marin and Tropic Marin are also interesting. TM’s Reef actif or FM’s reef Vitality and coral balance may help a lot but not sure they could do the whole job..
If you are able to set up a cheato fuge, it can be extremely effective. If you can’t, carbon dosing - starting very slowly- will also help, no question.
I should add that for reasons I can’t explain, I feel that the way cheato pulls down nutrients is less stressful to Corals than how carbon/bacteria does it..
reefmutt
Active member
Hey guys, time for an update and a few pics..
So as mentioned above, my cheato fuge did such a good job on nutrient reduction, it brought n almost to zero with p still slightly above.1 I have been dosing kno3 and cano3 to bring it up a bit and hoping the cheato would continue to pull down p.
It was working up until 10’days ago when i dosed fluconazole.
I was dosing enough no3 to get n back up to around .5 and p had gotten down to about .08.
But a week after dosing fluconazole and watching the bryopsis wither and disappear, I had a little nutrient spike.
This could have had a bit to do with adding one new evansi anthias- I was feeding a bit more but not tons more.
One week after dosing fluconazole,n was up to 2 and p .18.
I stopped adding extra no3 and put a small amount of gfo in the system. 3 days later n is closer to 1 and p is around .13 so, in general not a huge spike but a noticeable one..
I assume the system will adjust over the next week or two and get back into the rhythm it was in.
It is sooooo nice to not have bryopsis!!.. I won’t do a wc for another week or two nor add carbon.
Alas, I have had some cyano appear in my frag tank, now.. grr.. but it isn’t a plague so I will leave it a while and watch before taking action.. once the system sorts itself out, it may go away on its own. I had begun adding some aminos when n dropped to 0 sommaybe that started the cyano.. I have since stopped aminos as well..
I’ve had a few sleeping corals wake up lately but still have a bunch of sleepers. Cal and alk demand really went up in the past 6 weeks. I have more than doubled my kalk dosing and turned up my co2 a touch. Growth is pretty good lately..
And the cheato continues to grow like an animal possessed. It’s pretty amazing.
Anybody local need cheato? I have buckets of it. I wonder if it has nutritional value.. maybe I should try eating it as a salad... maybe not..
I have been kind of busy lately and very unsatisfied with 95% of my photos of late and haven’t really had time to apply myself properly.
I got up on the ladder today and will probably have more time this long weekend.
I did get a few super clean and nice shots today. But only macros. I’ll have to step back and take some wider shots..
Here are some macros.
This is Robinhood. A growth tip that is moving fast.
Here’s the wave and habanero from side:
And exact same sections from top.
Good old pink matrix growing like stink:
This is a cool shot of a coral from Fragbox he was calling ‘frozen’ it’s body was all white when I bought it. With my phone where it is I was expecting it to colour up and it has. Thebtip still looks similar to how it all looked when I bought it. I’m reasonably sure this is a myagi tort. Really nice and clear this one..
Here is another shot that just came out really crisp.
It’s a pink matrix with a Red Bull or diablo growing close to it.. crazy colour going on here..
And here’s pink tips meeting jf Flame head on..
Suharsenoi
Oh! And a rare fishy shot..
So thats all I got for now... I’ll try to do more this long weekend..
So as mentioned above, my cheato fuge did such a good job on nutrient reduction, it brought n almost to zero with p still slightly above.1 I have been dosing kno3 and cano3 to bring it up a bit and hoping the cheato would continue to pull down p.
It was working up until 10’days ago when i dosed fluconazole.
I was dosing enough no3 to get n back up to around .5 and p had gotten down to about .08.
But a week after dosing fluconazole and watching the bryopsis wither and disappear, I had a little nutrient spike.
This could have had a bit to do with adding one new evansi anthias- I was feeding a bit more but not tons more.
One week after dosing fluconazole,n was up to 2 and p .18.
I stopped adding extra no3 and put a small amount of gfo in the system. 3 days later n is closer to 1 and p is around .13 so, in general not a huge spike but a noticeable one..
I assume the system will adjust over the next week or two and get back into the rhythm it was in.
It is sooooo nice to not have bryopsis!!.. I won’t do a wc for another week or two nor add carbon.
Alas, I have had some cyano appear in my frag tank, now.. grr.. but it isn’t a plague so I will leave it a while and watch before taking action.. once the system sorts itself out, it may go away on its own. I had begun adding some aminos when n dropped to 0 sommaybe that started the cyano.. I have since stopped aminos as well..
I’ve had a few sleeping corals wake up lately but still have a bunch of sleepers. Cal and alk demand really went up in the past 6 weeks. I have more than doubled my kalk dosing and turned up my co2 a touch. Growth is pretty good lately..
And the cheato continues to grow like an animal possessed. It’s pretty amazing.
Anybody local need cheato? I have buckets of it. I wonder if it has nutritional value.. maybe I should try eating it as a salad... maybe not..
I have been kind of busy lately and very unsatisfied with 95% of my photos of late and haven’t really had time to apply myself properly.
I got up on the ladder today and will probably have more time this long weekend.
I did get a few super clean and nice shots today. But only macros. I’ll have to step back and take some wider shots..
Here are some macros.
This is Robinhood. A growth tip that is moving fast.
Here’s the wave and habanero from side:
And exact same sections from top.
Good old pink matrix growing like stink:
This is a cool shot of a coral from Fragbox he was calling ‘frozen’ it’s body was all white when I bought it. With my phone where it is I was expecting it to colour up and it has. Thebtip still looks similar to how it all looked when I bought it. I’m reasonably sure this is a myagi tort. Really nice and clear this one..
Here is another shot that just came out really crisp.
It’s a pink matrix with a Red Bull or diablo growing close to it.. crazy colour going on here..
And here’s pink tips meeting jf Flame head on..
Suharsenoi
Oh! And a rare fishy shot..
So thats all I got for now... I’ll try to do more this long weekend..
