Learning/rebuilding from my epic fail

[reefmutt]

Few more shots..
Pacman:

Cobalt tort-side:

Top down:

Now.... This is supposed to be an Oregon Tort. From a supplier that went to the states to buy his piece. Tell me what you think.. It's only been in the tank 5 days so it has some encrusting to do and probably some color changing..
Side:

Top down:

I'll keep taking photos of that one to see how it changes..
Ok what else????
Red Diablo not looking so great atm..

This is an echinata type coral frag that came out of an led lit tank with uln. It was ghostly white when I got it about two weeks ago.. It is now coloring up.. Can't wait to see how it grows..

Suharsonoi frag:

This has red planet coloring but wrong growth structure. Was sold as ultra Fiji frag..

Finally... A close up of another echinata type coral..


I didn't get decent shots of my ssc frag or pink lemonade, so I'll stop there and try again in a week or so..
In general, I am very happy with the progress, however sloooooooow it has been..
The last coral I lost was a my nice little red dragon which had really started to take off.. Then it just rtned in my for no apparent reason.. That was about 3 ish weeks ago.
I'm hoping I can keep things going in this positive direction..

I do plan... Or intend to pull p down a little more but it's been quite stubborn- even with the cheato monster I have growing and the aio pellets..
I plan to start dosing Kali..
I was also think about dosing a bacterial product to see if that helps with the p..
Any suggestion??

 

[stonecold]

AWESOME close up and corals, Matt! Happy Father's Day to you and all the dads...

 

[ajcanale]

Looks like things are going pretty well... some really really nice sps growin out here!

 

[maxxII]

Matt,

My experiance with bryopsis in the past was that I needed to run mg at around 1675-1750 for several months to kill it off.

Running mg above 1600 will put your chaeto into stasis. You will no longer get chaeto growth. Personally, I'd suggest continuing with the bio pellets and the cheato to continue to reduce PO4 and starve the bryopsis out that way.

 

[biggles]

Lots of cool acros there Matt and very nice photos mate

I saw the boys at Williamstown aquarium use about 8 peppermint shrimp to totally eradicate aiptasia from an 18" clam that was covered in hundreds of the little bastards. They had the clam and shrimp isolated in their own tank for a week and Bob's your uncle it worked a treat. You need to sort those little acro stingers out pronto now you have lots of nice acros growing again.

You have a duty of care to the acros Matt............

 

[sahin]

Wowsers...your giving Biggles a bit of competition with those acro colours (along with better photography might I add - I'm sure Biggles wont see this so its OK that I slag off his photography skills...and dodgy shakey video skills...). Biggles if you do read this, I'm not really saying that...you are imagining you are reading that.:uhoh3:

 

[reefmutt]

AWESOME close up and corals, Matt! Happy Father's Day to you and all the dads...

Thanks, Nick! Thanks for dropping by. I hope your tank is coming along. Haven't heard from you in a while.

Looks like things are going pretty well... some really really nice sps growin out here!

Thanks AJ. I just have to get them to start growing!!:headwally:

Matt,

My experiance with bryopsis in the past was that I needed to run mg at around 1675-1750 for several months to kill it off.

Running mg above 1600 will put your chaeto into stasis. You will no longer get chaeto growth. Personally, I'd suggest continuing with the bio pellets and the cheato to continue to reduce PO4 and starve the bryopsis out that way.

Thanks for that bit of info, Maxx. I did not know that my cheato would stop growing as well as the bryopsis at high mag levels... Food for thought.. Maybe I'll take your advice; try to drop nutrients, continue manual removal for a while longer and ee how it goes...

Lots of cool acros there Matt and very nice photos mate

I saw the boys at Williamstown aquarium use about 8 peppermint shrimp to totally eradicate aiptasia from an 18" clam that was covered in hundreds of the little bastards. They had the clam and shrimp isolated in their own tank for a week and Bob's your uncle it worked a treat. You need to sort those little acro stingers out pronto now you have lots of nice acros growing again.

You have a duty of care to the acros Matt............

Thanks, Andrew. Trust me, I want them out.. It is slow season in Montreal, so stores don't have much stock these days. I've had trouble getting a copperband.. I'm hoping the filefish I added last week will start feasting on them. My other problem is my purple tang who doesn't take kindly to strangers.. A copperband, by itself would have a hard time. If I can find a couple of other interesting fish to add at the same time, that would help, but tricky right now..
I have been using pep shrimp in a sump for a long time to remove pests like aptasia. Works like a charm. You know Greg has a bunch right in his display that he added a few years ago to deal with aefws. Since he added them, he hasn't had either aefws or aptasia... THIS I find very intriguing. I am very seriously considering adding a bunch to the display... I'm not sure I have the cajones to do it, though..

Wowsers...your giving Biggles a bit of competition with those acro colours (along with better photography might I add - I'm sure Biggles wont see this so its OK that I slag off his photography skills...and dodgy shakey video skills...). Biggles if you do read this, I'm not really saying that...you are imagining you are reading that.:uhoh3:

Thanks Sahin. Since removing the mitras and adding a third mh, it's been easier to photohraph the tank. It's a better light for the camera to deal with.
I am setting the wb to 10k and going with as low an aperture as possible. When doing this, often the shutter is as slow as 1/10s so all the side shots are with my 100m macro pressed right up against the glass for stability. That's why not all the top downs came out so clear. Harder to keep the camera stable and I find the IS on the macro not nearly as good as some of canon's other L lenses..
Again, I just took the shots and pulled them directly from the camera via wifi. One day I'll edit them a bit in Lightroom before posting..
One thing I found very interesting, comparing the same coral from the side vs the top down is how different they can look...

Thanks for the positive comments and good info, guys!!

 

[cFloor]

You got some really amazing corals, and excellent colors! I really like the orange passion piece and I'm straight up jealous over that Pink Floyd acro. Gonna be beauties as they grow out.

 

[maxxII]

Lots of cool acros there Matt and very nice photos mate

I saw the boys at Williamstown aquarium use about 8 peppermint shrimp to totally eradicate aiptasia from an 18" clam that was covered in hundreds of the little bastards. They had the clam and shrimp isolated in their own tank for a week and Bob's your uncle it worked a treat. You need to sort those little acro stingers out pronto now you have lots of nice acros growing again.

You have a duty of care to the acros Matt............

I've used Peppermint shrimp to eradicate aiptasia as well, and I also had an H.magnifica anemone in the tank at the time. No issues towards the H.magnifica, (pair of ornery Perc's in the anemone probably were responsible for this), and the aptasia were completely eradicated.

In my 120 I used 7 shrimp and kept them hungry....very carefully spot fed the fish and kept the shrimp from scrounging anything.

In my 58 gallon I had a BAD infestation of aptasia. I used 5 peppermint shrimp and again, spot fed the fish and kept them hungry. Aiptasia were eradicated in less than 4 weeks.

As far as Chaeto and magnesium goes...I didnt know that either until speaking with Tristan from Pax-Bellum, (maker of the of the ARID reactor). Being headstrong and stubborn, I punched up my magnesium to 1700 ppm in order to wipe out a small amount of bryopsis. Chaeto growth promptly came to a screeching halt for 4 weeks until I relented and did water changes to bring it down. As soon as the magnesium hit 1500, I observed chaeto growth returning to its usual exponential rate.

I havent played with it to determine where the exact cut off is, but I do know from personal experience that it's somewhere between 1500 ppm and 1700 ppm. I'm quite happy to take Tristan's word that 1600 ppm is the magic number and keep it around 1500 for optimum growth and inhibiting bryospis growth.

 

[tomae]

Amazing color, how u du that?

 

[slin1977]

I'm only up to page 4 .
See you in a few more pages.

 

[reefmutt]

You got some really amazing corals, and excellent colors! I really like the orange passion piece and I'm straight up jealous over that Pink Floyd acro. Gonna be beauties as they grow out.

Thanks cfloor! I am looking forward to seeing them grow out as well.. Each time I check my alk, it's between 6 and 7, then I adjust my ca reactor. But each time I do this, there's a jump in growth and the alk stays low.. So, I am very gradually ramping up the ca reactor and trying to figure out where/how to install my kalk reservoir and doser..

I've used Peppermint shrimp to eradicate aiptasia as well, and I also had an H.magnifica anemone in the tank at the time. No issues towards the H.magnifica, (pair of ornery Perc's in the anemone probably were responsible for this), and the aptasia were completely eradicated.

In my 120 I used 7 shrimp and kept them hungry....very carefully spot fed the fish and kept the shrimp from scrounging anything.

In my 58 gallon I had a BAD infestation of aptasia. I used 5 peppermint shrimp and again, spot fed the fish and kept them hungry. Aiptasia were eradicated in less than 4 weeks.

As far as Chaeto and magnesium goes...I didnt know that either until speaking with Tristan from Pax-Bellum, (maker of the of the ARID reactor). Being headstrong and stubborn, I punched up my magnesium to 1700 ppm in order to wipe out a small amount of bryopsis. Chaeto growth promptly came to a screeching halt for 4 weeks until I relented and did water changes to bring it down. As soon as the magnesium hit 1500, I observed chaeto growth returning to its usual exponential rate.

I havent played with it to determine where the exact cut off is, but I do know from personal experience that it's somewhere between 1500 ppm and 1700 ppm. I'm quite happy to take Tristan's word that 1600 ppm is the magic number and keep it around 1500 for optimum growth and inhibiting bryospis growth.

Well, I'll be playing with at number. I'm going to bump up the mag to at least 1600 and see what happens.. For some reason, the bryopsis has started to ramp up. Maybe it's the low alk along with normal mag levels.. Not to mention the p of .13..
You have also convinced me to add 15 or so peppermint shrimp- when I can find some. If they start to eat my corals, there will be a tear down and rescape in my future..

Amazing color, how u du that?

Thanks, tomae! I had very little to do with it, really. You should see the 7 other crappy pics I took. This was a good shot under 150w radiums. I set the camera to 10k for white balance and the pic came right off the camera with no processing.
I have heard that this particular coral likes higher nutrients and tends to fade out a bit in ulns.. With my n at 3-4pom and p at .13 maybe this is why..

I'm only up to page 4 .
See you in a few more pages.

Slin1977, I salute you!!! thanks for taking the time. I know it's no easy task to go read a thread from the beginning. I appreciate your efforts!!

Gonna try a few more shots later, if I get the chance.. It's a holiday in Quebec, today..

 

[biggles]

This isn't one of those nice 'update please' posts - it's a 'where is the $%#$@ update Matt !!!! :mad2:

 

[plyle02]

yeah Matt, you tease us with those stunning frag shots, looking more like small colonies at this point, regardless, they are sure looking colorful and very happy Way to go!!! I am certainly stoked for you, keep it up and give us a FTS when time allows it, would love to see all those corals and their spacing, what the overall look will be like now and in the future...
Best Regards,

 

[biggles]

What are you yeah Matt'ing about Perry, you need to lift your game too......

 

[reefmutt]

Well Perry and Andrew... Be careful what you wish for..
I do have an update lots of tight photos.. Again.. and a lousy fts for Perry.
But first I feel obligated to say something that is only half reef related...
41 years ago, after having to give away my cat due to allergies, my dad bought me a fish tank to keep the fish I had swimming in a mayonnaise jar. I had caught them from a friend's country house lake, and my dad seeing an opportunity to turn my sadness into a new interest, got me my first aquarium.
My dad, my mentor, my moral compass, my hero, died on Monday July 6th. I was there to say goodbye to him as was his whole family. He had been ill for some time so it wasn't entirely unexpected, but nonetheless, a very sad day. And a totally surreal week..the funeral was yesterday and I am trying to get back to some semblance of normal....
So.. For 41 years I have almost never been without an aquarium and for the past 20 years, I have made my living building, installing and maintaining aquariums and systems..

Ok.. Deep breath and move forward..
I'm starting with the fts. Not very good and I will most probably be redoing the scape because I will have to remove a rabbit fish that keeps taking bites out of my coral..
Here's the fts

Now, here's my ice fire echinata. This coral absolutely blows me away. I have to post a few shots...




More to come!

 

[reefmutt]

The tank has been rock solid for nutrients lately. About 3 weeks ago, I turned up the flow through then aio pellets. This brought my p down to .06-.07 and n down to 1ppm. i have doubled my nitrate additions to keep them 1ppm while the pellets have p at .06ish.
This drop in nutrients make it necessary to clean the glass every other day instead of every day.
Interestingly, immediately after increasing the aio pellets flow, I started to
Have spots of cyano appear- even with the almost halving of my nutrient levels.
I also spiked my mag and knocked off my bryopsis. Wishing 24 hours of getting mag to 1700 ppm with tech M, the bryopsis began to melt away. It was gone in 4 days.
I have also added 40(!) peppermint shrimp. They have already begun reducing my aptasia infestation, but they have a long way to go.
Recently, I had to turn up my ca reactor because demand has increased ..
My alk is at 7.6 and calc around 440.
Ok couple more photos.. I have no idea what this is but it's gonna be NICE!

Top down:

My cobalt tort.. I know I posted a shot of this last time but it's so nice, I'm posting a new shot..

And my Oregon tort getting a bit darker..

 

[reefmutt]

More more more...


This frag is new. Two weeks old but looking very good:

Tyree pacman growing well.

Mystery coral coloring up..

 

[reefmutt]

Ok. One more for now..

Ok two...

Couple more tomorrow..

 

[naterealbig]

Hi Matt, just dropping in to say hey! Love the pictures - your tank and corals are beautiful! Great to hear you are knocking out that bryopsis - it's a complete pain in the rear. I know, because I have dealt with it before. As far as the cyano goes, that is something that seemed to pop up with any form or carbon dosing I have tried.

I am so sorry to hear about your father, he sounds like a great man, and I'm certain you miss him more than anyone can imagine. Chin up.

Warmest regards,

Nathan