Learning/rebuilding from my epic fail

[reefmutt]

How does the Mitratus butterfly behave in your reef? Beautiful fish, but I've always been leery of them.

Yes.. You noticed! . Well, I have learned over the years to not be impulsive because it usually gets you in trouble.... Well.. Maybe I got myself into a little trouble with this impulse buy... He's a gorgeous fish, one I've never kept before and one I don't think I'd ever even seen before, in person. The price was very reasonable and a quick (in the store, on my phone) bit of research told me
I was taking a small risk but I rationalized it by telling myself- maybe he'll eat red bugs!!
He's only been in for a few days. He picks at all surfaces in the tank, whether they are rock, sand, glass or live coral. AND he eats frozen foods like a champ.. Only time will tell.. I think my pe may already be slightly reduced, but he never really takes more than one bite from any spot..

Simply sublime- makes me want to dive straight in and explore this reef face.

thanks Nils

Can't get enough of your pics Matt

Thanks! That's all I got his time around.

wow Matt! tank is looking GREAT!

the fish eye shot is pretty nice!

thanks for sharing mate!!

Cheers

Thanks, Flo. I'm loving your shots these days as well.

Crazy like bacterial piranha? lol


Great looking rose tabler!

Thanks, that tabler is beginning to really push out. It'll do
Some serious shading soon.
Piranha bacteria indeed!

That whole discussion about carbon, bacteria, nutrients and microbes just makes you realize how important moderation is in this hobby.
It's so easy to fall into the 'if some is good, more is better' trap..
The only thing that is good for a reef in excess is patience and level headedness..
Balance, balance,balance!

 

[joshky]

Yes, it's a smaller gyre. The overflow is acrylic and the magnet sits inside the box. The magnet does not rust or stain at all. Must be the same type of magnet used for impellers.

Okay so definitely some voodoo magic going on. :wildone:

I might steal your idea and mount one on my overflow vertically in the future.

 

[markalot]

Beautiful pictures Matt, thanks for posting them. Never enough!

 

[reefmutt]

Okay so definitely some voodoo magic going on. :wildone:

I might steal your idea and mount one on my overflow vertically in the future.

It'll give some good diagonal cross flow against your current pumps and if you put it on a pulse, your magnifica will love it.

 

[DiscusHeckel]

Hey aquavision thanks for stopping in! And thanks for the praise!
In your honor, I will post some porn to go with the preceding 'articles'
Few close ups:
Ice fire. Holding colour but not growing much..

This tabler has really taken off. Loving it right now..

Little Fiji coral ball that I've had for a year and stayed a pale cream forever. It has coloured up but not grown much.

Jaw dropper arm..growing well but as if said, the colony lower down gets better colour. This one seem to have trouble dealing with the light..

An arm of my fastest grower. Don't know what it is. The colony is on the floor of the tank front, far left..

Fts to follow!

Impressive close-up photos Matt. Your Ice/fire echinata looks very different to mine in that it has much more blue on its body. I really like it.

 

[reefmutt]

Beautiful pictures Matt, thanks for posting them. Never enough!

Thanks, Mark!

Impressive close-up photos Matt. Your Ice/fire echinata looks very different to mine in that it has much more blue on its body. I really like it.

Thanks, Bulent. There seem to be a few corals that get called the 'ice/fire' echinata. And I'm sure they are not all the same coral.
Yours and mine are clearly not the same coral. The structure is completely different.. Yours has thicker branches and more knobby corralites. Mine is extremely fine.
I have another so called ice fire. It's way up in a corner of my tank where it's very difficult to photograph.
It's in the upper left of this photo:

It has another completely different growth structure.. And no white in it but was labeled an ice/fire..
In the end, I don't really care because I just love the blue/white combo.. But the next time an Aussie shipment come s in around here- if ever- I'm going to try really hard to get your variety because is is just fantastic.

 

[Alex Costa]

OMG......:eek1::eek1::eek1:

Now I have to get money to buy a fisheye for myself...

Alex

 

[reefmutt]

Ha! Yes they are fun.. A luxury, really since you can't use them all the time but still fun.

 

[FloformAustria]

Thanks, Flo. I'm loving your shots these days as well.

thanks Matt!

same here with your shots :love2:

 

[biggles]

Reef is looking awesome Matt :thumbsup:

This looks different to Bulent's icefire echinata because it's not an echi Matt. Yours is A. speciosa, the slight inward curve to the ends of the corallite tips is distinctly different to the slight flare or very square ends of echi tips.

Bulent's porn top down of his A. echinata shows the obvious difference in corallite structure. Echi tips are square or slightly flared and can grow straight or curved. A. speciosa always has curved growth and curved individual corallites as in Matt's example.

In a nutshell it would appear that Matt has been lying about having an icefire echi............. :wave:

I've seen both side by side and over 100 different echi's and A. speciosa is rarely collected in Aus. If i see a speciosa at Dave's ever i will grab it because it's rarely seen and ALWAYS mistaken for echinata.

I want your speciosa Matt........... i don't have one

 

[reefmutt]

Reef is looking awesome Matt :thumbsup:

This looks different to Bulent's icefire echinata because it's not an echi Matt. Yours is A. speciosa, the slight inward curve to the ends of the corallite tips is distinctly different to the slight flare or very square ends of echi tips.

Bulent's porn top down of his A. echinata shows the obvious difference in corallite structure. Echi tips are square or slightly flared and can grow straight or curved. A. speciosa always has curved growth and curved individual corallites as in Matt's example.

In a nutshell it would appear that Matt has been lying about having an icefire echi............. :wave:

I've seen both side by side and over 100 different echi's and A. speciosa is rarely collected in Aus. If i see a speciosa at Dave's ever i will grab it because it's rarely seen and ALWAYS mistaken for echinata.

I want your speciosa Matt........... i don't have one

Well... Now that you point that out, Andrew, it's absolutely obvious.
It also adds to my conspiracy theory that we don't even get Australian corals when we get an 'Aussie' shipment!
Around here, mine is a more common 'ice/fire'..
I want a REAL ice/fire!!!!
I wonder if your friend Chris would ship me an order.. Maybe a group buy..
I can dream...
And yes, I confess, I'm a damn lier! The coral made me do it.

 

[biggles]

I have three icefire color variants and an all blue echi Matt so let's do a swapsy

I often wonder if it is more a case of the wrong color spectrum hitting a true deep collected (25-30mts) acro that gives the branch burn look. If that acro was used to say 2% red light and in our tanks is suddenly getting say 6% red, that tripling of just one color spectrum might do the damage rather than seeing it from a total PAR overdose problem.
Might explain why such pieces do better down low but still never quite pop like we know they can - just won't adapt to our lighting perhaps.

Rambling sorry Matt

 

[reefmutt]

Could very well be, Andrew. I don't really know.. Although, that piece, which is about 8 inches below the water, certainly gets more of all the light. It's right in between 2 blue plus and a coral plus (which was recently replaced by a third blue plus) and a 150w radium..
Not a lot of red spectrum, but some, and certainly more than my other lower piece... Less now, with another blue plus over it.

This piece which is easily 20 inches below the surface and also just below the mid point between a mh and the t5s does much better. You can disregard the red bugs. This coral is an absolute red bug magnet. They love this coral and infest it more than any other coral, and despite that, it continues to grow well.. Bugs seem to prefer being lower down in the tank.. Anyways this piece has much better colour. Not the type of crazy colour you can find in googled images, however..

The interesting thing about the Jawdropper is that I seem to recall people hitting it with huge par to make it really colour up...
You know, I think I'll start a 'show me your Jawdropper' thread and find out..

Oh! And I'm all over a swapsy!! We can meet in the middle somewhere like Italy or something and trade corals. Now, that'd be a trip..

 

[glaukos]

Man i really can't pick my favorite shot:hmm4:
Tank looks amazing matt!
So healthy with all those daily growing acros:inlove:
I bet i'll give you a good headache if i ask you how many acros you have in there
Amazing collection!

 

[reefmutt]

Hey Mike! Thanks. Maybe I'll count them this weekend... Maybe..
I appreciate the luv, Mike!

So last night I dosed interceptor.
By tonight the acros were clean and I've lost about 2/3 of my peppermints and the acro crabs. Emeralds, harlequin, pistol are doing fine so far.
Before:

After:

Looks pretty good.
I'll dose again next weekend, I think.

And.. Well, I did have the camera out, so....
Here's a cool shot.. An Aussie (apparently) that I've never shot before. Down very low and very slow grower.
My artsy fartsy shot.

A little closer. The coral has a red brain about six inches behind it..


One more neat shot before I go to bed. I'll post some more tomorrow..

Ok! I'm hoping to se some health improvements on a few stagnant corals now that the bugs are dead... We'll see in the coming weeks..

 

[Usernam Invalid]

Hope u kill all them pesky bugs. Great pics as always

 

[kevlow]

I have never experienced bugs before. Do you spot them or the symptoms first?

 

[markalot]

Sorry about the losses Matt but I'm glad the interceptor was dosed and worked well.

 

[reefmutt]

Hope u kill all them pesky bugs. Great pics as always

Thanks! Based on Mark's experience, I think I'll need another dose for the little bugs. The real red bugs usually only need one shot but I think the others need a second.

I have never experienced bugs before. Do you spot them or the symptoms first?

Well, my eyes are not what they used to be. They are not so good at seeing minuscule things on corals that are a few inches from my face. I did not now I had bugs until somebody pointed it out to me. Then, I got out the macro lens and some reading glasses and reluctantly agreed that I was infected. In my tank there were no concrete signs. Other than several of my corals being stagnated.
I've seen corals live just fine with bugs on them. As an example, my jaw dropper which was clearly infested with true red bugs has been growing and doing well. But some of my seriously stagnated corals had the other smaller and grayish bugs, as shown in the pic above.
People usually report corals that lose pe, then lose color and then shut down. It's not a bad idea to have a seriously close look a coral that follows that pattern.

Sorry about the losses Matt but I'm glad the interceptor was dosed and worked well.

Thanks Mark! I hope it was worth it. I guess I'll know as the next week passes. I hope I see a few non performing corals break out and start growing.
Mark, feel free to add any insight to Kevin's question above.

Here's a couple more pics
Plana in the bottom, desalwi on top (I think)

Plans:

Another plana shot.

A deep water that looks a lot like a pacman

 

[biggles]

Beautiful shots even with bugs Matt, glad to hear the treatment didn't have too many negative side effects mate

The growth on that little deep water is the type i always go for when i spot it, i love all the spidery long thin growing delicate acros. :thumbsup:

We're not meeting in Italy...... you obviously have some sneaky reason for picking that country so i'm not accepting it as neutral territory. :reading: