McPuff's new 300 (transfer from 120)

Sorry to hear about the fish losses. It's frustrating when you think a fish is doing well, and turns up mysteriously dead, because, how to you prevent that from happening again if you don't understand what went wrong? I think that in some cases, certain parasites or diseases can occur no matter how much we try to prevent them, especially those that don't show themselves to us. All we can do is put forward our best effort.

I meant to follow up and say thanks for sharing the FTS. Lookin' good! The stand is coming along nicely too.

Regarding the pygmy angels, I once had a Potter's angel. They're beautiful and peaceful fish. It was a model citizen in my tank.
 
Any updates?

Hmm... it has been quite a while. Took a break on the stand because of humidity. So it is primed, I have caulked it, and the doors are hung, but it needs to be painted. Now that winter is here (yuck!) I can begin painting at any point really. Still need to think of a solution for the canopy.

The corals are getting big and colorful. Fish even bigger. Things are going pretty well for now. I'll have to take and post some pictures of the lagoon and the display. Just enjoying stability basically. :0)
 
Right on McPuff! Stability is good. Glad to hear your corals and fish are growing up! Pics!

It has been a while since I've provided any updates! Here is an FTS from a couple weeks ago. Some of the colonies are getting huge... over 1' across on several. The fish are all fat and happy. I lost my 3 wrasses over the past year. Planning to get 2-3 more along with some more damsels and a pair of bangii cardinals. Their pattern is just so contrasting and vibrant.

Dec2019_300FTS.jpg

The stand is finally completed! Working on the canopy shell now in fact. Looking forward to having it all buttoned up.

Last addition... I'm upgrading my lighting to 3 x Orphek Atlantiks! These will do more for my tank than the current set of 9 LED fixtures. Nervous but very excited for this change. Have the lights on hand, just need to set them up! Will post more once this is complete.
 
That's exciting news! Good luck with the projects! Tank looks great! Big corals + fat fish = happy aquarium.
 
That's exciting news! Good luck with the projects! Tank looks great! Big corals + fat fish = happy aquarium.

Thanks Michael! The fish are definitely fat! 😉 The blueface is still behaving himself which is great. Hoping the next two weeks will allow me to complete the canopy and lighting swap.
 
Gotta love when you start seeing corals that get really large in our tanks. You are on the right path. Keep up the good work and sharing the pics.
 
What's up McPuff?

Hmmm... where to begin? I'll have to break it up into sections I suppose.

Equipment - I did add the Orphek Atlantik lights to the display and I really like them. Also get one for the lagoon. The stand and canopy are completely finished and everything is installed. I am really happy with how it turned out and it's very functional which was a huge goal. I did add a gyre to the right side of my tank to push water towards the overflow as I would occasionally get an "oil slick" on the surface and due to my setup it would stay on one side. That seems to be solved now.

I traded out the 40g tub that was my lagoon and installed a 75 gal tank and a new manifold with improved valves. It's pretty cool looking but now I wonder if I still need to get a bigger lagoon. :0)

Fish - This has been up and down. I did add a few more damsels to the display and most recently I added a Tahiti gold hawkfish that I had an opportunity to purchase. It was pricey but they are rare and it is a very cool fish to watch. Very aggressive when it comes to food. It doesn't like the arc eye hawk at all. I did get another Solar wrasse which was tiny when I got it.
It's now a full adult and nearly full size. Very cool fish. A couple months later, I added a labouti wrasse which was always on my "want" list. It was a juvenile and was doing quite well, growing and starting to get some really nice color. One morning I found him sitting on top of the screen tops that are supposed to keep the fish IN. Argh, that was a bummer. So what did I do? I had an opportunity to order 3 more wrasses (lineatus, labouti, and Scott's) that I really have wanted. They came in and the first two looked amazing. The Scott's looked to be on death's door. They all made it through TTM and into QT. The Scott's lasted a total of 2 weeks before finally letting go. The other two continued to eat like champs and become more social. The actual day I was going to put them in the DT (day 40) I notice they are both lying on the bottom of QT and looking like death was imminent. No idea what happened but it was like a switch. They went through TTM and full QT and the very last day they die. The rest of the fish are doing well... just getting bigger!

The lagoon has received a few new guests as well. I did have an azure damsel in there with the humu trigger and a pair of misbar clowns. I have since added a two spot yellow tail tang (bristletooth) and an Assasi trigger. I LOVE having a pair of triggers in there! They are both really fat and happy. Occasionally they'll go after one another but no damage yet.

Corals - Through the summer, I had several colonies that were getting massive and I figured it was time to trim them. At the same time, something odd started to happen and several of these large colonies just started to die in the very middle and radiate outward. It was a relatively slow process and if I cut off the living portion it seemed to be fine. The dead portion seemed to be rotting slightly on the inside of the skeleton. I lost quite a bit of coral biomass there but thankfully I was able to save chunks of almost everything to start over. I never found anything wrong with the system but it did prompt me to dose Microbacter7 on a weekly basis and my only thought was that it was something bacterial. In reality it was probably a combo of several factors (ALK consumption, pH, and bacteria). I have a few friends that had very similar events in their systems at the same time. Strange indeed.

Overall, it's still running pretty smoothly though I'm always keeping an eye on my "canaries" and trying my best to keep stability where possible.
 
That's great you got your stand and canopy finished up. I've heard good things about those lights. It sounds like you've got a sweet setup. I'd love to see how it all looks.

Sorry to hear of your fish casualties. If someone as good as you with QT loses fish, I worry about the state of the industry. Maybe the pandemic has lowered the standard of care in the chain of custody. Or maybe cyanide is making a comeback?

That's weird about your corals. I'm glad you were successful salvaging the remaining live parts. I won't pretend to know anything about corals, but the first thing I thought was about something I read recently, that when some corals grow big in captivity, they can shade the interior parts to the point it kills off those parts. As good as lights are these days, they don't move, like the sun, so once something gets shaded it stays shaded.

You have an amazing collection of fish! I'm so jealous. Good to have you back!
 
That makes me nervous to ever upgrade my tank. I'm experiencing both cyano and dino right now... and I think I have a green cyano which I've never seen in my saltwater before.

Hopefully you've gotten a handle on that coral rotting
 
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