My 20 long nano bare bottom

FOund out for some reason or another my stupid led heard me compliment it and decided today was the day to bug out. The automatic ramp up and down and off wasn't on. Light wasn't connected to the wifi.
 
Not unfortunatecthat I'm in Colorado. Unfortunate that I'm not near wreak. Also not meaning to complain about my fellow reefers in Colorado. But it is all business with them. Last one I got was a trade for chaeto.

Also I'm in Westminster if anyone is curious.
 
Not unfortunatecthat I'm in Colorado. Unfortunate that I'm not near wreak. Also not meaning to complain about my fellow reefers in Colorado. But it is all business with them. Last one I got was a trade for chaeto.

Also I'm in Westminster if anyone is curious.

I really don't think its just Colorado I have noticed there is a new trend with coral every one thinks they can make money selling them. Just a few years back if you wanted a frag thank you had to go custom now they are for sale at most stores.
 
I really don't think its just Colorado I have noticed there is a new trend with coral every one thinks they can make money selling them. Just a few years back if you wanted a frag thank you had to go custom now they are for sale at most stores.

Yeah, it's good and bad. It stinks that people don't really want to trade, because everyone has everything that everyone else wants, so they just want to sell (which I'm fine with, if you're charging $5-15, but charging more than that is a little :-/ )

It's good because there's availability of stuff everywhere, and it's usually pretty reasonably priced. I bought almost entirely "named" corals for my tank, a few favorite ORAs, some Larry Jacksons, some Tubbs, and some other really awesome stuff and probably spent less than $500 (which sounds like a ton, but I think I started with 30ish corals, so that's not much money all things considered). When mine were growing a lot, I was selling and trading frags, usually $5-15.

The hobby has exploded since I started in it about 10+ years ago. I honestly think it didn't grow much until the early 2000s and then exploded. Between 1975 and 2001 I doubt there were that many advances. Maybe some extra bulb and pump choices, but generally it was the same stuff, or it changed from VHO to MH+VHO. Now there's SO MUCH STUFF available, including DIY, and some even based on great DIY pioneer work too.
 
Absolutely getting more common and easier to be a reef keeper nowadays. I was around when halides and vho were standard and super expensive options. Also around during a site called fish geeks was super popular (dead site now) and I kept low tech planted tanks and aggressive freshwater fish.

Kept mostly fowlr tanks until I was 18, then I kept mushroom corals zoas and other cheap easy corals.

Named corals is a huge step backward in our hobby it makes these special animals seem so engineered. These creatures are amazing in all rights of the world. almost too special for our glass boxes.

This hobby has a high rate or failure compared to others. Maybe I need to wait until everything settles down. I love my fish and corals though and will continue to fill my box up.

I want some more frogspawn and hammers in different colors. I'm kind of over the sps bug right now. I just can't seem to keep them for long anyway. And if hey are around they don't grow much.
 
Absolutely getting more common and easier to be a reef keeper nowadays. I was around when halides and vho were standard and super expensive options. Also around during a site called fish geeks was super popular (dead site now) and I kept low tech planted tanks and aggressive freshwater fish.

Kept mostly fowlr tanks until I was 18, then I kept mushroom corals zoas and other cheap easy corals.

Named corals is a huge step backward in our hobby it makes these special animals seem so engineered. These creatures are amazing in all rights of the world. almost too special for our glass boxes.

This hobby has a high rate or failure compared to others. Maybe I need to wait until everything settles down. I love my fish and corals though and will continue to fill my box up.

I want some more frogspawn and hammers in different colors. I'm kind of over the sps bug right now. I just can't seem to keep them for long anyway. And if hey are around they don't grow much.

Its not just named corals even corals you could get for free like star/xenia is now 5-10.00 for a little frag. I think the internet is also a down follow of the reefing community in a way. It use to be come over and talk tanks and trade some corals back and forth along with ideas. now its I will sell you a few corals in the Walmart parking lot and if you want to talk about or see my tank go on the form.
 
Lol yeah, I've seen two others tanks here in Colorado. And one I had to drive to Greeley for. The store displays are better maintained and nicer to look at but I guess that's how they get you in to look.

After my coralline algae reversed I can't see any new growth. I added a diluted amount of kalk to my ato and hope it helps things get a boost.

Tested alk and it's stuck at 9.
 
Lol yeah, I've seen two others tanks here in Colorado. And one I had to drive to Greeley for. The store displays are better maintained and nicer to look at but I guess that's how they get you in to look.

After my coralline algae reversed I can't see any new growth. I added a diluted amount of kalk to my ato and hope it helps things get a boost.

Tested alk and it's stuck at 9.
What was your mix for the kalk/water?
 
I made a 1 teaspoon to 1/2 gallon ro mix and let it settle then siphoned it off into the top off water. It's almost a teaspoon of saturation for 3.5 gallons
 
I removed the skimmerctoday and ran a filter sock while blowing everything out of the sump. Tomorrow evening I'll baste the rocks and catch the rest. Cut a little off the wall of my acrylic sump (it's too tall) and was finally able to remove the entire skimmer and clean it top to bottom. Found my venturi was packed with salt creep and wasn't running well which might explain why my tank hasn't been exporting nutrients well. Also had chaeto in the intake and a piece of egg crate stuck in the teeth of the needle wheel. Skimmer is functioning properly now and I'll report back as things change.
 
viability for what? Are you having uncontrollable nutrient problems?

Honestly, after having a maintenance guy come over and siphon out most of my bubble algae, he recommended I stop vodka dosing, and let the tank grow back again. Within 48 hours of feeding the fishes more and stopping vodka dosing (effectively the same as carbon dosing/bio pellets) the colors on my corals really dramatically enhanced, and I saw growth again. I was dosing vodka at really high limits to try to kill the bubble algea, but it never worked, and all it did was starve out my corals.

So if you are constantly battling middle-to-high nitrates, yes, biopellets would be recommended. If you aren't, I wouldn't add them.
 
Ok, I'll test nitrates after I drop my wife off at the airport today. I too have the beginnings of a bubble algae outbreak. Did the guy siphon it out with the airline tubing method?

My tank is small enough that I could take the rock out and scrub/ rinse (saltwater rinse) the rocks. I'll do a full round of testing and a water change. I'll test before the change. I don't dose anything anymore and coral color is ok at best. Fish are healthy. Chalice melted and most of the stylophora is dead.

Lights are running at less than 20% peak day. Alk was 9 yesterday.
 
For my bubble algae, he ended up using the rigid tubing from my JBJ chiller tubing kit (which I haven't been using), cutting it to make a 12" section of hard rigid tubing, then sticking that into my normal waterchange hose. He then put a fine filter bag in a bucket, scraped and siphoned all of the bubble algae off of the rocks and into the bag in the bucket, and then once the bucket was filling up, he'd take the bag out, pour the bucket water back into the tank, and then start over. I think he did that 4-5 times. There was a lot of bubble algae. I need to add this to my tank thread.
 
Cool I'll end up doing that soon then. My nitrate and phosphate are rock bottom, alk is 8 and ph says 6.6 on color wheel.

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Chaeto grows fast and it's not out competing the bubble algae. I don't dose carbon.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
lol the pH alert isn't working for sure. Probably because it's for freshwater (though not sure, but I'm almost certain it isn't accurate for your tank. 6.6 would be pretty low, I never dip below the mid 7s.)

Bubble algae just needs manual or biological removal unfortunately. Really sucks with nano tanks. I guess that's why we should quarantine everything (I don't but should!).
 
Never even occurred to me that is says freshwater right on the damned thing. Oh well. I used it because it came in a pack with the ammonia alert for my qt.

As far as algae I'll suck them out and pop them during water changes.

I also know API isn't the best kits to use for accuracy but I don't test very often and a roundabout number is ok for me. I try to go by coral health.

Do you think my alk is too high for such low nutrients?
 
I also know API isn't the best kits to use for accuracy but I don't test very often and a roundabout number is ok for me. I try to go by coral health.

Do you think my alk is too high for such low nutrients?

API is just fine for the most part. You only need to upgrade if you want more precise test kits. Alk of 8 is fine. I shoot for 7-9 for maximum flexibility.

Check out jason2459's test kit comparisons here (and others listed in the first post on that page). API isn't all that bad, it's just imprecise.
 
And that's fine with me I hate chasing numbers. I'm going to get a water change done after work today and see if I can suck out some bubble algae at the same time.

I'll test alk again before and after my change. I just want things to fill in so bad. lol I'm being bratty. Good things take time. I'll shop around for a nice millepora colony soon.
 
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