My 300 Gallon Nightmare!!!

OH...BTW...I have a few new residents in my tank.

Believe it or not I added another Angel...Blueface about 5-6". He beat up my Moorish Idol a little and nipped at my Coco worm but has settled down now and is a good citizen. No problem with the Grey Angel. No pics so far because he is still a little shy.

Also added a small 3" Harlequin Tusk. Behaving very well. Still have most if not all of my shrimp.

Regal Angel, Indo Pacific, not Red Sea. I ordered a Red Sea, but they sent the wrong fish...what are you going to do? Nice fish though.

Pink Tail Trigger 4"

Lost my Helfrichi pair as well as my wonderful Laboutis Wrasse. Really loved those fish. Just disappeared without a trace. The Labouti was very big and can't understand what happened. He did a dissappearing act for three weeks before by jumping into the overflow and eventuallyh exitng into the sump. But we have since completey cordoned off the overflows and all access points out of the tank to prevent furhter losses. Big Mystery.

Everything else is doing very well. Corals are looking surprisingly god considering the tanks young age.
 
Speak of the devil Carl! I just installed a 45kw generator for my home today! They were way behind in delivery due to permitting in the city, but they delivered the unit today and will hook it up in the next few weeks!

Carl, you need to join the Palm Beach Marine Aquarium Society. A great group of people with the same affliction. Let me know if you are interested.

http://www.pbmas.org/
 
I went to their first meeting but Sat night is really bad for me.

thanks for the offer though.

A couple helfinches disappearing has to hurt. I only saw them at jawz. Did you get them locally or online?

Carl
 
Online. And yes it does hurt! They were expensive and extremely beautiful and fun to watch. I have no idea what happened to them.

Saturdays are rough for me as well. Family man and all. Wife could care less about fish...in fact I think she doesn't really like fish. Once a month isn't too bad though.
 
I live in Boca also and have a few questions for you. Your chiller system........what type and size? Does it seem to work harder being outside in the heat and humidity. I was told they are not designed for outside use? I am currently designing a room divider (about 300 gallons) and am thinking of spending the extra money for a split chiller system (just like a house a/c system). Thanks for your help. Where you at in Boca?
 
<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=7799276#post7799276 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by jpf71
I am currently designing a room divider (about 300 gallons) and am thinking of spending the extra money for a split chiller system (just like a house a/c system).
Click to expand...

Trust me when I tell you that you will thank yourself day after day for getting a split system. It is the best system there is bar none. The only small drawback to it is the extra initial cost. HOwever, you get that back and then some fromthe savings in electrical usage in the first year alone!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
 
I apologize for not having updated you all the past few weeks. Started a new business and have been extremely busy.

The tank has been up and running now since April 1, 2006. Approx. 4 months. I stocked up on a lot of fish and coral, mostly SPS. The fish are all doing amazingly well. I have added a blue face angel about 5" along with my grey angel and moorish idol. It was a chance I decided to take and it has been one that I probably would not do again. The blue face goes after my LPS and softies but not terribly. Its just that there are too many fish in my tank. I have had only one fatality in the past two to three months. My 5" blonde naso tang died today. he was doing fine for over two months but Friday night I saw that he had a bunch of white spots on the upper half of his body. Large white spots, larger than ich. It looked like snow. I don't know what it was. Anyway he did not look good, was not swimming as usual and very dark. This afternoon I found him dead.

I stocked very heavily with SPS large colonies very early. The tank parameters all looked good so I took a chance. I stocked so heavily, that I had no real estate left to place coral. Well that endeavor was not too bright. Many of my corals have wasted away. One at a time, one after another. I have many left and more than a few are doing very well, but many have died.

I have been doing monthly water changes. However, this past week I did a water change and all kinds of things went wrong. I checked the SG very carefully and the water in my reservoir was right where I wanted it to be. When I turned on my pump to send the water to the tank from the reservoir, there were all kinds of particles entering the water and the SG was way off. I think the pvc must have been filled with salt water from the last change, and the water must have evaporated somehow. The new water mixed with the salt residue from the old and caused a spike in the SG. Well that caused major havoc.

Alll in all, the tank is behaving fairly well considering how fast and heavy I stocked. There are many things to work out and I am dissappointed with the SPS debacle. I know that we have issues with water quality here in S FL. I have a top notch water filtration system and I am careful with water quality. I think that the tank is overstocked, the tank is too young and I am a little fool hardy.

As far as the chiller is concerned, I have a commercial JBJ Titanium 1/2 hp chiller designed to be outdoors. I do not know of a chiller that is designed to be indoors without heating up the room and making a lot of noise. This chiller is really a split system designed for a fish tank.

The last bit of info is that the tank is running me about $250/month in electric. I did not anticipate such a huge jump. I run the tank at 78 degrees and have the MH on for only 7-8 hours/day. But I have three large pumps running 24/7 and a lot of peripheral equipment. Oh well it was never going to bee cheap.

I will post pics eventually.
 
By the way, you can always check out the tank in real time by going to my website and clicking on the webcam. To go to my website click on the little red house at the top of my posts. Enjoy!
 
Richard, thanks for the update. Sounds like you've had to learn some of this stuff the hard way even with all your careful planning in advance. :( The mantra "Nothing good ever happens fast in a reef tank" is something we can rarely disprove.

Hopefully you can resolve some of the issues you've mentioned. The split chiller system some people use involved a unit outside and a titanium coil inside. I can't remember what kind you have. I tend to keep my tank around 81F, so you might consider that if you want to save on electricity a bit. (Less chiller usage)

The Naso might have suffered from Lymphocystis, but this is rarely a lethal disease. It tends to appear and then drop off within a few weeks or as long as two months. I believe the spelling is correct, or close to what I typed.
 
Hey Richard,
I think you used wrong house to house your tank, bar, and tv! They should be in MY house! :lol: :D
 
Fuge tank question

Fuge tank question

Very nice tank! I loved reading the thred took me a while.

Got a question about the SH in your fuge. What lighting are you using about it and on what cycle is it on?

I'm in the middle of upgrading my 2 systems into one and I was going to use the SH tank as a fuge but I'm just doing some resurch.
 
<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=8722820#post8722820 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by dgasmd
nothing new with this??
Click to expand...

I was thinking the same thing.

Looks like the web cam is pointed at the TV.
 
<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=8736588#post8736588 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by melev
Why watch TLC when you have a reef tank?! :o
Click to expand...

He must have heard you.. he just changed to Sesame Street :)
 
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