My 500 + gallon system. Last 13 years to now. Build, Aquascaping & more. Lots of pics

[Marc]

I have to disagree with you on this one. I have had DSB's since the very beginning of my addiction for this hobby back in 2004. I have always had 4" or more of fine sand on my main displays and this is the first time that I have had a problem like this.

After checking my water parameters, which everything from nitrate to phosphates are reading zero, and really examining the DSB, I noticed that the sand bed has so much life and worms that I really began to reconsider examining the bed further before I replace it. What I did yesterday is that I removed several scoops of the sand all the way to the bottom from different sections to see if the rotten egg smell comes out of it. My discovery was that the sand was extremely clean and when scooped out, it not only not smell like rotten egg, it also contained the same creamy colored silt it did when I first added it. No dark scum or dirt was coming out of it. I was surprised to discover this and then realized that I was the one at fault for what was happening to the front part of the DSB.

It appears that for the last 3 months of my cyano problem, I had been moving and digging the front part of the bed to clean the glass of the algae that grows there. By disturbing the bed, I probably deeply buried many tiny white sea stars and god knows what else and hence after a while, these buried animals died and began to decompose, creating the cyano, as well as releasing the smell of death.

I have since simply siphoned this front area of the bed to clean it out well, and believe me you, it hurt me to do this because by siphoning out this area, I also siphoned out many worms and critters living within the bed. I guess it's OK to do this because the critters on the rest of the sand bed will repopulate this are in due time.

I am a little shocked at the fact that your bed turned into a rock of sand after a while. It could have been due to lack of water movement, lack of micro and macro fauna to move the bed, and possibly the addition of too much calcium. In my bed, I have over 60 nassarus snails, god only knows how many tiny white brittle stars, as well as other micro and macro fauna that came in the live rock, to keep the sand bed clean, healthy and stirred.

I am not going to lie though, I freaked out when i smelled that rotten egg smell and my main concern was whether it was OK to replace it all in one shot without experiencing death of the animals and corals. Thank god this is not the case, but I want to thank the both of you for providing me with previous experiences and possible solutions for this issue.

I never liked mine for several reasons. First off I have a high fish load and at one time had a bamboo cat shark. So as you could understand my nitrate levels were very high. Up to 100 ppm. I installed a fuge based on everyone elses experiences with them and loaded up with Chaeto, Calerpa, Halimeda, etc. I had a DSB of 3.5 to 4 inches. I had many snails hermits and a sand sifting goby in there. I experienced absolutley zero benefit from it. It had been setup up for a year before I tore it down. There was no nitrate reduction whatso ever and my phophates were still throught the roof. I began to see black pockets of H2S building up and thats when I through in the towel onn the fuge. The fuge was dirty with detritus as well as my Chaeto would not grow at all. I had 5500 K lights as well as 10,000 K bulbs. So I took whatever snails I had left and the goby and put them in the main tank. Started removing the sand and it was like removing cement! Don't know what happened there as I don't dose calcium in my FOWLR tank! So then after tearing it down and cleaning it out, I installed a DIY sulur denitrator as well as my phophate reactors. My nitrates fell to zero in a month and my phophates hold steady at 0.001! Amazing and very happy with my full tech approach and everything is much cleaner now. No more cyanbacteria or green hair algae and my water is prestine clear. So as you no refugiums would not work on my type of setup with a high fish load. They probably work just fine in a reef setup with very little fish load but not in a setup like mine that has 8 large fish swimming around using there surroundings as their personal toilet. :hmm5:

Marc

 

[newyorkstyles]

I never liked mine for several reasons. First off I have a high fish load and at one time had a bamboo cat shark. So as you could understand my nitrate levels were very high. Up to 100 ppm. I installed a fuge based on everyone elses experiences with them and loaded up with Chaeto, Calerpa, Halimeda, etc. I had a DSB of 3.5 to 4 inches. I had many snails hermits and a sand sifting goby in there. I experienced absolutley zero benefit from it. It had been setup up for a year before I tore it down. There was no nitrate reduction whatso ever and my phophates were still throught the roof. I began to see black pockets of H2S building up and thats when I through in the towel onn the fuge. The fuge was dirty with detritus as well as my Chaeto would not grow at all. I had 5500 K lights as well as 10,000 K bulbs. So I took whatever snails I had left and the goby and put them in the main tank. Started removing the sand and it was like removing cement! Don't know what happened there as I don't dose calcium in my FOWLR tank! So then after tearing it down and cleaning it out, I installed a DIY sulur denitrator as well as my phophate reactors. My nitrates fell to zero in a month and my phophates hold steady at 0.001! Amazing and very happy with my full tech approach and everything is much cleaner now. No more cyanbacteria or green hair algae and my water is prestine clear. So as you no refugiums would not work on my type of setup with a high fish load. They probably work just fine in a reef setup with very little fish load but not in a setup like mine that has 8 large fish swimming around using there surroundings as their personal toilet. :hmm5:

Marc

LOL @ personal toilet.

 

[jmurr8484]

Kind of disappoint. Jim posted new vids, but none were from the infamous Scott's reef. Just kidding. Those videos were cool to watch and very informative. Still waiting to see what new things Scott have done with his setup. I'm sure there is endless possibilities.

 

[newyorkstyles]

Kind of disappoint. Jim posted new vids, but none were from the infamous Scott's reef. Just kidding. Those videos were cool to watch and very informative. Still waiting to see what new things Scott have done with his setup. I'm sure there is endless possibilities.

Yeah, they were great videos but I also want to see some updates on Scott's tank and skimmer as well.

 

[slief]

Kind of disappoint. Jim posted new vids, but none were from the infamous Scott's reef. Just kidding. Those videos were cool to watch and very informative. Still waiting to see what new things Scott have done with his setup. I'm sure there is endless possibilities.

Yeah, they were great videos but I also want to see some updates on Scott's tank and skimmer as well.

Soon guys! I will see if I can get Jim to bring his camera along this Thursday! :beer:

 

[newyorkstyles]

Soon guys! I will see if I can get Jim to bring his camera along this Thursday! :beer:

Cool, I'll be waiting!

 

[jmurr8484]

Yay Scott is back. Forgive me if I am wrong, but did you say you had ick again. What are you going to do about it this time.

 

[slief]

Yay Scott is back. Forgive me if I am wrong, but did you say you had ick again. What are you going to do about it this time.

Did you miss the "Got Ya, Didnt I part" that followed the ich comment. No ich.. I just felt like adding some drama to epside and throwing Jim under the bus for suggesting that I copper the lank. I guess I got ya! :lmao:

I am sure that many of the cyber space youtube La Fish Guys cult followers will eat that up.. Especially if they miss the gotcha part where I say the tank is doing really well.

For those that are interested, here is the link. This episde discusses my protein skimmer as well as my DIY enhancements to iot.
http://www.youtube.com/user/lafishguy#p/a/u/0/2vOexWiZgkw

 

[Marc]

Hey Scott, I noticed in one of your episodes that you have a lot of supplements from bulk reef supply. I just got on board and ordered from them and it's so much cheaper than going to the LFS and buying it. Do you use the two part additives from BRS? How do you dose calcium etc without the use of a calcium reactor?

Marc

 

[slief]

Hey Scott, I noticed in one of your episodes that you have a lot of supplements from bulk reef supply. I just got on board and ordered from them and it's so much cheaper than going to the LFS and buying it. Do you use the two part additives from BRS? How do you dose calcium etc without the use of a calcium reactor?

Marc

I have the supplements but have not needed to use any as of yet. Since I dont have much in the way of corals, my automatic water changes seem to be adequet for the moment. That will change as I add more corals though. My plan was to dose using my litermeter.

The only thing I currently add is magnesium and iodine.

 

[Marc]

I have a FOLWR tank with a shark and only have mushroom corals as well as a few hardy toadstools but dose the two part solution including the magnesium to keep the coraline on my liverock flourishing and bright. Ive noticed with my higher calcium levels that my fishes colors are brighter too! When the calcium is low, the fish begin to fade a little bit. Strange correlation there.

Marc

 

[Marc]

Hey Scott,

How is the new ozone reactor working out that you built? Did you set that up yet or are you running it throught the skimmer?

Marc

 

[jmurr8484]

Have you been getting much use out of the quarantine tank setup?

I have to watch it again to hear the gotcha part because you got me.

 

[stumpovrtyme]

awsome tank

 

[little bear]

very cool ,i suppose that you can try some sps, that will let your tank more beautiful.

 

[slief]

Hey Scott,

How is the new ozone reactor working out that you built? Did you set that up yet or are you running it throught the skimmer?

Marc

I have yet to finish it up. I was thinking about it today so its funny you mentioned it. For the moment, I am not running any ozone.

Have you been getting much use out of the quarantine tank setup?

I have to watch it again to hear the gotcha part because you got me.

The only thing I have used the QT tank for is some Cromis. Jim has brought most of my newest fish and he always QT's them in a medicated system. His fish usually go straight into the tank.

awsome tank

Thanks!

very cool ,i suppose that you can try some sps, that will let your tank more beautiful.

I might add some SPS in the future. It would definately make things more beautiful. My experience with them in the past however makes me a bit aprehensive as I never really had great success with them. This probably due to the fact that I am lazy and hate putting the daily effort into the tank that most SPS systems require.

 

[pnavarro170]

cool to see your on here also, i was out of the game for a while, and im setting up my new tank now. so in the past month or two ive been doing a bunch of research and came across the lafishguys on youtube, the stuff on your tank were the best episodes and i just finished going thru the entire thread. it also lets me know how little i know compared to some of you guys even though ive had success with my past 120 reef and my current 90 gallon going up. haha.

 

[Marc]

Any more vids of your tank on LA Fish Guys yet???

Marc

 

[slief]

Any more vids of your tank on LA Fish Guys yet???

Marc

Nothing new yet.

 

[bullitr]

scott
any word from Jason F?
also get a some easy SPS you dont need much.

thanks