My 65G Shallow Reef Tank

[DiscusHeckel]

Some top-down photos I took a few hours ago.

Acropora sarmentosa

This coral is looking very different top-down in a nice way. I can see pink colouration forming on the tips. I am very pleased with its progress considering it has been under full lights for only a few days. Have you noticed my baby gomezi frags in the photo? The tiny two pieces are the first frags ever.

Acropora granulosa

This coral has started to grow faster since I started to dose organic carbon. It has lost some of the green pigmentation (notice its left hand side growth compared to its right hand side), which is a welcome news. The humilis is growing painstakingly slowly, but its colouration is holding.

Acropora echinata

I am really proud of having this coral. It has started to grow much faster as well. With this rate of growth, I may start to produce frags for local reefers within six months. The lokani below it easily takes a back seat despite its vivid dark purple colouration with yellow tips.

Acropora gomezi

I will be propagating this coral further in the coming months. I want my tank look like gomezi forest.

With this last photo, I have used 100% of my free photo bucket storage. It is now decision time for what to do next.


Acropora desalwii

This coral is doing well despite strong flow and strong lights. It is now hosting one of the acro of the two crabs that came with the sarmentosa. I cannot see much growth on it at the moment. The digitifera frag in the same photo has already settled in its new position. It will not be glued to live rock. It is self-supporting. Its colouration is still vivid despite receiving significantly less PAR when it was part of the mother colony.

Thanks for looking.

 

[drawman]

Wow the granulosa, echinata, and gomezi all look amazing!! 3 of my top five that you have great colors on!

 

[DiscusHeckel]

Wow the granulosa, echinata, and gomezi all look amazing!! 3 of my top five that you have great colors on!

Thank you Mr drawman. I appreciate your feedback.

 

[DiscusHeckel]

I have just upgraded my subscription with Photobucket (I will miss the adverts :frog, so I am now able to upload a bigger picture of my desalwii and digitifera together, which I could not do in my previous post.

 

[reefmutt]

Really beautiful shots,
Bulent!
As I have said, I'm in love with your ice fire but that gomezi is also stunning. The intensity of blue is amazing!
What's your current regimen for nutrient control and colour management?

 

[mhucasey]

Some top-down photos I took a few hours ago.


Acropora echinata

I am really proud of having this coral. It has started to grow much faster as well. With this rate of growth, I may start to produce frags for local reefers within six months. The lokani below it easily takes a back seat despite its vivid dark purple colouration with yellow tips.

Acropora gomezi

I will be propagating this coral further in the coming months. I want my tank look like gomezi forest.

With this last photo, I have used 100% of my free photo bucket storage. It is now decision time for what to do next.


Thanks for looking.

Dang Bulent!!!! you have thrown down the gauntlet. That echinata is ridiculously blue, as is the Gomezi. Unreal my friend, simply mind boggling.

As for Photobucket, I came to that decision point about 6 months ago. I decided for a service that I use as much as I do, I don't mind paying $2.99 a month. It will be an eternity before I fill up the space I have now.

 

[sahin]

Bulent your tanks is looking great. That Echinata is looking sweet too. Would love to see a more of a lower K photo please. Keep up the awesome work.

 

[DiscusHeckel]

Really beautiful shots,
Bulent!
As I have said, I'm in love with your ice fire but that gomezi is also stunning. The intensity of blue is amazing!
What's your current regimen for nutrient control and colour management?

Thank you Matt. I tried to explained the reason why blues may look very intense in my response to Matt.

I stopped using KoralColor at the end of last month since it made no difference to my corals' colouration. Andrew reckoned that it is possible that my tank is not iron limited and it may take a while for it to become so. This would have meant that I would have had to stop dosing Tropic Marin Bacto balance, which contains cationic elements, and iron is one of the cations. I did not want to do that.

At the moment, to control nutrients and manage colours, I dose the following every day:

1.5 ml Tropic Marin NP bacto balance
1 ml Tropic Marin K+ elements (cationic elements)
2.5 ml Tropic Marin A- elements (anionic elements)
0.15 ml Tropic Marin Elimi-NP (organic carbon source containing polyalcohol)

Also, 3 drops of KZ ZEObak per week and 2 drops of KZ Biomate twice a week. I personally do not think that I need the KZ bottles, but I can't help using them since i already bought them. However, I stopped using KZ Sponge power.

Furthermore, I use 1 (US) cup of Seachem Matrix carbon passively and replace once a month.

Since I stopped KoralColor, my nitrates dropped from 5-10 ppm to 2.5-5 ppm. I have not measured phosphates since I stopped KoralColor, which was 0.046 mg/l. What I am noticing is that the green sheen on the gomezi and granulosa started to fade away since nitrates started to drop towards 2.5 ppm.

Dang Bulent!!!! you have thrown down the gauntlet. That echinata is ridiculously blue, as is the Gomezi. Unreal my friend, simply mind boggling.

As for Photobucket, I came to that decision point about 6 months ago. I decided for a service that I use as much as I do, I don't mind paying $2.99 a month. It will be an eternity before I fill up the space I have now.

Thanks Matt. The echinata's blue colour has deepened slightly (but definitely deepened) since I took its photo last month:

The same thing happened to the gomezi (last months photo):

When I took these corals' photos a few days ago with my iPhone, my phone must have casted shadow over the corals. I do not know if the shadow effect has manipulated their colours, but I uploaded the pictures as they came out from the phone's memory.

As for photobucket, I chose the $2.99 option too. I am happy so far.

Bulent your tanks is looking great. That Echinata is looking sweet too. Would love to see a more of a lower K photo please. Keep up the awesome work.

Thank you Sahin. How do I take a lower K photo? I do not change tubes while taking photos and there is no photo manipulation afterwards either. I take my pictures under full lights (3 B+, 1 actinic, 2 Coral+ and 1 ABS). I just rest my iPhone over the Ferrero Rocher plastic lid, stand back and press the button. This is how they came out. Perhaps I should use a camera instead of iPhone.

 

[kevlow]

Thank you Matt. I tried to explained the reason why blues may look very intense in my response to Matt.


Since I stopped KoralColor, my nitrates dropped from 5-10 ppm to 2.5-5 ppm. I have not measured phosphates since I stopped KoralColor, which was 0.046 mg/l. What I am noticing is that the green sheen on the gomezi and granulosa started to fade away since nitrates started to drop towards 2.5 ppm.



Hello Bulent.
I have been following your thread for quite a while. Congrats on a beautiful display with outstanding colors.
I wanted to ask about your statement above.

Do you think that the drop in nitrates is directly due to discontinuing KoralColor?

Did you see an increase in nitrates when you started using the KoralColor?

I appreciate your time for posting and look forward to understanding your thoughts on this matter.

Thank you,
Kevin

 

[DiscusHeckel]

Hello Bulent.
I have been following your thread for quite a while. Congrats on a beautiful display with outstanding colors.
I wanted to ask about your statement above.

Do you think that the drop in nitrates is directly due to discontinuing KoralColor?

Did you see an increase in nitrates when you started using the KoralColor?

I appreciate your time for posting and look forward to understanding your thoughts on this matter.

Thank you,
Kevin

Hi Kevin,

Thank you for your feedback. I appreciate it.

This is quite possible. As Andrew pointed out in his thread, when chlorophyll production is reduced zooxanthellate's ability to photosynthesise nutrients also drops. This must have direct consequence on nutrient uptake by the corals from the water column. I initially thought that KoralColor contained some form of nitrogen and phosphorus. I reported this in my tank thread because shortly after starting to dose KoralColor, there was an increase in both nitrates and phosphates. I believe that the same thing happened in Andrew's tank.

Furthermore, there is another angle to the story. That is that during KoralColor dosing between 2nd March and 20th March, I restarted dosing TM bacto balance (1.2 ml per day) because I got concerned with gradual increase in nutrients. I increased the dose to 1.5 ml per day on 20th March and I started to dose organic carbon (TM Elimi-NP) (0.15 ml per day).

When I stopped dosing KoralColor on 26th March, nitrates were 5-10 ppm. Within one week it dropped to 2.5-5 ppm.

It is difficult to draw conclusions from this as I made more than one change. But I am certain that KoralColor increased nutrients while I was not dosing bacto balance or anything else (note that I kept the feeding regimen the same during this experiment). Consequently, it may be logical to conclude that some of the drop in nutrients after stopping KoralColor may be attributed to this product.

I hope this has made some sense.

Cheers

 

[kevlow]

Thank you for such a quick response. Made perfect sense. I, too, made more then one change at once. It has been two weeks now and I am seeing differences in the parameters and coloration. But because of multiple changes it is difficult to tell what is responsible for what I am seeing.
Your explanation provides me with a little more knowledge to make good adjustments if needed.
May ask another question regarding the green sheen on the gomezi and granulosa? Was that due to the high nitrates or to a build up of iron or iodine?
Thanks again
Kevin

 

[mhucasey]

Hi Kevin,

Thank you for your feedback. I appreciate it.

This is quite possible. As Andrew pointed out in his thread, when chlorophyll production is reduced zooxanthellate's ability to photosynthesise nutrients also drops. This must have direct consequence on nutrient uptake by the corals from the water column. I initially thought that KoralColor contained some form of nitrogen and phosphorus. I reported this in my tank thread because shortly after starting to dose KoralColor, there was an increase in both nitrates and phosphates. I believe that the same thing happened in Andrew's tank.

Furthermore, there is another angle to the story. That is that during KoralColor dosing between 2nd March and 20th March, I restarted dosing TM bacto balance (1.2 ml per day) because I got concerned with gradual increase in nutrients. I increased the dose to 1.5 ml per day on 20th March and I started to dose organic carbon (TM Elimi-NP) (0.15 ml per day).

When I stopped dosing KoralColor on 26th March, nitrates were 5-10 ppm. Within one week it dropped to 2.5-5 ppm.

It is difficult to draw conclusions from this as I made more than one change. But I am certain that KoralColor increased nutrients while I was not dosing bacto balance or anything else (note that I kept the feeding regimen the same during this experiment). Consequently, it may be logical to conclude that some of the drop in nutrients after stopping KoralColor may be attributed to this product.

I hope this has made some sense.

Cheers

Interesting, I have been dosing the same ingredients as KoralColor in the form of MicroE for going on four months now. I have plenty of live rock, though it's almost all in the Flubber tank while the SPS tank is mostly inert(Plastic Rock). I added 2L of Siporax and 1.5L of the Eheim equivalent in January to the sump. I did this because the Nitrate value had stayed around 10ppm. I don't really worry about Nitrate, but I would prefer the value closer to 2-5ppm. So far, no reduction in Nitrates whatsoever. No rise either. I wonder if something in the trace element mix is affecting either the test or the denitrification. Strange that your Nitrates went up while dosing and then dropped immediately after...

 

[drawman]

I have to say it again that Echinata is gorgeous!

So why do you replace your Matrix?

 

[DiscusHeckel]

I have to say it again that Echinata is gorgeous!

So why do you replace your Matrix?

I replace Seachem matrix carbon, which is GAC. It needs replacing once its adsorption capacity is exhausted.

FWIW, I use 7.5 litres of Siporax and 1 litre of Seachem Matrix (not carbon) in my sump. They remain in the sump permanently.

 

[DiscusHeckel]

Having finished the deforestation exercise, I began the reforestation process last night. The first stage involved securing the digitifera sub-colony and microclados (SSC) frag to live rock. The SSC is effectively taking over the place where the copiosa used to be.

The SSC is showing some good potential despite being on the tank's floor for a month.

The SSC receives between 300-350 mmol/m2/sec PAR, whereas the digitifera receives between 400-425 mmol/m2/sec PAR.

The second stage involves placing the huge aspera sub-colony to live rock. Its "wing span" is as wide as a reef crystal salt bucket:

 

[markalot]

Looking really good, hope the re-forestation goes well! The echi is crazy beautiful but I love the blue of the gomezi.

 

[drawman]

I replace Seachem matrix carbon, which is GAC. It needs replacing once its adsorption capacity is exhausted.

FWIW, I use 7.5 litres of Siporax and 1 litre of Seachem Matrix (not carbon) in my sump. They remain in the sump permanently.

Ha gotcha. I read Matrix and I always think the biomedia. :facepalm:

 

[naecO.rM]

Hi Bülent!
What is a water flow through Siporax please.

Хорошего рифа!

 

[DiscusHeckel]

Looking really good, hope the re-forestation goes well! The echi is crazy beautiful but I love the blue of the gomezi.

Thanks Mark. I cut two tiny frags from it a couple days ago. I intend to spread it around the tank. May be one day I will have gomezi forest.

May ask another question regarding the green sheen on the gomezi and granulosa? Was that due to the high nitrates or to a build up of iron or iodine?
Thanks again
Kevin

I cannot figure this out, but in my opinion there might be two (perhaps interrelated) reasons.

First, the green sheen could be as a result of changing my tube combination. I changed from 5B+ & 3 C+ to 3B+, 1 actinic, 2C+, 1P+, 1 ABS.

Second, when I had the previous tube combination, I also had smaller fish population and my nutrients were fairly low (typically NO3: ~1-2.5 ppm). After changing my tubes, I also increased the number of fish to 16 from 6. This resulted in some increase in nutrients (typically NO3: 2.5-10ppm). Phosphates seem to remain fairly consistent though (typically 0.024-0.092 mg/l).

I really do not make the green sheen as a big issue. It gives me something to research about. Life is too short to experiment with one parameter while keeping others constant.

Hi Bülent!
What is a water flow through Siporax please.

Хорошего рифа!

It varies depending on how clean my return pipe and return pump are. I use a Sicce silent 2.5 return pump. With one meter head, it pumps up to 1750 lt/hour (see the figure below). In time the return rate drops significantly.

I hope this helps.

 

[naecO.rM]

Thanks .
Is all water flow from Sicce silent 2.5 going through Siporax media?
Is 1750 lph not to fast to make a denitrification process in Siporax?

Хорошего рифа!