New aquascaping

K

KalimanMX

New member
Well i have had this tank for a year. After about 4 months i foud that the initial acuascaping was a going to be a problem, and about 2 moths ago i was sure about ir, when all my lateral glasses where full of coraline algae. I also foud that i had too many rocks on the sand and i was geting some high levels of nitrates (10 - 15) because of that, so the re acuascaping was a must.

Finally i decide to do it, but before that i made this thing with PVC to be able to have current under the rocks... This is the result.
The change was yestarday, so some corals are not fully open.
I didnt place any rock on the side glass because i want to be aple to clean it.

I aslo got 3 new maxi yets 900.

This is how it was...
P2130004.jpg


This is the PVC
P2180005.jpg


And this is how its now...

P2190018.jpg

P2190023.jpg
 
IMHO, you are on the right track, Bro. There is a big plus to being able to clean three sides of the tank - as you can now.

Please do not take this as a harsh criticism, but I think that we usually add too much LR to our tanks. In nature, fish tend to swim above the corals, and we often "plant" our corals on LR structures that are so high in the tank that the corals reach the top of the water table before they grow out to their "intended" height. It is difficult to envision how the tank will look with mature corals, and so we initially tend to compensate by adding LR where we really hope our corals would be when they grow out. With that in mind, if I may humbly suggest, I'd remove the top layer of LR.

Just my $.02... and I know it's all a matter of personal taste. That's what makes this such a unique hobby.
 
elwaine thats a really good idea, the only thing is that i wont keep any sps (there are the ones that really get big) because i dont have MH or HQI, so ill try to make it just a little bit lower.
One more thing, i know that the pics dont say much, but the higher part of the rock are in the back of the tank
 
You make a good point. BTW, I did notice the slope of your rock structure and I really like that. You should wind up with a fabulous reef.
 
Anemone, i understand what you said but i felt that the problem (not only the nitrates, but the coraline algae... the tank has side views) justify the change, im also confident that once the corals fully open and the white sides of the rock get purple again it will look better.
 
I'm not a big fan of the pile look . IMO a tank thats got less more times looks better , overhangs , archs amd passages . So I'd say remove some rock . Play with it , move things around .
Rick
 
Its hard to get alot of that though in smaller tanks. But now he has a huge overhang lol. His fish have the biggest cave of all, since they can go all under the rocks lol.
 
not really, much more moving and youll see the pvc. I think he is trying to hide it lol. I did like how he has the powerhead underneathe the rocks now.
 
Well its true that more move will make the PVC visible, also its hard to move rocks because they are too big (most of them)... but ill try to find out how to make some caves and archs
 
<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=6783255#post6783255 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by KalimanMX
Well its hard to move rocks because they are too big (most of them)... but ill try to find out how to make some caves and arches
Click to expand...
But it is even harder to part with our live rock. I don't know which gets more attached to LR... us or our corals.

I just re-did my aquascape 2 weeks ago. Actually, I re-did nearly the entire aquarium, switching from a tank that was mainly softies with a few LPS to one that will be mainly SPS with a few LPS... and the frags need time to grow out, so the aquascape looks "young." Maybe I should have been more aggressive and gotten rid of even more LR... but after a while it began to hurt too much. :D

I'm not good with a camera and I can't capture the "3D" points of interest in my tank. I couldn't even get a good shot to show off the caves, arches and overhangs that I created - but the point is, the more LR I got rid of, the easier it was for me to add caves (holes) and arches (holes) where LR once was.

Front (at an angle)
53023ftsm.jpg


Side showing Clown exiting one of the many inter-connecting caves.
53023s4.jpg


Close-up of some of the caves and overhangs.
53023c1.jpg
 
I would have to vote for the previous aquascaping as well. Maybe you could make two smaller pvc stands out of the one and keep more of your original idea but off the sand. If you are still undecided with the new setup of course...
 
I'm puzzled. If LR sits on PVC pipe above the substrate, won't that create an area where detrius will accumulate, and where you cannot siphon it out of? If LR sits IN the sand, and current swirls around it (or should) as in nature, why is this not correct? IMO, have a small space beneath the rock will harbor dead things, detrius and other crap that will cause some problems in the future with this setup. Any long-term experience here? Thanks.......Barry
 
sttroyiii:
Thats a really good idea, ill wait some time, and if this acuascaping does not get batter with all the mods that ppl here told me i may try what you said.

Barrysalt:
That wont hapend beacuse with this way water will go tru with just one powerahead because it has nothing that can stop the curren, when the LR is on the sand its really hard to have water movent eveywhere because the LR stop it.
 
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