New hobby I've found, time for a huge thread.

[leviburns89]

Thank Brian!
That's pretty much what I assumed. As I said in the OP, this isn't my first rodeo with rasing crittiers, just my first attempt with saltwater.

But Brian, you have been an amazing asset, and I can't thank you enough. I look forward to having you follow my progress and give a secondary opinion on my thoughts.

 

[leviburns89]

Quick update:

Prepared 30g of sw measured at 1.02525.
(I get this measurement by using 3 Refractometers, and finding the average)

Heated to 79.5f also measured with 2 heaters and 2 thermometers.

Transfered all the rock into this tub, and now it sits again for probably 2 more weeks. (Checking salinity and topping off as needed).

After 2 weeks, I will do some parameter testing, and if all is well, it all goes into the DT with sand.

It is at this point I will fire up the reactor, and powerheads, and get this beast running, minus lights.
Let it simmer for a month, then kick on the lights for 8 hours a day.

Will monitor params, and hopefully witness an algae bloom.

As of right now, it's looking like early-mid March for the addition of my first coral and fish.

Time is flying, I can't wait.

Also: If algae is present and concerning, I will get a maximum of 2 true scarlet hermits. The ones with yellow eyes.

From what I've studied, they are the only reef friendly crabs over time.

 

[BrianKC]

I admire your patience. Good stuff.

 

[leviburns89]

Craziest thing:

Just did a flashlight inspection of my rocks, and I noticed a weird green glob in one of the holes on the rock.

I took a pair of tweezers, and grabbed onto the glob, and a 3" worm was pulled out.

This is astounding considering the rock's were dried for 2 weeks, then bleached for 3 days, then dried again for a week then soaked in FW for a week.

But holy cow, life will prevail.

Today the sw looks crystal clear, day 3 of second water change. 2.5 weeks total in sw. Everything looks and smells amazing.

Clean water almost zero smell, just the slightest mineral smell when nose is within mm of surface

 

[leviburns89]

I should also add, the worm looked like an earthworm, not a flatworm.

 

[BrianKC]

That is crazy. Is this inside or outside? Possible some terrestrial creature snuck in?

 

[leviburns89]

During the dry, it was kept in the garage.

I highly doubt it was anything terrestrial as I live in minnesota, and the last month has been -20f. You can throw water in the air, and it freezes into snow before it hits the ground, seriously.

And once inside, it was kept in only ro water, and then freshly made sw, also in new sterilite totes, which come "sterile" from factory.

Honestly, I think I just encountered some rare worm that can withstand the harsh environments.

Life has been found in pure acid, and boiling baths within the ocean, so I'm not surprised that it exists, I'm only surprised that I've found such a thing in my rock.

 

[leviburns89]

Would I be ok using the t5s for the first couple months and then adding the leds?

Didn't I post this?

 

[leviburns89]

Bad news....

So last night, I ran my RODI feed linto into my tank that is curing my rock.

The rodi unit pumps out about 3g/hr, and I needed exactly 3 gallons to top off the tank from evap.

Well long story short, I got into a huge fight with the wife, and completely forgot about it, and went to bed.

Woke up to a flooded basement...

Took about 3 hours to get the water cleaned up. But my bigger concern, is will my rock be ok?

I was already running late for work, so I had to leave it, but will make some new sw tonight and transfer it over.

What a way to add insult to injury, wife ****ed, followed by flooded basement, and thwarted curing.

 

[leviburns89]

Bump

 

[BrianKC]

Oh no! I don't have experience with that but, I'd get it back to salty and just start doing some tests. If ammonia is bad, you may have had some die off but I doubt all is lost.

 

[BrianKC]

This, by the way, is how I crashed my reef 2 years ago...except it ran for 6 days while on vacation thanks to a faulty ATO setup....that's too long and I lost everything. Now I run my RODI into a separate container that then tops off my sump. This way there's a limit to just how much fresh could run in.

 

[leviburns89]

Dang, I would cry if I left it on for that long. And to top it all off, it probably expired your rodi filters. After yesterday's mishap, I'm about 60% thru my first set of resins.

Im grateful it was only the rock, in the sterilite tote, and not a finished display tank.

Next week I am going to buy some spec grade aragonite sand, and some testing supplies, and will probably just finish the cure in the DT, this way I cannot be tempted with running my RO line directly into something that matters

 

[leviburns89]

Going to do my aquascape tomorrow.

Purchased 55lbs of dry sand.

I am using CaribSea special grade aragonite reef sand.
LFS had it on sale $35 for 40lb bags.

Rocks look great, the water they are in is a week old, and has zero smell to it.

Purchased testing supplies today, will start testing in a week or two just to get an idea of where I'm at.

Livestock still on schedule for early to mid march.

 

[BrianKC]

Woop woop!

 

[leviburns89]

View attachment 341321

Ok, so I got my aquascape about 99% complete. I may tinker with some of the small peices, but it's pretty much done.

I was only able to use about 35lbs of sand to keep a 1.5" bed. I didn't account for the footprint of the rock. Is this normal? From what I've read, a shallow sand bed should have around 1lb/gal, but if I were to keep that ratio, I would be well over 3" deep.

Tank is sitting at a cozy 80.1f. I turned on the carbon reactor, and powerheads to help disperse heat, and clean out the fines.

There is still a small cloudiness, but tomorrow, it should be crystal clear.

Looking forward to getting my bulbs ordered that way I can see the proper color of the tank. Looks a bit drab with just the ambient room lighting. I know not to run lights yet, but I want to see it lol, ants in my pants.

Also getting a skimmer in the next 2 weeks. So the build should be pretty much done after that, and ready for cycling.

Ghost feeding with sinking pellets will begin next weekend.

 

[BrianKC]

Looking good! Yeah, your tank dimensions have less floor and higher walls than a lot of reef tanks so you've got less floor to spread the sand out on. I wouldn't sweat it though.

 

[leviburns89]

I figured that was the case. I'm going tomorrow to find a brush that will fit in the very tight spaces between the rock and tank face to clean the glass. Shouldn't be too bad, I can make something if need be.

I figured since I'm using a decent amount of rock, filtration won't be as much of an issue as I play it out in my head.

Also, I did some high science, and marked 1g and 5g on the side of my tank so I know exactly how much water is lost via evap. Big marks are 5g and small are 1g. I only went down about 4 inches so it wasn't so gaudy.

Also, you can't tell from the pic, but the center 1/3 of the tank, has about 5" of sand between the rock and the face of the glass. I did this so I could have a nice sea floor zone for acans or brains. And the entire center 1/3 is also mostly tabletop so I can have my zoa colonies on one side of the pinacle, and some other show peices on the other. The large peices on the right and left of the tank have many large slots to insert frag plugs if needed. You can't really tell, but the right half of the tank is pukani, and the left half is figi. The center is just some random rocks

 

[BrianKC]

So in your display tank, keeping a constant salinity is going to be important. If the water level goes down by 5 gallons, your salinity would wind up being really high. For example, with your rock let's assume there's 48 gallons in the tank and you're at 1.026 (35ppt). 5 gallons of evap would take you to 1.029 (39ppt). Not a big deal to your live rock probably but do you have plans for an ATO or something to keep water level pretty constant?

Also a thought on the rock...if you took those two rock out of the center and put them up higher you could have two awesome islands.

 

[leviburns89]

Also a thought on the rock...if you took those two rock out of the center and put them up higher you could have two awesome islands.

I was thinking the same thing. I'm pretty picky about my aquascapes, this would be my 4th that I am currently running, and probably my 100th overall, but without a doubt the most complex. I want to keep a plateau in the center as to not diverse from the rule of 3rds. That being said, I have had dreams (literally) about the two island thing. Once my chapped knuckles stop stinging, I will move the center around a bit.

In regards to the evap topic, I am taking your previous advice, and keeping 2 gallons of rodi in the cabinet for top off at all times. I have a 35g resivior of rodi, and will keep that topped as well.

From what I've noticed in my curing tub, I will be topping off about .3 -.5 gallon every day in rodi. I figure if I pour half of that number in the morning, and the other half at night, I can avoid swings in salinity/temp. I should also add, every Saturday is maintenence day for all my critters, I spend about 1.5 hours doing water changes, and cleaning glass, so this is just an added 20 mins for a weekly vacuum and 10%WC

Any thoughts on that?

Ad far as an ato, I already have too much equipment in the DT for my liking. My FW aquascapes are almost naked in terms of equipment, so even the use of powerheads and heaters in this tank kinda bug me. I did however manage to hide the maxijet1200 behind one of the rock piles, and that helps curb my ocd.