ReefWreak finally got an upgrade!

[soulpatch]

I mean you dose up the tank with ammonia and it creates a ton of bacteria and sets the tqnk up for success. If your stock stays minimal then some will die up as the tank stabilizes to need but at least you would have more then needed and not need to have emergency water changes or such as livestock goes in.

Plus CUC can be much more fickel with ammonia so while you fish might be fine you could run into issues with the CUC you just spent money on....

 

[homer1475]

+1 Ammonia and no guesses(See we all agree sometimes). :lolspin:

When I was trying to cycle my QT tank, Dr Tim's did nothing(tank had 2ppm for 6 days before I added biospira). IO Biospira cycled it in 3 days. On the third day I dosed up to 3ppm ammonia and it cleared in about 12 hours.


The pukani I pulled out that I am using some now I bleached for 5 days, then soaked in RO/DI and prime for another week, was super clean.

I was going to acid wash the rest this summer, but maybe I'll just bleach it instead.

 

[Rakie]

Well I'm glad you not only got an upgrade, and ended up with a surprise upgrade to boot!

Yet again, I agree with @homer and @soulpatch (Small shout out to you two gents -- I very rarely agree with almost everything people say, but both of you have very sage advice and never biased.. Both of those qualities are as rare as it gets in this hobby). ammonia is the way to go. But I'll also blend up a tiny bit of shrimp or frozen as well. It's overkill, but it won't hurt so why not. But again, Ammonia is instant and a safe bet. Anything else is just extra.

As for lights, I think a third radion, with all radions turned front to back will give you the coverage you want. 3 seems to be the magic number on anything over 36" -- WWC runs a 290g with 3 Radions. And they run a 900g with 5-6 radions. Some people with huge well grown in colonies would advise you to get 4 eventually.

You could also get one of the hybrid fixtures to add 4 T5 bulbs. They're well priced all things considered, and if you desperately feel the need for even more LED, you could put a used XR15 in the middle and that should be more than enough for you.




EDIT: Oh yeah!! -- The diffusers are a GAME CHANGER. I can't recommend them enough. They significantly help the tank with shadowing and evenly distributing par. I know... $130 for upgrades on $1600 worth of lights... But it's really worth it.

@Reef -- I remember talking a lot with you about LED vs T5 and our experiences. With the G3's, I was all about T5's, I saw an instant improvement in my corals when adding T5, and a bigger improvement once going full ATI. I wouldn't have ever gotten a G4 but I won it in a raffle... And the G4 is so vastly improved over the G3, I have to admit it now outperforms T5 in growth and color In my personal experience.

I had a buddy who picked up a pair to run WITH his 6x48 T5 fixture, I convinced him to pickup a 3rd Radion, ditch the ATI, and get the diffuser for all three radions -- He hates to admit, his corals never looked better. Growth and color.

Didn't seem like it to a lot of people when they dropped, but the G4 is a gigantic upgrade over the G3, because of new LED diodes, wider spectrum, and HEI optics. So no matter what you do -- You should be very happy with your G4's.

 

[ReefWreak]

EDIT: Oh yeah!! -- The diffusers are a GAME CHANGER. I can't recommend them enough. They significantly help the tank with shadowing and evenly distributing par. I know... $130 for upgrades on $1600 worth of lights... But it's really worth it.

@Reef -- I remember talking a lot with you about LED vs T5 and our experiences. With the G3's, I was all about T5's, I saw an instant improvement in my corals when adding T5, and a bigger improvement once going full ATI. I wouldn't have ever gotten a G4 but I won it in a raffle... And the G4 is so vastly improved over the G3, I have to admit it now outperforms T5 in growth and color In my personal experience.

I've heard similar stories about the G4 vs. everything else. Actually one of the reasons I finally decided to go for the G4 Pro vs. T5 hybrids was because jackson6745, who has a spectacular 115g cube, and is somewhat of a reefcentral legend (and really nice guy who I've met a few times in person since he's local), and is a huge advocate for T5 and MH ONLY, had a nice conversation with me over PM. He said that he sees that the G4 finally is a game changer, and he'll be moving to them with his next tank, because he's seen the light, and finally there are LEDs that are comparable to T5 and/or MH. And that means a lot, because I know how much he loves his 10x24" T5 fixture...

Weren't you going big on T5s Rakie? That's a sweet raffle prize, and I'm glad you're enjoying it. You deserve a nice break after living through AEFW treatment.

Also, I need to look into the diffusers eventually. I think my wife would kill me if I bought diffuses after buying everything else though, particularly the $1600 lights + arms.

 

[Rakie]

I was using T5 for a year, around xmas I won the Radion, switched out my ATI for my Radion in January and it's been a huge improvement. I still feel a single XR30 G4 Pro leaves a little too much shadowing for my taste.

The diffusers are such a big upgrade it's almost a G5 radion within itself.. People hate on it because it's a flimsy piece of plastic -- But if it came standard on the Radion everyone would love it.. It's really that good.

 

[ReefWreak]

FIIINE, I dosed ammonia. I ordered the ammonia clear from Amazon. I dosed the tank up to 2ppm (though the calculators said it should be at 1ppm from my dosing; it definitely spiked to 2ppm). That was Saturday morning. Sunday morning and night it was 1PPM, and tonight it is 0.5PPM. Nitrates were actually high right after dosing (10-15PPM), then immediately dropped to 0ppm, and have stayed flat even with ammonia coming down. I'm always skeptical, but that's what's supposed to happen with the marinepure. Skimmer doesn't notice a difference, and I've been keeping on top of topoff.

I also couldn't resist picking up some fishes while at the LFS this weekend returning unused rock. So for the first time ever, I'm fully quarantining fishes. Doing TTM in the basement right now (IT'S SO NICE HAVING SPACE, I FEEL LIKE A HUMAN AGAIN). The fishes are pretty lethargic, or still in hiding, which isn't great, but I'm sure it takes a few days to adjust to the new surroundings.

I haven't posted pics in a while, and everyone loves the pics, so:

Quarantine setup is black 27g home depot buckets, on top of a lid (to keep it insulated from the cold floor), with a 100w heater (overkill, I know; next swap and bleaching I'll use the 50w heater that is in the cube right now). and I just added clear lids tonight. I was using the yellow lids, thinking that with an overhead light on above the QT during the day it would look like daylight and the fishes would be active, but when I got home they were mostly asleep still, so tonight I found clear lids and put that over the tank.

TTM protocol suggests moving them Wednesday night at 10PMish, so that's my plan. Tomorrow going to a Mets game! So 12 days total, hopefully they survive. I'm not a big fan of QT or TTM, but I know that as a grown-*** man, sometimes you have to do what you have to do.

 

[Rakie]

I spot a leopard !

 

[ReefWreak]

Indeed you do. The rest is a mystery (not wrasse). I'm hoping they make it through QT... They're pretty ****ed off I think one was eating when I walked away after feeding (he came out of hiding when food was in). The others are just sitting around on the bottom, not dead, but not quite alive. I'll see how they are tomorrow night, and then I'll get the prazipro in there too at the same time, just so they spend their 24 hours before the next TTM move (or maybe it's better to get them feeding comfortably and Turn 2 will be Prazi since they'll take a day or two to eat from the stress anyway?

QT is hard and very uncertain. A lot of places online say not to even QT leopard wrasses in particular.

 

[Rakie]

Prazi can suppress appetite. So I would get them eating first and foremost before any treatments unless they look absolutely dire.

Whenever I get new fish I just repeat this phrase like a mantra; "Calories into fish". For the first week or two, nothing else matters, unless they are physically and visually dying in real time from some grievous injury/sickness.

 

[homer1475]

I would not prazi the leopard, they do not take to it very well. If you read the leopard wrasse primer in the reef fishes section, some had success with prazi, but most had them die in QT after adding prazi.

My fisrt leopard I used prazi and she died minutes after putting her in the bucket with prazi. My second leopard did fine in TTM, and I did a FW did for the flukes. She lived 2 years before ich wiped out my entire fish population.

 

[ReefWreak]

Thanks for the tips. The fishes generally seem healthy, so I'll just stick with TTM. 29.5 hours and counting! (I set a timer for 72 hours, since I know I'd screw up the timing if I did it manually).

The fishes seem healthy, but the listlessness of the leopard still makes me somewhat concerned. I'm hoping that with the clear lid and the lights on in the daytime, hopefully they're more attentive today. I also added some prime just because the ammonia alert looked slightly off of yellow, so just to be safe.

Then I'm excited to test the ammonia in the big tank. Hopefully it's coming down quickly. Also, I'm somewhat concerned about bringing bubble algae in through the angel's poop. I'd hate to QT my already healthy fishes just to keep their poop out of the big tank. I'd say it sounds crazy, but I don't think it's actually that crazy of an idea... Especially considering how much of a scourge bubble algae is.

 

[Rakie]

Oh! just a heads up -- Prime sometimes reacts very badly with some medications, one of them specifically being PraziPro.

Having had to learn about medicines I was kinda surprised at the stuff I didn't know -- like what I just typed!

 

[soulpatch]

given the speed of which we process what we eat I think if you had the angel in the qt tank for a day or 2 it would process any of the bubble algae it ate and could go in the tank.


And yes do not use Prime with any meds to be safe. It will either cause a toxic issue for many or will negate the meds.

 

[ReefWreak]

I'm not really liking TTM, though I know TTM and QT is important. The fishes seemed uncomfortable the whole time, and wouldn't eat at all. I called it quits after the second transfer when they still weren't eating.

Once transferred to the main tank (I moved my nano fishes first), everyone seemed pretty disoriented the first day. The second day, the leopards were out and about, and the tang had started picking at the rocks and having a good time following around the angel 24/7. The angel and tang are inseparable.

Some pics:

I know everyone is skeptical of the Nyos skimmer, but let me just say DANG. This is with like 3 days of use. I'm going to work to get it to skim wetter, but am still thoroughly impressed.

I'm feeding somewhat heavily, with cyclopeeze and mysis mixed, and just bought some pods to seed the tank with from Algaebarn (also got their free artemia for your first purchase). Fishes are all eating and looking very happy and healthy. I'm frustrated that I lost a beautiful (and expensive) wrasse, but I guess such is life. At least the leopards seem to be doing well.

The fish list thus far are:
2x percula clowns (From old nano, still doing very well together)
Flame Angel (nano)
Orange Stripe Bristletooth Tang (happy and follows flame angel around all day, also picking at and eating the brown crap on the rocks all day since it's a bristletooth tang)
Meleagris Leopard Wrasse (female)
Negrosensis Leopard Wrasse

I bought the two leopard wrasses because the LFS said they were the same species, just male and female. Shame on me. They're both eating and seem very happy though. They're already coming out during the day and eating frozen at meal time.

I still want to get some sort of refugium or algae reactor going, but at least I'm feeling good about the skimmer. I took the ATO container that came with my tank to another LFS this weekend that was near where we were going (the zoo!) and asked them about drilling the tank. He said maybe it's possible with a brand new hole saw blade, but he wasn't going to take the risk as the glass was too thin. So I'm not sure if I should just pick up a 10g and practice on it, or see if someone else would consider drilling it locally (I actually wonder if BAO would drill it, or if he works with glass or just acrylic?). There has to be someone locally comfortable drilling this. Otherwise I can look into getting one of the algae reactor ARID knockoffs >$250, but I do think it would be worthwhile, particularly in the beginning of the tank.

Also, once the ammonia on the tank dropped, I saw one small spike of 10-15ppm nitrate, and nothing since. I'm sure it's not that the skimmer is that good, so I'm thinking 2 marinepure block are making a big difference. Who knows, but after the fishes have been in the big tank, being fed moderately, for 3 days now with no ammonia or nitrate movement, I'm very happy.

 

[homer1475]

I have only ever had a couple fish eat through TTM, so I don't sweat it now. Not that I should be the one speaking about fish. >.<

Love the rockwork! Definitely jealous of the NYOS skimmer. I'll wait till you have a bioload and see how it does, but it is on my short list of new skimmers.

 

[soulpatch]

My fish rarely eat though TTM but considering fish can go like 3 weeks without eating it is normally not a concern to go 12 days in TTM.

 

[ReefWreak]

I guess I'll have to be more insistent about full length TTM going forward. The fishes just looked really miserable, and factoring in that they've possibly been in trans-shipping, I hate to keep them uncomfortable longer or have them starve since they likely haven't been eating. I know I the context if things, it's better than then and all the other fishes dieng of a disease, so I'll just try to stick with the 12 day's going forward.

I'm sorry to see you've had so much trouble with the bristletooth tangs homer. Bizarrely bad luck.

The nyos is nice. I hate to contribute to hype, especially since until I got the skimmer going I was kicking myself for not buying a used reefoctopus skimmer for $150, but ultimately this skimmer is doing a great job with very little bioload.

The rocks had some nasty brown sludge algae growing for a few days last week, so I added 5 astrea snails and 5 nassarius snails, and they cleared all of the brown sludge within a day or two. The angel and orange stripe helped too, and are alwasy picking.

I added some pods from algaebarn, and hopefully that is keeping the leopards snacking, though they're both fat and happy and eatjjg mysis regularly now.

Wife and I did the measurements and calculations for an artfully acrylic cover for the tank. Absolutely necessary since I've already seen a fish jump into the eggcrate. It'll be helpful if I get some more wrasses as well in the future.

Going to do the first big scale water change tonight, even though nitrates and ammonia have been zero since the cycle ended. Very happy for 3-4 weeks in. The tank is still a bit cloudy with green algae which is annoying, but that's what new tank life is like. I'm adding a half of a teaspoon of kalk to the sump directly to keep calling/alk up and promote purple corraline algae. I know it's frowned upon but it barely registers any change in ph, and I never see any powder come through the return so less worry about harming any inhabitants. There's a nice walk reactor for sale locally, but it only makes sense for the first 6 months, so I'm not convinced I should buy it. All recommendations have also been against adding any kalk directly to the reefer ATO reservoir becasue it clogs too easily.

Happy with the progress so far, still have a lot to do and set up, but the early stages take time, and only bad things happen quickly (TM)

 

[Rakie]

Some people observe their fish for a bit first, and let them just chill and get used to eating before treatment -- UNLESS, they absolutely have something visible on them.

For me, a FW dip (or formalin if you can get it in your state still), then put them in a QT and focus on getting them to eat. Once they're eating, then I move onto treating unless they have no signs of anything, and nothing came off in their dip..

During this observation period your chief goal is get them to eat, and observe behavior.. Any signs or symptoms tells you where to go and how to treat next. Lots of itching, stringy white poop, development of cotton or whatever -- You know what to do next.

But Step 1 for me is "Calories into fish", always get them eating first. And I repeat that phrase like a cultist to everybody I help with QT. Calories into fish, calories into fish.

 

[ReefWreak]

Rakie, that definitely makes a lot of sense. Solid rule. Almost makes me want to keep the nano to use as a QT to get the fishes comfortable and eating before they get TTM and/or treatment. I still have to figure out what to do with the nano, though I should probably sell it. Need the cash for the rest of the build. I forgot how fast the money goes. I wonder how I did all of this when I didn't have a job while building my first tank.

I've got a line on a Geo calcium reactor setup, so hopefully I'll have that figured out by this weekend. I also need to figure out an ATO container, and also whether I'll do a refugium or algae reactor too. If I do the ATO container, it really makes sense to try to get the current Reefer ATO container drilled so that I can turn it into a fuge, but I've never drilled a tank before. I can probably pick up a cheap 10g tank to drill just to try with finnicky/thin glass, since apparently that's pretty similar to the reefer ATO container too.

Long Island Reefing Association frag swap is this weekend and I'm going. I hope I don't load up on too much....

 

[homer1475]

And I have enver bothered with QT first. makes no sense to me. Lets oput a possibly sick fish into a QT tank to observe and et eating, Ok understandable, but what happens if said fish is sick? You get them eating them TTM them only to dump them right back into the same QT they were just in. Makes no sense to me.

I have always done TTM, then QT for observation and to fatten them up. At least this way my QT isn't infected.

Why Are you worried about a calk reactor for now? Your ways away from needing one of those. BRS bulk chemicals will get you a nice 2 part system that will be good for a while, and be loads cheaper then even a used reactor.