Starting a 180, initial progress

[chrisguy]

Went out of town for the Turkey day weekend. Was gone from Wednesday PM thru about 4:00 today (Sunday). I had the tank setup for my normal "short time away" auto pilot setup with plenty of top off water and an auto feeder with pellet food. Also had a neighbor checking on it every day, along with our dog and gecko.

I was very disheartened to find the tank a total mess when I walked in the door. I had been having some minor cyno issues since setting up the tank and have not yet figured out why. The cyno had almost completely covered the sand and much of the LR. The glass had lots of green algae, which is not totally unexpected having not been cleaned in 5 days. While cleaning the glass I saw what truly saddened me. My clam which I had had for just shy of 2 years was nothing more than an empty shell. It was not looking too good before I left, but did not look on it's deathbed. Other than the clam, all fish and coral seem to be OK.

I decided to turn the lights out and give everything in the tank a little break. I think this also helped me not feel so bad. I may leave the lights off another day or two to help get things back on track. I will be doing water change tomorrow and a full run of tests to see if I can figure out why the new setup, which gets a lot of TLC, is doing worse than the tub, which was almost ignored.

 

[suppressivefire]

ouch! Sorry for the loss and i hope everything gets back in line for you!
-chris

 

[tmz]

Chris, Sorry to hear that . I hate to go away. It always seems soemthing happens.Perhaps the clam just died and polluted the tank some, Hope taht's the end of it. LEt me know if I can help.

 

[KurtsReef]

Sorry to hear that Chris.

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=11255165#post11255165 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by tmz
.Perhaps the clam just died and polluted the tank some

Those were my thoughts, clam died and what was not eaten immediately was polluting the water.

As for your algae, once you get a UV filter in place it will surprise you the the drop in problem algae you have with it running.

 

[chrisguy]

Looks like a day and a half of lights out and a water change have helped a lot. Things looked back to "normal" tonight.

Got our electric bill today and it went up about $30. I knew it would go up some from the addition of a third 250w MH, but I was hoping that by using less pumps than I had in "the tub" I was hoping it wouldn't be that much. Showed the wife the bill and explained that it was from the new tank. Her response was "Oh well, it's worth it."

Not sure she will let me put up the full run of my "Griswold family Christmas Vacation" lights this year. That's usually an additional $20-30 for the month of Dec.

 

[magdelan]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=11268570#post11268570 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by chrisguy
Not sure she will let me put up the full run of my "Griswold family Christmas Vacation" lights this year.

"Little full in here. Big tree. Lot'a sap".

 

[chrisguy]

I forgot to mention in my previous post that the Bartlett Anthias that was showing signs of ich, is still alive and kicking. No other fish have shown signs of ich and the anthias has less spots than it had a week ago. Hopefully I've dodged the bullet on this one.

 

[chrisguy]

When I got home Sunday and the tank was such a mess I decided to go Lights Out for a couple days. All lights were turned off at about 5:00pm on Sunday. Wednesday I started bringing the lights back on slowly. Tomorrow will be the first day of full lighting. Last night I had all lights on for a couple hours and the tank looked really clean, so I snapped a couple pictures. ENJOY

From the Kitchen Side

Down the long side

From the Family Room Side

Family Room, Left side

Family Room, Center

Family Room, Right side

 

[chrisguy]

Continued.....

Kitchen Side, different angle

Green Clown Goby, looking at the world

Nice close-up

Another nice close-up

Can anyone name this wrasse??

 

[johno4]

Sweet pics, I love the pic of the clown goby. I was thinking about getting one. Thanks for the help deciding.

 

[Chrsnwk]

Lookin' good! My condolences on the loss of the clam.

 

[Conesus_Kid]

Great pics!

The wrasse is C. solarensis.

 

[crp]

Nice pictures.

 

[otiso777]

Looks great!

 

[tmz]

Great photos and subjects.

 

[Kent E]

Flows better but are you achieving the results that your looking for?

 

[chrisguy]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=11285833#post11285833 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by Kent E
Flows better but are you achieving the results that your looking for?

Not sure what you are asking??

I have made some changes to address the flow but I think there is room for further improvement. I am thinking the next change will be to the OM 4-way to a different drum. That is unless I find a Vortech in my stocking.

 

[chrisguy]

Added a new piece of vital equipment to the system today.

Placed a LeakFrog inside the stand under the closed loop pump and on the floor under the sump.

These little suckers are loud when they get wet. Hopefully I never hear them because of an issue.

 

[chrisqueenz]

Sweet looking tank, turning the lights off for a couple days does make a world of a difference..

 

[chrisguy]

Bringing this thread back from the dead.

So far 2008 has been a good year for the tank. Had the challange of being away for 15 days in April and my wife and her sister did an excellent job with the maintenance. The best part is that her sister still cleans the glass when she comes over once a week.

I'm long past due for updated pictures. I'm going to try to do that this weekend.

Right now my biggest issue is growth. Some of the Monti Cap corals are getting so big that they are being broken by the mag scraper when cleaning the glass.

I still have not made the doors for the stand, I was hoping to start that this month, but it's looking like a June project. I will have them done before the end of summer.