Video- My 'Mother Nature' filtration room for Shark Lagoon

[griseum]

Hey all
I love this dark little recess on the forum.... Mwahahah.
Alright, that was kinda corny but i really do love Macro, Micro Algaes, the true vascular marine plants like the grasses and Mangroves. Ive been experimenting with several Red Mangroves, as you will see in the below video, as far as manipulating the growth and 'bonsai'ing them, so to say. Also, various light combinations under which they grow best, and I believe i have found the best now. And as you will see, I love the genus Caluerpa! I cultivate many different species of it. I find the textures, growth patterns, and variety to be fun to grow, as well as how excellent it is for nutrient export, when enough is able to be grown and the right environment is provided for dense growth.
As well as the filtration elements to these various tanks you'll see, they also harbor tremendous amounts of live foods. So much so, that 2 times now, I have gone at least 12 months of not seeing a fish, thinking it had died and was scavenged proficiently, and forgot about it, only to be stunned at its sudden appearance! This is possible because i culture marine shrimp in every tank, which reproduce. As well as Mollies and Killifish, that reproduce as well, especially the mollies, producing constant live food sources, on top of the tremendous amount of microfauna that exists in the form of -pods, worms, asterina stars, reproducing snails, brittle stars, etc, etc.

The highlight of this video is not the fish, although you will see several. The highlight is the algae and plants. These tanks have not only provided the ability to rehabilitate injured/sick fish in extremely short periods of time, but they also allow for complete stability of water parameters, along with my Apex, so that I can rest assured that there wont be drastic changes in any aspect of water quality.

Enjoy the show:


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[btreyes]

Your video was very peaceful to watch, I'm sure the mollies and angel love it.

 

[Michael Hoaster]

Very cool! Love the idea of reproducing mollies and shrimp. What kind of shrimp do you have? At about the 2:20 mark I thought I saw mysids. Are you able to keep up a growing population of pods? Did you get them established first before adding the larger mollies and shrimp? Would love to here more about order of introduction, acclimating the mollies, maintaining you caulerpa, etc.

 

[Sugar Magnolia]

That's a healthy thriving refugium!

 

[griseum]

Hey
Sorry for not responding sooner. Didn't know anybody was looking at this thread!
Thanks for the comments.
As far as order of introduction. I allowed the various macroalgaes to propogate well, than as they increased in mass and volume, it gave the micro-inverts a better covering and rhizome-network to live in and on. They reproduce very well in the one tank with the mangroves. That tank goes through stages of what Macro species is the majority every few months. At the point of this video, I believe the majority was Bubble Caluerpa. or Grape Caluerpa, whichever you call it.
The worm population increases when food input increases. I get tagged with bristleworm spines too much. I've been on a worm-hunt for the past 2 months. I have some REALLY big Worms living throughout the system and in the Live Rock.

So the Algae grows in, the micro-fauna takes a bit to establish good reproductive populations. The mollies I add year round, as they normally don't live very long. Even in three, four and 6 foot tanks, male competition will cause other males to jump from the tanks. Females get weery after giving birth several times. And the good species of Killifish only are available during summer months. They are hit or miss. The best place to find them is sometimes Bait shops. Other times the LFS.

So i would say the order is pretty much in order of complexity. From plants, micro fauna and flora, bigger things ie. mollies/killis. etc. And input of food at variable frequencies.

 

[Michael Hoaster]

Great stuff! I just re-watched your vid. Thanks for replying!

I'm preparing to set up a Caribbean (mostly) seagrass and (some) macro tank, so I appreciate the info. I too am going to start with just the plants and micro inverts. Then maybe mysids and/or some larger tank-breeding shrimp. Then, when I get some micro algae, snails and then mollies. Very good beta on the mollies, thanks.

After reading what you wrote, I think I'll only add one male and ten or so females. My tank is around 200 gallons. Ideally, I'll end up with a sustainable school that will help with the algae, as well as feed some Lookdowns. That'll be a challenge, but wouldn't it be cool?

 

[saltwater sam]

This macro tank is bad ***. I love everything about it. I think if fw planted tankers saw this tank they would be very impressed and possibly persuaded to the sw hobby. Thanks for sharing!

 

[griseum]

Thanks for all the compliments!

Just so you guys know, that video was clipped together of all of the refugiums I have running in different tanks at the same time. Not like the stages of different refugiums. Its 4 or 5 seperate tanks that are all in-line with the shark pond. Which is in the adjacent room.