Bmwaaron's 90 Gallon Reef tank project

[fat walrus]

do it again. make sure you don't use carbon too early.

[bmwaaron]

How long should I wait to use the carbon? I think I did it as the directions said but cant remember exactly.

[fat walrus]

i wait a few hours. the last time i did it, i skipped the carbon completely......i don't recommend that though.

[bmwaaron]

OK wasn't sure the last time I updated this so here I go.......
Almost all my hair algae is gone now. I added a clean up crew on Monday and they have been chomping away. Here is an update on my livestock

1 Lawn mower Blennie
1 Green Chromis (3 died but all the ones at the LFS died also)
3 Peppermint shrimp (1 of them is eating Aptasia )
50 Cerith
50 Blue leg hermits
5 Astrea
5 Banded Trochus (have to be my fav snail, They look so cool)
15 Nassarius (another great snail)
2 Nerite snails
2 Scarlet hermits

Everything seems to be doing very well, I am adding some buffers to raise my ALK and CA Seachems reef complete and Seachems ALk buffer.

I will be hooking up the CA reactor Saturday I think. I am trying to decide still If I want to invest in a Solenoid valve and PH Controller for it or just try and do it manually.

Right now here where I'm at
Ammonia 0
Nitrate 0
Nitrite 0
Phosphate 0
PH 8.3
Temp 88
DKH 8.0
CA 400
Salinity 1.025

Also all 3 shrimp have molted, The scarlet crabs have molted
I have 4 cerith egg sacks on the glass also.

[fat walrus]

what about your cyano?

[bmwaaron]

I added a maxijet 1200 that blows flow in another direction and I havent seen any cyno since. I basically just sucked out what I saw then added the powerhead.
The powerhead is not pointing directly at the spot were the cyno was but it has not returned. Its been about 7 days since I have seen any.

The Hair Alage problem is also going away with the addition of the Clean up crew. My Lawnmower Blennie is eating very well. I am worried now about what happens when I run out of HA. I have thought about baking Nory onto a LR and seeing if he will eat that. I havent tryed to feed him any frozen food because the food I have only has shrimp in it.

[fat walrus]

the blenny is an omnivore. try any variety of food.

[bmwaaron]

I dosed the Flatworm Exit product today. The only ill effect I had was that all my Cerith snails dove into there shells and fell off the glass. I haven't been able to find any good information on the effect of Flatworm Exit on Cerith snails. Its been about 4 hours since the initial dose and I do notice that the Cerith seem to be coming back out of there shells, They aren't moving around yet but I do see a few of them popping there heads out.
I still see a few straggler flatworms so I think I will have to do a second dose. I am thinking I will wait 3 days and then re dose. Hopefully I will get them all.

[fat walrus]

did you try to siphon out as many flatworms as possible?

[bmwaaron]

About 36 hours after dosing Flatworm exit all Cerith are OK, unfortunately so are some of the Flatworms........

I am going to add a Sixline Wrasse and hope he picks off the extra. My fish store is having a after hours sale on Friday and they promised me a Sixline. I wish I could add one in the fuge but I don't think I can since they eat copepods.

I actually have the change to buy a fourline wrasse but am not sure the advantages or disadvantages of them.

[fat walrus]

the four line is just an eastern pacific version of the six line. they command a higer price because of lesser availability. they will so no better job than a six line, but is worth the difference to me because i like the look of a 4 line better. some stores and books refer to the four line as a twelve line.

[bmwaaron]

Update 8-5-06

I added 3 new fish last night,
2 False Percula Clowns
1 Sixline Wrasse

The sixline has imeditanly gone to work on the flat worm issue as if he knew thats what I wanted him to do. I am opptimistic since I have seen him munching on them for a 12 hour period now that he will keep them under control if not eliminate them.
The 2 clowns are also very nice. They are tank rasied as per Robs advise.
I also picked up 2 cleaner skunk shrimp incase I have a parisite outbreak like ich or something.
I can see tons of Pods in the refugium now and am very excited about that. I also have Coraline growth all over my rocks in the display tank and the fuge.


Ammonia 0
Nitrite 0
Nitrate 0
CA 480
PH 8.1-8.3
ALK 10.6 dkH or 3.77 meq/L
P04 0

[CarmieJo]

Please post pix once the new guys get settled in.

[bmwaaron]

After adding the Sixline Wrasse all the Flatworms in the display tank are gone
Although I still have them in the fuge.
I'm not to worried about the ones in the fuge at this time because they don't seem to bother anything they just look ugly. At some point I will probably take the fuge offline and super dose it with Flatworm exit. I don't want to add another Wrasse into the refugium.
Other then fighting all the little debris floating in the display tank everything is great. I am considering getting a Canister filter and running some poly filter in it to try and get the water clarity better.
The only other thing at this point is I am afraid I am under feeding. I have

2 False Percs
1 Lawn mower Blenny
1 Sixline
1 Blue/green Chromis
1 Serpent Star
1 Sand sifting Star
about 50 Hermits
about 60 snails
1 fighting conch

I am feeding about half a cube of SFB Emerald entrée a night and some pellet food. Let me know if you would increase that.

The Sand and rocks are VERY clean and I am getting Coraline growth on the overflow box and Wavebox

I did add Some Zoos. I will be getting some SPS frags tomorrow from a friend. I will take pictures and post tonight.

[bmwaaron]

Here are those pictures

First is just a Banded Trochus Snail and the new Zoo's above it, If anyone can Identify the Zoos it would be extra cool


Second is just a left side shot of the tank


This is the right side shot of the tank


2 clowns and the sixline


Here are my 2 cleaner shrimp and you can make out the serpent star under the rock, its his hiding/hangout spot