I figure I need to be honest with you all... I just about killed my tank off completely.
Yep. A bout with cyano/hair algea, nearly all of my coral algea the dying off, the loss of some of my softies, the loss of two fish and nearly all of my clean-up crew left me depressed. And the way I deal with my problems is just to ignore them which, of course, makes things much worse.
So here is where I stand now (7-28-06):
40 Lbs of live rock, 2 clowns, some clean-up crew, and 20 or so mushrooms. (Nothing can kill a mushroom!)
I recently moved, so it gave me an opportunity to remove all of my rocks and equipment and clean the bad stuff off of them. My skimmer never worked at all and so I replaced it with a Coralife Super Skimmer 65. I removed all filtration media from my canister so now it works as a big closed loop system.
My plan for the immediate future is to replace the canister by building a DIYsump/fuge out of a 15 gallon tank and add an overflow box to the back. I am thinking about a QuiteOne 4000 return pump connected to a SCWD. I will then be adding about another 30 lbs of Live rock to the fuge and display, then I can start re-populating the tank.
So wish me luck! I will be needing all of your help to turn this back into a thriving reef again!
I am really rather embarrassed by all of this. I have been into reefkeeping for over 2 years now. I know quite a bit, yet still I make the stupid mistakes that I know better than to be making.
Anyways, Here is a shot of the new Coralife Super Skimmer in action.
It's only day 2, and there is very little bio-load in tank, I feed my fish very light, yet it's still pulling out way more than that Bak Pak 2R ever did when my tank was fully loaded.
Can't wait to get my fish load back up so it can start pulling some serious scum!
How long had your 37 been up and running before the disaster?
__________________ Amphibious
Reaching my 70th BD, I realize that I cannot help but grow old. However, I refuse to grow up!!! My wife would tell you, "He may be 70 but, He's going on 17". Life is wonderful with a woman like that.
It was up and running for about a year and a half before things went downhill. I got to a point where I got fed up with the problems and didn't want to spend the $$$ to do things right. Now I am trying to work myself out of that hole I dug for myself.
I am buying an AGA 15 gallon tank today that will be the sump/fuge. maybe I'll pick up some eggcrate while I am at it. I have a glass top on there now and my tank has been sitting at a steady 83.5 degrees when the 10,000 k turns on. Not good.
I got 3 different color variations of zoos and a nice chunk of rock with some GSP on it yesterday from a fellow club member.
Here's hoping I can keep these guys alive!
In other news, I bought an AGA 20 Gallon tank for the sump/fuge, and will most likely be buying the overflow, the pumps, the acrilic, and all the other goodies in the next couple of days.
I've got pictures YEAH! First up, some of my new polyps.
Here is my sump/fuge in progress. total running volume is about 14 gallons. Should work ok for my little tank. Hopefully I will have it set up tonight and pumping away by tomorrow morning.
if you look at the zoos in the middle of the pic, you'll see they aren't open. They haven't opened yet, and I do not know why.
Monday I am ordering another 40 lbs of live rock and will be getting some macro algea for the fuge. I have some new coraline growth on the rocks. looks like things are comming along well!
Oh, and I also replaced the glass top with eggcrate Gwen. Thanks for reminding me! (it's also lowered the temp a full 3 degrees!)
Things are looking good. Those zoas in the middle look OK. They will open more as time goes by.
Caution. When you add more LR you are likely to have another cycle. Some call it a mini cycle but any cycle event can cause problems. Even "cured" LR will cause a cycle. Just a reminder.
__________________ Amphibious
Reaching my 70th BD, I realize that I cannot help but grow old. However, I refuse to grow up!!! My wife would tell you, "He may be 70 but, He's going on 17". Life is wonderful with a woman like that.
Here is the sump in operation. nothing super special, but thanks goes to Melev for the inspiration for the design.
The blue stuff is filter pads which is keeping the micro bubbles at bay. (only a temporary solution.) You can see where the return line Tees and a small 1/2 line drains into the refugium which is in the front. The fuge then overflows into the main area of my sump in the back.
And here is a temporary mod I made for my overflow to quiet it down and cut down on bubbles entering the sump.
I added a short bit of 1 1/4 inch tubing to raise the water level a bit more over my U-tube outlet and then inserted a 1 1/2 foot section of 1/2 tubing into the overflow bulkhead to keep alot of air from being sucked down by the draining water. Should the water level raise in the box from a blockage, it will pour down the 1/2 tubing and into the sump. Should work well, and it keeps my aquarium SILENT!
I also got 45 lbs of Dr. Foster&Smith Select Premium Fiji Live rock. The rock arrived pretty dry. a piece of wet newspaper was all there was. There are some interesting coraline colors on it, and sponges, I don't know what alive and whats dead yet.
My last order of Live Rock was aquacultured in the keys. the company I bought it from was decimated in the hurricanes last year. They are no longer in buisness. The rock I got from them was full of Coraline, lots of little crabs, the bag it came in had a good amount of water in the bottom and the rock was nice and wet. This is...different. This is my first experience with Fiji Rock so I am not quite sure what to expect from the shipment. Perhaps some of you guys with more experence can tell me how this looks.
Well, I got VERY lucky. As I was headed out the door for work yesterday I thought to myself, huh. Its cooler outside than it is inside...
Thought nothing of it.
I came home from work last night and it was well over 80 degrees in my house! My air conditioner wasn't working! I Ran over to my tank and the temp was about 84.5 degrees!
Not life threatening but I calculated this: The sump keeps my tank about 8 degrees cooler than it was before I got the sump ( I kept my air on quite high in the house)...So if I hadn't set that thing up, my tank would have been running at nearly 93 degrees all day long!
Wow. I got lucky. Now I gotta set up an appointment to get the air conditioner fixed and who knows how long that will take. Most likey it will be days before they will arrive at my house to fix it.
USA 
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