The good:

This little piece of montipora (I think) came stuck to a rock I bought for the GSP on it. Second coral I ever put in the tank. Once I realized it was a piece of SPS, I broke it off the rock and stuck it here. It simply existed for a year. Dull brown color, no growth, but pretty decent polyp extension. Fast forward to a month or so ago. I swaped out mu old worn out 20K HQIs for 10Ks. The monti bleached, but still maintained polyp extension. I didn't really care, and totaly ignored it. It colored back up to the same old brown, but in the last week, it has started morphing. The background is turning a nice baby blue, and the polyps appear to be turning orange. Not only that, it's GROWING....



I'm sorry for the attrocious pictures, my macro mode really sucks...

The bad:

My goni has come down with brown jelly
It has been doing great until I stupidly moved it to the other side of the sandbed the other day. I took this shot right before I took it out of te tank for disposal. Frogspawn, torch and hammer seem OK at this point. I know these guys are REALLY hard to keep,and most don't make it past a year, but it had been doing SOOOOOO well. Oh well, maybe I'll try another sometime. I really enjoyed it while it was around, and it was my wifes favorite piece.



The ugly:

Yuck. I've been dealing with an algae outbreak since I changed my bulbs. This is probably the worst rock. It's on top of the rockwork, high light and not the strongest flow. I'm starting to get a handle on it, it's receeding little by little. I really need a PO4 test kit. I have a feeling I'm paying the price now for using tap water for topoff for most of the first year the tank was running. That combined with the whiter light was all it took. My cheato is growing well, the cleanup crew is doing it's part, the skimmer is working well, and I assume my water quality is improving now that I have a RO/DI unit.



It's interesting to see how this little piece of purple polyped encrusting cap is clearing the rockwork in front of it's growth.

BTW, this doesn't really look a lot like the HA I had after the tank cycled, anyone have a good ID on it? Bryopsys perhaps?

Anyway, not the best week between the brown jelly and the continuing algae, but it's just another challenge to overcome. Besides, what's the good in only reporting the good stuff that's happening in one's tank?

Oh, another question. I want to start using some phosphate remover. I don't have a phosban reactor, but I do have a canister i use for running GAC. I know I could put phosban or rowa in it, but they're both on the pricy side. more ecpensive than the reactor, in fact. Has anyone here used either the Seachem or Kent phosphate reducers? any good at all, or crap? Much cheaper, but I'd rather pay the premium for somthing that actualy works.

Man, I need to set up a tank journal sometime, even though the tank has been up over a year already. I need somewhere to track my progress and post photos for growth and coloration comparisons.