On March 3rd we went out & got the first portion of the cleaning crew: 12 Astrea Snails, 12 Margarita Snails, 6 Red Leg Hermit crabs and 12 Blue Leg Hermit crabs. We also fell in love with a White Star coral so it came home with us.
On March 11th we added a Zoanthid and an orange Sun Coral.
I also learned that all corals are not filter feeders and purchased Cyclop-eeze for the Sun Coral.
On the same weekend I went and picked up a Toadstool Leather from a different LFS, which we placed on hold even before the tank was installed. When I placed it in the tank there was too much water flow from the return, across it, as you see in the picture.
During the following week we had a rather hot day here in Georgia. The A/C was not on in the house and the tank paid the price. The Toadstool, which had three stalks, was reduced to one dying stalk and the White Star completely died off.
Since there is an A/C duct right behind the tank I built a deflector to direct the cold air onto the sump to help keep the tank cool. I do not have room near the tank for a chiller so this will have to do.
We also started to find several empty snail shells littering the bottom of the tank. A few days later some of the crabs had moved into snail shells.
We added another 16 Margarita Snails on March 18th, to replace the Astrea Snails that had disappeared. We found out that the crabs had been eating the Astrea Snails. So I started to feed the crabs with Formula Two Marine pellets. We also added an Emerald Crab, Rex.
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