My tank setup

[HelifaxNZ]

Well done Hazy... You're further ahead than I am.

[hazymranch]

So, alot has happened since my last posts but I have been too busy to get pics up. I will get on that soon.

So, everything looked good as far as the sump, flow, and chemistry, and I ghetto-mounted my 150W MH above that tank (5200K bulb). The first livestock I put in there was a leather frag that had been recovering from shipping in Gareth's tank at the LFS. Once it was in my tank it looked really good with polyps wide open.

Bolstered by that, my wife came home from a trip to Christchurch with what the LFS there claimed was a red-base sand anemone, labelled heteractis aurora. I did some research on how to care for this and found that h. aurora is actually a beaded anemone. Aside from that, none of the pictures I found of a red-base looked anything like what I now had in my tank. Anyway, as soon as the anemone was placed on the substrate it started moving toward the opening to a cave from which a solid laminar current flows. It lay on its side rather than upright with its mouth into the flow.

A few days later I received a white and a brown xenia. They looked pretty good as soon as they were submerged and I was hopeful although the anemone looked worse than the day before, which was worse than the day before that. Its mouth began to prolapse and the tentacles were shrinking.

The xenia continued to look great, but I noticed that as the anemone declined, the xenia and leather all looked like they were being affected. The mouth on the anemone was severely prolapsed at this point so I removed it from the tank and placed it into quarantine, where it steadily declined toward its inevitable death this morning. It is now a $100 white, crusty blob. Expensive lesson.

The xenia have since pulled in their polyps, starting with the white. The brown, which had been so beautifully long with great feather-like polyps, has now shrunk considerably and the white is now very listless, ashen, and the polyps look ready to fall off at any moment.

I added montipora on the same day as the xenia and they have gone from a brown to a green to white/green. In the last day or so they have taken on a brownish tinge.

The leather has also declined steadily and spends most of the day looking gray with polyps retracted. Over the last day or so it has started to recover a bit and extend polyps to a degree but nothing like it was.

On the weekend I added a green zoanthid and it had closed up shop upon addition, but is now starting to look like it might extend polyps.

Tuesday night I did a 50L change with NSW (20-25%) and added 2 small power heads doing 700lph each. Flow now comes from these 2 heads, placed at opposite ends of the tank and blowing toward the center, one 500lph head blowing back to front, another 500lph head blowing diagonally back/side to front/center and the 2 returns from the sump blowing across the substrate and into the top, as well as the return from the cannister filter blowing back to front in the center. Should be plenty.

I received a new 14K bulb and placed it into the MH fixture last night and upon lighting this morning, the leather seems to have responded somewhat.

I have been struggling with my water chemistry a bit and my Ca levels are abysmal, despite what should be adequate supplementation. Gareth loaned me his testing kit and last night I ran the gamut of tests resulting in some concern.

SG = 1.026 (10pm and I top-off 1L/day each morning)

pH = 8.3

temp = 27.4 C

Amm, NH2, NH3 = 0, 0, 0

PO4 = 0.2

KH = 20

Ca = 200

Mg = 1200

From what I understand, the high KH is precipitating the Ca, which accounts for the basement values there. How do I lower that?

I have also begun a 4-day regime of intensive Ca supplementation to get that up to 400.

Advice?

Stay tuned for pics.

[Brianemone]

KH of 20????

[wasp]

Just keep adding the calcium, it will start taking out the kh once calcium comes up more.

But do you have any reefer type friends nearby? May pay to get someone else to test your ca and kh levels with their own kit, just to make sure your testing technique/kits are accurate.

[hazymranch]

I tested teh Ca using 2 different kits and the KH twice using the kit I borrowed from the LFS. I run complex assays in a lab all day so the "add, mix, and compare" kits should not be beyond my capabilities.

I had low pH at the outset so I buffered with baking soda in my top-off for a week and obviously spiked my KH. I didn't have a kit for it so I didn't know it was happening, and the pH did exactly what I wanted it to, so I thought I was on the right track.

I obviously need a full kit pronto.

Another question: The Speights Brewery here is built on top of a natural spring with pristine water that they filter. They have a tap out front of the brewery from which they allow people to collect. Would this be a good source of top-off, or at least better than the tap water treated with Stress-Coat that I am using now?

[wasp]

You'd need to test the water to know, but tap treated with stress coat is generally not a good idea long term. as you have access to a lab looks like this will not be a problem.

What you'd test for would be kh, Po4, and TDS, for starters. the kh will not matter provided it's not sky high, you just want to know what it is, so you can factor this in to your dosing regimen. TDS should ideally be less than 5, and Po4 if you can detect any at all with your Salifert kit that's too much. Bear in mind that as you top off all the time, whatever you're adding becomes more and more concentrated.

A tds of 5 is unlikely to be achieved, although I don't know what Speights actually do to the water. which is why most people eventually move to using RO, after battling phosphate etc. which becomes apparent after they are a few months or a year into their hobby.

[Feelers]

A RO unit is only the price of 3 more lost anemones, and would give you peace of mind.

[wasp]

Yes have to say i just would not go back to not having one.

If the water from Speights is extremely good, you may be able to skip the RO and just run it through a DI. The purpose of the RO is to remove TDS cheaper than DI, but it doesn't get it all, so a DI is used as the last stage to finish off. The DI resin gets used quite quickly if the water has a high TDS. But if there is a TDS of say, less than 20, a litre of DI resin will give you quite a long period of service if you're just making one litre of water a day.

I'm making around 7 litres a day, from water with a TDS of 60. In my case an RO before the DI is definately more economical.

[hazymranch]

A RO unit is only the price of 3 more lost anemones, and would give you peace of mind.

I'm hoping not to kill 3 more anemones and I'm already way over my budget with another tuition payment coming up so a RO/DI unit is not in the immediate plans, unfortunately. Maybe I can pinch some Milli-Q water from one of the labs at the Uni.

as you have access to a lab looks like this will not be a problem.

Unfortuately, it's not that kind of lab and we don't have the assays for any of those parameters. The kit I borrowed from the LFS is a JBL kit and doesn't have TDS. Maybe Speights will have an analysis on file. I would think that they would have to.

Maybe I can get an RO unit and tell my wife it is for us to have potable water.

[Feelers]

I would just ask uni for the water, at Canterbury they make heaps of pure water, I'd imagine they would give it to you. I'm gonna be getting my "NSW" from the uni system - they said it was fine - I can just go get it when I want to.

[hazymranch]

I think that's the way to go. Do I go with double distilled or do I need something more filtered like Milli-Q, which is distilled, and then ultra filtered. I would assume that the more pure/filtered the better?

[wasp]

Distilled is fine, long as the coil was not copper.

[hazymranch]

The Milli-Q water is distilled and then de-ionized for use in genetic assays that require ultra-pure water, so that would be best. The rub is that the equipment is bloody dear so they charge money to use the water. That said, I will have to calculate how much it will cost me at my present top-off rate of 1L/day and pit that against buying a RO/DI system.

However, I know where I can get as much double-distilled water as I want for free, but does that remove all of the TDS? The coils are glass as the water is also used in sensitive assays.

[lduncan]

Lab water distillation machines are usually glass from the ones i've seen anyway, so it shouldn't be a problem.

Layton

[JoeBlog]

I would just ask uni for the water, at Canterbury they make heaps of pure water, I'd imagine they would give it to you. I'm gonna be getting my "NSW" from the uni system - they said it was fine - I can just go get it when I want to.

Where at Uni are you getting the water? I work there, so it would be very convenient for me to tap into this source as well.

[Feelers]

Well I havent got any yet- but I asked my marine bio lecturer and he told me to go see some guy - forgot his name, but it was fine. If you ask a lab technician named Jan I think she can show you where. I think there are taps in the 1st 2 floors of the zoo building.

When I go back I'm gonna ask for a tour of the system - 35 000L or something, I didnt get a chance last semester.

[hazymranch]

Lab water distillation machines are usually glass from the ones i've seen anyway, so it shouldn't be a problem.

So double distilled water would be adequate and it wouldn't have to be de-ionized as well?

[Feelers]

I would imagine that distilling would be better than ro/di?

[lduncan]

So double distilled water would be adequate and it wouldn't have to be de-ionized as well?

It's more than adequate. Running it through DI would probably contaminate it :lol:

Layton

[wasp]

Just single distilled water would normally be fine. If the double distilled stuff is free, go with that. I would imagine that following a double distil with DI, would be to remove any gaseous contaminants that made it through the distillation. But those contaminants, in the quantities we would be talking, would not be a concern to us.

[hazymranch]

I have been meaning to get a few pics up but my laptop blew the pooch so posting has been delayed. Alot has changed since the last round of pics.

By way of an update, I have managed to sort out my KH issues by a series of 20% water changes. The KH is now down to 13 from 20 (as of a few days ago) and dropping nicely. As a result of this, the Ca I have been supplementing is becoming soluble and Ca has risen from 180 to 380 and is climbing steadily. Mg has held solidly. I have been getting double distilled water from the Uni to replace evaporative loss. The heat from the MH and this sticky hot weather had my loss at 1L per day (open top) and the wiring of a cooling fan has increased that to 2L a day, but it now keeps the tanks steady at 24.5C. I have also started supplementing iodine this week.

The corals have really responded to the changes. The white xenia has extended its stems and polyps are wide open and pulsing beautifully. The brown xenia is still shorter than it was, but the polyps are more open and also pulsing nicely. The finger leather is growing almost visbly now, and is a far cry from the purple blob it had become. The green zoanthid is still a worry. One or two polyps are partially extended, looking like short eyelashes, but the vast majority have still closed shop and look like individual pipes. The color is mostly brown, but the center of each polyp is a nice fluorescent green. Any suggestion on how to get it to open up? More direct light or flow?

[wasp]

Zooanthids prefer low/med flow, although some will do OK in high flow, and low/med light.

If they are closed up I'd try moving further from the light see what happens. If they are the same as my green ones they like less light than some other zooanthids.

[Control]

Where at Uni are you getting the water? I work there, so it would be very convenient for me to tap into this source as well.

Christchurch has one of the purrist untreated water supplies in the world and it's free, why go to so much trouble.

[hazymranch]

Well, it is a year later and I think it is time for an update. Once I got things somewhat sorted, I came down with a case of MTS and now have 3 marine tanks going.

First, I'll pick up where the thread left off last. My parents were visiting from the US last April so I went on ebay and bought a 6-stage 100 GPD RODI system for $100 US and had my parents mule it here to save on the shipping (insert jokes about swallowing massive baloons filled with filters here). I installed it with a splitter so one goes to the kitchen sink for drinking water and the other line goes under the house right to the tank in the lounge. Once I get it together I will sort out an auto top-off but for now, I just manually do it. I add Kalk to it every other day.

The 34L nano in my son's room is doing brilliantly. I fashioned his name out of paua chips glued to a glass pipet that I melted to form. Technically, this tank is the oldest of the three tanks through several incarnations. The rock, substrate, and fish (Krusty the Klowfish) are the oldest anyway. Coralline covers almost every surface, there is almost no nuisance algae (or wasn't until I let a friend with no experience and fat fingers mind my tanks for 2 weeks) and the rock seems to spout another group of xenia or worm every week. I have a Weipro 4xT5 2ft. fixture over it with 2 actinic blues and 2x15,000K that are on for 11 hours. Some pics from about a month ago (as good as a hack like me can do with a Sony Cybershot):

Last May, my wife noticed that water was pooling under the tank in the lounge. I thought that the tank had cracked somewhere as I could not find a leak elsewhere. So, I took the tank down and as it turns out water was leaking over the top of the glass and under the plastic rim. Another quality Jebo product. The water was getting underneath the tank because the stand was beginning to bow (also jebo) so it was only a matter of time before the whole thing ended up on the lounge floor. Fortunately, the folks from the LFS were taking a marine tank from their house down at the same time and they just gave me the tank, substrate and rock for getting it out of their house. I bought the arcadia 250W MH, prizm skimmer, and eheim professional wet/dry they were running on it for $200. So, I moved everything from the lounge tank into the new tank that I placed in the kitchen. Several 4am nights later I managed to fit all of the rock, corals, and fish in the new tank without a single loss. here is what it looked like after I was done.

I realize it is a giant wall of rock, but I had to fit the lounge rock (darker rocks) as well as the new rock in there. I also bought a few fish from a local guy who took his tank down so the extra rock gave the overcrowded fish plenty of places to hide. Here are some of the critters I had in there at the time:

In september I finally finished building a new stand and canopy for the lounge tank so I moved most of the original rock, all corals that weren't stuck to the remaining rock, and 4 of the fish back to the lounge. This is what the tank in the kitchen looks like now:

Since reducing the bioload and the amount of rock it has really settled down and I am finally on top of the nuisance algae in it. the previous owners had the tank up for at least a year before I got it so the rock is well and truly alive by now. Decent coralline growth and there are scattered mushrooms, zoanthids, colts, star polyps, and xenia flourishing. I am also using it as a frag tank for assorted soft corals and I think I will keep it simple with a few low-light soft corals and mostly fish.

The lounge tank is going to be the real show. Here's a link to the DIY stand and canopy build. Plenty of step-by pics. http://www.hazymranch.com/theshrimpsons/diystandandcanopy.html

here is what the tank looked like after the rebuild. Again, no losses:

I have a pair of Banggai Cardinals, a Flame Angel, and a Green Mandarin in here. I want a shrimp in there ASAP and I think a dottyback or gramma after that will do it. I have one SPS in there now, and it is doing well so I am going to try a few more. I also built and added a closed loop for this tank. It runs on a Laguna 6 and I had it running through a SCWD for a wee while. I have since seen the error of my ways and it is going through a 25mm "T" now. HEAPS of flow in there now as the main CL outlet points right at the sump return and creates a lot of turbulence.

I also added baffles to the sump to reduce the microbubbles and it worked out pretty well. I need to get the refugium up and running again but I need to sort the lighting out. Any recommendations for cheap lighting that macroalgae will love?

That's it for now. I'll get some pics of the closed loop setup as well as how the tank looks now (a month on from the posted photos) as there has been all sorts of new growth as things settle in a spread out a bit. I'm currently battling the hair algae as the tank settles down but it already looks to be receeding.

I still feel like a newbie but at the same time I have learned a lot in the last year and feel like I have it somewhat sorted for now. Thanks again to everyone for their help.

[Drifty]

wow, I think your tanks look great, well done