Mr. Microscope
Member
Thanks chgoblknazn! How do you pronounce your name BTW? I keep wanting to say chigz. LOL, just looked up chigz in the urban dictionary, "A cool laid back person, smooth, and very cunning." Maybe you should change it.
Mr. Microscope's 25 Gallon Cube
- Thread starter Mr. Microscope
- Start date
Mr. Microscope
Member
Thanks Smitty! I figure in addition to keeping phosphates down, it will help with pH, O2, and generally help to keep the tank at a lower nutrient load.
Mr. Microscope
Member
Will do Cubbies. Thanks!
poidog
Active member
Get that macro out of there! It will over run that little tank in no time, and that Grape you'll never be able to get out. There is no such thing as a controllable grape caulerpa. If you want to use macro to control in the display, you can put chaeto in there as it does not root on to anything.
Your tank is small enough were you can treat the byropisis easily with some Kent Tech-M. I have some for you if you want to do that route. You can spot treat large areas of the byropsis and you'll watch it melt in front of your eyes.
Your tank is small enough were you can treat the byropisis easily with some Kent Tech-M. I have some for you if you want to do that route. You can spot treat large areas of the byropsis and you'll watch it melt in front of your eyes.
Mr. Microscope
Member
Hmm..I'd give it a shot. I'd love to kill it all. How do you spot treat? Turn off all pumps and use a pipette? Thanks Eric!
poidog
Active member
Yep, you still treat the whole tank, but the spot treating melts it away faster.
KeishaKornbread
Banned
Have you beaten the byropisis ?
Mr. Microscope
Member
Hello there! Thanks for asking. I've been meaning to update lately. I've made quite a few changes to my tank lately including a new fish and the addition of a skimmer. The bryopsis turned out to be hair algae. It got a bit worse, but I've beaten it back considerably. I got really frustrated one night and just scrubbed the hell out of my rocks. I figured it was probably a bad idea and that it would just spread it around, but it's actually stayed at bay. I'm doing frequent 20% water changes and minimizing feedings. The only areas where it's really held in is where I can't really get to it like next to a sensitive coral or something. The battle continues, but will be won in turn! Pics soon!
Mr. Microscope
Member
Update 2012.06.05
Hell All!
This update is long overdue! What can I say? Life is busy for a new dad. I got out a better camera for this update. 'Gotta start with a new FTS FTW!
New fish!
I got this little beauty from DiversDen. It’s a four-line wrasse. I really like to colors of this guy. The fins have a kind of royal purple hew from the right angle. He started out eating only frozen, but now he’s into pellets too. It swims in more areas of that tank than my clowns or bangaii do. It’s fun to watch him go in and out of the rocks.
Here's couple more candid shots with the four-line.
You can see in this pic that I moved my red cap monti down to the bottom. There it stays.
Fan/power
I was tired of there being a million cords behind my stand. Also, I had a Tupperware box that I made to accommodate my power strips that sat on the side. Ugly, ugly, ugly! I salvaged a couple 12 volt fans from a piece old lab equipment that was going to get junked. I drilled another hold in the back of my stand and installed one of them blowing out as exhaust. I was then able to move the power strips inside the stand. I still have a few cords hang out the back, but it looks a heck of a lot better than it did.
Skimmer
Special thanks to member, “floppybass“, I now have a protein skimmer! A Bubble Magus NAC3. It’s working like a charm! ‘Pulling out tons of crap! I clean it about once a week.
To make room for the new skimmer, I moved my fuge to an area in my sump that I built for a smaller skimmer.
New coral placement
In addition to moving the monti cap, I’ve mounted quite a few more of my corals. I put several zoas up top as well as mounting my Vivid Rainbow Acro that has about fully encrusted it’s plug. It’s an intense lime green right now, but I’m also starting to see some purple in it.
Battling Algae!
My porcelain crab molted a while back, but I don’t think he survived it. As a result, I had a huge outbreak of hair algae. It took me a while to figure out that this was the cause of it. My SPS browned out, stopped growing, and in a few cases started to recede (STN). This was about a month ago. Since then, I’ve been working hard to get rid of it. This has been my strategy:
And a couple shots from the sides:
The rock pillar is coloring up!
After scrubbing the algae away from my rock pillar, I noticed that my rock is really starting to color up! There are lots of patches of pink, purple, and red coralline. It’s like watching another coral growing. Fun fun!
LED canopy with hinges and new mesh top
When I first put up my LED build, I had it resting on some clear acrylic about 9 inches from the water. This left us practically blinded while sitting on the couch. As a stop gap measure, I cut up some pieces of cardboard as light blockers. Again..ugly, ugly, UGLY!
As a solution, I ordered some sign white opaque acrylic cut to size and attached it with some nice looking hinges. I now have light blockers that match the white acrylic of my setup. It really cleaned up the look. The hinges make maintenance easy as well.
You can see here that I've also added a mesh top. At first I didn't think it would be necessary, but I have heard a few splashes since adding the four-line wrasse. Hopefully, it will prevent any carpet surfing. Thanks poidog for helping me build it..er building it for me!
MP10 upgrade and short pulse with wave
I was running the old blue MP10 controller, but I came upon a great deal for the newer Ecosmart controller. The additional features are kinda neat. I used to run my MP10 in Reef Crest mode 24/7. Now, I’m playing around with the short pulse. I’ve found a good balance and have the water rocking really well. Not quite a wave, but probably the best I can do considering the height of my overflow and the fact that the tank is a cube and not rectangular. Check out this video.
No new corals, but new stuff to come on Father’s day!
So, I still haven’t added any corals since my last update. I got these pink guys a few months ago and fragged the colony a while back.
They came from a very low light tank. So, I’ve been slowly raising them up the side of the tank. Once I reach the top, I think I may add them to the display, minus the frag plugs. I was originally planning to sell them and I still might, but they’re starting to grow on me as they get better and better color. What do you think? Should I keep them? Long story short, nothing new in the tank coral wise.
I haven’t really had the time or money to invest in new corals these past few months. However, for Father’s day, my wife is going to take me to my favorite LFS and let me get a few pieces. I’ve been fantasizing about it for weeks already! I can’t wait! Hopefully, they’ll have a sale going on.
That's it for now!
Mr. M out..
Hell All!
This update is long overdue! What can I say? Life is busy for a new dad. I got out a better camera for this update. 'Gotta start with a new FTS FTW!
New fish!
I got this little beauty from DiversDen. It’s a four-line wrasse. I really like to colors of this guy. The fins have a kind of royal purple hew from the right angle. He started out eating only frozen, but now he’s into pellets too. It swims in more areas of that tank than my clowns or bangaii do. It’s fun to watch him go in and out of the rocks.
Here's couple more candid shots with the four-line.
You can see in this pic that I moved my red cap monti down to the bottom. There it stays.
Fan/power
I was tired of there being a million cords behind my stand. Also, I had a Tupperware box that I made to accommodate my power strips that sat on the side. Ugly, ugly, ugly! I salvaged a couple 12 volt fans from a piece old lab equipment that was going to get junked. I drilled another hold in the back of my stand and installed one of them blowing out as exhaust. I was then able to move the power strips inside the stand. I still have a few cords hang out the back, but it looks a heck of a lot better than it did.
Skimmer
Special thanks to member, “floppybass“, I now have a protein skimmer! A Bubble Magus NAC3. It’s working like a charm! ‘Pulling out tons of crap! I clean it about once a week.
To make room for the new skimmer, I moved my fuge to an area in my sump that I built for a smaller skimmer.
New coral placement
In addition to moving the monti cap, I’ve mounted quite a few more of my corals. I put several zoas up top as well as mounting my Vivid Rainbow Acro that has about fully encrusted it’s plug. It’s an intense lime green right now, but I’m also starting to see some purple in it.
Battling Algae!
My porcelain crab molted a while back, but I don’t think he survived it. As a result, I had a huge outbreak of hair algae. It took me a while to figure out that this was the cause of it. My SPS browned out, stopped growing, and in a few cases started to recede (STN). This was about a month ago. Since then, I’ve been working hard to get rid of it. This has been my strategy:
- Added protein skimmer
- Increased water changes -> 15-20% once or twice a week.
- Less feeding -> Still daily feeding, but frozen every second or third day instead of daily. Sorry bangaii! (he only eats frozen). Most days, it’s just pellets and I make sure the fish get almost all of them.
- Replaced Chemi-Pure Elite with a fresh bag
- Scrubb-scrubb-scrubbing the rocks with a toothbrush (this seems to actually work rather than spreading it around. I guess my flow, overflow, and return are fast enough to get it out before it settles in.
- Manual removal with some fine and course tweezers for the bigger patches.
- And finally, Mexican turbos!
And a couple shots from the sides:
The rock pillar is coloring up!
After scrubbing the algae away from my rock pillar, I noticed that my rock is really starting to color up! There are lots of patches of pink, purple, and red coralline. It’s like watching another coral growing. Fun fun!
LED canopy with hinges and new mesh top
When I first put up my LED build, I had it resting on some clear acrylic about 9 inches from the water. This left us practically blinded while sitting on the couch. As a stop gap measure, I cut up some pieces of cardboard as light blockers. Again..ugly, ugly, UGLY!
As a solution, I ordered some sign white opaque acrylic cut to size and attached it with some nice looking hinges. I now have light blockers that match the white acrylic of my setup. It really cleaned up the look. The hinges make maintenance easy as well.
MP10 upgrade and short pulse with wave
I was running the old blue MP10 controller, but I came upon a great deal for the newer Ecosmart controller. The additional features are kinda neat. I used to run my MP10 in Reef Crest mode 24/7. Now, I’m playing around with the short pulse. I’ve found a good balance and have the water rocking really well. Not quite a wave, but probably the best I can do considering the height of my overflow and the fact that the tank is a cube and not rectangular. Check out this video.
No new corals, but new stuff to come on Father’s day!
So, I still haven’t added any corals since my last update. I got these pink guys a few months ago and fragged the colony a while back.
They came from a very low light tank. So, I’ve been slowly raising them up the side of the tank. Once I reach the top, I think I may add them to the display, minus the frag plugs. I was originally planning to sell them and I still might, but they’re starting to grow on me as they get better and better color. What do you think? Should I keep them? Long story short, nothing new in the tank coral wise.
I haven’t really had the time or money to invest in new corals these past few months. However, for Father’s day, my wife is going to take me to my favorite LFS and let me get a few pieces. I’ve been fantasizing about it for weeks already! I can’t wait! Hopefully, they’ll have a sale going on.
That's it for now!
Mr. M out..
Mr. Microscope
Member
Happy Father's Day all!
I hope you've all had a great weekend! Now that I'm a dad, I rarely get new corals anymore. So, for Father's Day, I requested a trip to my favorite LFS. The whole family came and we had a lot of fun. It was like Christmas! I feel I made out pretty well.
Here's my haul!
To start out, I got this amazing torch. Unfortunately, the pic doesn't do it justice. It has yellow metallic tentacles and pink tips. The yellow really looks amazing under blue LED's. I'm especially excited about this piece because it fits in the spot that I actually built in my rock pillar for a torch. See my original pillar coral layout plan here.
Second, I found a little orange fungia. At the store it looked all orange, but in my lights it has purple tentacles and a slight purple rim around the edges. I went to the store wanting bigger corals, but I've always wanted one of these. So, I bit down.
Lastly, I got this nice big deepwater SPS. I think it's called an anapora. I'm not sure how it's going to color up, but it's pink and white right now. It's in photoacclimation, but will go on the top with all the other SPS in a few weeks.
As a bonus, a friend won a free $10 frag and gave me the ticket. I picked out this Blasto frag.
I also won some free Astria snails. I'm not a big fan of them since they can't right themselves when upturned, but they seem to be doing a good job cleaning so far. 'Guess I'll keep them for the time being.
That was it. Time for a little update. I realized i haven't posted much about my acans yet. They're doing amazing in my tank. They started out with only two polyps when I first got them.
(Lower right pic)
Last time I counted there were fifteen. Nine of those grew in just the last three months! Here some oohs-and-ahhs under RB LED's.
That's it for now!
I hope you've all had a great weekend! Now that I'm a dad, I rarely get new corals anymore. So, for Father's Day, I requested a trip to my favorite LFS. The whole family came and we had a lot of fun. It was like Christmas! I feel I made out pretty well.
Here's my haul!
To start out, I got this amazing torch. Unfortunately, the pic doesn't do it justice. It has yellow metallic tentacles and pink tips. The yellow really looks amazing under blue LED's. I'm especially excited about this piece because it fits in the spot that I actually built in my rock pillar for a torch. See my original pillar coral layout plan here.
Second, I found a little orange fungia. At the store it looked all orange, but in my lights it has purple tentacles and a slight purple rim around the edges. I went to the store wanting bigger corals, but I've always wanted one of these. So, I bit down.
Lastly, I got this nice big deepwater SPS. I think it's called an anapora. I'm not sure how it's going to color up, but it's pink and white right now. It's in photoacclimation, but will go on the top with all the other SPS in a few weeks.
As a bonus, a friend won a free $10 frag and gave me the ticket. I picked out this Blasto frag.
I also won some free Astria snails. I'm not a big fan of them since they can't right themselves when upturned, but they seem to be doing a good job cleaning so far. 'Guess I'll keep them for the time being.
That was it. Time for a little update. I realized i haven't posted much about my acans yet. They're doing amazing in my tank. They started out with only two polyps when I first got them.
(Lower right pic)
Last time I counted there were fifteen. Nine of those grew in just the last three months! Here some oohs-and-ahhs under RB LED's.
That's it for now!
Mr. Microscope
Member
I took a few shots with the blue LEDs on tonight. Recently, I mounted all those pink zoas. Most of them are on the pillar now, but I decided to expand to the overflow. I'll be putting SPS on the back wall as well as zoas. It's going to be a fun new rock scaping project.
Some more zoas up close (Pinks, Zombie Eyes, Organisms)
Just for fun..Yumas!
Some more zoas up close (Pinks, Zombie Eyes, Organisms)
Just for fun..Yumas!
KeishaKornbread
Banned
Nice pics!!!
RedDevil.258
Active member
Great looking Reef Tank!
Mr. Microscope
Member
Thanks Smitty! I've got the new SPS about half way up the tank now. For light acclimation, I just put the whole piece on my BlackRockReef frag rack. When I get to the top it'll get mounted up there. Unfortunately, my blasto was half eaten/stun by a favia that it fell on. It's looking pretty sad right now, but maybe it'll recover.
Thanks Keisha! It's a challenge to shoot with LED's. I've got to photoshop the images to make them look true to life. Even then, they're still blue a all get-up. But i try to ignore the background and just focus on the colors of the corals.
Thanks RedD! Today, the reef is officially 4 months old since the day it got wet with SW for the first time. I can't wait to see how it looks in a year. Hopefully, we won't loose power on one of these crazy hot days. I have no battery backup.
Mr. Microscope
Member
Water Change!
