AquaticEngineer Posted November 24, 2010 Author Share Posted November 24, 2010 Once I get the final pieces cut for the false bottom of the cube tank all the heavily fed animals will be going in that tank since it has a refrigerated auto feeder (copied from your design ) on it. I ended up putting the auto feeder on a closed loop by itself, so when the tank is not being fed there will be quite a bit of flow, but while being fed it will cut down to about half flow. The intake for the closed loop is on the very bottom of tank below the false bottom so all the detritus and food that settles to the bottom will be pulled in and cycled back into the water column. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AquaticEngineer Posted November 24, 2010 Author Share Posted November 24, 2010 As for the eel grass....I grew eel grass for about a year before I tired of it. It is fairly easy to grow...but, the problem is....that the conditions necessary to grow the eel grass also are the conditions necessary for nuisance algae. I was constantly battling nuisance algae growing on the eel grass (same with kelp) and killing it off. Perhaps I should try again since my current system is much more capable of nutrient control. The eel grass is very attractive. Hopefully its such a small tank I am growing it in that it wont be much of a problem. I'm going to move over some of the snails I have in the big tank that were meant to be a food source for the starfish over into the eelgrass tank and see how they do with algae. I'm also trying out a semi aquatic plant that grows in estuaries and tidal marshes. We'll see if it survives long enough for me to get the tank I want to put it in made and plumbed into the system. If not, I found a place in the UK that sells a similar species for dirt cheap. I can always go back and actually dig up a whole plant with roots and sand and bring it back instead of just clippings too.(laugh) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gill Posted November 26, 2010 Share Posted November 26, 2010 Did you catch the fish? He is super cool!!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AquaticEngineer Posted November 27, 2010 Author Share Posted November 27, 2010 Did you catch the fish? He is super cool!!! Yup....with my bare hands I got 5 of them total, they are a species of tidal sculpin. Cant remember the name right now, but the 4 larger ones I caught are difinately getting frisky with each other. Looks like I have 2 males and 2 females, and the males are fighting over the same female. Might have to seperate them since they manage to find eachother even in a 110 gallon. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AquaticEngineer Posted November 27, 2010 Author Share Posted November 27, 2010 Thought I would share a quick video I shot the other night of my tank. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AquaticEngineer Posted December 28, 2010 Author Share Posted December 28, 2010 OK, so this throws another nice twist into my plans for a custom built acrylic coldwater tank. The guy I bought my 110 Marineland tank from is a commercial recycler and just called me to see if I was interested in another one. I told him depending on price and condition that it was in I would be interested, and if not me I know a few people who might be I'm not really sure what I'll do with it other than set it up right next to my other one and use them both as display sumps in the garage for the indoor tank, but hell that'd be cool too B) If I buy this it'll stall the custom build by a few months, but in the end I think it will be much better having 220 gallons of sump, with 2x3/4 horse chillers 2xUV filters, 2xskimmers, 2x mechanical filtration on my system. What do you guys think? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AquaticEngineer Posted February 27, 2011 Author Share Posted February 27, 2011 Pics with the LED strip lights on the tank. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AquaticEngineer Posted February 27, 2011 Author Share Posted February 27, 2011 Few more pics Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheGooseWhisperer Posted February 27, 2011 Share Posted February 27, 2011 Really pretty setup. Can you get a top down view on this tank? What and how often do you have to feed the stars? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AquaticEngineer Posted February 27, 2011 Author Share Posted February 27, 2011 I think I have some old top down photos I can post up real quick. The bat stars I feed small bay scallops every couple days or when ever I see them begging for food at the top of the tank The ochre stars get to cruise around the tank and eat snails as the find them. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AquaticEngineer Posted April 1, 2011 Author Share Posted April 1, 2011 Thought I would give you guys a picture update of my tank, all the starfish and the gorgonians in here I have had since November of last year. Most of the anemones and the Corynactis I've had since July of last year. Here's a couple pics of my orange Ochre Star eating snails from the market. Picture to show you the size of the Bat Stars and Ochre Stars, I got big hands too. My abalone with my finger in the shot for size reference. My slowly growing strawberry fields Gorgonians Anemones Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
impur Posted April 1, 2011 Share Posted April 1, 2011 Very cool its coming along nicely!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Drew Posted April 2, 2011 Share Posted April 2, 2011 Dark tank or lights just off? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AquaticEngineer Posted April 2, 2011 Author Share Posted April 2, 2011 Dark tank or lights just off? Very dimly lit tank, it only has a couple of waterproof LED setups angled from each end towards the middle and one of them went out the other day :( Nothing in the tank is photosynthetic so lighting is just for when I want to see whats in there Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AquaticEngineer Posted April 14, 2011 Author Share Posted April 14, 2011 Stopped by a local seafood market and picked up 6 live spot prawns for $4.95 Got em drip acclimated and in the tank but they are all still getting used to the new surroundings. I'll snap some pics of mine tomorrow, but in case you don't know what these are here is some images I pulled off of google. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheGooseWhisperer Posted April 21, 2011 Share Posted April 21, 2011 spot prawns...yummy! oh i mean, beautiful:) Are they making it in the tank? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AquaticEngineer Posted April 21, 2011 Author Share Posted April 21, 2011 spot prawns...yummy! oh i mean' date=' beautiful:) Are they making it in the tank?[/quote'] Yeah I bought 6 of them and 3 died due to handling. You have to be very specific when telling them what you want them for so they dont just grab them and crush their legs and bodys as they toss them in the bag. But the 3 I still have are doing awesome Just brought back a ton of stuff from the coast yesterday, here's a quick list of things we got: 3 different colors of Rock Sculpin 1 large different type of sculpin unlike the rock sculpins ( need to grab my book and ID him) 2 Large Green Rock Gunnels ( Which may be a male and female because we did see lots of baby gunnels so small they were still clear with just yellow eyes and less than an inch long) Purple Urchins Aggregating Anemones Green Anemones 2 Varietys of Orange Hyrdroids ( the ones the opalescent nudbranchs eat, we watched them eat some and found a lot of them laying eggs within the hydroids) 3 colors of Ochre stars in varying sizes Kelp Crabs 3 color varients of chitons Several Large feather duster tube worms Different Algaes and seagrass' Hell I'll have to go home and take an inventory, the only thing we didnt get some of that we found where the several different colors of sponge from black to green, yellow to orange, and bright red. Left them there since we didnt know for sure if we could keep them alive longe term. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheGooseWhisperer Posted April 21, 2011 Share Posted April 21, 2011 Wow! How much livestock can you keep in a temperate tank?!? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AquaticEngineer Posted April 21, 2011 Author Share Posted April 21, 2011 As much as I want Seriously though, It depends on what your keeping. I only have 4 fish in the entire main tank right now, so the bioload is pretty minimal. The majority of the livestock is small inverts and anemones really. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
drunkreefer Posted April 22, 2011 Share Posted April 22, 2011 you need to post the lame pictures of us hahaha cant wait to get my share of livestock in my tank! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AquaticEngineer Posted April 22, 2011 Author Share Posted April 22, 2011 you need to post the lame pictures of us hahaha cant wait to get my share of livestock in my tank! You must mean these AWESOME PICTURES right? I think its funny that we didnt even think to take pictures because we were to excited to get down there, lol. That's right, I'm the most hardcore tidepooler on this BEACH!!! lol. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AquaticEngineer Posted April 23, 2011 Author Share Posted April 23, 2011 So now that I have both of my 110's up and running, I've decided to make one of them a NPS deepwater biotope and the other a tidal Oregon Coast biotope. There is a little bit of cross over in some of the inhabitants but not much. This'll give me a few more options on livestock and tank design. They will still be used eventually as the powerplants for filtration and cooling on the indoor tank. Oh yeah, and the monster display tank inside the house will still be the pylon idea Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AquaticEngineer Posted April 28, 2011 Author Share Posted April 28, 2011 So I was feeding tonight and I saw the Fringehead pop out and grab some food, he's alive still !!! I finished up my 50w LED project tonight and used it to for lighting to get some shots of the tank. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Drew Posted April 28, 2011 Share Posted April 28, 2011 Thanks for the pictures! Always nice to see some cold water setups. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
reefboy Posted April 28, 2011 Share Posted April 28, 2011 too cool I will know who to hit up for advice when I do mine Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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