180 Gallon Glass House

[Higher Thinking]

Big thanks to Cerk for the hookup on equipment and zoas. He gave me a couple ballast, reflectors, and end caps for my future T5 modification I'll be doing on the canopy.

 

Hopefully in the next couple weeks I'll get that all wired together and get some bulbs. Speaking of: If anyone has some 48" bulbs for sale, let me know. Thanks!

 

Here are the zoas courtesy of the cell:

 

Rastas and Ring of Fire

[Higher Thinking]

Well, update time. Due to not quarantining my coral, I now have AEFW. I dipped the incoming coral and then noticed the worms in the dip after placing the coral in the display.

 

I was hoping to be able to keep the worms contained to just the new colonies through twice weekly dips. Well unfortunately that didn't work, as I have them on established pieces now.

 

So time for drastic measures. I know the ideal setup to ensure elimination would be through another complete setup. However, I'm not wanting to risk more stress with new flow, lighting, and potentially inconsistent parameters. So I will pull out all acros, twice a week, and dip them.

 

To help accomplish this, I pulled all encrusted acros off, mounted them to plugs, and then situated them on a single rack. That will allow me to pull them out and dip them all at the same time. I also have four large pieces that will get put through the treatment. I then smashed all encrusted coral.

 

 

 

 

 

It'll basically be a 5 gallon water change twice a week. I'm hoping for the best, but the coral already look pretty stressed out. A lot of them are looking pretty brown and pale. Super lame....

Edited March 7, 2016 by Higher Thinking

[PowderBlue]

Dang that is a bummer. I hope everything works out in your favor

 

Sent from my SM-G928V using Tapatalk

[Paratore]

Been there man:/ Bayer dips every 5 days for a month and a half knocked them right out of my tank! Haven't seen one since! I did have a couple colonies die due to stress from dips though. :/

Good luck with your battle!

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[Exodus]

[language filter] Andrew that sucks! Sorry to see that going on, you know I have been fighting Dinos for over a year now and throwing in the towel myself. You are right quarantine is your safest bet, though I can understand the concern of stressing the corals, wouldn't dipping them twice a week be just as much if not more stressful?

 

I wish you luck, hopefully you can eliminate them.

[Higher Thinking]

[language filter] Andrew that sucks! Sorry to see that going on, you know I have been fighting Dinos for over a year now and throwing in the towel myself. You are right quarantine is your safest bet, though I can understand the concern of stressing the corals, wouldn't dipping them twice a week be just as much if not more stressful?

 

I wish you luck, hopefully you can eliminate them.

Even when they go in their own qt setup, they would still need the same amount of dipping.

[Higher Thinking]

Much like everyone else, I am past due for an update. I'm pretty sure I have defeated the AEFW. I almost killed all my acros, but everything has been moving in the right direction now.

 

I was dipping the corals like normal and I had a heater and small pump running in tub. The water accidentally got a few degrees too warm which I don't think is a huge deal. But when I removed the pump, there was a short in the wire and it was sizzling. I didn't feel any current in the water, but I was grounded so maybe I wouldn't. At any rate, all the acros didn't have any polyp extension for a couple weeks and they proceeded to all turn nearly white. I thought they were all goners.

 

Fast forward a month and everything is coming back around. The coral coloration is not exactly what it was before, but it is WAY better than it was. I've lost one colony and a frag (it got killed by a milli that got pushed up alongside it). I'm not sure what happened with the colony. I have been doing regular inspections and haven't seen any eggs or bite marks.

 

Anyway here are a couple shots of where I'm at. I still have most of the frags on the temp frag rack. I'll place the frags and remove the rack at some point.

 

From left side:

 

From right side:

 

And a couple FTS:

 

 

Edited April 26, 2016 by Higher Thinking

[Higher Thinking]

I went ahead and added three T5s to the canopy. I really appreciate how the bulbs even out the whole display's lighting. I'm confident the bulbs are improving the SPS coloration as well.

 

I was going to go with four bulbs, but I just didn't have enough room to cutout that much, plus still be able to hold up the LEDs. Here is what it looks like now:

 

 

 

[Higher Thinking]

Not only are my photos all from my phone, they are from my phone which has a terrible camera. So hopefully everything is at least acceptable quality. Here are a few updates on tank inhabitants:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[HyphyMike]

Very nice looking tank. Sweet hybrid lighting! Thats a huge colony you got there, not sure if its a favia or something completely different

[Higher Thinking]

Very nice looking tank. Sweet hybrid lighting! Thats a huge colony you got there, not sure if its a favia or something completely different

Yeah, it's a war favia. I've had that piece for a couple years. Thanks!

[albertareef]

Looking great Andrew!  Lots of nice colonies in there and seems like they are growing well.  Thanks for the update.

[youcallmenny]

That's awesome!  I love the t5 supplementation. That's crazy about potentially electrocuting some corals.  Glad everything is doing well.

[badxgillen]

Tank is looking bomb man, some killer progress in the light build and some good growth going in all those corals. That purple cap is getting out of hand. After looking at this I am thinking I might dig out a T-5 to supplement my main tank here just for fun, can't hurt right? Fill in some of those light "gaps" so to speak.