theJenchild Posted June 23, 2008 Share Posted June 23, 2008 Hey everyone! Like many folks on here I am new to the world of marine aquariums. I kept FW tanks for quite some time, and recently ventured into a reef tank. For my graduation from college I received a 15.5 all-in-one cube made by pacific coast. It has already been a bit of an adventure! Currently the tank is lit by PC bulbs that came stock in the hood. It has about 30 lbs live sand, and about 15 lbs LR. I am not planning to run a skimmer quite yet, and I am waiting to decide if I will run a sump. The configuration of the hood won't allow me to have an overflow box, but if I switch to a sunpod metal halide, then I will be removing the hood anyways and will be adding a sump (maybe a protein skimmer as well). My plan for this tank is to have primarily soft corals, mostly zoanthids and mushrooms. I'd really love to have xenia and GSPs as well. I do not have any plans for fish at this stage, but may be interested in a pair of green banded gobies. That is really far in the future though! I am in the middle of my cycle and am not planning to add animals until late in July. Any suggestions are welcomed. I'm excited to be part of the community here at PNWMAS. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dsoz Posted June 24, 2008 Share Posted June 24, 2008 Welcome to the addiction! And welcome to the club. The tank looks nice. I like the open cave look, and there are lots of flat places to add coral frags. If you every come up to the portland area, I can give you some xenia. I can't help you too much with the GSP because they do not grow well in my tank. Go figure, they are weeds for most people, and I can't keep them... ??? Even though you are in the middle of your cycle, there is a guy in Corvallis that is selling off frags. You may be able to get by with getting some GSP and putting it in your tank anyway. It may survive the cycle. Or you can ask him to hold some for you for the time it takes for your tank to cycle. It is too bad that you missed the meeting yesterday up here in portland. We had a big-name speaker come in and talk to the group. It was a lot of fun, and there were a lot of people there. Next time there is a meeting, ask around to see if you can car-pool to it. It would be great to meet you in person. dsoz Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
theJenchild Posted June 24, 2008 Author Share Posted June 24, 2008 Wow dsoz! That's really nice of you to offer, and once my cycle in finished I will absolutely take you up on it! Where are the meetings usually held? I make it up to the OC/Portland area on a semi-frequent basis. I have a few friends up there that I come up to see. It'd be great to meet other marine keepers! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
biomekanic Posted June 24, 2008 Share Posted June 24, 2008 Nice tank Watch out with GSP and Xenia though, they can grow like weeds and overrun other things in your tank. I would definately advise running a skimmer, even a little air driven model can help ( plus you can run ozone through it. Must mention ozone or Bob Fenner will come after me. ) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
theJenchild Posted June 24, 2008 Author Share Posted June 24, 2008 Nice tank Watch out with GSP and Xenia though, they can grow like weeds and overrun other things in your tank. I would definately advise running a skimmer, even a little air driven model can help ( plus you can run ozone through it. Must mention ozone or Bob Fenner will come after me. ) My logic with the gsp and xenia was that I could frag them when they started to get too big. I'm still tossing species ideas around, it'll be at least a month before I add any corals. I just saw yellow colony polyps and am interested in learning more about them.... At the risk of sounding like a goober, I'm gonna ask what ozone is? Also, do you have any ideas as to what model protein skimmer would be good for this size tank? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
biomekanic Posted June 25, 2008 Share Posted June 25, 2008 That is true about Xenia and GSP. I have an AquaC Remora, and it pulls a lot out of my tank. It's a down draft model. Ozone... I'd advise reading this: http://www.wetwebmedia.com/ozonefaqs.htm Bob is a big believer in ozone. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mister crabs Posted June 25, 2008 Share Posted June 25, 2008 dont overfeed and keep up on your water changes and you wont need a skimmer. Most skinmmers that fit a tank of that size (with the exveption of the tunze nano skimmer) are not worth a crap anyhow. its hard to get good skimming with limited size cuz you got no room for bubbles with a small reaction chamber and little or no bubbles equals little or no skimming. looking good so far. I will be moving to the lebanon area in a couple months and have some nice green mushrooms, kenya tree, and maybe some zoos to get you started. good luck. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
spectra Posted June 29, 2008 Share Posted June 29, 2008 Good looking start(rock2) Is that a Nano Koralia? If so how do you like the flow or can you tell? Am looking at getting one for the sons AP. Keep the pics coming:D Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kevinmc Posted June 30, 2008 Share Posted June 30, 2008 Thank you for visting and posting on PNWMAS. We are always happy to have new marine hobbiest posting to help keep our site active with full of new interests. We invite you to take part in our events as well as local in home club meeting. Our club also will be having local Meet and Greets where you will have the opportunity to meet face to face with our members and participant in a monthly get together. Please make yourself a home as we are a local marine club that is here to assist you at a local level. We look forward to meeting you. Thank you in advance. Kevin Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dsoz Posted June 30, 2008 Share Posted June 30, 2008 No problem with the offer for xenia. PM me when you plan on being in the area, and you can come on over for some. Have you been to www.nano-reef.com ??? While PNWMAS is my home, I also go to NR to get ideas. It is designed for the nano tank (less than 30 gallons). There are a lot of good ideas on what to do with an all-in-one. Also a lot of good advice on how to stock it. dsoz Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
theJenchild Posted June 30, 2008 Author Share Posted June 30, 2008 Good looking start(rock2) Is that a Nano Koralia? If so how do you like the flow or can you tell? Am looking at getting one for the sons AP. Keep the pics coming:D So far I really like the koralia nano. I don't have any livestock in there yet though, just LR. It produces a lot of flow and I LOVE the magnet mounting system....super convenient. dsoz, I practically live at NR! I actually just set it as my home page. Its an awesome website. Quick question, looks like I'm having an outbreak of ball anemone in my tank. Its definitely not apitasia, and there's like 8 of them on one rock. Should I Joe's Juice these buggers? Will a peppermint shrimp eat them? Would it be easier to just get rid of the rock? I think I have to do something quick since there's ALOT of them. Thanks for any advice! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dsoz Posted June 30, 2008 Share Posted June 30, 2008 Are they mojano anemones? If so, use nuclear bombs on them. It may do the trick. Short of that, use Joe's Juice, Kalk paste, boiling lemon juice, etc. If there is nothing else living on that rock, you may want to just take it out of your tank for a few weeks and let it dry out. Then re-cycle it in a bucket of salt water and a powerhead. There are not many sure ways to kill mojano anemones. dsoz Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
undrtkr_00 Posted June 30, 2008 Share Posted June 30, 2008 If there is nothing else living on that rock, you may want to just take it out of your tank for a few weeks and let it dry out. dsoz I'm with Dennis on this one... since you are just getting started, you might as well pull them out and kill them for sure right now. The various other treatments seem to have limited success. Also, if you are a firebug, you could try Andy's approach to Aiptasia anenomes! (flame)(flame)(flame)(flame)(flame) I'm fairly sure that flames will work to kill pretty much any kind of anenome, worm, sponge, coral, clam, fish, snail, insect, reptile, mammal, etc. if you expose them long enough. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dsoz Posted June 30, 2008 Share Posted June 30, 2008 I'm fairly sure that flames will work to kill pretty much any kind of anenome, worm, sponge, coral, clam, fish, snail, insect, reptile, mammal, etc. if you expose them long enough. Not always true. Someone over on NR.com used Andy's approach on some xenia that would not go away, and it still came back to life... Some people can't grow it, some people can't get rid of it. LOL dsoz Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
theJenchild Posted July 1, 2008 Author Share Posted July 1, 2008 I don't think they're majano anemones. The tentacles are clear and have a tiny white ball on the tip of them. They are nocturnal and only extend at night. Seems that they're reproducing like bunnies though, so I gotta do something major tonight or tomorrow night. I'm thinking that I might just buy a different piece of LR for the spot that that one has and replace it. In fact, I might do that now.......I don't want them to spread to the other "healthy" pieces....... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dsoz Posted July 1, 2008 Share Posted July 1, 2008 Are the bodies red/orange color? Then they may be a strawberry anemone, or an orange ball anemone. Corinacties, or pseudocorinacties (or something like that). I will look up a thread that I had earlier on them. Not a bad find, but if you feed them, they can get large, and can catch and eat fish. Here is my thread from NR. Skip to post #6, and follow that link. Good luck with it. Mine are all gone as far as I can tell. dsoz EDIT: forgot the link http://www.nano-reef.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=116588&hl= Thanks Mike Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
biomekanic Posted July 1, 2008 Share Posted July 1, 2008 <_< >_> Psst, dsoz... the link is missing. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Miniwhinny Posted July 2, 2008 Share Posted July 2, 2008 Welcome to the addiction from Central Oregon. I like your rock work, it's going to look even better as it gets stocked. I'm sorry but there's no known cure for this habit DOH!(whistle) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
theJenchild Posted July 2, 2008 Author Share Posted July 2, 2008 Well, as per normal in my world, I got an idea into my head and went with it. I just completely re-did all of my rockwork because I decided to "cull" the piece of LR that had the scary anemone guys on it. Apparently they were spreading a whole lot faster than I expected because I found a few tiny ones on some of the rocks that I ended up leaving in. A few minutes with a butane lighter and they went "snap crackle and pop." Lets hope that the anem problem is over with. The tank looks really different, but I think it'll work out nicely. Thanks a bunch to Jason at coral reef. The rocks are awesome, and you guys are hilarious. I'll have photos up shortly of the new rock-scape and a pretty darned sweet "hitch-hiker." Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
theJenchild Posted July 2, 2008 Author Share Posted July 2, 2008 As promised, here's the photos of the new scape. I think its still going to be changing a little as my "hitch-hiker" isn't going to like that location when I upgrade to metal halide (70w sunpod is in the mail....(dancing)). Either way, sweetest hitch-hiker EVER (granted, these rocks came from an established tank....but I like it better that way! More cool stuff, less bad stuff). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mister crabs Posted July 2, 2008 Share Posted July 2, 2008 love the aquascaping. As for the mushroom not liking MH, If you acclimate the tank carefully (start with a short light period and gradually increase) then He will love the MH and soon you will be giving the baby shrooms away. I have a rock of green shrooms about 8" under a 175 MH and they reproduce like crazy. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
stylaster Posted July 3, 2008 Share Posted July 3, 2008 i have that same 70 watt halide i use to keep chalices and acans, the shrooms that are in the tank right under the light do just fine, just give it time to acclimate to the new light and it will do fine Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
spectra Posted July 3, 2008 Share Posted July 3, 2008 What type of light did you go with? A DIY or one made for the nano? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
180Brandy Posted July 3, 2008 Share Posted July 3, 2008 I like your aqua scape!!!! And welcome to the club! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
theJenchild Posted July 3, 2008 Author Share Posted July 3, 2008 What type of light did you go with? A DIY or one made for the nano? I bought a 16" sunpod after I measured the top of my tank. With the legs it should fit perfectly. Now I just have to figure out how to remove the existing top without A. breaking it, or B. sloshing water all over my bedroom carpet. I had a minor scare last night, I heard a clicking coming from the general vicinity of the tank! (scary) I started having nightmares of a mantis shrimp, so I took my handy dandy flash light over to have a look. Turns out it was just my dog crunching on a dried out bone. *phew* Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Join the conversation
You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.
Note: Your post will require moderator approval before it will be visible.