good to hear Catherine, I will make ya a deal once i'm back from Afghanistan if you are looking for a bigger tank you come down to manitoba and I will give you my 120 gal with tank and stand if you want too.

If ya want too. since I will have my cube going I hope by then .....next summer once I get back but your going to have to give me ahand to load the other tank...

What do you think your snapper pumps head loss is with that manifold you built? I am thinging of doing something similar, though maybe half around tank instead of full. But my overflow is 1300-1600 gph...so i might need to go up to a dart...just trying..quite unsuccesfully to do the numbers in my head.

:lol: :mrgreen: I would love another larger tank!

I love it, aside from the leaking problem. The headloss isn't all that bad, but now that the system is up and running and the rocks are in the system, I could have gone to a Dart.

The manifold works well for two reasons; it provides a lot of flow throughout the tank, and not just in a few areas, and its adjustable. The downside so far though is that the lockline is causing some shadowing, but I think that is more of a lighting issue then anything.

If you can, go for the Dart. You can always choke it back with no harm to the pump. Is this for your big system you just bought? Is it in Didsbury? We are coming out through Didsbury on the 26th!

Yep its for the big system. I was going to go with a mag 18 for a return, but then i would need to plug up the bulkheads in the sump. I figure about 4-5 feet vertical and maybe 2 feet horizontal for head loss. I was thinking the snapper, but was afraid it would be cut back to much with a manifold. The sump has a bulkhead very near or the same as the inlet size on the dart/snapper so figured it would be easy, plus i like the energy ratings of the snapper. So many choices....but for 171 vs 234 at jl it mkes it even harder to decide. I've heard good things about both pumps...but i think with the head loss the mag would be underpowered. I have also decided to not really utilize the baffles in my sump and to fill the water over them. I think to much of the sump is wsted withthe heaght of the baffles that are in it now. I have to work boxing day :(
Now i hafta run out and get some epoxy to finish up my stand. Good christmas project :)





EDIT: I cannot spell, I aplogize but i don't feel much like fixing the inumerable errors...

I understood what you were saying, so errors or not, it doesn't matter. Sorry about having to work Boxing Day, that does suck. Maybe with that setup look at the Dart. I know the purchase costs between the two are just $5-10 apart. From what it sounds like I would probably go with a Dart on the system you described.

You should start your own tank journal, with photos! Then we can all watch the progress.

I was just looking at your webpage Catherine. Have you thought about the black sand that you had in your tank, caused the bloom of algae

Yeah I looked into it. I can safely rule it out now though. I still have GHA and I have no sand. That sucks though. I do however have a better idea considering I moved and some parameters changed. I'm now thinking that whatever parameters were constant before and after the move may be to blame, e.g. the rock, the fish, etc. as they were the same before and after the move.

I'm glad nobody is coming over here for the holidays....my tank is a bit drab to look at. Maybe I should print out photos of prettier tanks and tape them up over my glass? :mrgreen:

More bad news...

- My sixline wrasse died. I'm not sure what happened, it was fine on Wednesday morning, and on Thursday I found the corpse. There wasn't enough left of the fish to even guess what happened.
- The neon green algae has returned and its stronger then ever.
- The cactus coral died, and I had high hopes for its recovery.
- My urchin died.

All water parameters test normal, ammonia, nitrate, nitrite all at 0ppm. I'm trying to convince someone to head out to one of the boxing day sales on my behalf to pick up stuff. Nothing like getting sick on the ONE day you have to shop all the holiday sales.

I'm going to pre-face this post with a huge thank you to Snappy. I was over to pick up macro algae yesterday and came home with a few beautiful SPS peices to get me started again. They all look great, polyps out and everything. Thank you very much Greg for your kindness.

I'm finally getting a change to start dosing Aqua Connect's Energy Elements product. I now have a very small collection of SPS and my water parameters have been all in line for some time. Why not start now while I repopulate my system.

So today's parameters (Jan. 6th)
SG 1.025
Nitrate, Nitrite, and Ammonia 0ppm
Mg 1500
dKH 10
Ca 500

I started using Ocean Pro Pure salt in December, and so far without running reactors I'm finding all my levels are a bit high for my liking. I think I will be switching back to Red Sea Pro after I finish with this experiment. However I don't want to skew any results by switching back now.

I'm using all three products 1, 2, and 3. The recomended dosing is 1mL per 100l, which converts to about 1mL per 26g. Per the website this is assuming a heavily populated coral tank. Since my tank currently isn't well populated I'm cutting down my dosage to 1/4 of the recommendation, so 0.5ml per 50g.

The website claims to do the following;
-enhance the intensity of colors
-support a better growth
-enhance vitality
-improve the appearance of the polyps
-not boost algae growth

Photos. I'm going to try and photograph each coral at least once a month, and post FTS one a week. If I can offer more frequent photos, I will.

Today's FTS:
http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b2...a/DSC_0041.jpg

from today:
http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b2...DSC_0014-2.jpg

http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b2...DSC_0012-1.jpg

http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b2...DSC_0018-1.jpg

http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b2...a/DSC_0020.jpg

http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b2...DSC_0021-1.jpg

http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b2...DSC_0027-1.jpg

http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b2...a/DSC_0032.jpg

Today is the 3rd day of dosing and I think I'm already seeing some minor results. So far I'm just seeing increased polyp extension on all the sps, and my hammer coral is more inflated and elongated then it was before. Granted its very early in this test, but its nice to see results. On the other hand increased polyp extension could also be a sign of the SPS fully settling into my system.

I switched out my (dirty) batwing reflector for a luminarc reflector tonight. The change is huge, however the drawback is the crazy shading from the reflector.
http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b2...DSC_0007-2.jpg

I'm not sure if even moving the PC lights further to the sides is going to do anything for the shading. I can't see how to get any PC light to the center of the tank.
http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b2...a/DSC_0008.jpg

Shot down the right side of the tank
http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b2...DSC_0010-1.jpg

SPS today after 3 days of dosing. I think all the polyps are out more in all my pieces, even ones I've had in the system for a month, or the surviving zoas and LPS.
http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b2...DSC_0001-1.jpg

I've decided to go to 250w MH, regardless of the reflector. Its too hard to get 175w bulbs reliably, and I'm thinking of moving that setup onto my QT system. I just have to buy a ballast, which I'll do tomorrow.

Next up on my todo list:
- hook up kalk stirrer on the kalk. reactor (I'm sick of hand shaking)
- Swap out 175w ballast, and put in new 250w ballast and new bulb
- Re-plumb my skimmer
- Put in a new sump
- New drain design for the overflow

Catherine you are very welcome, I hope things continue to turn around for you. I do recommend that the type of birdnest be kept in a low light area and it will get green hues through it and the polyps will turn green as well. It is a bit bleached from the location it was in high in my tank before I cut it down. The acros & digitata you got should colour up in no time under the strong light assuming your nitrates are kept in check. Anyway, let me know how those experimental pieces do and we can get you set up from there. Good luck.:biggrin:

Thanks for the advice. I will definitely make sure that the birdsnest is placed low as I want to see those lovely greens again.

I still haven't seen a full shot of everything! Why are you doing this to me:)

I wonder if you can drop the actinics down even with the bottom of the reflector. This should eliminate some of the shading.

I'm doing 'cause I'm mean and like to tease you :lol:

The lights just came on so here you go. I'll take something nicer in the future after I'm done cleaning up the tank.

http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b2...ka/DSC_3-2.jpg

Nice! I'm glad it looks good. Now we just need to remove that growth from your camera lens... Oh wait that's a dog! Your dogs are such camera hogs:)

Yeah they are bad, Matia is the worse though.

Go
 

Another idea that might work - install them at a 45 degree angle low on the sides of your hood instead of the top. Might be able to get some light to the middle. Would need to play around to figure out what angle gets light to the middle without excessive light bouncing off the water surface.
________
FXR150

Well I want to put the luminarc on a slider system, and maybe I can put the actinic down at the edge and tilt them like you suggested. I wonder if my actinics will even reach the center of the tank.

Go
 

could work - Kind of like this?
http://i274.photobucket.com/albums/j...t_F/lights.jpg
________
Honda RC161

That is awesome, and exactly what I was thinking. I'll have to make something to allow all the lighting to slide together on a slider. etc.

This weeks update:
Parameters for January 13th
SG 1.025
Nitrate, Nitrite, and Ammonia 0ppm
phosphate 0.05mg/L
Mg 1380
dKH 10
Ca 500

I'm still dosing daily. I've also added a few more SPS to my system, and I've started using filter socks again. The other change I've made, is that the skimmer has been replumbed so the output is no longer right above the imput for the pump. Between the filter socks and the replumb I've seen about an 80% reduction in microbubbles. However, the bubbles do return if I put my hands in the tank for any reason.

Photos
Re-plumbing the skimmer. This is it before with its metric plumbing.
http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b2...a/DSC_0113.jpg

Filing out the inside of a reducer
http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b2...a/DSC_0116.jpg

Reducer on the stand pipe.
http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b2...a/DSC_0123.jpg

http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b2...a/DSC_0124.jpg

The new plumbing isn't the most graceful looking thing, but it gets the job done for now.
http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b2...a/DSC_0125.jpg

Filter Socks after 2 days (yuck)
http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b2...a/DSC_0117.jpg

I still have a few more things to do to the system to get it to where I want it. I am excited to have a system again that will require little if any weekly maintenance (other then water changes, feeding, and dosing).

FTS and photos of my new aquisitions to follow.

Today's FTS, it seems that the GHA is both spreading, and thickening. I am going to manually prune it later today. It seems like I have another GHA battle on my hands.

http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b2...DSC_0019-1.jpg

This is some of SPS I aquired this week. I need to re-mount one of them, and find permanent homes for them in my rockwork. However, I don't like my aquascaping so I'm really iffy about gluing anything down.

New SPS
http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b2...DSC_0004-2.jpg

http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b2...DSC_0005-2.jpg

Existing corals.
http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b2...DSC_0010-2.jpg

http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b2...DSC_0002-1.jpg

http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b2...DSC_0013-1.jpg

http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b2...DSC_0005-3.jpg

http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b2...DSC_0010-3.jpg

http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b2...DSC_0026-2.jpg

Catherine that first new piece doesn't look too healthy. I recommend a whack of blue legged hermits to chow down the GHA. I could lend you 2 large guys that will eat that stuff.

Actually this first new piece is supposed to be A. plana (http://wickedfrags.com/images/sps/Dec4_l_plana.jpg) Its bleached for sure in shipping. I already lost two pieces from my shipment, I'm waiting back on a reply about the losses.

You probably wouldn't know it from the photos but I have 35 blue hermits in the system, and I keep moving them onto the GHA. They have been pretty ineffective so far. Would you suggest more?

Put some of them in your sump for a week or two so they are good and hungry and then place them where you want them to start eating.

Okay sure. I'll try that today and see what happens.

January 20th Update
Parameters today:
SG 1.023
Nitrate (Pinpoint monitor): Undetectable
Nitrite 0ppm
Ammonia 0ppm
phosphate (Hanna Colormeter) 0.01
Mg (salifert) 1190ppm
dKH 7
Ca (salifert) 420ppm

Things that are happening this week;

I noticed cyano forming last week in tiny patches, I siphoned it out. This week its back and its everywhere. Last time I delt with this was 2004 and I fixed it by correcting my then low dKH levels. This time around I don't really know what to do. I'm researching it again to see what new information has come out on dealing with it.

I am experiencing STN on my biggest colony of SPS. You can see in the photos below the fresh white skeleton showing through. In one photo there is cyano on the colony before I blew it off. I'm unsure if it is related or not to the dosing program I am on as it was fine prior to starting the program.

My surviving clams came back to me. Delphinius was kind enough to hold onto them while my tank settled back to where I wanted it. Its really nice to see them again. Both are open and the mandarin is happy to have his favorite hiding/hunting spot back again. I can't wait until I can add more clams in the future, I really miss my field of clams.

The tang that I was holding for a friend is now mine. I convinced him to trade the tang for a good meal. I am now the proud owner of a tang that EATS!! GHA. I'm planning a 6ft tank right now to move him to in the next month or so. The tang also taught my imperator angel to eat GHA, so I can't complain. :biggrin:

Speaking of the GHA its still proliferating. I manually prune about 1/4 cup every few days. Its not as thick as the GHA I delt with in my previous tank, so that is a bit of a relief. I'm slowly going to start moving out infested rocks so I can cook them. It is going to be a long and slow process, but I think it needs to be done.

I'm thinking that there are two possible sources that are feeding the GHA right now, a) my RO/DI itself, b) my rocks from my original first set up in 2004. The only rocks that do get covered with GHA are all rocks that I got in 2004 when I set up my first tank. I had to go back through all my photos to make this connection.

I did starve a bunch of my hermits in my sump as suggested, now that they've been returned to the tank I hope they start chowing down. My urchin has finally abanadoned the tank walls as his perfered spot. Instead he how hangs out on the rocks, sadly its the underside, rather then the tops with the GHA.:rolleyes:

FTS from Friday the 17th
http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b2...DSC_0019-2.jpg

FTS from today, the 20th
http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b2...a/DSC_0029.jpg

The imperator angel.
http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b2...DSC_0050-1.jpg

Mandarin
http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b2...DSC_0043-1.jpg

Necrosis on my colony
http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b2...a/DSC_0031.jpg

http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b2...a/DSC_0046.jpg

Other corals in the tank
http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b2...a/DSC_0033.jpg

http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b2...a/DSC_0036.jpg

http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b2...a/DSC_0037.jpg

The clams, home at last.
http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b2...a/DSC_0035.jpg

http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b2...a/DSC_0039.jpg

Very encouraging to see you have your clams back. Hope all the corals come back. Lovely angel and of course love the mandy. Is it a male or female? (just curious)

Thank you. Its a huge improvement from say just prior to x-mas.

The mandarin is a male. I eventually want to find him a lady friend, but it seems like there are no females to be had.

My tank looks empty now :) But I'm happy your clams are back home where they belong! That is one of the nicest derasa's I've ever seen. If you ever decide you're tired of it .... :lol:

Sorry to hear about the one piece receding but your other frags are looking well (better than mine ... I'm tempted to try moving them out of the coral-nippers tank, but I'm a little paranoid about putting SPS in my other tanks!)

Gorgeous mandarin. Seems to me they come in bursts .. you'll see a whole bunch, then not for a while, then a bunch again .. if I see a female at any LFS I go to I'll let you know. :)

Thank you!

I was really happy to get my clams back, they just add something to the tank that nothing else can. I guess the same goes for you, if you get tired of any of your clams, I'll happily take them!

OMG!! Cyano and GHA are the bane of my tank's existence. The cyano now covers everything. It is smothering out, or trying to, get my surviving zoas, and some of my new SPS.

I added in a seio 2600 to the display to add more flow....something about this just isn't right.

I hate to say it, but I think my tank requires more flow. I think I need to pick up a bigger pump...as if a Snapper isn't big enough....So...who has a dart pump for sale?

Today I don't love reefkeeping as much as I used to.

A brief, albeit photoless update for today, superbowl Sunday.

- The cyano got so bad it covered everythng in my tank. I had to blow it off the corals and the sides of the clam twice daily. The powerheads became covered in it. It was just horrific.
- I ended up stopping the use of Energy Elements on Wednesday January 30th and within two days the cyano had dropped back considerably. By today about 95% of the cyano has vanished. I will try again to use the Energy elements in two weeks and see if it again triggers the cyano.
- I'm still battling the GHA, I've swapped out my MH bulb, I'm running a shorter photo period, and I'm doing larger water changes each week, 14g a week rather then 7g. I'm still manually pruning the stuff.
- I am planning to change the tank around. I'm going to re-aquascape this week and see if I can't get things done a little better to combat the GHA. I'm going to cap off two of the returns to see if I can't get stronger flow from the Snapper pump, and more random currents.

try doing a 100% water change are you running Phosban reactor on the tank..

Catherine maybe try polyp-labs to reduce the nitrates.

Thank you for the suggestions! I'll look into polyp labs when I next get a chance.

I'm thinking perhaps this tank needs to be torn down and changed at this point. Things still aren't perking up regardless of what I've tried or done, sadly GHA seems the be the least of my worries right now.

Things I need to figure out how to address;
1) RTN its back! My large colony has RTNed, and two frags I picked up in January have died as well. Both frags were fine yesterday evening and gone this morning.

2) Mystery leak? or crazy evaporation. I am going through about 2g per day of water. While my SG remains constant (when I don't over top off), its a lot of water to be topping off. I'm concerned because of the quantity, however I don't see any negative/positive influences because of this.

3) GHA which is a problem in and of itself. I don't want to discuss it as I feel like I've spoken about it ad nausem.

4) Getting things to thrive and not just live. I've seen a color change in one of my frags, but I have seen no growth, not even nubs on anything else. Birdsnest and digitata has always been a quick grower for me, and nothing is growing.

These are today's parameters; they are also prior to today's water change
SG: 1.023 (low, I want 1.025)
pH: 8.1 (before lights on, same as lights on though)
Ca: 370
Mg: 1170
dKH: 5 (low)
Phos: 0.04 (its going up since last week's 0.01).
Nitrate: 1ppm (stayed the same from last week).
Nitrite: 0
Amm: 0
temp: 80.4

On a positive note though the cyano has disappeared, its only one one patch of zoas, and even then it seems to be receeding slowly. I did try to start dosing Energy Elements again, but I saw the return of cyano and immediately stopped dosing. The filter socks I purchased have also solved the microbubble problem, I'm really happy with this turn out, and gladly accept the trade off of cleaning them every other day. I'm looking into polyp labs right now as a potential solution to my tank's sad state. However, since I don't know what the problem is, I hesitate on how to fix anything. I also worry about constant dosing, I liked having a more or less hands free system. Should my upcoming changes not yeild any results by the end of the month I will be trying this. The bottom line is things aren't doing well. While my fish and clams thrive, nothing else (GHA aside) does, and I need to figure out how to fix this asap before the rest of my SPS die.

I think I will make a post in the reef section to solicite opinions on what else I can do. I am at such a loss and I'm very disapointed in how things are progressing. Depending on the responses I get, I will probably purchase polyp labs at the end of the month or early March and try that system. I will also try to do one major overhaul by removing all the rocks that have GHA and see what happens. Since I suspect the phosphates are being released by those old rocks, I'm going to try and remove them, and see if that solves the issue of GHA.

Photos later of before and after the changes as well as some of the RTN possibly.

Hey Catherine, sorry to hear things still are not going well.

I wish I had a answer for you but I think the reason I have avoided some of these issues is just dumb luck. It sounds like you have been doing all the right things, doing your homework and getting good advice.

I am a fan of filter socks, I started using them again and have noticed a difference in water quality.

I have been using ReeFresh also and think it's beneficial for sure, I don't see all the benefits they claim but would rather use it than not.

I was having some minor issues with nuisance algae and cyano a while back and started using ozone and ReeFresh and things cleared up quite quickly. I have since taken the ozone off but would and may use it in the future if needed.

I'm sure things will start to turn around for you.