2.5 gallons of greatness
 

This tank started as my 2012 nano contest tank. I really love this tank so I've kept it going. Here's a link to the contest journal thread if you want to look back and see the beginning's of this set up. It went from a maxi mini anemone tank to a reef tank :biggrin:

http://www.canreef.com/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=89848

The light I was using was an ok light but the coral colours didn't pop like they should of so I upgraded to a halo par 38 led light from fragbox and I am very happy with the upgrade. I also changed a few of the corals around, and thanks to the new light the red/brown monti at the top of the tank has now turned into a superman monti :mrgreen:

Before pic with old lights
http://i261.photobucket.com/albums/i...ps839a32b7.jpg

pic taken right after setting up new light
http://i261.photobucket.com/albums/i...psfaaa1627.jpg

Pic taken today with new lights
http://i261.photobucket.com/albums/i...ps54d2df9c.jpg

Closer up pic's

top half of tank
http://i261.photobucket.com/albums/i...ps9032358e.jpg

bottom half of tank
http://i261.photobucket.com/albums/i...psdf13a49f.jpg

Pic of tank and new light
http://i261.photobucket.com/albums/i...ps3c38d034.jpg

http://i261.photobucket.com/albums/i...ps53e21008.jpg

2.5 really are you sure lol amazing job

I should add that the contents of this 2.5g tank are; a Barnacle blenny, blue spot anemone shrimp, porcelain/anemone crab, pom pom crab, scarlet hermit crab, nassarius snail and a trochus snail. I have mostly zoas, a neon green candy cane coral, superman monti, bleeding apple scoly, 2 fancy mushrooms and a ricordia.

Doug took a bunch of pic's after I got the new light so enjoy

http://i261.photobucket.com/albums/i...ps47d47bab.jpg
http://i261.photobucket.com/albums/i...psa990b367.jpg
http://i261.photobucket.com/albums/i...ps0bc9cbd1.jpg

http://i261.photobucket.com/albums/i...ps7b462fa9.jpg

http://i261.photobucket.com/albums/i...pscd8509ca.jpg

http://i261.photobucket.com/albums/i...psa63952cb.jpg

very nice setup and beautiful zoas!
how far up are you running the par38 ontop of the tank?

http://i261.photobucket.com/albums/i...ps20bf27be.jpg

http://i261.photobucket.com/albums/i...ps7d9d40b0.jpghttp://i261.photobucket.com/albums/i...ps5456dd4b.jpg
http://i261.photobucket.com/albums/i...pseb2dfb0f.jpg

This shrimp is well fed and while he moves around on the zoas he doesn't hurt/eat/pick at them like the sexy shrimp did
http://i261.photobucket.com/albums/i...ps0b124003.jpg

I may have posted these last 2 pic's in my old thread but there worth sharing again :mrgreen:

http://i261.photobucket.com/albums/i...ps611f1d4f.jpg

http://i261.photobucket.com/albums/i...ps9668a7d6.jpg

You are well overstocked and should give away those corals before any harm is done :razz:

And your pico is awesome! :D

Thanks and yes it's only two and a half gallons! :mrgreen: I had some great rock to pick from (took it out of my boyfriend's sump) and was able to create an over hang and a cave (can't really tell with the corals covering the rock) but here's a pic of the rock from when I first set it up
http://i261.photobucket.com/albums/i...ps187d55ed.jpg

Thanks, I'm running the par38 about 8-10 inches above the tank. I also have a mesh screen/egg create cover over this tank to keep the bleeny in, which with the par38 helps to cut back on some of light as it is a powerful light (no dimmer) for such a small tank.

what are those really red zoas up top under that encrusting thingie? and those are rastas down at the bottom right?

really nice polyp collection in a small tank. concentrated awesome.

I think there's room for all to grow out nicely :wink: and thanks

Do you mean the ones I circled? Under the encrusting superman monti, between the sunny d's and space monsters?

http://i261.photobucket.com/albums/i...ps06b7671a.jpg

this is a close up Doug got of them when the new light was first put up, as you can see they are brighter now. FYI I love my par38 :mrgreen:
http://i261.photobucket.com/albums/i...pseb2dfb0f.jpg

Those are super awesome red/orange with a purple ring in the centre (I have no idea what they're called but I could come up with a cool name if you'd like) zoas :lol: and yes those are rasta's which are finally looking like rasta's under the better lights.

The rasta's went from this
http://i261.photobucket.com/albums/i...ps92ff3abd.jpg

to this
http://i261.photobucket.com/albums/i...ps44164284.jpg

I had actually thought that they weren't rasta's and that a mistake had been made, crazy what a difference a light can make. Although I think they still have some colouring up to do, but they're getting there and they've come a long way in a month.

http://www.marineaquariumsa.com/imag...27bcb415fc.jpg

wow they were not happy at all! looking a million times better now.

Ya just a bit :lol:

I have to say love the colour I'm getting from my corals under my new halo par38 led from fragbox. March actually wants to put a pic of my nano up on their website, so I sent a few pic's to him and thought I'd start this thread since I was on a roll :biggrin:

Here's a pic of the egg create cover
http://i261.photobucket.com/albums/i...psd367ae37.jpg

Good old beer can reference for size pic :mrgreen:
http://i261.photobucket.com/albums/i...ps6221cc92.jpg

Do you like my corsage? I know its a bit big but its designer! Via space monster :mrgreen:

http://i261.photobucket.com/albums/i...ps9f73f7c6.jpg

Love that blenny! What an usual one that you have found. You always have the neatest fish and critters! If I have more time...and money...I'd love to start another tank. Something about a nice, quiet tank that can house tiny shrimps and crabs without them being totally lost is very...zen.

Thanks Barnacle blenny's are super awesome and perfect for small pico's. I also love little inverts. Found out the hard way you have to be careful though. I had sexy shrimp that were eating the zoas :twised: had to move them to a different tank. Then I got some more zoas and added some more rock and tried gluing the new zoas down (ran out of putty and was told reef glue would work) but the glue released some toxins into the tank (I'm guessing) and shortly after my cool blue spot anemone shrimp died and a little later found my pom pom crab dead :cry: Did a 30-40% water change and everything else seems ok. Still have a few zoas I have to stick down but I bought putty now. I'll have to go slow in adding as to much putty at once will create issues.

Beautiful nano, love the blenny. I use to have one, they have so much character...

I guess super glue can be toxic in a small tank, never thought that it would be harmfull but I'll keep it in mind for the future.

Keep the pics rolling please!

Ya I'm used to my big tanks so I didn't think a tiny bit of reef glue could be so harmful. I've been waiting till I get the zoas puttied in to take more pics but I'll try. Guess I should take some pics of the rock I added, you know you got to many zoas when you have to add more rock to the tank to make room :lol:

On an odd note my red hornet zoas look awful under the new light. Which is really odd since all the other zoas look nicer. Also getting way more algae growth with the new light, not surprising but a pita nonetheless.

Awesome little tank!

Was that some utter chaos beside the rastas?:mrgreen:

I don't think so (not sure which ones you're thinking of) but I'm not great with zoas name though. To the left of the rastas are armour of god pallys, above and to the right are maybe.....not sure but they sort of look like;

Nuclear Meltdown zoas
http://www.zoaid.com/gallery2/main.p...serialNumber=4


Is this the utter chaos zoas you where thinking of??? Sadly I don't have those. Got it off google image
http://i285.photobucket.com/albums/l...ter20chaos.jpg

(Actually on the first page,Rasta on the eggcrate top left:smile:).I'm really considering the PAR 38 now for my frag tank,they seem to be the ticket for a small tank.

great setup! pretty amazing you keep a sw tank going with just 2.5 gallons.

Ohhhhh, at first I was confused (as I've never had my rastas on egg create) then I looked back to the first page and realized you were talking about the pic I took off google images. In that post I used that pic to show what my rastas should look like. But looking back I'd have to agree in that pic it does look like they are utter chaos zoas (or maybe darth mauls) but unfortunately it's not my pic.

I love my halo par 38. I got it from fragbox, I went with it because it had a red and green spectrum to it and not just white and blue. I highly recommend this light, it made my coral colours (with the exception on my red hornets) really pop :biggrin:

Thank-you. It's relatively low maintenance (I use a red solo cup for water changes :mrgreen:) but with a small tank I'm constantly checking temp (I find the temp can swing quite a bit unfortunately, thankfully it seems to handle the temp swings ok) and I have to putty things in slowly and be careful not to use to much or it could cause a tank crash.

I think I found an id for the above zoas, I think they are Ko's nightmare

coralpedia pic
http://www.coralpedia.com/gallery2/m...serialNumber=2

Happy news, I was puttying in some zoas and saw my Pom Pom crab :cheer2:

Thankfully what I saw before was a molt and not a dead crab like I thought.

Pic I took (crappy iPhone with the lights out pic)

http://i261.photobucket.com/albums/i...ps16d9e1f8.jpg

Thought I'd share pics with the added rock and zoas. I was to lazy to use the good camera and download pics but I got some ok iPhone pics to share

http://i261.photobucket.com/albums/i...psd719b092.jpg

http://i261.photobucket.com/albums/i...ps1ba0f402.jpg

So after relentlessly scrolling through coralpedia I think I've identified all the zoas in this tank

Zoa list:

Magicians
Orange bam bam
Armour of gods
Everlasting gobstoppers
Pink zippers
Sunny D's
Candy apple reds
Rastas
Space monsters
Red hornets
Miami vice
KOs nightmare
Nuclear meltdown
Jokers
Eagle eyes
Watermelons
Green lanterns
EZs
Taylor's holy grail
Flaming sun

I also have a neon green candy cane, bleeding apple scolly, superman monti, one ric and 2 mushrooms.

New zoas I got today :mrgreen:

http://i261.photobucket.com/albums/i...psa721c087.jpg

I think they are darth mauls (like the pic below) or a morph of them. They were labeled as deadpool (in the store they kinda looked like them, but i had a feeling theyd look better under better lights) and under my lights they definitely look more like more like darth mauls
http://www.coralpedia.com/gallery2/m...serialNumber=2

Upon further research I think my new zoas are KO's not darth mauls

http://i261.photobucket.com/albums/i...ps3a320c50.jpg

KO's (coralpedia pic)

http://www.coralpedia.com/gallery2/m...serialNumber=2