400 gallon project

[Marlin65]

Nice additions too your tank I was thinking about you today OA has a nice Majestic angel there a big one he must be at least 5" I thought he would fit in your tank quite well.

[Marlin65]

Did you get another cleaner I only saw one when I was there?

[argan]

It looks like the gorgonians on that rock contracted the gobies to build them a wall around their property. :P

[untamed]

Originally Posted by argan

It looks like the gorgonians on that rock contracted the gobies to build them a wall around their property. :P

I have a couple of non-fishy friends that drop by regularly to see the tank and they thought I built the mound myself. They couldn't believe that the fish did it in only a few days.

They build so fast that they buried a large snail. When the snail decided to move out, it caused a collapse near their entrance. It was really amazing to watch them set about to repair it because they carefully selected large objects to fill the hole. The larger one grabbed a very large rock from some ways away and dropped it directly over the hole. The smaller one then manipulated that rock to test fit it a few different ways before they moved on to bury that rock with additional small rubble.

Another entertaining few minutes at the tank!

[untamed]

For some time now, I've been challenged to keep the tank's alkalinity up. Each time I noticed the alk falling, I would increase the flow to the reactor a bit. Eventually, I hit the max output of my pump (117ml/min)...and began to think..."this isn't right!".

My Ca/Alk usage shouldn't be extremely high...yet. My corals aren't large enough and there are lots of other tanks with much more coral that haven't max'd their Ca reactor.

One popular theory was that I was flowing so much water through the reactor that I was not allowing time for the media to dissolve. I began to measure the alk output of the reactor. My first reading was 13! (I was hearing other people had readings over 20).

So I began to turn the reactor flow down, and measure the output every day. I got right down to 65ml/minute and the alk had only increased to 14. No...this wasn't a flow problem.

So I started working on the pH. I dropped the pH of the reactor from 6.6 to 6.55...no change. I dropped the pH to 6.50, no change....

Then, I recalibrated my pH probe and dropped the reactor to 6.45. Alkalinity jumped to 24! As always, because I had done two things I don't know which solved the problem. I strongly suspect that the probe had become inaccurate.

Anyway...the lesson learned is.."Calibrate your reactor pH probe frequently".

[untamed]

The gobies continue to make a remarkable difference to the overall look of the tank. My entire sand bed is now perfectly clean and tossed, all the time. The down side is that the water column is not as clear as before. There is always some very fine sediment being kicked up by the gobies somewhere. I'm hoping it clears out eventually, but I can live with it if it doesn't.

Twice now, the gobies (Bonnie and Clyde) have piled up the gravel so high that it starts to cover some corals on the lower rocks. They have smothered a couple of corals and some have had some die back.

Bonnie (the smaller one) gave us a bit of a scare recently when she disappeared for nearly 3 days. From what I've read, this might be consistent with breeding behaviour. It is possible that she would have disappeared for longer if her health had been enough to sustain her in her burrow. As is, it may have been a practice run.

Enough words...here's some pictures!

The Atlantic Blue Tang is really striking colour. It is really hard to describe, but I've come close to capturing it with this picture.


The dynamic digging duo....


Pitstop at the cleaning station...

[Pan]

Beautiful Atlantic Tang.
Mine has blue edges and just a hint of blue anywhere else, still very young.

[untamed]

Originally Posted by Marlin65

Nice additions too your tank I was thinking about you today OA has a nice Majestic angel there a big one he must be at least 5" I thought he would fit in your tank quite well.

I was also at OA today. They actually had two of those Majestics. Ran into TomR at the same time...small world. I wonder how long it takes a Majestic to get that large? Mine is nice and fat, but isn't growing noticeably. (not like the Vlamingi, who I swear gets bigger every single day. He just passed the White Cheek Tank in overall size a few days ago)



I did start with one cleaner, but added the 2nd one quite a while ago. They split up frequently, so they both may have been there.