albert_dao's 2012 Nano Contest Entry

[albert_dao]

Originally Posted by nanoreefnewbie

Yea hey I'm on day 13 cycling and almost done I'm taking the patient route lol...starting too get the ugly brown gunna add clean up crew here next day or two..

Oh, yah, lol. I hated that. I use to cycle tanks by letting them sit and was subject to "ugly algae tank" syndrome like everyone else. Now I just rely on turbocharged bacteria and ceramic medias to insta-cycle the tank and keep algae from ever gaining a foothold.

The trade off is that I can't used uncured liverock, which I am okay with. I have a pretty good selection of reef rock which I scrub and dry out in between tank switch-ups.

That said, I am really warming up to this "mud flats" look with the river-worn, volcanic substrate and rocks.



**** Livestock addition: I almost forgot to mention this! Last night, I seeded the tank with roughly 20 large bristleworms and 15ish micro brittlestars. I also threw in a cube of chopped mysis to keep everyone happy. I am constantly surprised at how much food a tank with good bacterial ecology can handle. My previous tanks each received a cube of mysis every night with zero climb in nutrients or algae issues. I'd be hard pressed to run a tank using any other method.

[nanoreefnewbie]

Originally Posted by albert_dao

Oh, yah, lol. I hated that. I use to cycle tanks by letting them sit and was subject to "ugly algae tank" syndrome like everyone else. Now I just rely on turbocharged bacteria and ceramic medias to insta-cycle the tank and keep algae from ever gaining a foothold.

The trade off is that I can't used uncured liverock, which I am okay with. I have a pretty good selection of reef rock which I scrub and dry out in between tank switch-ups.

That said, I am really warming up to this "mud flats" look with the river-worn, volcanic substrate and rocks.



**** Livestock addition: I almost forgot to mention this! Last night, I seeded the tank with roughly 20 large bristleworms and 15ish micro brittlestars. I also threw in a cube of chopped mysis to keep everyone happy. I am constantly surprised at how much food a tank with good bacterial ecology can handle. My previous tanks each received a cube of mysis every night with zero climb in nutrients or algae issues. I'd be hard pressed to run a tank using any other method.

I'm reply relying on my clean up crew too take care of the algea with that name proper on time water changes I'll control the algea..almost forgot tonite should be a good night for water change and add my diy skimmer

[Boxboy]

" Now I just rely on turbocharged bacteria and ceramic medias to insta-cycle the tank and keep algae from ever gaining a foothold.*"

Would really like to learn more about this, care to share?

[nanoreefnewbie]

I guess you would really love too know been you have too start all over hey boxboy

[JDigital]

Maybe I missed it, but how big is this tank Albert?

[albert_dao]

Originally Posted by JDigital

Maybe I missed it, but how big is this tank Albert?

Ah, it's 8 gallons.

I've been slacking on the updates, but only because I left my camera somewhere

Will be picking it up tomorrow.

I've made some additions I'm not so sure on. I got impatient waiting for some feather dusters, so I threw in a bunch of green finger leathers. They look out of place. I'll leave them for now because they fill in space, but will remove them as soon as something more appropriate comes up. If anyone sees any sea pens around, LMK!!!!

I've also added a ton of tiny Trochus snails. After adding all of the freshly cut leathers, my tank clouded for a couple days. Afterwards, I started getting a light dusting of algae on the rocks. They cleared it up overnight. I'll probably remove most of them once that quits.

Anyway, text says so little. Pictures tomorrow!

[albert_dao]

Alright, got my camera back. Here's that much needed update.

First, a shot of the little army of dudes I added to stave off any future algae issues. Seem to be doing their job mightily. I might actually have to pull some of them back into my main system:




Now for the FTS:




As you can see, I've made some additions:

- Got around to adding the feather dusters. I'm a big fan of the way they look with the Cerianthids.

- There's that green leather I mentioned. I'm still not really feeling it. I'll leave them for another few weeks and see if my opinion changes. This is a case where I think I would have preferred a tan-colored leather over these green ones. If some Pom Pom Xenia presents itself, I'll probably replace them with that.

- Two maxi-Mini Carpets. These are just in here temporarily. I have plans to do some propagation with them, so they'll be moved over to the frag tank as soon as the space presents itself.

- Two Flower Anemones. Ditto on these - temp home until I clear up some space.

That's it for now. Will take some more pictures tomorrow!

[albert_dao]

Originally Posted by Boxboy

" Now I just rely on turbocharged bacteria and ceramic medias to insta-cycle the tank and keep algae from ever gaining a foothold.*"

Would really like to learn more about this, care to share?

Absolutely, first, some science:

Absolutely:

http://www.esajournals.org/doi/abs/1...urnalCode=ecol

http://jb.asm.org/content/85/6/1413.full.pdf

http://zeovit.com/forums/showthread.php?t=4656

A lot of our modern aquarium techniques are extrapolated from the known studies of microbial metabolisms and how to functionally control their cycles.

Let me know when you've got that reading out of the way and I'll elaborate how it's applicable to our captive systems sans jargon.

[Boxboy]

http://jb.asm.org/content/85/6/1413.full.pdf dont work, Ive box marked the other for tonight! Ill PM you when done reading

Yes I have to start over haha. O well..

[albert_dao]

Originally Posted by Boxboy

http://jb.asm.org/content/85/6/1413.full.pdf dont work, Ive box marked the other for tonight! Ill PM you when done reading

Yes I have to start over haha. O well..

Just make sure you have the latest Adobe Acrobat update. That one is SUPER jargony, being a science paper and all, but it's got a lot of good stuffs.