400 gallon project

Delphinus · #1 02-17-2009, 06:07 PM

Here's my unsolicited $0.02

I think our tanks are more like gardens than they are forests, ie., they are cultivated garden reefs, not wild reefs. Thus, it's not unreasonable to expect to have to prune and manage over the long term to maintain a balance. Like plants, some corals will grow faster and some will grow slower. Think about how a forest grows, there are distinct stages or phases. First, the quick growers fill in and compete for space, but tend to be weaker or shorter lived, followed by slower growing but longer living species. (Like here in Alberta at least, Poplars are usually among the first trees to grow after an area is forested, they live for about 30 years or so, they get ridiculously tall in that timeframe, too big for their own trunks to support their own weight, so they start dieing off or falling in windstorms, leaving openings for slower growing, but longer living or stronger tree species to fill in. And so on...)

So I would think that in the wild reefs, storms and waves do likely create some damage among species like staghorns, which break off quickly. I suspect that you don't see as much damage as you expect because there is a greater diversity of species. But I have seen reefs where the ocean floor was literally littered with staghorn rubble, which in turn is brilliant fish habitat.

But because our reef tanks tend to be collections of things that interest us, it tends to be a more random assortment of species that may not necessarily inhabit reefs in the same zones or phases in the wild.

Plus there's just the challenges of maintaining ideal flow conditions, which gets harder as pieces grow, plus the challenges of static light locations, and the fact that the bases always get shaded .... I am truly amazed when someone can grow large pieces of coral without this sort of thing happening..

This thread over at RC has some amazing large specimens:
http://reefcentral.com/forums/showth...readid=1561866

Look at this beast in particular:

How on earth someone manages to grow a piece like that in a tank, is simply beyond me. That's incredible.

Trigger Man · #2 02-17-2009, 06:23 PM

just looked over the link, and all I can say is wow, I can't imagine my corals ever getting to those sizes.

untamed · #3 02-20-2009, 07:03 AM

People laugh when I say it took me 1 year to build the aquarium...but it then took me another two years to finally finish the bar! Today, it is finally done! So...I had a rum 'n coke to celebrate!

As the bar has two mirrored walls, all the fish found the other aquarium very interesting....

Chaloupa · #4 02-20-2009, 07:06 AM

OUTSTANDING! WOW just isn't enough.

BlueAbyss · #5 02-20-2009, 07:08 AM

Gah, I love your tank

How's everything faring?

untamed · #6 02-20-2009, 07:16 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by BlueAbyss

Gah, I love your tank

How's everything faring?

Dealing with some coral death at the moment, actually. I had this spot on where a colony of hynophora used to be, and it kept growing back and killing other coral nearby. So I attacked it that spot with a scrub brush to try to kill it. It worked, but it has triggered an outbreak of STN death in my other two large colonies of hynophora, which has also caused some tissue loss for nearby stylos. I think I'm going to lose one entire colony of the hynophora before this is done.

So...you know...pretty typical stuff.

hillegom · #7 02-20-2009, 07:29 AM

Too bad about the corals, but I know you will persevere.
Outstanding bar!
I wonder what the fish think of the "other" fish in the mirror, while looking around the bacardi

High tide · #8 02-20-2009, 07:43 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by untamed

Dealing with some coral death at the moment, actually. I had this spot on where a colony of hynophora used to be, and it kept growing back and killing other coral nearby. So I attacked it that spot with a scrub brush to try to kill it. It worked, but it has triggered an outbreak of STN death in my other two large colonies of hynophora, which has also caused some tissue loss for nearby stylos. I think I'm going to lose one entire colony of the hynophora before this is done.

So...you know...pretty typical stuff.

Sheesh!!...that sucks!...."typical" is right. It's that chain reaction effect that comes in ,hits you hard,keeps on coming,and stops only after its killed a few prized colonies.....oh brother, how I know! Frag what's left and turf the rest!

untamed · #9 02-24-2009, 05:27 AM

Really tough times going on here. I'm losing coral all over the place. Mostly from the tips.

Desperate to try to figure out what is going on, I took a measurement of Nitrate and Phosphate yesterday. Historically, I've rarely been able to detect nitrate, and had barely measureable phosphate. Today...20ppm nitrate and 18ppm phosphate. Every other measurement I can make seems fine. I've turned my Ca reactor down a bit as my alk was reading 8.5dKh....but really...8.5dKh is not something I would usually be concerned about.

That's not the kind of numbers that cause coral to die that I'm aware of...but I suppose it is a signal that something isn't right. I'm running some ferric oxide to see if I can absorb phosphate, but so far it has made no difference.

So....I thought I would vaccuum out the main sump as it has become pretty filthy. I look into the sump at something I think is a fish poop...and learn I have sea cucumber babies! I bet there is 50+ of them in that sump. I was easily able to find about 15 once I started to look. Here's a shot of a couple babies. The larger of the two might be 1" long.

Since they most look like this cucumber, I'm assuming this is mom...or dad...or both...I'm not sure how it works for cuces! New promo...Free Donkey Dung with frag purchase!