# Bayinaung's stacked tanks



## Bayinaung

Here goes. This is a new setup I've been working on since spring. I did take my time setting it up.

I got about 300lbs of live rock from a guy demoing a tank from a home reno. had them baked in the sun for 2 months. then did RODI curing with them for about 2 months. I was going to have a 30 long with 35 gallon refugium on the same metal stand, and went with the other way around. so the 35 gallon Hagen standard is the display. the 30gallon long is the refugium tank.

I waffled between going with in-sump skimmer or HOB/HOT. Found an SWC Xtreme HOT skimmer (w/c I wrote about in equipment) on kijiji and decided to get it. It's rated up to 120gallons heavy stocking, and I don't plan on having a crowded tank. With it, I can now do a display refugium. My thinking is to keep non-reef safe fish in there.

For lighting I went with D120 V2. The light is different from the screw-in par38 LEDs I got on my nano, but seems more like the LEDs other peeps have in here, i.e. bluish hue. I have just one, and I think it'll be plenty enough. I'm not planning on doing much SPS. mostly LPS and softies.

It took me a while to set up the tank and making decision on scaping, but finally got it going a while back. It was cycling fishless for about 4 weeks, using the biofilter material from my nano to seed it. Then I got some mollies to speed up the cycling. Saw a small ammonia spike but then disappeared. so I got some more mollies, from kimchi on the forum. then I saw a more visible cycling. Satisfied that I got some bacteria colonies established, I put in 2 blue damsels a blood shrimp and a firefish to the 5 mollies in both tanks.

The rockscape took me a bit of time to work through, and this isn't how I had set it up outside the tank, but I went with another concept once in the tank. The idea was to create some arches for fishes to swim through, have some vertical surface for GSPs or perhaps branching corals (hammers or SPS) and a bowl for a BTA to inhabit and canoodle with a clown fish or two. I think I got there with this setup:










the display "bowl" for a BTA is in the middle to the right of the blue damsel in the middle.
the green pipe is the overflow from the skimmer on the bottom tank (which doesn't have lights right now).

There are plenty of caves and hiding places in the tank. the rocks themselves have lots of holes in them and the damsels and mollies have been doing a great job of exploring them.

I have a carpenter's wrasse that hasn't been added yet, but will do so soon after these guys have established in this tank. perhaps a nemo if I find one in the coming weekend.

Corals are still in the nano. zoas, gsps, mainly, with some LPS. I'll let tank mature a bit more before putting them in, is my current thinking.


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## altcharacter

I like the rock work and how it looks. Good idea with the caves and the hiding areas. Most people forget that livestock need places to chill and just get away from the day to day

A damsel is a bad idea though...especially as the first fish to go in. Pretty much anything you add to this tank after will get destroyed by it.

My blue damsel killed 4 clownfish and a goby...then he became shark food at BA's


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## sig

" the display "bowl" for a BTA is in the middle ...".

tell it to anemone 

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## altcharacter

I placed my anem where I thought it should be, then it decided otherwise and took a one week trip around the tank to see the place...

A week later it ended up in the same place it started.


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## Bayinaung

sig said:


> " the display "bowl" for a BTA is in the middle ...".
> 
> tell it to anemone


LMAO yeah... I'm learning anemone speak and it's goin where it's supposed to go.. I know.. Im hoping it will go there!

I think I made the mistake of feeding the BTA. it's very big now and and not so cute.


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## Bayinaung

altcharacter said:


> I like the rock work and how it looks. Good idea with the caves and the hiding areas. Most people forget that livestock need places to chill and just get away from the day to day
> 
> A damsel is a bad idea though...especially as the first fish to go in. Pretty much anything you add to this tank after will get destroyed by it.
> 
> My blue damsel killed 4 clownfish and a goby...then he became shark food at BA's


Thanks... 
I hope the yellow tail damsels will be ok with more fish. right now they dash at two silver mollies I have in there and those are still alive despite being slow. so I'll have to get a clown that's at least as big or bigger than the yellow tails. I hear they are the least aggressive of damsels. If they become annoying I'll simply move them to the lower tank.


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## Bayinaung

*FTS, sorta*

So here's a snapshot of the FTS with both tanks. lower tank doesn't have any light on there yet. just rock, and 3 mollies. you can see the small aquaclear filters with the biomedia I used to transfer bacteria for cycling. leaving them there for now. The top tank has the D120 v2. the blues are at 100%, the multicolor LEDs are probably at 15%. While the color to my eyes was natural, iphone cam still made it blue. will have to use the D7000 next time.


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## Bayinaung

Here's a shot of my live rock curing operation over the summer. lots of RODI used. was paranoid about pests and worms. Rocks got baked good. then got RODI water with powerheads/pumps circulating water for weeks. You can see the marsh seedpods being grown in the bowl at the top. they'll go into the tank at some point.

It was kinda boring waiting for the curing but the nano kept me entertained during the summer.


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## Bayinaung

*Stocking up*

SUM had a nice big shipment this week. Despite getting there at 11:30am on Friday, I wasn't even fortunate to get to some of the fishes that were on their stock list I wanted, or wanted to see. I did pick up a few. An OC clown, skunk clown, and a power blue tang for the reef tank. got a small vagabond butterfly and a small midnight damsel for the fish only tank.

The main archway seems to be an attractive place for the fishes, and I saw them all competing for that territory this morning: 









Now here's a curious thing: the powder blue tang seems to love this cave right in front of the tank. I saw it spending time pecking at the walls of this cave when it settled in yesterday. Then last night when I got home I saw it sleeping in there. yeah sleeping in the cave! it will go around the tank, but always swim back to return there. Never figured a tall flat skinny fish to be a cave dweller lol










I am slowly bringing the corals in. I dropped a small frag of yellow polups on the rock works. a GSP fell to the sandbed and left it there.


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## altcharacter

You have a damsel, a skunk, and a tang in the same tank?? This should be interesting!! Kind of like Mad Max beyond Thunderdome!!!!

My bets are on the damsel still but I think the first to go would be the OC clown...


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## Bayinaung

lol you're the king of analogies. well so far it isn't mad max yet. if fishes do become aggressive towards each other, i'm splitting them up. So far the only one causing raucus is the carpenter's flasher wrasse. I saw him attack the mollies and yellowtail damsels which causes the other fishes to freak out also. If the order in the tank isn't settled in a day or two I'm taking him out of there. 

the clown i got is a fairly good size and that will make him second in pecking order to the tang. flasher is a bit longer but smaller and I noticed wrasse is giving the clown room without challenging him. I think the pecking order will be settled by the end of the day.

in the meantime, I wonder where firefish went. It was no where to be found this morning. I noticed sand's been piled high infront of the hole it likes to go into. i'm not at home now so I'll look for it again later in teh day.


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## fesso clown

Dude, did I miss something? Is that a 35 Gallon tank? I am not judging at all but with the stock you have in there right now you're going to be looking at a Mad Max senario for sure. Again not judging but a PBT in a 35? You might want to reconsider that....


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## altcharacter

My money is still on the damsel on the winner but the wrasse might be a close second when he gets bigger.


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## TypeZERO

Im sure he did his readings before purchasing fish. Not saying its right or wrong with stocking ones tank to the brim, I only find it wrong one one does it and complains when things go wrong.
Not going to lie, my 60g display tank ( mind u i got about 90gallons of sumpage to keep water quality top notch) i have a yellow tang, tomini tang, darwin clown, male and female flame wrasse, radiant wrasse, red line wrasse, midas blenny, few gobies, few cromies, and a harlequin tusk. Only thing i worry about is aggression and sleeping space. I feed heavily yet take measures to have my nutrients in check. So I say learn the risk your taking and do it if you want but dont cry if it does not work out.

With the op current stock list, only thing I would worry about is the butterfly having a taste for coral poylps.


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## Bayinaung

I'd sell them or trade them in once they get bigger and or uncomfortable or I get bored. This hobby is one with all sorts of guilt associated with it. so unless it's extreme, I'm comfortable being outside of the conventional definitions of space needed for fish. the aquascaping is helping with multiple territory marks for them so the confrontations will be less than if it was one where there are less demarcations of territories. That thought did go into the aquascape design as well as having multiple level surfaces for corals needing different intensities of light.


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## Bayinaung

I did check and the ones that are together are ok with each other. I do spend hours watching the fish behaviour in the shop before making a purchase (Percy got annoyed a bit but I did help them make some sales lol). Aside from the breed's inherent traits each individual has its own personality. I noticed the clown I got for instance was the biggest one in its tank and exhibited a very gentle and mild aggression. same with tang.

the wrasse is the only issue thus far, and if it doesn't stop showing aggression towards the mollies or damsels, I'll be putting it up for sale. I've had it for a few months. It's a gorgeous healthy fish and displays his finnage all the time, and eats voraciously.

the small vagabond butterfly is in the bottom tank where I don't plan on having any coral. I'll be supplying it with algae-covered rocks.

the skimmer is quite capable of handling a heavily stocked 120G. which is what the prior owner had it handling before he got tired of the rattling noise which he wasn't able to solve (but I did hehe). i'm testing water daily after stocking to see how the tank's handling the bioload. it'll tell me if i need to do drastic action.


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## altcharacter

If he does get to aggressive and you decide to sell him give me a shout. He would do fine in my tank and I have tons of room. I hate to see fish homeless on the street begging for flakes


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## Bayinaung

I got home and settled down to watch how the territories are settling. There was still too much chasing around for my liking so I took out the 2 silver mollies from the top tank into a QT tank.

After that things calmed down a lot. The two yellow tail damsels are now naturally at the bottom of the pecking order. The carpenter's flasher wrasse has claimed the top part of the rockscape. It will chase away the damsels when they show up near there. Skunk's claimed the bowl. the larger blue damsel likes a little cubbie hole under the front arch, and will contest the skunk clown. so they will display sideways to each other and that's all the action. 

the firefish goby likes the front opening of the big arch, and has become a bit dominant, so the OC clownfish who is bigger has moved slightly behind under the arch. Firefish goby is now staying in holes in the rock all the time unless it smells food then comes out to claim the front of the tank. Order is slowly being established in the tank.  I will get some photos of their territories tomorrow in daylight.


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## Bayinaung

altcharacter said:


> If he does get to aggressive and you decide to sell him give me a shout. He would do fine in my tank and I have tons of room. I hate to see fish homeless on the street begging for flakes


lol yeah he will beg for flakes. he always comes to the top of the water when I come close to the tank. for a supposedly shy species, this guy's not shy at all. The time I bought it, I did pick him out for his outgoing personality out of maybe 20 flashers SUM had at the time. Just didn't know he'd be aggressive haha. I'll let you know if I'm going to sell it.


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## Bayinaung

*Detente!*

Order has been achieved in the tank. everyone's got their territories. We are all feeling secure. Tang ignores all the fishes and doesn't bother any of them.


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## Bayinaung

*Firefish*

Firefish early in the morning


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## Bayinaung

Blood shrimp making an appearance as he smells food


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## Bayinaung

*Midnight Damsel*

This little guy is one of my favs! he's in the bottom tank. Curious, healthy, and sometimes hangs out with the 3 mollies.


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## Bayinaung

*Nemo*

Here's the money shot on the nemo. I think I picked out just about the perfect nemo. Great colour, very defined and bright markings. And very good temperament.


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## Bayinaung

After 3 days of stocking up and steadily increasing feeding, here's the brown water I'm getting in the skimmer:










it smells of phosphates. yum! after dumping it, I thought why didn't I drop them in mangrove bowl? next time I'll be doing that.

I'm starting to get green algae coz I've had the lights on a bit too long along with the increased bioload that supplied nutrients to algae. blue lights were running 12 hours 100% to encourage coraline growth, multicolor LEDs running 8. Additionally I also get bright ambient sunlight in the living room. time to cut down on lights. 6 hours for blues. 4 for multicolor leds. This delays my introduction of corals to the tank .

water's showing 0 ammo, 0 nitrite, 10 nitrates. nitrates have moved up from 5 they were at with 5 mollies.


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## Bayinaung

Chaeto from nano didn't grow fast enough. Just bought some chaeto from LFS to supplement. I put it into a tub to clean it of debris. I pulled out what I thought was a debris turned out to be a big wiggly pink worm! 









going to do fresh water dip overnight and keep them in quarantine for now but might just dump them. I didn't spend 4 months curing live rock to introduce pests into my tanks this way. Does anyone have pest-free chaetos?


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## altcharacter

There is no such thing as pest free cheato. Believe me when I say that you will always have some type of pest. The best thing to do is either live with it or try to get some livestock to eat the pests. 

Most people think things like stomatella snails, astrea starfish, bristleworms, and bristle stars are a pest while others don't mind them at all. This is a hobby where you really have to sit back and think that "whatever is in the ocean will be in my tank"

Good luck with the worm and your wrasse should be able to eat it.


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## Bayinaung

well, that's very zen of you... live and let live.... this however makes me cringe - worms. I did find a big worm in my nano from the live rock. it was the kind that eats corals. that's what freakin me out. what are these worms by the way? Got them in a tub with fresh water. dead. tomorrow putting the chaeto in separate tank and keeping them there a couple weeks to see if other stuff gets hatched there.


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## altcharacter

Worms in your sump aren't that big of a problem. Like I had said before, just put your wrasse in there for a couple of days and all the worms will be gone.


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## Bayinaung

ok I hope you're right!  I did leave them overnight in fresh water so anything alive is going to be dead. hopefully any eggs in the chaetos will not hatch either.


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## PACMAN

I am following this tank. Lookin good!


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## Bayinaung

still watching algae growth. Looks like beige algae. perhaps it'll become coraline. though I am having second thoughts about desirability of coraline. Since it's still low lights, I thought it'll be safe to drop in the mushrooms. The photo was taken with multi-color leds at the barest minimum, and blues at 90%+, this was just to get the colors to pop on the mushrooms. D120 doesn't do the job my par38s do when it comes to colors.


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## Bayinaung

PACMAN said:


> I am following this tank. Lookin good!


Thanks pacman. I hope it turns out good  still trying to figure out coral arrangement.


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## Bayinaung

turns out keeping both blues and full spectrum leds at minimum gets the real colors out:


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## altcharacter

nice shroom garden going on there. In my 20g I had my shrooms pretty much in the same place and they ended up "walking" towards the rock and finally stuck themselves there.

I always love the clean look of new sand. I just wish it stayed that way


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## Bayinaung

thanks. I hope they will crawl up the rock. it'll be awesome! I'll be adding a scoly and a donut there to join the shrooms.


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## PACMAN

The blue one on the left is pretty nice looking.

I have never had success with ricordeas for some reason


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## Bayinaung

yeah its blue with yellow fringe and beads in there. purple one has shades of pink in there too but it's too subtle. I got these from R20. They seem more durable than indo yumas. These are Filipino yumas. You might want to grab some from there and give it a try. They are not expensive.


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## Bayinaung

*Protozoan infection & hyposalinity for whole setup*

I got a question for you experienced marine fish keepers.

I was warned that PBT are ich magnets by several people. I don't have ich, but my PBT Jajabinx seems to have some parasite in his right gill, which he rubs against sand once in a while. I was waiting to see if it will go away by itself but it hasn't. now it seems that my nemo is looking irritated at times as well and may have this.

the problem is still mild at this stage. the tank is healthy, the fish are eating well and are energetic. since I don't have a lot of corals in there yet, should I use hyposalinity treatment on the whole setup?

from what I read, inverts in liverock will die off but beneficial bacteria will live.

the second question is, how often do PBTs develop some sort of protozoan infections?


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## noy

nice collection of ricordias 

post a pic of your pbt. hypo is only effective against ich. make sure you know what you are dealing with before treating anything. 

Hypo in a display tank that's been going for a while is not a good idea. The die-off from the inverts (even just the ones you don't see - bristle worms, feather dusters etc...) may cause a crash and the ammonia spike may affect (or kill) the fish.

Ich usually starts in the gills/fins. If there is some obvious parasite hanging from the gills - it may be flukes or flatworms. There are some very specific medications for that. I'm actually more a fan of the newer copper medicines (like cupramine) than hypo. 

I'm a big fan of freshwater dips (with a bit something fairly benign like paraguard thrown in). This give the fish some immediate relief. Catching the fish may be pretty stressful though.


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## Bayinaung

yeah I'm pretty sure it's black ich. take a look at the spots on here. It began with tang scratching the gills against sand. then the last day or 2 the black spots are very prominent now.

And the fishes that hang or get close to him now are rubbing against things too - especially that small yellow tail damsel who seeks the tang for protection from bigger yellow tail damsel.

The tank's not been up too long so I'll take a risk with hypo. I took out all the corals. since this is a worm I'm hoping 4-6 weeks of hypo will get rid of them.

For something like this, would a cleaner shrimp help?


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## Bayinaung

well, 15 hours after those pics were taken, tang is dead. I saw him swimming slowly in the front of the tank in ambient light at 1 am last night. I was looking to see if it would sleep in ambient light at night. tang was the only fish who would be out and about in any amount of light and I was concerned whether it was getting enough sleep. I'll have hypo going for four weeks. not a good start to it though it has to be done.


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## altcharacter

Just a suggestion, and don't take this the wrong way, but tangs of any size should only be kept in larger tanks. The smaller tanks stress them out and they tend to get ich and other sorts of problems.

Stick with nano fish


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## Bayinaung

nope, not taking it the wrong way. and I know what the average recommendation is. He was pretty happy in there, 36" length tank, lots of swimming lanes, not just back and forth lanes or circular lanes that most simple rockscapes offer. I know of tangs that get ich in big setups as well. they are known to get, attract ich. Ich didn't kill this tang. It contributed to it certainly. Look at the pics, the fish was not in poor condition at all. Ich infection wasn't that bad yet. I know of a tang that lived in a 10 gallon nano for over a year and did fine. 

He was eating well and quite active until this sudden death last night. Fish loss is common in this hobby, and I did buy from a place that is known to have a higher mortality rate than others, so that's the trade off.


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## WiseGuyPhil

This is a common case of black spots disease. I see this often in the aquarium hobby. This is my personal opinion, but I believe it to be caused by nutrition.

What happens is the tangs are very finicky eaters and need a balanced diet. If they don't eat a balance of foods they are will start picking away at rocks or substrate. If your tang tends to sleep near the bottom of the sandbed it will most likely find a food source from there (ie. flatworms). Once into tangs system, you will slowly see the appearance of black spots. There are only a few treatments that can be done but its 50/50 chance they won't work. Generally once they appear its already too late.

I don't think that your tank length had anything to do with this case however I would recommend avoiding species of tangs in 36" tanks and sticking to the Zebrasoma species. They do better at smaller tanks.



Bayinaung said:


> nope, not taking it the wrong way. and I know what the average recommendation is. He was pretty happy in there, 36" length tank, lots of swimming lanes, not just back and forth lanes or circular lanes that most simple rockscapes offer. I know of tangs that get ich in big setups as well. they are known to get, attract ich. Ich didn't kill this tang. It contributed to it certainly. Look at the pics, the fish was not in poor condition at all. Ich infection wasn't that bad yet. I know of a tang that lived in a 10 gallon nano for over a year and did fine.
> 
> He was eating well and quite active until this sudden death last night. Fish loss is common in this hobby, and I did buy from a place that is known to have a higher mortality rate than others, so that's the trade off.


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## Bayinaung

WiseGuyAquatics said:


> This is a common case of black spots disease. I see this often in the aquarium hobby. This is my personal opinion, but I believe it to be caused by nutrition.
> 
> What happens is the tangs are very finicky eaters and need a balanced diet. If they don't eat a balance of foods they are will start picking away at rocks or substrate.


Hi,
informative. This tang wasn't a finicky eater. He was a good eater. He was eating flakes, marine pellets with garlic (chopped up to the size he likes), and macroalgae which I bought just to feed him. I'm not sure what else I should have been feeding him?

He was most like a dog I had in a fish tank. He would swim excitedly when he sees me come to the tank holding food can. A few times he swam around so excitedly the other fishes got scared. I miss this guy.


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## noy

sorry to hear about your loss. I find that pbt's are tougher to keep even than most other tangs. you are going to hear a lot of different opinions about what causes diseases so I would recommend you do your research and decide what right for yourself (so here is mine). Most of fishkeeping is based on empirical experience and there isn't any exact science on this.

You are also going to get a lot of opinions on what size of tank is required for a pbt. I think 36" is a bit small but you can keep a smaller one but its probably not a good long term solution. Small tanks increases aggression and stress and makes the fish more susceptible to disease.

If your tang had black ich (planarian flatworms) - and I can't tell from your photos whether that is the case - then it got it from the LFS. IMO - its a fairly treatable disease because its easy to spot early on. It attaches to skin and gills and its a parasite in every sense. Its when it attaches to the gills when its dangerous. I had a yellow tang which had it and I followed the general recommended treatment of fw dips with formalin and its never had that issue since (that's almost 2 years ago).

If you are in acquisition mode you really should think about setting up a qt tank. It can be as simple as a used fishroom quality 20 gallon with a sponge filter and a heater (BUT read up on this - you have to deal with ammonia/nitrite issues in most qt tanks because they are not cycled). I can understand why someone starting out may not have the equipment, space and time/effort to set up a qt tank but at a minimum you should do fw dips. That will increase your success percentage substantially. Everyone goes through this - all part of the learning process I think.

You should monitor you other fish to make sure they don't succumb. Read up on black ich - i'm not sure hypo is the best/recommended treatment.


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## tom g

*loss of fish*

it sucks when u loose something u like .. so sorry for that .your tank looks amazing and u took the time to quarantine all the rocks so u would not have the pests great move and it takes a lot of patience to do that .
the hardest thing to do is hold back when u get your tank all done believe me I know u hold back are all your intentions then u see something u like and bammmmmm u get suckered in .
as Noy had said it is pretty easy to set up a qt tank.
a cheap tank that holds water approx. 15 gals or so .a sponge filter that I keep in my sump so when I do get something that needs to be qt its already cycled .
a small working heater , a few pieces of pvc for hiding and smooth to not scratch up the fish.u can even throw in some fine sugar sand to keep the glare off the bottom and to make it more comfy.when qt is over just drain water leave sand to dry rinse off sponge filter and put back in sump . 
pretty simple and pretty cheap if u look on the buy and sell section of this forum or kijjii.
good luck with the tank and hope that gives u an idea .
but paitientce is the key 
cheers 
tom


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## Bayinaung

noy said:


> sorry to hear about your loss. I find that pbt's are tougher to keep even than most other tangs. If your tang had black ich (planarian flatworms) - and I can't tell from your photos whether that is the case - then it got it from the LFS.
> 
> If you are in acquisition mode you really should think about setting up a qt tank.
> 
> You should monitor you other fish to make sure they don't succumb.





tom g said:


> the hardest thing to do is hold back when u get your tank all done believe me I know u hold back are all your intentions then u see something u like and bammmmmm u get suckered in .
> as Noy had said it is pretty easy to set up a qt tank.
> a cheap tank that holds water approx. 15 gals or so .a sponge filter that I keep in my sump so when I do get something that needs to be qt its already cycled .


Thanks for kind words and the tips. Yup this shipment came in and had what I wanted, and I went for it. I didn't think I'd need a QT but I see the logic for it. I have an unused 20 gallon too. I'm watching the other guys. they all seem to be doing fine. the small yellow tail damsel is scratching up a lot, but eating well and is active. hopefully hypo will do the trick. From what I'm reading a lot of treatments call for fresh water dips and formaline dips but only hypo will get rid of the black ich in the tank which has a 12 day life cycle and inhabits the substrate as larvae. good thing I don't have any gobies! phew.

I'm not adding any more fish. focus will be on getting the tank ready for corals. One day I'll get a 5-6 foot tank and get a pbt again then. And a cat who'll watch him all the time. lol. sorry my weird sense of humor.


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## WiseGuyPhil

Sorry, just to clarify what I meant by finicky. If they aren't getting something that they normal would consume in the while, they can/will stop taking other foods.



Bayinaung said:


> Hi,
> informative. This tang wasn't a finicky eater. He was a good eater. He was eating flakes, marine pellets with garlic (chopped up to the size he likes), and macroalgae which I bought just to feed him. I'm not sure what else I should have been feeding him?
> 
> He was most like a dog I had in a fish tank. He would swim excitedly when he sees me come to the tank holding food can. A few times he swam around so excitedly the other fishes got scared. I miss this guy.


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## damsel_den

I didnt read the whole thread... But am I reading it correct when i am reading you are doing hypo in your dt?


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## conix67

damsel_den said:


> I didnt read the whole thread... But am I reading it correct when i am reading you are doing hypo in your dt?


I think that is what he said, with all inverts out of the tank - just rocks and fishes.


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## Bayinaung

conix67 said:


> I think that is what he said, with all inverts out of the tank - just rocks and fishes.


yup, conix is correct. this is to get rid of any blackich lurking in the sand or anywhere else in the tank. black ich has a shorter life-cycle so I may not go for the full 4 weeks but I want to be careful there. fishes are doing ok at this point. If I start seeing signs they are under stress from hybo, I will move them to a stand-by 20 gallon.


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## noy

get an ammonia badge and test for ammonia/nitrites for invert die-off.


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## Bayinaung

Just took a measurement. ammonia 0, nitrite 0, but nitrates have spiked to around 30ppm from 5ppm. So I guess I did have an ammonia spike but bacteria is still alive and did a fine job transforming ammonia and nitrite. Gonna watch the nitrate and will do a big water change end of week to lower it.


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## Bayinaung

the skunk clown and wrasse have been hiding. So I got into the rocks. found the wrasse hiding in a hole, and he has black ich. I suspect skunk's got it too and is hiding. today maybe the fifth day they got infected and as the worms mature they are making their way to the skin surface. they'll drop off from these fishes soon and will start the cycle again. This time I am hoping the cycle will not start again due to hypo, as long as these two survive the infection. Other fishes still look ok.


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## altcharacter

nuke the system and start over again. Put the fish in a different tank.


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## Bayinaung

altcharacter said:


> nuke the system and start over again. Put the fish in a different tank.


LOL that's what I'm essentially doing with the hypo. I'll catch the wrasse and skunk tomorrow, give them a FW dip to get rid of the worms coming out, put them in QT and keep treating tank with hypo.


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## Bayinaung

*Update after Hypo*

I thought it was time for a little update on my system. It's probably more than 6 months that it's been up.

I went nuclear on the black ich and went hypo on the DT system. After six weeks I slowly brought the salinity back up. I kept the mangroves and chaeto and two mollies in the system (in the lower or sump tank). I purchased a bunch of corals from Ryan's. And some fishes from SUM, and BA and put them in QTs. SUM fish died in QT (file fish). The BA fishes are still in QT and will be in there in another two weeks. For now, it's the three survivors of the black ich plague: yellow tail blue damsels and velvet neon damsel.

Also redid the rockscape, simplified it, less rocks, more for coral display. The unintended consequence is that yes there are now less territorial demarcations so this may pose a problem in the future that I will have to manage.

Without much further ado, here are the update pics:


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## Bayinaung

*the double stacks*










The top tank is the main DT. It's got the Evergrow D120 light. Bottom tank's 30G. It's got 4 T5s. Chaeto's in the basket. And the two mollies that I used to cycle the tank.


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## Bayinaung

This is the left corner of the tank where most of the corals in the tank are. Most of them were bought from Ryan. I quarantined them for 4 weeks and medicated them for a few weeks. The pipe coral was from a huge colony that was in my 10G. It kept growing so big it was outgrowing the small tank so I broke it up into 5 pieces and it's all been going south since fragging them. A bit of a mystery why. Pectina was from Ryan as well. Evergrow D120 doesn't show off its colors well. I'll have to mod this light or add more to get that actinic pop for corals.

Oh yeah the long wisps aren't hair algae. It's a type of macroalgae that came with the donut coral I got from Taipan and it has happily established itself in my tank. They give rocks a natural look so Im' not taking them out.


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## Bayinaung

The tanks with the viewing chair. This is where I perch myself when looking at the tanks or read or watch TV.


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## 50seven

Reading this thread for the first time. Nice idea with the stacked tanks, kinda like a planted marine tank on the bottom, and a reef on the top... I assume the water from both systems are connected?


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## Bayinaung

50seven said:


> Reading this thread for the first time. Nice idea with the stacked tanks, kinda like a planted marine tank on the bottom, and a reef on the top... I assume the water from both systems are connected?


Thanks. yeah both systems are connected. Bottom tank's basically a sump. That's where the chaeto, mangroves and skimmer (SWC Xtreme HOT) are.


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## 50seven

Yeah, usually people hide their sumps/refugiums from view. Yours looks kinda cool


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## Bayinaung

I'm slowly adding more livestock to the DT. ammonia nitrites, nitrates all 0. Phosphates is a shade below 0.25ppm as the test colour is slightly blue. This is still causing a slight algae growth in the DT. I'm waiting for Chaeto, mangroves, and a new macroalgae just added to the tank to catch up with the rising bio load.

I finally moved the mushrooms from the 10G nano I've been using as a coral holding tank into the display tank:










It seems rics are the only ones which seem to look good under these blue lights from Evergrow D120. Evidence: the frag just above the orange/purple ric is a purple chalice. It sure isn't turning flourescent with Evergrow blues.


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## Bayinaung

*BTA hitching a ride from a snail*

My two BTAs in the holding tank have been moving about after I moved the tank a bit. In the case of one BTA, it hitched a ride from a snail. Nemo came to investigate. I thought it was cute:


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## rickcasa

Bayinaung said:


> It seems rics are the only ones which seem to look good under these blue lights from Evergrow D120. Evidence: the frag just above the orange/purple ric is a purple chalice. It sure isn't turning flourescent with Evergrow blues.


Pretty colours! Reminds me, I don't have enough rics...must grab me some of that nice blue and yellow ones.

Yeah, purples look uninspired under my Razors too.


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## Bayinaung

rickcasa said:


> Pretty colours! Reminds me, I don't have enough rics...must grab me some of that nice blue and yellow ones.
> 
> Yeah, purples look uninspired under my Razors too.


Thanks! I'm just glad I got some colours in there now. Man it sucks that your more expensive Razors aren't bringing out the colours. I think it's because there isn't enough near-UV light in blue LEDs because their spectral output is a very narrow band where as T5s have a flatter bell curve in spectrum output and thus hits that narrow near-UV band that results in the light spectrum conversion from near-UV to a different light spectrum as it gets reflected. So in short, I'm looking at doing a LED DIY to add near-UV (violet spectrum really) to the light setup.


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## Bayinaung

rickcasa said:


> ..must grab me some of that nice blue and yellow ones.


That's the only one of it's kind I've seen anywhere. There are far more colourful yumas out there of course. I think those two colour combinations work really well. Think of how good blondes look in blue dresses.


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## kamal

Would you recommend the d120? Or if you were buying again would you look at a different unit?


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## Bayinaung

kamal said:


> Would you recommend the d120? Or if you were buying again would you look at a different unit?


You can't beat the value of this unit. I paid ~$200 including shipping for the new gen light. It's solidly built, there's a 3 year Canadian warranty from ReefSupplies.ca. $200 is the price of 6 months of 6 T5 lightbulbs and they won't come close to this one in terms of intensity or light output.

I think what's clear is for way better colour rendition like I've seen at RR, you'd have to spend more than double or triple. I'm just putting the colour rendition issue out there only because that's something that's not been said about these EvergrowD120s (not the wannab D120s).

I'm not an electronics guy but I think this thing can be easily modded. I've seen a video of the insides and all the lights are fixed to a board. but thus far nobody's put out a how to on on how to replace the bulbs with different colours, and I'm not going to mess with the 3 year warranty. Thus I'm going to build supplemental LED light bars to get the colour rendering I want - ie more near-UV.

At this time there isn't anything close to this unit in terms of price and value and I'm not looking to spend $600 to $1200 just for lights. And I think it's insane spending $200 every 6 months for T5s on a small tank. So yeah I'd do it again!


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## kamal

Thanks....i am setting up a 55g so its either two of these or one buildmyled.com 48" 14k spectrum fixture....


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## Bayinaung

Kamal, I'm looking at the LEDs buildmyled uses for 14k and I'm not seeing sufficient difference. Looks like half of the blues are royal blue instead of just blues, less deep red. The addition of royal blues will make for better colour rendition IMO. Not sure if it's separate controllers for blues and full spectrum LEDs like D120. 

I think their superactinic series might give the "pop" in colours in corals I want to see. But it needs the full spectrum into the combo as well. That's why I think I'm going to go ahead and figure out how to build the supplemental actinic light.


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## Bayinaung

*Maxi minis*

I went on a shopping trip over the weekend. Got a few things. One of my happy finds were these maxi-minis:









the purple inner ring on the left should be more red and orange than the purple it's showing up on the screen. they sure looked better under ATI blue+.


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## Bayinaung

*New additions*

I got a few frags in the last two weeks and they seem to be responding well to the tank:

Bonsai:









a pink/red acro with purple tips and green polyps, and a yellow green one:









they came with little acro crabs but died when I dipped them in Coral RX  next time I'm taking them out.


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## Bayinaung

My find from last weekend: aussie gold hammer:










It was exactly what I wanted to be framed by the arch. I am so elated with that buy.


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## Bayinaung

Here's another shot of one of the mini-maxis. This shot shows its colour better:


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## Bayinaung

And a new resident of the tank - a small cherub angel:










It was in quarantine for over 4 weeks before being added to this DT. Fabulous little guy with the deepest blue and a shimmering electric blue on the fringes of its fins, and the brightest yellow for its face. I've never seen a prettier cherub


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## altcharacter

Very nice angel!! I was almost talked into buying one of those but decided not to.
Starting to like your tank more and more! Now it just needs to age a bit


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## aln

This tank is really coming along! Even you need cheato I have lots...I pull out a fist worth almost every water change lol. I love those maxi mini nems looks.super cool!


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## Bayinaung

altcharacter said:


> Very nice angel!! I was almost talked into buying one of those but decided not to.
> Starting to like your tank more and more! Now it just needs to age a bit


thanks alt. means a lot coming from you.  I love this little guy. he doesn't bother anyone, goes about his business, but doesn't back down when challenged. My kind of guy!


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## Bayinaung

aln said:


> This tank is really coming along! Even you need cheato I have lots...I pull out a fist worth almost every water change lol. I love those maxi mini nems looks.super cool!


are you serious? you throw your chaeto out? mine are dying suddenly and I'm having to keep some in a stock tank. I will have to grab some from you soon.

and thanks for your encouragement. yeah I'm resisting the urges to fill up the tank. I've got a plan in mind for the corals I want in the tank, their colour structure and placement and I'm slowly going about building up my collection.


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## aln

Cant wait to see it filled for sure!


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## zoapaly

Nice and clean set up  need some more corals to make it look better think about my set up


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## Bayinaung

aln said:


> Cant wait to see it filled for sure!


hahaha me too! I hope I don't go broke doing it. already thinking of upgrading to a bigger tank LMAO


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## Bayinaung

zoapaly said:


> Nice and clean set up  need some more corals to make it look better think about my set up


thanks! yeah I need to add more... slowly but surely. I don't have a lot of cash to splurge so I must spend wisely. your setups are crazy dude. I'd be super happy if I can get corals that are just a quarter of what yours are like. I've been meaning to ask you - where do you get your STUFF! it's out of this world! you run your own store somewhere right? you're just not telling us?


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## Bayinaung

*Constant Gardener*

I'd like to introduce you to the self-appointed gardener of my reef garden:


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## Bayinaung

He spends the entire time inspecting every square mm of the tank. rocks, sand, corals, constantly grooming the live rock, picking off things at the base of the corals. Here he is looking into a little cave:


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## Bayinaung

Here he is cruising by the sand-dwelling nem... which by the way has a green colour under actinics and has delicate little tentacles...


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## Bayinaung

This shot shows off the electric blue fringe on the cherub angel - it showed up better when I brightened up the pic a little bit. It looks much better in person.


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## Bayinaung

ok.. justtttttttt one more of my little guy.. a parting shot:

by the way on the lower left is a red stag with green tips. the green tips didn't show up under this light. I'm hoping its colours will get darker with time.


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## zoapaly

Bayinaung said:


> Here he is cruising by the sand-dwelling nem... which by the way has a green colour under actinics and has delicate little tentacles...


Beautiful picture , I'm thinking get one like your for my tank


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## zoapaly

Bayinaung said:


>





Bayinaung said:


> thanks! yeah I need to add more... slowly but surely. I don't have a lot of cash to splurge so I must spend wisely. your setups are crazy dude. I'd be super happy if I can get corals that are just a quarter of what yours are like. I've been meaning to ask you - where do you get your STUFF! it's out of this world! you run your own store somewhere right? you're just not telling us?


I don't run my own store , 90% of my corals from Reef Raft  no secrets


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## Bayinaung

zoapaly said:


> I don't run my own store , 90% of my corals from Reef Raft  no secrets


yeah... so the guy still entertains you?  how do you get to go there?


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## zoapaly

No , no more customers walk in right now


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## Bayinaung

*Hammer not extending*

I'm not sure what's happening. My hammer isn't as fully extended as the earlier photos. I am ramping up the light for the SPS. and SPS is responding, with more intense colours. but the hammer doesn't look happy. I'm going to test the water for phosphates and nitrates.

could it just be light? should I inspect the hammer? Does it need feeding?


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## Bayinaung

*test results*

woa.. very weird....

Phophates... 0!
Nitrates.. 40ppm!

damn chaeto... why did they die!!!! mangroves not doing good job. I did start ramping up feeding after reading the articles in here about high phosphates... instead.. phosphates are 0, but nitrates are high LMAO. shoot. water change and cut down on feeding again.


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## 50seven

Phosphate readings can be very misleading, as your LR has the ability to soak it up like a sponge, and release it again when water concentrations are low. 

My LPS shows extension based on changes in salinity. Maybe yours is a bit off?

I've had chaeto die off in both of my tanks in the first 3-4 months of them running. From what I can tell, it was finding equilibrium with the amount of nutrients in the system. 

Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Tapatalk 2


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## sig

do you rung GFO, carbon or just testing?

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## Ben J

Definitely lower those nitrates, run carbon if you don't already. Also keep in mind that cherub angels can nip at lps, its not guaranteed, but it is possible.


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## Bayinaung

50seven said:


> My LPS shows extension based on changes in salinity. Maybe yours is a bit off?
> 
> I've had chaeto die off in both of my tanks in the first 3-4 months of them running. From what I can tell, it was finding equilibrium with the amount of nutrients in the system.


salinity is stable at 1.026SG. I'm hoping this spike in nitrates will give chaetos a spur to grow again.



sig said:


> do you rung GFO, carbon or just testing?


No I don't run GFO or carbon. I'm counting on skimmer and plant material to take care of the phosphates.



Ben J said:


> Definitely lower those nitrates, run carbon if you don't already. Also keep in mind that cherub angels can nip at lps, its not guaranteed, but it is possible.


I was going to change water a bit, but decided to experiment with carbon dosing - using sugar. just cleaned out my skimmer cup last night. will see how much a day or half a day will collect (I turned off skimmer by accident last night).

I'll be watching the cherub for any unwanted behaviour. he's gone if he goes after corals


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## Ben J

Try to just make sure you feed him lots (but not too much).


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## sig

Bayinaung said:


> No I don't run GFO or carbon. I'm counting on skimmer and plant material to take care of the phosphates.
> 
> [/IMG]


not planing to hurt your feelings, but based on the pictures this approach does not work.
it will be much more difficult to fix it than prevent

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## Bayinaung

sig said:


> not planing to hurt your feelings, but based on the pictures this approach does not work.
> it will be much more difficult to fix it than prevent


no my feelings aren't hurt. I appreciate the candor. I want to be able to run a simple setup with as much biological filtration as possible. I'm going to try the jaubert method here and see how far that'll take me.


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## sig

Bayinaung said:


> no my feelings aren't hurt. I appreciate the candor. I want to be able to run a simple setup with as much biological filtration as possible. I'm going to try the jaubert method here and see how far that'll take me.


I really wish you the best and hopefully it will work for you. Unfortunately it did not work for many on this forum, who tried to recreate 'natural ocean in 30G"
Our tanks are always on the edge of collapse and when we dose something without knowing what we do bad things happen.
I almost killed my tank 2 years ago

I read about jaubert, this method 3 years ago and most of the opinions summarized here:

"jaubert,s methods are more then 20 years old, he started early 80,s in a laboratory setting with a team of scientist to make his style work. it has to be finely tuned to say the least. and to many its thought that he supplemented his tank with natural sea water like many of his other displays.
his method is best left in the graveyard of complicated methods that are not practical for the home hobbiest.
do not confuse jauberts method for a simple plenum, theres much more to it"

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## Bayinaung

I appreciate your input sig. I don't want to over complicated things but I do want to reduce risks as much as possible. so phosban reactor it is. I don't plan to keep many SPS so that I won't need a calcium reactor.


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## Bayinaung

*Valentine's day 2014 log: Horny nem*

well the sand nem is at it. I guess it's a male. I had read that these nems are not known to split but multiplies through procreation. I guess this is the evidence.

This is from the evening:









I guess it went on all night as I found the tanks all milky by the morning:










He's lookin for love! does anyone have a female sand nem like this? hehe


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## zoapaly

I think water cloudy maybe you have a bacteria bloom , I double you should do 50% water change and add Phos remover as soon as good


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## zoapaly

Make sure your RO water reading between 00ppm to 0.4ppm


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## sig

Bayinaung said:


> I appreciate your input sig. I don't want to over complicated things but I do want to reduce risks as much as possible. so phosban reactor it is. I don't plan to keep many SPS so that I won't need a calcium reactor.


I am not talking calcium reactor. I would not recommend something that I have no clue about.

Get 2 Little fishes Phosban reactors and run carbon and phosphate remover media in them

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## zoapaly

Test kits for my trusted only Salifert and Elos nothing else


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## Bayinaung

zoapaly said:


> I think water cloudy maybe you have a bacteria bloom , I double you should do 50% water change and add Phos remover as soon as good


oh yeah bacteria bloom that's it! I dosed sugar into the tank to lower the nitrates as a one time thing. skimmer's working overtime right this minute. water has cleared by evening:


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## zoapaly

Bayinaung said:


> oh yeah bacteria bloom that's it! I dosed sugar into the tank to lower the nitrates as a one time thing. skimmer's working overtime right this minute. water has cleared by evening:


Man your skimmer working hard  I would like see your fts


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## Bayinaung

here's a quick FTS. water's cleared up. haven't done maintenance yet. algae is growing a bit more due to nitrate spike and light ramp up. I am running blues at 100% now and full spectrum at 65%. (not in current pic. late at night so lights are already being turned down).










I have moved the aussie hammer further away from the center. infact it's been at the corner where it gets the least light. I moved it between the arch and mushroom rock so I can take a photo of it.

oh yeah the tubes on the left are being used for drip acclimatization of a few hermit crabs I picked up today.


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## Bayinaung

*Problem with Aussie Hammer*

Uh oh. I come home and find the aussie hammer is showing tissue receding at one corner, where it gets the most light:










is there anything I can do about it? do I leave it alone? feed it more? what do I feed it? suggestions are welcome here.

I will be measuring nitrates and phosphates again.


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## 50seven

I never acclimate crustaceans. Just let the bag sit in the tank to get to the same temp, reach your hand in the bag and toss them in the tank. NEVER had a loss this way.

Not a lot you can do. The first thing I ask when I see a change in my critters is, "What changes did *I *make in the tank recently?"

If you said you were ramping up your lighting, maybe it's getting too much light?


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## Bayinaung

50seven said:


> I never acclimate crustaceans. Just let the bag sit in the tank to get to the same temp, reach your hand in the bag and toss them in the tank. NEVER had a loss this way.


I'm disconnecting the drips as I write. lol



50seven said:


> Not a lot you can do. The first thing I ask when I see a change in my critters is, "What changes did *I *make in the tank recently?"
> 
> If you said you were ramping up your lighting, maybe it's getting too much light?


yup I was ramping up the lighting from about 35% to 82.5% in the space of a week.. maybe that was a wee bit too fast. Nitrates did ramp up. the one SPS is looking super happy and getting really intense in colour. but aussie isn't happy. so I'm going to tone down the lighting again. bring it back to 70% blues 50% full spec which is... 60%. I think my nitrates are also dropping from the carbon dosing. I can see a bit more extension by the hammer.


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## Bayinaung

*Score!*

OMG. Im unpacking a coral colony I got today for dipping and quarantining. the full spectrum light turned off. only blues on. and WHAM. this blasto lit up.










THIS IS EXACTLY WHAT I WANTED! WOOOHOOO! Firepit Blasto!!!!!!!!!!!!!

coral angels looking after me. best valentine's day ever! LMAO


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## matti2uude

Very nice.


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## Bayinaung

*Urghhhhhhhhh!!!!!!!!!*

My hammer's looking worse this morning:










it's like the skeleton side is melting.


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## Bayinaung

*Test results*

Just tested water.

Nitrates are 0 now
Phosphates 0

Sugar carbon dosing worked! used 2 teaspoons of sugar on first day, then 3 the next. total water volume is 65G. less rocks - probably 50-57?

I'm going to turn OFF the skimmer now to prevent nutrition starvation. oh god please... don't let hammer die.


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## 50seven

You killed it, you cruel evil man!

Can't tell you how many times I lost a coral and there was no obvious explanation; but take stock of every little change and you might find a pattern or something. Don't feel bad- we've all had it happen.


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## Bayinaung

did I? can it still be saved?


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## 50seven

Bayinaung said:


> did I? can it still be saved?


It's hard to say. You can hope for the best, but try not to do anything drastic to the tank. Coral hates fluctuations in parameters more than a constant bad parameter. This is partly because zooxanthellae can adapt to poor water conditions if given enough time, but if it's jumping all over the place from hour to hour, they don't know what to do and can die off, leaving the coral itself extremely vulnerable.


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## Ben J

Maybe someone else could input but what I would do instead of sugar dosing is get an HOB filter (maybe aqua clear 50 or so) and just run the sponge and a bag of carbon. Then you just rinse the carbon before putting it in the filter, and change it between every 2 weeks to once a month. Also, don't do so much changing to your lights, constantly lowering and raising the amount of light prevents the corals from really getting settled.


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## Bayinaung

sigh... this hobby is harder than keeping a dog LMAO.


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## Bayinaung

would carbon not absorb the minerals from salt mixes for the corals?


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## Ben J

Bayinaung said:


> would carbon not absorb the minerals from salt mixes for the corals?


No I do not think so, I always run carbon, and most people I know also run carbon. But if you find that after a while it starts to remove trace elements, you can always just dose those. But imho activated carbon is very good to use.

And you can always give the hammer to me if you are scared of killing it


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## Bayinaung

*Hammer lesson*

LOL. I'll keep you in mind Ben.

Ok this is a good lesson learned. Do NOT panic when parameters change. I definitely made it worse by 1) moving the coral (change in light AND flow) and 2) sudden drop in nitrates. both made hammer unhappy.

this evening I have restored the hammer to its pride of place (same light same flow as before) and it looks better. while it isn't fully extended, it didn't look droopy. I will take some pics tomorrow and post.


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## Bayinaung

A happy side effect of the spike in nutrients is a little growth spurt in this macroalgae:










I personally like it as it gives animation to the landscape, like tall grasses on terra firma.


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## fury165

I'm not sure if you mentioned it earlier burt why did you start carbon dosing (in the form of sugar)? I'm not sure your approach is correct as it should be done slowly and over a prolonged period of time. You also need your skimmer on when carbon dosing. I'd agree with the folks who recommend taking it slowly and not making sudden or drastic changes to the tanks. You might save the hammer and kill something else - it is a game of balance.


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## zoapaly

I did not hear anything from you for do WC ? And stop feeding your corals PO4 NO3 go up and you can see algae bloom


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## Bayinaung

Hey fury I did bring the skimmer back online when I realized my API kits were probably showing 0 when there was still a bit left. 

doing water change tomorrow. letting things settle a bit after carbon dosing.


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## Menace2Sobriety

Bayinaung said:


> sigh... this hobby is harder than keeping a dog LMAO.


More like....

"This hobby is harder than keeping a happy wife!"

Menace


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## Bayinaung

Menace2Sobriety said:


> More like....
> 
> "This hobby is harder than keeping a happy wife!"
> 
> Menace


LOL. how do you keep your wife happy? I can use tips on that too. (divorced LMAO).


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## Bayinaung

So I did water change yesterday. about 20% volume. that was a pretty big change and may have altered the PH a bit for a time. A green acro and the red stag didn't take well to the WC. Red stag was a sorta "rescue" which had flesh loss on it when I purchased it. It was from that area that it began to lose more flesh. I fragged healthy parts of both. Didn't pay much for them, and they weren't my favs so I'm not all that upset. will post pics later.

One coral that's definitely happy with the WC is the pectinia. It's all puffed up. usually it does that only in the AM or after eating.


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## Bayinaung

I guess looking down on it the puffiness doesn't show as much.


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## Letigrama

so, if you want to keep that " tall grass" i suggest you keep it at bay. make sure you pull new growths and keep it to just one rock. that " plant" is going to start to bug your zoas soon and make them retract.

I still think the cloudy water was your nem spawining and not a bacteria bloom. is a serious issue to have a bacteria bloom. what could have caused a bacteria bloom to a cycled tank? the residue on the skimmer cup was because the skimmer cleaned your water from all the gamets 

I am going for a phosban reactor soon too. is a spring project!


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## Bayinaung

Hey leti the first cloudy water was the nem and then in the morning I think it had to do with carbon dosing. what carbon dosing does is it causes bacterial bloom that uses up nutrients. bacteria are then is sucked up by the protein skimmer. so I had my nitrates go from 40 to 0 in one day. and that sudden change caused the hammer to start dying. and now I'm crossing my fingers that it will recover.

by the way, I got a new healthy nem - a pink crispa or malu.  not sure if I'm going to put it in this tank or put it in my clown tank.


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## Bayinaung

Diagnosed the aussie hammer situation. It's the light, intensity of the LED light I have. I noticed the hammer's extension was much better in early morning hours, then wanes as the LED lights come on. (LPS seems to love that early morning light) so I moved it under the arch formation I have. It seems to be doing better there, and the slow die-off from the one side has finally seems to have stopped for now. 

conclusion: while a healthy hammer enjoys strong LED light, a weakened hammer prefers lower light intensity to recover.


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## someguy

I notice it's been a couple months since your last update. How is the LED fixture?


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