Barney's New Marine Journal - 150l Upgrade.

[1entra]

LOL darn clowns can be very territorial and defend their "turf" against any intruders! I've had mine attack my hand alond with the siphoning tube as well!

Anyways the tanks coming along really well so keep the pics coming so we can all join in your journey!

Btw just a quick question... is your tank open top as I have read through your journal and can't see anything about you using any form of covering on it? Its just my new tank I am in the process of setting up is going to be open top and I would like to have a firefish in there but am afraid it may jump...

 

[xxBarneyxx]

Yeah its open topped but I use eggcrate to cover it over. I got it off ebay (search on there for koi filter grid) as it was a lot cheaper (and I couldnt find any locally). I would say it is a must have, my firefish has jumped a few times and the egg crate saved him (he really hates it when I use the mag float in the tank).

I have black egg crate which actually doesnt look too bad on there.

 

[1entra]

Thanks for that Barney. But I bet your tank has support brakets on the inside doesn't it or have you just placed the eggcrate accross the top of the tank?

 

[xxBarneyxx]

yeah it does and it has a plastic trim round the top that helps it blend in nicely (it actually looks like part of the tank). The support brackets are not an issue if you dont have them. As long as you can drop the water level in the tank by an inch for a couple of days you could silcone in some bits for it to sit on (just be very careful while doing it). You could even get a couple of blocks of acrylic and super glue them in to rest it on.

Uploading photos at the moment so will post them in a bit
Edit: Well I would do but Imageshack is not playing nicely tonight. It only uploaded half the photos so I logged out and now it wont let me log back in.

 

[xxBarneyxx]

Well some of the photos are here. I will upload the rest when imageshack decides to work again.

Compare this to the photo below which was taken Oct 12th and you can see how quickly the zoas are starting to grow with a little bit of feeding and much better lights:

 

[SkiFletch]

Wow Barney, nice

 

[jennybugs]

Any chance of names for us novices please?

Gorgeous piccies

 

[xxBarneyxx]

Thanks

The top one is a torch coral and the second one is a bubble coral. The others are zoa's and I think Paly's (not 100% sure of the difference between zoas, paly's and large button polyps).

Will upload photos of the other one later and of the bubble at night when its in feeding mode (looks totaly different).

 

[ben1987]

nice barney, cant get my zoo's t do anything
Yours look great. The red one really has grown

 

[kj23502]

Any chance of names for us novices please?

That's what I was thinking also

Great pictures Barney . It seeems amazing what a little extra attention can do.

*Just to share something that I read on Melev's Reef. If you have something you need to spot feed but fish or shrimps are coming up and snatching the food from them:

Cut the bottom off a 2 liter bottle (or similar).
Put the open bottom of the bottle around the coral.
Use turkey baster to put the coral food into the top of the 2 liter bottle where the lid would go.
You can let it sit there for a little bit to protect the coral and food while it eats. Another tip was to put a few small tiny holes around the bottle. That way if you forget to remove the bottle for awhile, the coral still has some water flow around it.

Just thought I'd share since I just read it and this topic was kinda about feeding corals

 

[fiskkeeperpro]

nice tank Barney

does the egg crate block out much light? also, what tubes are you using please? looks really nice

could youget some pics of how the egg crate is attached? how is it with the luminaire? easy to get off?

thanks

 

[xxBarneyxx]

At the moment for tubes I'm supposed to be using:
1 ATI Actinic (54 Watt Actinic)
2 ATI Aqua Blue Special T5 HO Lamps (54 Watt Aqua Bl
1 ATI Blue PlusT5 HO Lamps (54 Watt Blue Plus)

However the blue plus never arrived (got sent a friggin plant pro tube) and I think the actinic is faulty (it doesnt seem very bright at all) so Im running with the two 54w tubes a cheap actinic and a faulty actinic.

After months of screwing around with the company I bought them from they have finally sent me out the blue plus and they have told me they will send me out two blue specials as well to compensate (they only did this after I PM'ed them on one of the forums they sponsor though).

So when I get the 3 new tubes Im going to have a play around and see what looks best. Will probably be 2 blue specials the cheap actinic and the blue plus.

The egg crate actually doesnt block too much light at all. I have to brace bars running down the edges of my tank so it just sits in there. I will get some photos of it up over the next couple of days. It actually looks pretty good because of the black plastic trim on the top of my tank as well. I have it in two sections and its as simple as just lifting the luminaire unit up and lifting the eggcrate out.

 

[GShorty1981]

Looks wicked Barney..i reckon you should get some more fish tho!

 

[xxBarneyxx]

I would love to but its overstocked as it is already in my opinion (5 fish in a 20G UK). Its not so bad because the tank is quite long so they all have their own space (I probably wouldnt have all these fish in a cube tank of the same volume) but I wouldnt want to put anymore in there.

Give it 5 or 6 months and if all is ok I might get a watchman goby/pistol shrimp as they would tend to stay in one area but will see how it goes.

 

[GShorty1981]

150 litres is over 30 imperial gallons mate!