First Marine Tank :)

[-Nemo-]

Concerning your second to last post,
Sucks that you got a feather start instead beautiful but nearly impossible to keep...

That is one of the ways for mushrooms to split. Like yours, part of the base forms into a new mushroom, or the mushroom itself just splits into two.

The star on your glass looks more like an asterina star because of the weird legs, but tough to tell for sure.


Concerning your last post,
Hope everyone gets all better soon


Tank is looking great. Some huge corals in there!

 

[indir-emir]

Yeah i heard about the feather star Sucks, but i figure ill let it go and see what happens. I feed it with rots each night when i feed my goni. :\

The mushroom has since split again lol. Doing okay

Not realy sureo n the star, but still pretty cool looking

That makes to off us! That mandarin im very pleased about, as im pretty sure its eating Was very very worried for her. Hoping all goes well though! Has been 3 days :\ 4th today. So still a long time left.

Yeah. THanks mate! Some of hte corals have grown alot! My sinularia has like quadroopled in size since ibought it lol. The orangey hammer coral is a 20+ cm circle when it is fully opened Looks fantastic!!! The pinky hammer coral is the shape of a football now And the size of half of half of one (width wise). I have a few pics f the duncans, the duncan has about 5 small heads on each of hte big heads. It absolutely fanastic haha. It has, at a guess, about 50 heads now compared to 20 when it got put in haha. Need to figure out a way to frag it though as it looks a little strange now It is a big head with 5 litle heads around its base

 

[indir-emir]

FINALLY the fish have gone back into my tank! It took over 6 weeks, but they got there and all have survived the treatment. Very happy to see the fish back at home, swimming around like crazy looking for things to do

Goni was going great guns, till i released the clowns into the tank. Not even an hour after going in, they were hosting it again. She didnt like it, and i couldnt stand to let it die. So i made a makeshift keep away thing lol. I cut notches out of a 5L bottle i use for water top up carrying (cant no more ) and placed it over the goni. This means the clowns cant get onto it, its opened back up already. Clowns are now swimming around the tank looking for a new home i hope

Mandarin has learnt that the bottle = food. Atleast, it was going back into it in the QT looking for more food, atleast i think thats what it was doing in there! She is however, munching away at all the pods that exploded in population while she was not in there haha. Have not fed the fish yet however, so there is no food in her bottle just yet.

Have learnt that my goni really likes 0.5mm pellets of new life spectrum i have lol. Barely reacts to rotifiers, chases the pellets though Going to try mysis tonight as ive been feeding rots and pellets for a while now. The daughter goni is the same as her mother, and is growing nicely and extending nicely Anyone know if i should glue the daughter bud down or not? She is just sitting on one of my rocks.

The rest of the corals are grwoing nicely My green sinularia, my first coral, has grown ALOT. The SPS frag i bought ages ago, which ahs never been a big thing with me (was a test frag, not really into SPS i must say) is now extending its green polyps and looks nice.

My peppermint shrimps are going strong and have grown a huge amount since i have purchased them ages ago.

I purchased a nice bubble tip anemone specimen It is approximately 10-15cm when fully open. Has moved from the rock that it is on in the pick, and is the bottom left corner of the tank. It will probably move from there, but ill give it time to move around Hopefully the clowns will be hosted by it, thats the hope It is a green bubble tip, pink base, purple tips on it tentacles. And is balloning nicely on pretty much every tentacle, and appears in great condition

Also went to feed my fish just now. And the turbo snails were wat appeared to be spitting a white stringy thing out. Which i assume is sperm? As there is a big group of eggs just under one of my power heads, being laid by one turbo. While 3 others i can see are doign this "spitting". So thats pretty cool, free turbo snails More clean up crew, yes please

Going to buy some fresh prawns, muscels, clams, etc from the store to freeze and feed to the anemone tomorrow also

Anyway, thats enough chit chat from me Time for pictures, not too many though

First a macro shot of the BTA:

Just a shot of the BTA on the rock i placed it on.

A shot of the BTA under the moonlights, is an awsome green and blue/purple under the moonlights!

And a finally a full tank shot as of the 23/11/2010:

Also, My cleaner wrasse appears to have some sort of wound on the top of its head. Have not noticed it till earlier today and is still in the QT tank. It appears to be a scratch or bite or something? Still eats and swims and everything fine. Would it be ok to put this back in the tank? Or give it a few more days in the QT tank to see if the wound spreads or anything?

Thank you for looking everyone Please leave a comment on the tank

 

[seffieuk]

What a great update and such good news as well

Your BTA, is it really that pale colour?

Seffie x

 

[indir-emir]

Thanks seffie. Feel good to see them in the tank. Any ideas on the cleaner wrasse though?

And no its actually a nice green, but my phone camera sucks Haha.

 

[seffieuk]

Wait for the wound to heal, just in case it is a parasite making the wound. What else do you have in the qt, live rock etc?

Seffie x

 

[Harry1996]

you tank look fantastic and those duncans

 

[Rayne457]

Your tank does look very nice. I like your corals. I just got a new Frogspawn coral. You should take a look at my journal. It's not as in depth as yours. I agree with seffie, the cleaner wrasse should stay qt'd till the wound goes away. My canary wrasse had a mark on his side but it healed nicely.

 

[indir-emir]

Will do seffie. Using a hang on back which has cycled fully by the 3rd week. Still do water changes every other day to keep on top of it all Just a bunch of pvc pipes and a 400L/h power head to keep some flow going around Heater is there but it never turns on, as its becoming hotter and hotter lately so the tank is ok

Thank you very much harry. They have grown a ton since i bought them. Started with about 20 heads from memory (is in the journal somewhere), and there is now easily over 50. There is atleast 3 heads on every single large head.And they are still growing!! I see more litle ones on a few of the heads Love htat coral, is in a perfect spot too. Would be happy to send you some But your a bit far lol.

Thank you Rayne, will have a look at your tank journal tonight as im just about to head out for lunch with my girlfriend So ill leave my comments there for you

The cleaner is still in QT and the wound appears to be staying the same. He is hiding a little more then he used too, well earlier not more. During the day he is out and about, but likes to go and hide inbetween the pipes. Wich is ok, i want him to heal up nicely I feed him during the day when i feed the big tank for the first time.

I have my mandarin dragonet in a breeder net, feeding on live brine. And possibly frozen, but i have not seen her eat the frozen yet. Though they do disapear after a little while. She is being trained onto live food as she was skinnier then i had liked when she came out of QT.

 

[indir-emir]

Back for another update. This one is both sad and happy. I sadly lost my cleaner wrasse today some time Ive VERY gutted about this, she must have had some infection on the wound on her head Spewing, i vowe to take up another cleaner wrasse some time in the future as it is a very interesting fish.

Mandarin took a few frozen brine srimp today so happy about that. But I was not sure that she was geting all the food from the net, and the fish seemed to be pecking at the bottom fo the net to get the food. So i decided it was time to introduce her to the glass bottle diner i picked up the other day from the el cheapo shop, $1.50.

Put some live brine in the bottl, along with some frozen (thawed ofcourse) brine. She noticed them and was pecking at tthem and looking disapointed when she didnt get a mouth full of them haha. She is trying to find a way in to get them, hopefully she gets to the lid soon and will learn So see how we go

On another non fish related, but happy, note - I did well this semester at uni and have completed all of this semesters subjects Good marks too

Picture of the cabinet now:

 

[Rayne457]

Sorry to hear about your cleaner wrasse. It's good to know your gonna try again. I hope your Mandarin does well. I would like one, but I do not know how long I should wait for one. My tank is 3 months old since I upgraded. Congratulations on doing well in school.

 

[indir-emir]

Yeah im gutted, it at everything and was a very interesting fish with a great personality. Was inquisitive of everything haha. I will try another one eventually

Mandarin is doing ok so far, she is noticably fatter in the past 2-3 days ive had her in the breeder net feeding on adult brine :\ I know its not as nutritous as babys but i didnt have eggs on hand, and unable to get them so i am just going to culture them The 50 odd adults in the 2L bottle i have, have dropped eggs already. And there is a ton of bbs aswell. So as i feed her the big ones, she gets littles ones too. Hope she recognises the glass jar as food though, she has not found her way in yet, but is sleeping under it tonight haha.

I cant remember when i bought mine, but i did see it eat frozen food in the sellers tank (several times). But in mine i was not sure if i got much... I think they are possible to keep quite easily, as long as you are able to train them into prepared food. That is not to say that, the actual task is easy.. It takes patience, and persistance Mine loves the live, but has only just had a few pieces of frozen without spitting so far. So she is coming along, i hope the bottle will teach her quicker and easier as id like to fatten her up and release her into the tank with the diner so she will continue to eat prepared food, plus she can hunt for pods. Id like to breed them one day

If i buy any other mandarin fish, or picky eating fish . I intend on training them in the QT tank to eat prepared food (i didnt quarantine until my ich outbreak, that killed me enough!) while continuing the QT process ofcourse.

 

[Rayne457]

Yes, I would like to get one. I might wait a little longer as my tank is finally starting to do really good now and I would hate to throw it out of whack with another fish. I would also like a Red Scooter Blenny.

 

[indir-emir]

Yeah best wait a little while longer for the pod population to be strong anyway

Havnt looked at many blennys myself.

I would like to get a yellow tang for the tank Not sure when though.

 

[Rayne457]

Yes, yellow tangs are neat. My LFS has quite a few of them. Do not know much about their care though.