Nano Tank Diary...

[katrinel]

It may not be important but I do know that live sand has beneficial bacteria that the rock doesnt have. Live sand has different things living in it then live rock does. It really isnt that expensive either. Theres the kind in the store but I am not sure about the baged live sand it seems fake to me.

Theres are really good website about the ingredients for a perfect tank its www.tbsaltwater.com/

Basically the say if you want a little peice of the ocean in your house you have got to create and mimic the natural environment. And live sand from the ocean is re creating a natural environment.

The brittle star is a brownish redish color.

I didnt start of with live sand but when I got some i noticed a huge difference in the fish and the water quality

 

[TBLightningFan]

I didnt start of with live sand but when I got some i noticed a huge difference in the fish and the water quality

Thats for sure there. Especially if the sand bed is made very deep. It will clean out nitrates as well. Its a nice bonus.

 

[katrinel]

oh yeah i wanted to ask you Navarre about mangroves i just orderd some pods. What are they like? How fast do they grow? What do they do! I am really excited!

 

[Navarre]

Bagged live sand really isnt worth the money imo. I used some myself and found it to be a complete waste IMO.
Sand thats removed from a holding tank is another matter altogether. This sand will be teaming with life... however, this life can only come from the life that lives within the liverock so it wont give more diversity, unless.... its taken from the ocean dirctly and thus carries such critters.. a little risky though as the sand can carry alot of unwanted lifeforms as well as wanted ones.


The brittlestar sounds ok. Watch the green ones very closely as they will hunt and catch fish

As for mangroves...

I have red mangroves and they are doing very well indeed. They are not fast growing so the intitial uptake of nutrients is poor. However once they start to grow leaves they soon flourish much faster.

These mangroves canbe placed entirely under water if you want or you can keep some of them out of the water and let the roots dangle down. If you allow the mangrove to sit on the bd and be fully submersed underwater then it grows extremly rapidly, however its roots will remain soft as it burrows through the sand and these roots will not be strong enough to hold its weight, you will have to find other ways to support this plant. If you suspoed the mangroves in water so tha tpart of the mangrove is in air and the roots dangle down, you will find it grows slower but the roots grow far stronger and these roots will actually be strong enough to hold the plany uprightout of the water when they are long enough.

Red mangroves are very delicate when it comes to pruning. Under no circumstance should you lallow the stem to get damaged before the plants growing leaves. Once the leaves are growing do not prune it until it has at last 2 branches or you stand a very good chance of killing the entire plant (i have lost 4 plants this way ).

Lastly... Mangroves are hungry for Magnesium, make sure you test the tank for magnesium levels closely or you will find it depleted of magnesium very quickly. I have to dose my tank with magnesium now because hte mangroves stripped it of mangesium so quickly )

 

[katrinel]

I will go get some magnesium thank you so much! I got 12 pods and i think I am going to use only two or three I am going to give the rest to the lfs. I bet they look really great. Thank you so much for the info.

 

[parker313]

If you'd like to talk to me about my tank, I'd love visitors, but if you have a completely unrelated question, please start a new thread.

Thank you

 

[parker313]

Picture time!!

Unidentified "thing"

Aiptasia looking thing, I hope it's not

Purple firefish

and again...

I still can't get a good pic of the clownfish b/c he just hangs out right in the corner or right at the top of the water...

 

[Navarre]

First photo is a Seasquirt. A filter feeder and a goody for the tank. Prefers darker areas and often grows inside canister filters

Next is some form of polyp i think. Will be interesting to see exactly what type as it grows.

Nice purple Firefish! I love the rich colour on them and they are even brighter under actinics. Mine loves living under the reefrack

 

[parker313]

Cool, thanks for the ID help I figured the seasquirt was some sort of egg pod of some kind maybe for pods or something, but really didn't know; especially when it didn't "hatch".

My firefish does sleep in the reef, but is out all day. Since the clown stays primarily in the extreme upper right front corner of the tank, the firefish pretty much has run of the tank

 

[parker313]

I had a bit of a scare this morning with my purple firefish! Normally, he hides in the rocks until the lights come on and then he hangs out in front of the rocks. Well this morning, he didn't come out! I looked in from the side, and saw his tail hanging out of the back of one of the rocks, but when I looked again later, it wasn't there. The whole time I was worried that he'd died in there. I was very concerned, both for him and for the water quality. Finally, a couple hours after the lights came on I dropped some food in the tank and he came out of the rocks like a flash He's still out in front and ate just fine and is acting fine.

What a relief

 

[Navarre]

firefish do this. My purple is on show quite often but when i had a red firefish it would remain hidden for days!

 

[parker313]

I can't believe I haven't upated this in so long! My tank is doing really well. We went on vacation over the Christmas holidays and other than having a neighbor drop in some dried brine shrimp every other day or so, nothing else was done to that tank while I was gone. I was sure I was going to come back to 2 dead fish. Nope, everything is looking great!

My clown fish is noticeably bigger and his white stripes are developing more, as is the black on his tail fin. The firefish looks just the same.

My brown polyps are bigger too. The white polyp-y thingies are pretty much the same size.

I did have one casualty - my top crown snail. I don't think the hermit crabs got him b/c he was at least twice their size! To make up for that loss though, I have somehow now got 2 new snails that I think are Nerite snails and I think another one that may be a baby Astrea snail.....

I ordered some new coral/polyp frags from seacrop.com last night - a 3 piece nano frag-pack of 1 mushroom, 1 soft and 1 polyp. Then, I ordered a gorgeous zoanthid - orange with bright green skirt. I got them all for $67 including shipping. I think they'll get here Thurs. via FedEx

I think I need a new background on my tank though. I currently have a dark green background and the whole tank just looks dark. I'm thinking white maybe.....

 

[parker313]

I just bought some upgraded lighting. It was on big sale. It's from Aquatraders, I saw them mentioned in someone else's post. This should be good for me since I'm not looking to keep SPS or anything.

My new corals get here Thursday, hopefully the new lighting will arrive shortly after that

 

[parker313]

Thumbs up for Aquatraders. I placed my order for my new lights yesterday, with a black hood. I got a call from them today that the black was out of stock til Monday but they could substitute the silver instead or I could wait til Monday. I chose the silver since I have the corals coming tomorrow, but I thought it was really nice of them to call and let me know

 

[Ed4567]

The second picture (the polyps) looks quite a bit like anthelia (waving hand coral).