Orca Tl450 Nano Reef Log

[daveo_irl]

Hey everyone,
I'm new to the forum, and new to marine aquariums! I got a TL450 from my brother and thought I would post my progress here as I have enjoyed readings other peoples experiences!

Basically I have had the tank running now for 5 days with about 5kg of live rock and live sand. I have some hitchhikers: so far 2 x turbo snails, 1 x Bumblebee snail 2(so far) x some sort of bristleworms and a crab of some sort I have failed to identify. It is about 1cm across, cream colored with red/brown blotches, hairy legs and blunt claws. Haven't decided what to do with him yet though!

My readings so far over the past 5 days are:
Nitrate: 0, 5, 5, 5, 5
Nitrite: 0.05, 0.05, 0.05, 0.05, 0.05
pH: 8.4, 8.2, 8.6, 8.6, 8.6 (last 3 days readings from late evening, maybe that is why they are higher?)
Alkalinity (meq/L): - , -, 2.8, -, 3.4
Ammonia (Toxic ppm): 0, 0.022, 0, 0, 0.04
Specific Gravity: 1.023, 1.023, 1.023, 1.024, 1.023
Temp: 26c every day

I am a bit concerned about the ammonia. I haven't see my bumblebee in a while and I wonder if the little fella died and that is why the ammonia is a bit up.
Will be doing first water change in a few days so maybe that will help.

Planning on getting another 2kg of live rock and adding maybe two hermit crabs and another 2 snails to CUC. Then thinking of a pair of clowns when things settle right down. Also might add 1 or two soft corals in the future.

What do you think?

Cheers!
Dave

PS: Will add some pics when my switchover to a new ISP is complete (right now stuck with no broadband and posting this via my iPhone)

 

[garry_boyd3]

Welcome

I am only a beginner myself, so I will let others comment on your stats so I don't get it wrong.

I have got 3 Bumblebee in my tank & I can go for a week without seeing them so don't worry too much at the moment. Be careful with the clowns I think your tank maybe to small for the larger ones but I may be corrected on that.

Start planning, its great fun & ask load of questions the people on here are brilliant & helped me alot (although cost me alot everytime I read one of the journal updates )

 

[daveo_irl]

Welcome

I am only a beginner myself, so I will let others comment on your stats so I don't get it wrong.

I have got 3 Bumblebee in my tank & I can go for a week without seeing them so don't worry too much at the moment. Be careful with the clowns I think your tank maybe to small for the larger ones but I may be corrected on that.

Start planning, its great fun & ask load of questions the people on here are brilliant & helped me alot (although cost me alot everytime I read one of the journal updates )

Thanks for the welcome Garry!

Was thinking of a pair of the smaller tank bred clown species?
Getting a buildup of green algae on the rocks and substrate at the moment and it seems like my 3 hitchhiker snails are having a tough time trying to get through it! Will need another couple of snails & a hermit or two to help out I think. But will need to wait until my readings have settled.

 

[daveo_irl]

Just went down to the tank with the torch and got a better look at the crab. Got a few pics before my battery went in the camera. Will post them up when my broadband is back.

He has red claws with black tips and when I was observing him he was picking up grains of sand and putting them into his "mouth" and then sort of rolling them around before spitting them back out again, so i guess he was eating the algae.

 

[TigerIssey]

Red claws with black tips = bad crab. It will grow to become a fish eater. You need to trap him and take him to your lfs. To trap cut the top of a coke bottle and invert the top, place it inside the rest of the coke bottle. Place a small piece of bacon in there and lay it against the rock where he is hiding. Keep checking with the red torch you may need to persist. You can use a glass jar, tilted again against the rocks.

 

[daveo_irl]

Red claws with black tips = bad crab. It will grow to become a fish eater. You need to trap him and take him to your lfs. To trap cut the top of a coke bottle and invert the top, place it inside the rest of the coke bottle. Place a small piece of bacon in there and lay it against the rock where he is hiding. Keep checking with the red torch you may need to persist. You can use a glass jar, tilted again against the rocks.

Thanks for the advice. I will try and trap him this weekend, as I am planning on going to my lfs to get some more live rock anyway. Hopefully I can find him, he is constantly moving his hiding place from rock to rock!

Getting a nice build up of diatoms on the substrate (with some nice trails left in it as my turbo snails do their work!) and rock now, so the cycle seems to be going ok. Hopefully when I take readings this evening my ammonia might have dropped back to zero.
I am a bit confused about the Nitrate/Nitrite readings as they have remained the same nearly the whole time. I presume this is because when I got the tank from my brother, he had already had it running for over a year, and we used some of his live rock and live rubble in my setup. So maybe the cycle was much shorter due to the already established bacteria.

Just another quick question. Are the lights that come with the TL450 adequete for any corals? If so, which ones? - if not, can anyone suggest lighting that will be sufficient that would fit in the Orca?

 

[xxBarneyxx]

Welcome to the forum

I started off with the same tank and its a pretty good tank to get your hands wet with

With regards to the water stats. This looks about right. Your going through a small cycle and you should within the next few weeks see the ammonia and nitrite drop off.

With regards to the clowns. I did keep a pair of small perc clowns in mine but after seeing them in a bigger tank and how much more they swim around in it I wouldn't recommend them.

The lights in the 450 are fine for soft corals (mushrooms, zoas, xenia, etc). I did think about modding the hood on mine though to put bigger power compacts in (should be fairly easy to do) but never got round to doing it before I upgraded.

 

[daveo_irl]

Thanks for the welcome and advice. Have you any recommendations for fish? Another fish I like is the purple firefish.

 

[xxBarneyxx]

yeah a purple firefish should work well, they don't tend to be very active swimmers so should be happy enough provided they have plenty of bolt holes in the rockwork to go into.

Gobies are another one to look at (there are many gobies that remain small and would be perfectly happy).

Banggai cardinals or pyjama cardinals could work well too as though they do get pretty big (in comparison to the size of tank) they don't actually swim around that much.

A small group of red striped gobys could be cool (saw this guys at the weekend and they are pretty cool).

Maybe a pair of Banggai cardinals, a clown goby and a firefish would be good.

 

[daveo_irl]

Thanks very much for the suggestions! Will post up todays water readings later on.

 

[xxBarneyxx]

Just double checked on the cardinals, minimum recommended tank size is apparently 30g so maybe not a good call for the orca 450 (sorry my fault for not checking first). Even the large ones I have seen (about 3 inches big) didn't seem particularly active so I thought they would be ok.

 

[daveo_irl]

No worries Barney!

Readings from last night:
Nitrate: 5 (no change)
Nitrite:0.05 (no change)
pH: 8.6 (no change)
Alkalinity (meq/L): -
Ammonia (Toxic ppm): 0.05 (+.01)
Specific Gravity: 1.023 (no change)
Temp: 26c (no change)

Hopefully my ISP have got the act together and will have my broadband working again today to post up some pics.

 

[seffieuk]

to the salty side

My suggestions for stocking would be similar to Barney:

A purple firefish
A yellow Assessor
A goby and shrimp pair

A shrimp, maybe peppermint
5 Nass snails
2 blue leg hermits
2 Turbos

shells for the hermits

Seffie x

 

[daveo_irl]

Hi Seffie, thanks for the stocking suggestions! The yellow assessor looks like an interesting fish! When you say Goby & Shrimp pair, does that include the peppermint? Or would it be a peppermint + another shrimp?

Going to get more live rock tomorrow. I love buying live rock, it is like those lucky dip bags you would get as a kid!! ;-)

 

[seffieuk]

Hi Seffie, thanks for the stocking suggestions! The yellow assessor looks like an interesting fish! When you say Goby & Shrimp pair, does that include the peppermint? Or would it be a peppermint + another shrimp?

Going to get more live rock tomorrow. I love buying live rock, it is like those lucky dip bags you would get as a kid!! ;-)

I would get a goby/shrimp pair and the peppermint - shrimps don't really add much to the bio load, the only though might be aggression between the two shrimps, but peppermints tend to hide away most of the time and the randals shrimp will be busy looking after his hole and goby (how cute). Take a look on youtube, search for goby shrimp, there are several vids on there to show you how entertaining they can be

Seffie x



ps your stats are fine, whilst you keep adding rock, your tank will keep doing mini cycles - as soon as you have enough rock, things will settle quickly (that is of course if the rock you add is fully cured and not out of water long). I feel like the whole of marine fishkeeping is like being a kid at christmas, so i would agree with you about the lucky dip