Rhy's Juwel Rio 125L Tropic To Marine Attempt!

[GGtank]

Thanks Sorgan! Was looking at that but I dont wanna take up any of the fishes swimming space, plus then the shade it'd cast on the bottom (i've no sun corals to take advantage of it lol). Then I was thinking, maybe a hang on refugium?? Ozzie's seems to be pretty decent!

But then I thought: I have a huge rectangular boxed off area (the old filter holder) that really only has a tiny bag of carbon and phosphate remover. Soooooooooooo I think I'm going to remove the cover of that filter cannister and use one of the chambers to hold cheato! This is the cannister http/www.juwel-aquarium.de/en/filter_full.htm , one chamber has a small pump (which i still run) and holds the heater. The other larger chamber used to hold two tall stacks of various filter media (when i had a fresh water tank in there) but now just has a bag of carbon and a bag of rowaphos sitting at the bottom.

So I'm thinking of using a small acrylic box (previous invertebrate trap box, putting some cheato in above the bags of carbon/rowaphos, removing the lid (and putting some mesh over the top) and cutting the aquarium lid so that a hang on aquarium light can give the cheato some light. (That way i can use reverse photo periods etc). Thoughts on this??? I haven't seen anyone use their Rio 125 filter area as a refugium yet (though I'm sure it's like a natural refugium as is).



Cheers Danny! I think you're tank is ace! Haven't actually kept track of the LR unfrotunately. I kept getting more and more (from buying corals attached to LR), but I also recently bought 2 new pieces of LR, 8kg i believe. I checked out your phyto/zoo culture there, great job! Phyto is looking ace! I bought a small bottle of phyto and a small bottle of rotifers but I figure it'd just be better for me to create a refugium to supply live food to my tank as opposed to trying to set up cultures (I don't have a mandy or scooter blenny to wipe out the population, just an overzealous sixline lol). But I do want to start cultures at some point, but for now, I'm gonna focus at creating a refugium.


Harry- lol I love that red starfish! Haven't seen the LFS get one like him since (I call him patrick). I hope he's getting enough food though. He gets into the funniest positions on the LR and has small black dots on his back!

 

[GGtank]

Here's some shots of patrick for Harry

Wellso puffing himself out at feeding time! I love this coral, always changing shape, changing size (up to x4 times its size), changing colour (from blues and purples to very pink depending on its shape), tentacles in/out. Great colour!

Here's the duncan right after feeding it.

edit: duncan pic rotated

Rhy

 

[ozzie2011]

Lovely pieces fella.

As for the last pic, when you take the photos and put them on your comp use the windows picture viewer to preview the image, there is a rotate option so you can see it the right way round, if you do that then close the viewer it will save the image with the correct orientation.
Duncan is a great pic would look better the right way round

Keep up the good work

 

[Harry1996]

Nice and great name

 

[creg]

that flame angel is ace, think i saw one at my lfs couple weeks ago for around £70 is that anywhere near what you paid?

 

[GGtank]

that flame angel is ace, think i saw one at my lfs couple weeks ago for around £70 is that anywhere near what you paid?

Yup, paid €90 for mine! They're quite pricey!!! But she's a great character, loves swimming in the rockwork and poking out every now and then! She has her own little spot in the tank and she doesn't hesitate to let the other fish know it's hers! LOL!

 

[GGtank]

SUPER EXCITEMENT!!!

Came home from work, was watching tank for a while, saw my male clownfish swimming oddly close to anemone, and just 1 minute ago he dived into it and is now feverently hosting my BTA! YAY!!! Extremely chuffed here! The bigger female clownfish is watching him closely but she hasn't gone into the anemone yet (I think she will before the night is over, they never leave each other's side).


Oddly, when the anemone moved a few days ago, it settled in the back corner of the tank in the exact spot that the clownfish normally sleep in ( maybe it was attracted to that spot?? lol) Either way I'm super happy! I took some pics with my phone but they suck as the LEDs are on now and lights are set to come off in 2 mins. Will get a better pic tomorrow :

 

[GGtank]

QUICK UPDATE:

One of my clowns is still hosting the anemone (intermittently) but the other has only gotten within inches (I think she's just a bit shy). Also, the anemone has found a lovely spot... IN THE BACK OF THE TANK! Oh the horror!

Also, my dottyback has started hosting an area of anthelia, it's really weird to watch, she kinda wiggles on it constantly and if any other fish come near (including the much larger angel) she snaps at them. The anthelia is right above the two new caves she has decided to dig out and she keeps popping her hear out of the holes, very amusing stuff!

Pics on the weekend!

 

[seffieuk]

The flame angels are really lovely aren't they, too expensive in my mind though!

Keep a close eye on that nem, is is getting enough light? They seem to be quite stupid sometimes and settle at the back of the tank because there is usually less flow, but then there is usually less light as well, so they bleach

You might want to consider moving him/her with the rock its foot is in to a place with more light and less flow

Seffie x

 

[Funkoid]

Looks fantastic! May I ask if you're just using juwel carbon filter media? Would it be worth me getting some from the outset?

 

[seffieuk]

No, no, no to the juwel carbon filter media

Seffie x

 

[GGtank]

UPDATE!!!!!

WOW ok so I haven't been on the site in ages! But I'm still very much a marine junkie!!!

My tank has been growing and been great since I've been gone!!! I had a little bit of a DISASTER last week and instinctively took pictures which reminded me to update here!!!!

So firstly:
THE DISASTER - All was well, tank very stable, everyone and everything growing nicely when BOOM --- power cut which happened while I was away and lasted more than 24hrs. Came home to find temperature in tank had sunk VERY LOW, everything was off, I was sure I was going to loose all my coral and fish.
THE CASUALTIES - well a few corals scared me but once everything came back on and the temp rose, they survived = no coral casualties. FISH - my FLAME ANGEL (Angie) and my long time SIX LINE WRASSE (Cleo) died. Couldn't find them after the power cut, then saw the flame angel's body . Still couldn't find the six line (thought she might be hiding in the substrate or in a rock, but the following day her body turned up. Did a series of water checks (things were a little bit off) and removed the first two fish I've ever lost And they were getting so big tooo!

Ok so I'm not gonna post the morbid pictures but I thought I'd update with a few new piccies and some new additions!

1) My large purple mushroom has split (first into two and then into three!)

2) The algae blenny (Fred), Neon Dottyback (Nteri) and the Clowns (Harpo and Bingo) have been doing great. The blenny has such a great personality, always rushes up to the glass to say hello whenever you go near the tank. The dottyback has made many caves and burrows under the rock kinda like a pistol shrimp/goby would. She carries sand in her mouth to the other side of the tank and dumps it. You always catch her peeking out of one of the openings in the caves she's made. The Clown fish has GROWN! well the female has. The male is almost as small as he was when I got him, while the female looks twice his size.

3) I have a lovely acropora ( closed in the pic below but I will try and get one with all the polyps out)

4) Some BEFORE and AFTER pics to show growth

KENYA TREE BEFORE

KENYA TREE NOW

ZOA BRIDGE BEFORE

ZOA BRIDGE AFTER (NOTE THE SPREAD ON TO THE ADJOINING ROCK

TRUMPET CORAL (which had almost died if you guys remember after getting this horrible jelly looking disease, then we tried to remove the disease part and ended up breaking the whole thing into pieces with only a small slither of the original left on the rock [the rest went to LFS]. It had also lost all its ZOOXANTHELLAE and was purple for months, surviving only because I was feeding it actively.)

TRUMPET NOW! (Has gotten back all its zooxanthellae remarkably!!!) the pic is bad but it's actually grown and split three times since it was last diseased so I'm happy

My frag of zoa, growing nicely!

Anthelia which has tripled in size and spread to TWO new rocks

Zoa Garden Growth (all the zoas have filled in and my fav [the green hulk one] has spread to an adjacent rock nicely)

Also the Duncan is huge now (but was acting up tonight, so more piccies of that another day), the brain coral has grown almost 2inches and all is well!


Here is a FTS

In the pic above you can see my two new additions after the loss of my Flame Angel and my Six Line Wrasse
ie My new Coral Beauty (Beauty) and my Green Wrasse (Irene)
I wanted to add more fish but because my dottyback can be quite aggressive, I knew my only chance of doing that would be to add a large dwarf angel to put her in place so I added the two newbies at the same time. Sure enough the dottyback initially went straight for the wrasse who promptly buried herself in the sand. The next day though, the dottyback tried to chase the wrasse and the new coral beauty was having none of it, she showed the dottyback who's boss. And now all three get along swell. Of course no one bothers with the clowns or your friendly neighbourhood algae blenny.

I've only recently read that green wrasses can pose dangers to a reef aquarium (and I now have one less fan worm) so I'm think I may take her out and return her soon. I don't want to stress her out too much so I'm giving her a week before she goes back.... or maybe I'll keep her, not too sure yet.


AND FINALLY
My LFS had two of these REAL anemones on display. I was in shock! I thought they were fake for sure except that I was seeing them with my own eyes!!! Have a look at these!!!!

Let me know what you think!!!

 

[SaltNoob]

AWWEEEE So so so so sorry for your loss. #41#### power. I keep thinking about getting a generator. Your tank looks amazing. And that last anem looks AWESOME. I love your tank, I wish I had one a little larger.

-Tyler

 

[lljdma06]

That is a nice update. The pictures look great and the coral growth is very good.

Look forward to more.

L

 

[GGtank]

Cheers SaltNoob!!! Our tanks are close in size!!! Your's is looking great and coming along nicely as well!

Thanks a mil lljdman06, hopefully there will be lots of good updates coming soon! I'm planning on dosing Vitamin C from next week to see how the corals react and I'm finding a new home in the tank for cheato too see how it affects my nitrate levels when in bright light and high flow. Also, going to remove my two T5 ballasts and get Marine White TMC LEDs (all white, lower Kelvin).

Fingers crossed all works out well!

Rhy