First Mono Sebae

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Well right now they're in a heavily filtered 30 and I've got the SW density up to 1.010.

They're going to stay there until they grow about three times as big as they are now, or about 6 in tall before they go in a bigger tank.

The idea that I will need a 300-gallon tank for 6 1lb fish is astonishing. Are they that aggressive?

There is no way I will make room for anything bigger than about a 100.

I will suffer whatever maintenance is necessary to support them or start trading them back to the LFS.

I'm running 9 tanks now so I'm used to doing a lot of water changes.
 
Well here they are in the 30 tall.
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I added some snails and mollies and Guppies, as my bacteria seems to have taken hold and all the water parameters were looking good.
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As a treat, I threw a couple dozen ghost shrimp, and it looks like they pretty much cleaned them out. There may be a few hiding down in the rocks and plants but I kind of doubt it.
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I put some in a freshwater tank right next to it and we'll see if any survive in there.

I wasn't 100% sure if Ghost Ship would live in brackish water, or that what I was buying were actually official ghost shrimp.
 
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Well my oscar certainly loves the ghost shrimp but the rest of the fish don't seem to be eating them. They do seem to be killing them but they are being eaten by the other shrimp.

The Mollies, Guppies and Mono sebae are all getting along just fine. Everyone is eating well and the brackish tank has survived its second water change, and I am already out of salt.
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Nobody at the fish stores could tell me if a protein skimmer would work in a brackish water tank. So I built this one out of a plastic bottle and jar and a wooden air stone.

Amazingly it seems to work, although this is a new setup and not a lot of crud in it yet, there is still some scum comming off in the foam.


This is a real quick and dirty set up made with rubber bands and fast setting epoxy, so I was totally amazed that it worked.
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I ran the skimmer about a week but ended up removing it for various reasons. Essentially, it did function, and did remove stinky foam from the tank.

Anyhow, these fish have had 3 50% changes and one sump flush since early march, and the tank is now really stable.
Everyone is eating and swimming well and I am adding about a quart of water a day for evaporation.

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Mono Sebae Update:
First, I love the name African Moonyfish, and I tell my friends that. Mono sebae sounds too much like a disease.
:yuck:

In the past 34 days the Monos have grown quickly taller and the mollies have grown fat. Some of the guppies have been eaten, but mostly spirulina and veggie diet for the Monos, which they love. The get Hikari Excel, TetraMin flakes, and Fluval sinking pellets, which mostly go to the Mollies.
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I've been keeping the density at about 1.010 for well over a month will good reults. After I set up the new tank I will take them up to 1.020 and once I get everything settled in I will think about maybe putting in I really bright saltwater fish.

The current tank decor makes it easy for the Monos to hide, and they do it well, but school readily to eat.

I have purchased the largest tank that I can reasonably put on my hearth. This is 6 ft long and 125 gallons. That's a 30 standard on the stand & they are in a 30, so you can see the 4x difference in water. The current 7 gallon sump will be replaced with a 55 gallon sump.
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32 gallons of water soon will become 160, so they should love it.

Right now I'm only doing one modest water change a week on this tank, where every other tank gets at least two per week. Once I go full SW, I will probably put them on a drip system.

But this will be a total Adventure being my first saltwater tank.
 
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