hey guys as some of you know i have a 10 gallon reef (technically) set up and i figured i'd share what i did so i can help anyone interested in trying to start one...
components:
20# Caribsea live sand
5# of dry lace rock
5# os LR from my oldest tank (original peices)
10 gallon AGA tank
25W Aarineland stealth heater
Aquaclear 20 (originally an AC 30)
Hagen GLO 24'' dual bulb 48W T5 lighting fixture with 1 24W actinic and 1 24W 10,00K bulb
inhabitants:
then:
1 BSJ
and 1 YTBD all now dead from rock slide
now:
1 dragonface pipefish
1 margerita snail
2 astrea snails
1 blue legged hermit crab
1 fire red mushroom
1 colbalt blue shroom
1 "tiger snake" shroom
2 emerald green shrooms
2 heads of white striped green candycane coral
1 head of hammer coral
1 frag of GSP (approx 30 polyps)
i used to feed rod's food and mysis to the damsel and the jaw, but now i don't feed the pipe, just the occasional feeding of Cyclops-eeze. the tank is litterally crawling with copes and amps, and s/he's getting fat (for a pipe anway)
pH 8.0
Ca 420
Alk 179/17* (still not sure how to read results)
NO3,NO4,AM, all 0
element readings unknown (don't have tests, I just dose adaquately)
what i did:
i put the tank where i wanted it, and where i wanted it to stay, my desk right next to my computer. i added an 8 outlet power strip instead of the 6 plug so that i could run the computer, tank, and all components of both simultaniously (except the speakers :/ i make due)
i added the filter and heater ot the tank and added my base rock then the live rock on top of that and filled the sand in around it all (did this in reverse last time, hence deadly landslide
)
i placed a bowl on the major open space in the tank and poured the premixed SW nito that to keep form aggitating the sand too much, turned on the filter and heater and waited.
the tank cleared in a day (thanks bowl!
) and was cycled (no trites) in about a week.. bought the YTBD, then another week later the BSJ, long story short i now have a pipefish.
i had bought a pair (or at least 2) but one died a very strange death.
after about another 2 weeks of not seeing ammo or trites, i added a frag of my GSP, 2 heads of my canes, and my dying hammer coral, the hammer has come bad a little bit in waves but is now onn a recession (think i may just go buy another, healtier one)
then bought a few shrooms, just the red and blue at first, then the snake and greens, i added one of the greens to my 29 with halides and all the green has faded to brown except for when the actinics or moonlights are on...
they've all done good and are now growing (save the hammer) so im think ing of adding a few more frags in the near future (wondering how SPS would do under T5's?)
my maintainence shed, consists of weekly 10%ish WC's and bi-weekly dosing of elements and Ca (+/-?)
topping off isn't much of a problem, i have a very tight lid (jawfish) but there's good circulation through the AC so there's also good O2 content. i top off maybe 1x a week if that.
my clean up crew does good work but there's still some algea on the glass, a small mag float easily mows through it.
thinking of adding a biocube 29 skimmer to it, they have them for $30 at an LFS and the one on the BC does good work
also i DIY'd the AC into a fuge after getting the pipe...
tryed it on the 30, killed the motor, didn't have enough $$ at the time so replaced it with a 20
basically all i did was pour LS (again from the oldest tank) into the media chanber of the AC, add some cheatomorph, and make fure the light gets to the algea... literally that it.
i see pods pouring from that daily, and as proof of it's workingness have 0 trates
components:
20# Caribsea live sand
5# of dry lace rock
5# os LR from my oldest tank (original peices)
10 gallon AGA tank
25W Aarineland stealth heater
Aquaclear 20 (originally an AC 30)
Hagen GLO 24'' dual bulb 48W T5 lighting fixture with 1 24W actinic and 1 24W 10,00K bulb
inhabitants:
then:
1 BSJ
and 1 YTBD all now dead from rock slide
now:
1 dragonface pipefish
1 margerita snail
2 astrea snails
1 blue legged hermit crab
1 fire red mushroom
1 colbalt blue shroom
1 "tiger snake" shroom
2 emerald green shrooms
2 heads of white striped green candycane coral
1 head of hammer coral
1 frag of GSP (approx 30 polyps)
i used to feed rod's food and mysis to the damsel and the jaw, but now i don't feed the pipe, just the occasional feeding of Cyclops-eeze. the tank is litterally crawling with copes and amps, and s/he's getting fat (for a pipe anway)
pH 8.0
Ca 420
Alk 179/17* (still not sure how to read results)
NO3,NO4,AM, all 0
element readings unknown (don't have tests, I just dose adaquately)
what i did:
i put the tank where i wanted it, and where i wanted it to stay, my desk right next to my computer. i added an 8 outlet power strip instead of the 6 plug so that i could run the computer, tank, and all components of both simultaniously (except the speakers :/ i make due)
i added the filter and heater ot the tank and added my base rock then the live rock on top of that and filled the sand in around it all (did this in reverse last time, hence deadly landslide
)i placed a bowl on the major open space in the tank and poured the premixed SW nito that to keep form aggitating the sand too much, turned on the filter and heater and waited.
the tank cleared in a day (thanks bowl!
) and was cycled (no trites) in about a week.. bought the YTBD, then another week later the BSJ, long story short i now have a pipefish.i had bought a pair (or at least 2) but one died a very strange death.
after about another 2 weeks of not seeing ammo or trites, i added a frag of my GSP, 2 heads of my canes, and my dying hammer coral, the hammer has come bad a little bit in waves but is now onn a recession (think i may just go buy another, healtier one)
then bought a few shrooms, just the red and blue at first, then the snake and greens, i added one of the greens to my 29 with halides and all the green has faded to brown except for when the actinics or moonlights are on...
they've all done good and are now growing (save the hammer) so im think ing of adding a few more frags in the near future (wondering how SPS would do under T5's?)
my maintainence shed, consists of weekly 10%ish WC's and bi-weekly dosing of elements and Ca (+/-?)
topping off isn't much of a problem, i have a very tight lid (jawfish) but there's good circulation through the AC so there's also good O2 content. i top off maybe 1x a week if that.
my clean up crew does good work but there's still some algea on the glass, a small mag float easily mows through it.
thinking of adding a biocube 29 skimmer to it, they have them for $30 at an LFS and the one on the BC does good work
also i DIY'd the AC into a fuge after getting the pipe...
tryed it on the 30, killed the motor, didn't have enough $$ at the time so replaced it with a 20
basically all i did was pour LS (again from the oldest tank) into the media chanber of the AC, add some cheatomorph, and make fure the light gets to the algea... literally that it.
i see pods pouring from that daily, and as proof of it's workingness have 0 trates
