GraffitiSpotCorals

Wow great dimensions, how will you light it and what corals do you plan on keeping?

Thanks Tom I will try and play around and see how I do with taking a decent video.

I also finally hooked up a kalk reactor so I can start introducing kalk slowly to the tank. I am starting by turning it on once or twice a day to stir the kalk and keep upping it as my alkalinity lets me. Until I am ready to use a kalk stirrer which keeps it saturated at all times. I plan to make my own stirrer which can hold a large amount of kalk and will have multiple blades on angles to stir. The angled blade should help turn the kalk over instead of just pushing through it. I am not sure of the size I am going to make it just yet. Probably a 6" chamber 2' or 30" tall. I have a lot of evaporation from having so much surface area on the system and am hoping once the new stirrer is made and running things will really kick off. It was almost to the day that I turned on the kalk reactor and saw growth and color in corals I haven't seen it in. People sometimes underestimate kalk and the good benifits it has or its ability to run a system.

Yea I should figure out how to post videos and post one of him grunting. He vibrates the tank and is very loud. Best fish we ever had too. I have some pictures of him when he was a baby the size of a quarter in Amanda's shallow zoanthid tank somewhere, I gotta find them.

So I am very happy with how the tanks running right now. Corals are starting to look nice and showing good signs. I will try to get a final picture of how the display looks and take some macro shots of some stuff as well. So far I added more leds over the display. I am extremely happy with the color they are putting out and the shine they give the acros even with both halides on I can see a huge difference. I still have them on every side of the tank facing in and the two new 3' strips are mounted on the side of the halide reflectors more over the "center" of the tank. So far I have the following... 4 - 2' reefbrites 1 - 3' reefbrite which didn't put it on the wife's tank, I stole it :p 1 - 3' reef bar pro with no lenses That's 102 blue LEDs I am supplimenting the halides with. Thats close two the same output as two and a half led fixtures. Some people only run one single led fixture over this size tank. I think having no lenses really helps spread the light out over the tank well, if I had lenses things would probably be affected badly especially given the distance from the tank. The LEDs are mounted 5" off the water surface and the two radium's are 6" off the surface. I am very excited to see how things grow. I hope I can keep the tank up long enough to be satisfied with all the work I have put into it.

That's awesome, maybe he should teach you what he did? Just kidding, but do you have before and after pics? Was color better too?

It will be very easy to cut a hole in the ceiling and do something to brace the joists together. I would feel better just putting small pieces of boards in lines where the tank goes to connect the joists so the tank doesn't have an edge sitting on a non supported area. I like Tom's idea and double check the weight the area can handle. Then I would make sure all edges are supported.

Yea colors definitely change from tank to tank depending on nutrients, lighting, and parameters. This coral isn't "morphed" because of another tanks conditions though because this coral came straight from a reef in figi. I am hesitant to use the term morph anyways since it kinda means different things to different people. Could be another good discussion too. The polyps could have stressed a little and looked yellow from it or were yellow from the start. Either way the pieces went through a lot of stress so they could turn out completley different. Although I did see pictures from one vendor of the same coral that came in not so stressed and the polyps were still fairly yellow. Either way I just like the contrast of the polyps on the coral, green or yellow. It really stands out more than any other cap I have seen. I hope it grows out so others can enjoy it. This is a first for me getting excited over a freaking monti too... I ordered all acros and they threw these and some other sps in there by mistake I am assuming, and I was sooo angry when I saw monti cap. Now not so much

There are a few options to attach a fitting for rodi there. If you go to a good Lowe's the guy running the plumbing section should be able to get you something that works. There are brass compression fittings you can cut in there or use flex hoses if your sink bottom works with them or solder a T into it with a compression fitting on the side for the plastic 1/4". The valve pictured above may be hard to find and would require you to redo the copper tubing since the connection would then be on the side and not on a 90 degree angle or the top of the valve once connected.

I find t5s with lower nutrients really help bring out bright lighter colors on acros. Some of my favorite tanks are carbon sourced heavy par t5 tanks. I think the coverage they provide really helps acros color up well. Especially with half blue bulbs and a good variety of white or daylight bulbs. To many blue bulbs give a washed out look in my opinion. I used to not use actinic but really like using at least one now.

Looks a lot like dinos but as Tom said you have to research and find out. Dinos will fade away with decreased light and blackouts are how some strains are treated. They do tend to settle on lower flow areas but so does cyano. Along with manual removal before the blackout. I have treated tanks with peroxide and blackouts with manual removal fist. Works great but there are many types which some are resistant to this process of removal. Either way if it's cyano or dinos turning you lights off for two or three days after a very good tank cleaning is a good first step to try and get them under control. Key is get as much out manually as possible before you start lights out and or peroxide. Also after the blackout slowly ramp your photoperiod back up to 8 hours starting with 4 the first day. Make sure corals do not pale to much while the lights are out. If they are unhealthy it could cause problems,. If so could a bad dino or cyano issue. A member by the screen name Pants I believe can test to see which strain you have. Maybe other can help too but I wouldn't bother if the blackout works.

That stag looks great, I miss my old colony. I love how long the color runs down the branch on a healthy piece and how thin the tips are.

I got you rob. Eric I am not sure if it's dark green or purple or both, I am bad with alike shades of colors. I will update when I get one growing.

Dinos release toxins in the water and lower o2 levels. Fish can die in minutes. They will also kill corals in tanks when they start spreading. Also the clear spot in the picture could be a small bacterial mass. If it's slimey and snotty it's a good chance.

So I found a new fish that lives in my rockwork. It's a orchid dottyback and I have no clue when it was added. First time seeing it I also picked up three more convict tangs so I have 4 total for the coral tank upstairs. Also added an ebli angel which I want to add to my display tank to go with my ebli tang but I have no idea how that will work out. Especially with a flame angel who likes to give chase now and then. I added two 6 lines one upstairs and another to my display, forgot how much I love these guys. The convict tangs went to schooling right away. Very happy with them and I hope they keep the tank clean. I have a lot of work to do on the whole system and we might need help to tell the truth. Here is everything that needs to be done. Find a new big home for our large emperator angel Frag all larger zoanthid colonies Cut frags from grown out colonies in my display to keep things growing in the right direction. Frag and mount all the acros upstairs that didn't do well on a shipment so they can grow out on fresh surfaces. Rewire the soligfoi halide fixtures to replace one of the atis on the tank upstairs. Clean all corals, algae and detritus upstairs. Mount reefbrite on the wife's tank. Plumb the bead filter into the system. Send in a number of pieces of equipment to get fixed or refurbished. And many more things that never end. Large systems take time and energy that's for sure. I honestly can't wait to begin to downsize and move so I can set something up right from the start. I really want to take some macro pictures to post for everyone to see but I am lazy and need motivation...

Wow, very nice clean tank! The frags look spotless. Makes me want to start over with everything new even worse. Not keeping any acros yet?

Also if it has stringy parts with small bubbles coming off the green stuff be careful because it could be dinos like Rob said. They can kill fish when disturbed and left to float around in the tank.

Thank you for the response Alan! I thought the same thing and wonder if the body will turn more purple as it aclimates to an aquarium. It's more deep green right now but who knows. Wilds can change color so much it's hard to know. The polyps could go completely dark green and never go back to the yellow they were when it came in. It's hit or miss sometimes.

Elbowdeep, I was not ranting at your response, just anyone who views my few posts as "hype" adds. I appreciate your honesty for sure. I can see how people would take my post about needing help with acros the wrong way now that I go back and look at it. But I felt I needed to be descriptive to find the right person to help me. Luckily it all worked out and no one contacted me trying to buy them. Only people who wanted to help. Again tanks to those people!

Did I offend you somehow? I mentioned Spanish people at a 7-11 that look for work because its the only other fast option for help in my area. And they definitely don't have the skills I needed that day. Not sure how any of that is garbage. Mentioning them or using them as an example to create a point shouldn't offend anyone imo. I didn't mean for it to be a rant, just tried to give my explanation because I don't like to be looked at like I am putting posts up to try and hype anything up. This thread has gotten very off topic. And judging by the fact that no one has said "it's common" I will continue to try and grow the monti instead of giving it to friends. I like the contrast it has anyways, if I can just keep it off my rockwork. Sent from my XT1585 using Tapatalk

Oh I see, when I asked for help unboxing and aclimating acros it looked like an add? Whatever, I don't care how it looked, I had 100 colonies stuck in bags in the air for 3 days. I would say that the only reason any of them survived is because a friend saw my post and dropped what he was doing to come help me. Which I appreciate because otherwise a LOT of money and coral would have been lost. If I can't go here for help where am I supposed to go? The 7-11 down the street and hire a bunch of Spanish dudes?? I appreciate your thoughts though, I have given my reasons for posting each post and will let others think what they want.

An add? For a monti cap?? Hah! I stated the purpose of the thread multiple times. No one can say the words "seen it before" or "never seen it before"? I could not sell montipora caps if my life depended on it so I am not sure how an add would change anything. I simply want to know if people in the area who like monti caps are already growing this piece. If they are not then I will try and grow it out so others can enjoy it. I don't remember the last dollar I have made off a monti cap. I gave away maybe 20 large pieces of monti cap a few months ago when I was giving away free corals. One more thing, what do you mean by "just like the last thread you started, this feels like an add."? What thread is this your talking about?

Here is another bad phone picture under halide bulbs. It's a different piece of the same cap. Hopefully they fully recover from the long trip and do well. I just moved them to the display so they got a little stressed where they weren't used to the light. Let me know if it's a common piece or if it's something you haven't seen. Sent from my XT1585 using Tapatalk

Yea I will get a picture under daylight when I get home. Polyps are still very bright under daylight. I was Mai my wondering if anyone has this or if it's common. I don't remember seeing it before.

So I came across a cool monti cap I haven't seen before that glows really nice with cool contrast. Has anyone had one of these before? Even though I don't really keep these in my reef I would like to make sure I keep it growing if not. It's a deep green with greenish yellow polyps. It came in with yellow polyps so I am hoping it colors up that way. They are brightening back up though. I will get a picture under daylight tomorrow but here is a quick phone picture under only blue leds, sorry about that... Sent from my XT1585 using Tapatalk