30G Bow Tank.....Leaping into the darkside

Oh what a fool I felt.
I needed to do a water change, and for some reason my Kenya Tree has shriveled up these last couple of days, so I thought OK, definitely get the water change done.

I'd taken out about 8 - 10 gallons, when I realised that some of the prep'ed water was sitting in the back room, a north facing room which I rarely bother to have any heating in.

The water was damned cold, and there I was with a tank in need of warm water.
I was not pleased with myself at all, yes I had prep'ed water in 5 gallon buckets, but cold enough for a polar bear to enjoy.

Then I had my brainstorm for the day.

Run a hot bath, sit the buckets in the water (minus nice smelly bubble stuff), stir occasionally, and keep checking the temp.
It took less than 20 minutes to get all the water up around 79-80F.

However the Kenya Tree still is looking shriveled...sigh.

Good call on the hot bath!

Soft corals just seem to do that. If they aren't shriveled up before a water change there is a reasonable chance they will be afterwards.

Quick thinking though. :-)

let me know if the Kenya doesn't make it I have 2-3 frags ready if you need one.

Thanks G/fang but on getting home this evening it's started to un-curl.
The only other possibility I thought of was that I had noticed that it had been touching the Pulsing Xenia.

OK so some more recent pics. I have done s light move around since these were taken, but they give you an idea of how the new rock added to my wall, and the awesome colour of the Acans (I think).

I liked this one just for the angle of the shot as much as the full view, colour is out slightly though.



Looking from the right, you'll see I have my SPS forest close to the top. The new rock has elevated them about 6 inches, which has made a noticable difference, as and when I can get LED's, I'm then hoping I'll be able to spread them around more.


This one is for Gabe really, showing him just how much the snow flake has spread. It's such a simple softie, but I love the delicacy and colour. The sad Green Slimer has been one of those moved much higher in the hope of saving it.


The obligatory Clown shot, they are nearly worse than the Kardasians. The rock above is hollow, but strangely nothing ventures in ...... and I've seen nothing creep out at night either.


Closer shot of part of the SPS forest along with another of the LA additions the Green brain?

Looks great! You already have a great variety... looking,forward to watching it mature. :-)

Wow Yeti, really impressive! So how are you liking the dark side?

LOL.. Dark Side! Looks great Yeti!

Looking good!

The "donut" looking rock in the middle...Petco?

I have 3 of them.

Very Nice!!!

Thanks guys, I'm getting real enjoyment from this tank....and maybe a little stress.

Gabe, I'm not sure about the donut rock, it came from the LA rock, it's certainly not uniform in the middle, as the other side has a much smaller hole.

Now to keep parameters steady, and as Matt said, enjoy watching it mature.

Interesting development.
In the pic's you will see top left is the Kenya Tree and one of the closed Green Brains. Of course during the day, the Kenya is out, and at night the Brain comes out. So in my ignorance I was thinking that there would be little animosity, however it seems the twain should not meet. The Brain has obviously been sending it's stingers out during the night, and the trunk of the Kenya has an area that is now dark brown.
I've moved the Brain down to the bottom right of the tank to see if the Kenya improves, but to be honest, if the Brain starts to become even slightly faded, then I'll pull the Kenya off and plug it else where, as the Brain is a beauty, and I would hate to lose it.

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Anyone have any ideas? This is one third of my Snowflakes. It's come on in the last 24 hours, only thing I've changed in the last 2 days is the out flow from the filter. I'm about to move the rock, but I'm wondering if anyone has seen this before, and has any idea what's causing it.

Cyano growing around the polyps. You can blow it off with a powerhead or a turkey baster. You can increase the flow in that area to keep it from coming back but it's feeding off nitrates or phosphates or both.

OK thanks, and this is just 3 days after I did a full water check. Thanks, I'll have a good clean of the filter.

And this is my tank now.

http://www.advancedaquarist.com/blog/another-amazing-reef-videography

Well OK, maybe not, but this has major WOW factor. Some day...some day

Some new additions.

Donnie very generously donated me his Duncan prize. It's a great specimen in my eyes, when I picked up from Wade it had 3 heads, with one splitting. In the last few days another has appeared, and I can see about 3-4 more starting to bud around the base.
If I place this rock on a larger rock will they then spread onto it?

Again, thank you Donnie, and thanks Wade for donating such a healthy coral.



The next is Thor, 3 healthy heads on one golf tee shaped rock that has (hopefully) wedged in the rock wall securely, giving it ample room to grow and spread. Nice frag Matt, thanks.


Final shot is tank of today. I have the overflow in the top left, probably way to big for my system, but it works. Now the question is, as its so big, what about if I were to put some egg crate in the base, and use it as a frag rack?
My theory is that it has deep enough water, constant flow, light and... no damned Turbo Snails molesting the frags.

Yeti
Your tank is very impressive for such a short length of time! You are doing a fantastic job. The Duncan looks good in there too. It will not spread to other rocks, it is a large polyp stoney coral and it will just continue to multiply and grow new skeleton given good conditions, plenty of calcium alk and such.

Looking good man! I see the 6 Line is doing well!!

Nice new additions. Tank is looking good!

Love it buddy! I'm glad you like the hammer!

Thanks guys.
Reilly the 6 Line is a wonderful addition, it cruises the tank, after sorting out the demarkation line between it's area of cruising and that of the Orchid Dottyback.

Skimmer - Sport - Science - Alchemy - Finger in the sump?

From my reading I discovered that a skimmer is almost like A) A bicycle seat - in that you have to suffer the pain of breaking it in, which is a pain in the butt - before it works for you B) A case of sitting watching it as the sump level fluctuates through the day, and comparing that to the air flow you have set through the air tube C) You threaten the whole damned thing with it's replacement with a ton of Chem-Pure Elite D) You twist and turn the air in take nozzle, and sit and watch just what difference it has made, getting up every 15 minutes to look for disgusting foam frothing into the cup. Foam climbs most of the way up the tube to the cup, but no frothing like a cappuccino into the cup.

It must be doing something as 4 days shows about 1/4 inch of dirty yellow water in the cup, but no foam flowing over. So it's being erratic....or the cats lifting the lid and peeing in there.

Is this normal? (I mean the lack of foam, not the smart cat using it as it's own urinal).

I'd help out with the skimmer but I'm too busy laughing at the post.

LMFAO!

What kind of slimmer do you have?