Introduction

Thanks so much for choosing my tank for the TOTM. I am honoured!

I couldn't decide which tank I wanted to feature, as I love them both, so I'm submitting pictures of both of them! Hey, two for one is always a good thing!

Some History

Well, I started with a 10 gallon freshwater tank in my bedroom, back when I was about 12. It was a pretty standard community tank with guppy's, sword tails, and some corys.

Back in the day, it was little plastic boxes filled with filter floss for filtration, and the fish you bought were packed in little waxed paper boxes, like the Chinese food takeout boxes. And gravel was carried home in pails from the lake across the street!

Fast forward about 20 years. I had a bunch of tanks breeding freshwater angels, but this got boring. We decided we should try a small saltwater tank, so we set up a 33 gallon, which became a 65 gallon, then added two 50 gallons and a 20 gallon! We have taken a few down and are holding steady with a 100, a 50 gallon frag tank and the 20 gallon nano.

100 Gallon System

The tank is a custom made Sea Star eurobraced 24" wide tank with dual drains. The sump was custom made to fit the stand (30x20x12) and has 2 sets of baffles. Next to the sump there is a custom made 20x19x6 fresh water top off tank.

I use an Eheim 1260 return pump, a Bubbleking mini 180 skimmer, a phosban reactor, a couple of heaters and a Tunze Osmolator for freshwater top off.

For flow in the tank, I have a Tunze Nano Wave box, 3 Tunze nano streams in the corners, and a Tunze 6010 tucked behind the rock in the back wall. All the pumps are on a Tunze Multi controller.

I get a nice wave action from the wave box, and the pumps are all set on a fast pulse.

Lighting is two 400W Sfiligoi pendants with 20K CoralVue bulbs. They are powered by Icecap ballasts. Actinic's are Sfiligoi bulbs.

Inside The Tank

I changed glass about 2 months ago, so I tossed the sand and decided to go bare bottom. I hate the look of bare bottom though, so I got about 40 lbs of flat shelf rock and lined the bottom with that. I was worried about detritus building up under it.. so that's why the big Tunze is in the back wall. The rest of the rock is Tonga Branch and Marshall Island branch. I've lost track of how many pounds I have, but I would guess 200 lbs.

My tank is a mixed reef. I went thru a SPS phase a while back, but my true love is LPS. Sadly my SPS are not as happy as they once were. I blamed that on the tank move, but honestly I think its the LPS and the bunches of ricordea I have in the tank. I think eventually this will become a mostly LPS tank.

Did I mention Ricordea?? LOL!! I'm a ricordea whore! One side of my tank is carpeted with them and I'm working on the other side now.

For fish I have a Regal, Kole, and Yellow tangs, a pair and a spare Bangaii, a flame angel who has been a model citizen, a solar wrasse, a 6 line wrasse, a freakin' huge green wrasse, a lawn mower blenny and a cleaner wrasse. I keep a mottled file fish in my sump and rotate rock or frags thru there that has aptasia and he cleans them up nicely. I just don't trust him in my tank.

20 Gallon Nano System

This tank was started a year ago. Its a custom built 16x16x16 frame less cube. I made panels for 2 sides and the bottom using white cement and old reef sand poured into panels made out of egg crate.. I cured the panels in freshwater for 6 weeks, changing the water daily. Then I cured them another 3 weeks in saltwater adding vinegar daily, finally getting the PH down to 8. After setting up the tank I had horrible algae (probably from the silicates in the cement) for 2 months. During this time I took out the bottom panel as it was trapping too much crud underneath it. Then one day the coralline started to grow and the algae was gone.

This is my favorite tank now, and everyone who sees it loves it. Would I do the panels again? Probably not.. as the cure time was so long.

Lighting is a 150W pendant from a Sonoma system and I'm using a 14K Aqua Connect bulb.

I had a little sump built to fit into the stand. The sump is 19x14x11. It houses the Eheim return pump buried under about 30 lbs of rock, as there is no rock in the display, and the other chamber has a Tunze Nano Skimmer and a heater.

Inside the tank there is a pair of seahorse's, a spotted anthias, a pipefish, a neon goby and a peppermint and cleaner shrimp.

Chemistry

Chemistry on both tanks is about the same.

SG is about 1.025.

Temp I try to keep about 79-80 (with fans).

PH I gave up on.. so its just right!!

Alk I struggle to keep at 7.

Mag I keep at about 1300.

Nitrates and phosphates are too embarrassing to mention. :)

I dose calcium and mag manually directly into the sump's and keep my top of water Alk'ed up.

I'm sure I've forgotten a ton of stuff. But that's basically it. Thanks for your time!

Shelley

 

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