Myka's 10L Pico Reef
 

EDIT: The 3L Bubble was swapped out for a 10L Bubble on Feb 6th.

One of the local Facebook pages, Saskatchewan Saltwater Aquarium Enthusiasts, started up a "jar reef challenge". Jar reefs are popping up all over the place in the last couple years, recently there was even a couple articles in Coral Magazine highlighting jar reefs.

I've wanted to try a pico reef for many years, and figured why not now?

Of course I am always up for a good challenge, and the first thing was finding a "jar" I liked the look of. I wanted something that was clear to look through, not wavy and distorted. I also really like how the 12-gallon IM Cylinder tank looks at Bayside Corals - the convex acrylic makes the livestock look bigger than it is.

My inspiration is from floating flower bowls:
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This is what I came up with, and I'm sure it will take some tweaking to get it right.

- exactly 3 liters actual water volume, filled using water from my reef
- 14 ounces (0.5 lb) live rock from my reef's sump
- 1 1/4 cups coarse dry sand
- 8 watt reptile mat for heat, not adjustable
- Cobalt heater controller
- air pump for water movement, no stone (figuring out ideas to replace this)
- AI Prime HD lighting

So far temp fluctuates between 74.0 to 74.2 F. A little cool, but should be ok. I ordered a tiny DC water pump, not sure if it will be SW safe, but I'm hoping it will help add some heat to the tank, and replace the airline which makes messy salt creep.

Light is AI Prime. I ordered a white one through Bayside Corals (they only have black in stock right now), but don't have it yet.

Honestly, this pico may prove to be too small. I just like the shape. I haven't worked on aesthetics around the tank yet - just set it up an hour ago.

Livestock: Wait and see! https://www.facebook.com/images/emoj...5/16/1f603.png

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Crazy... but interesting.

Lol thats awesome some Zoa would look cool in there and maybe like 1 super cool looking hermit that you could target feed or something

Should be quite easy to keep stable as 100% Wc will be a snap , yea some cool inverts or something you can target feed would be cool in there

Good luck, I had a 2 gallon pico for 7 years and it was a lot of fun, you can actually see a photo of it in that coral magazine article, but I ran mine more or less like a traditional tank with a few minor changes. I kinda wish I hadn't taken it down but the tank itself was just so worn out, I did crazy things like drill the back while it was running to hide another tiny powerhead and allowed chalices to encrust to the acrylic.

100% water changes are your best friend in a pico.

Yes, certainly 100% water changes will be the norm. I'm using H2Ocean so that should help keep parameters in check.

I picked up a Fluval 106 canister filter today. The adjustable flow can be reduced all the way from 0-100% so I can actually crank it back far enough to use it. The media capacity of the canister is supposedly 0.3 gallons so this will double the water volume which will help significantly for evaporation. Hopefully it doesn't add too much heat. I won't have time to hook it up for a few days. I'll have to figure out how to hook it onto the tank in a clean manner. I'm going to get some sort of cabinet/side table to set it on so the canister can be hidden. I think I'll probably either put live rock and a filter pad/carbon in the canister or Siporax.

Corpusse, which pic is your former tank?

It's on page 33, 2 gallon pico Andrew from Ontario, Canada.

For heating your tank you could try a reptile ceramic heater instead of the mat. With a temp probe you could program it to come on / off then get rid of the probe if your house temperature is pretty stable. Adding the pump may push things up a degree or 2 which will get you into the comfort zone anyway.

You can really do a tank any size you want but after a while it just gets too small. That was the biggest reason why I took down my pico other then the fact the tank itself was in rough shape and with everything encrusting it would be difficult to just transfer it to a new tank. You get tired of knocking things over, trying to glue them back ect.

Think about how you're going to clean the glass, there is a tiny 2 little fishes magnet cleaner, but at least back when I had my tank they rusted out relatively quick.

Looking good Myka!!! I like the challenge of the little pico.

I bought a little cabinet for it today to set it on, and the Fluval canister fits under it. Looks pretty good. The hoses on the Fluval are ugly as all get out though, so I ordered up some glass lily pipes. They're going to take a couple weeks to show up though.

Ah ok, I thought that was yours! I think you shared it on here before didn't you? I think I recognize it.

Well, I hooked up the Fluval 106 canister filter a couple hours ago which added 5L of water, so that makes more water to heat. I'm hoping the pump on the canister helps. I'll see what it says tomorrow.

I am looking for one of those Vertex Simplex Mag-Cleaners for cleaning the glass. They are super slim. I have a Duplex one, but a Simplex would work better. Can't find them anywhere though. I might have to make my own using magnets from Lee Valley or something.

I imagine once it's grown in it will be a pain in the butt to have to trim all the time, so I will certainly keep in mind how easy or difficult a particular coral will be to keep in check.

Thanks for your tips! :)

Thanks Mark! Still have your 10-gallon going?

You might try the TLF nano magnet cleaner. It is flexible on the in-tank piece and should work for your curves. Check out you tube in boxing on it.

Thanks Mark, will do! I didn't realize it's flexible.

The Fluval 106 ran overnight and the temperature this morning is 74.3F, so the heat added by the Fluval is offset by the added water volume. I'm going to look into options for inline heaters.

I'm also tossing around the idea of replacing this 8" bubble vase with a 12" bubble vase which will hold about 3 gallons rather than the current 3 liters. This will allow me more options for fish and invertebrates. I'm not sure it's fair to put any fish in 3L no matter how small they are.

A little extra room should go a long way! Following this unique tiny build thread :smile:

Yes, I ended up ordering the bigger bubble. I went with the 12" bubble which was the biggest reasonably priced bubble I could find that wasn't hand blown (hand blown is "wavy" instead of clear). I didn't realize these bubble vases come up to 19" across! They are quite expensive that size though!

No doubt Myka! At least you were able to get the non-hand blown glass so it will be clear. Does the bowl magnify the contents? Or is it barely unnoticeable?

Yeah it magnifies it a lot! That's why I wanted the bubble to begin with. Look at the first two photos I post - the top down you can see there's lots of room around the rock, and the front view it looks like the rock is busting out the sides. :D

Lol... ok I took a second glance and it looks like you have the city of Atlantis in that tiny bubble.

Blah blah blah. Where's the pics?

Yep! Hehe. I was cleaning the glass today with a mini magnet cleaner (Innovative Marine FTW!) and kept thinking I was going to hit the rock, but the magnet makes it all the way around. :lol:

I took some pics last night. I stole the light off the Betta tank so I could pretend the bubble was awesome. The light is super yellow though, so it wasn't awesome. Haha!

UPGRADES COMING:

AI Prime HD lighting
Cobalt ETH in-line heater
Cobalt Neo-Stat heater controller (the smallest in-line heater is 200 watts lol)
12" bubble vase to replace the current 8" one

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I put a little test frag of Blow Pop Zoas in there and Scarlet is checking it out. Scarlet gets 1 fish pellet a day. She's onto the routine pretty fast. Haha
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The bigger Bubble arrived today, so I upgraded the 8" Bubble to a 12" Bubble. I added 10 liters (2.6 gallons) of actual water volume to the tank (plus another 3.8L in the canister filter). I added another 200 mL of sand, and another 14 ounces (0.5 lb) of live rock.

So the current stats are:

2.6 gallon Bubble Vase (3.6 gallons net system volume)
Fluval 106 canister filter
1 lb cured live rock
2 cups of sand
Temporary Betta light

1 Scarlet Hermit Crab
Frag of Blow Pop Zoas
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Looking good. Multi-tank syndrome is so much fun!!!

Hahaha! It has been creeping up on me. I had one tank for a long, long time. Now I notice there is a tank in the bedroom with the goldfish from the pond. There is also a Betta beside the TV. Of course the reef tank in the livingroom. Now the Bubble Reef. How did this happen? :neutral:

On the bright side, the Little Bubble was repurposed - the Betta got an upgrade! I do like how now the Betta Bubble and the new Bigger Bubble match. Maybe I should move my SPS reef into a giant Bubble...hmm... :idea:

The light showed up yesterday! So I finally got to add some real stock to the tank!

ORA Chip's Acro
RR Orange Passion Acro
CM Blue Polyp Nasuta
Monti setosa
ORA Long Polyp Toadstool
Purple Candelabra Gorgonian
Frogspawn
Blow Pop Zoas
Sunny D Zoas
Solar Flare Zoas

More to come!!!

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Some nice frags in this little bubble :biggrin:

Yeah, should be ok. :) Polyps out today. :)

Looks great, good job

Thanks shrimp. :)

Today was the first water change. I changed about 95% and vacuumed the sand. I also added 250 mL Siporax and a few pieces of live rock rubble from my reef tank into the canister filter. I also have a filter pad in there.

Cleaning the canister is a giant PITA, so I may skip out on the filter pad and just let it run with the rock and Siporax. Then I could clean it out quarterly instead. I'd probably have to do twice weekly water changes though because I'd be doing less than 50% water changes if I'm only draining the display and not the canister. That would likely be better for the SPS anyway... hmm...

Here are some before WC pics and during. Some diatoms on the glass now. Yippee, that's a good sign. :)

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Clearly I need to get a camera to get photos like these. This little bubble is shaping up nicely.

Most of the time it's not the camera, it's how you take pictures. :lol:

I tend to agree with you. I suck at photos.

Man that is looking great!! Your dedication always shows. My nano (my daughters which I have to care for) is looking less than beautiful with my poor water change schedule.

All the photos in this journal have been taken with my cell phone - Samgsung Galaxy S8 using the "Pro" settings.

That is very true! Cameras and phones with white balance sliders or settings rather than sensors make all the difference in the world though.

If this tank becomes too much work it will go in the closet. :lol:

Sorry not to derail Myka's journal...

My photography skills is most like as bad as yours or maybe worst than yours DKokoman.

When I started taking pictures of my aquariums, I thought I need the latest and the greatest DSLR to take awesome macro shots. And so I did purchased a nice DSLR and a nice macro lens for almost $3K. And guess what my pictures still suck. :redface: Until I started learning photography and realized that it's all about how you use your camera (camera settings), and the art of taking photos (rule of thirds etc.)

Now I seldom pull out my DSLR from my camera bag, instead I use my Samsung Galaxy S8 to take pictures same as what Myka is using. And yes, your iPhone or Pixel will take breath taking pictures more than you think.

By the way, awesome Nano Tank Myka. Keep the pictures coming. Now I'm itching to have one on my desk. :p

Significant diatoms growth on the rocks and sand now. I added a Ring Cowrie that I stole from my reef.

I have some goodies coming for the pico in the next week. Can't wait. This tank has made reefing exciting for me again. :D

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I added 2 Panda Gobies today. I took some photos before adding hem for two reasons. One being I may never see them again, and the other so i could show you guys how tiny they are!

I also added a few frags today:

Orange Oxide Zoas
Dragon Eyes Zoas
Pink Pocci (for the Pandas to possibly hang in)

I'll get pics later when they open up.https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/201...bfdccde9d4.jpg

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So the gobies have been pretty awesome. They aren't as cryptic as expected. I can usually locate one or both of them when I look at the tank. The smaller one likes to hang out on the sand, and the "less small" (haha) one likes to hang out under the Long Polyp Toadstool. The Toadstool was just supposed to be for filler and I planned to remove it once everything else grows in a bit, but now I'm torn. Trouble is, I already promised it to someone. Dangit.

When I first added the gobies, the bigger one went right into the rocks, but the smaller one dove face first into the Sunny D palys. One of the Palys was closing up on him, so I used a skewer to pull him out. For the rest of the evening he sat an inch away from the polyps looking dazed and confused, so I was thinking he was a goner. Today he's perky though, so I have hope! So the gobies have been pretty awesome. They aren't as cryptic as expected. I can usually locate one or both of them when I look at the tank. The smaller one likes to hang out on the sand, and the "less small" (haha) one likes to hang out under the Long Polyp Toadstool. The Toadstool was just supposed to be for filler and I planned to remove it once everything else grows in a bit, but now I'm torn. Trouble is, I already promised it to someone. Dangit.


When I first added the gobies, the bigger one went right into the rocks, but the smaller one dove face first into the Sunny D palys. One of the Palys was closing up on him, so I used a skewer to pull him out. For the rest of the evening he sat an inch away from the polyps looking dazed and confused, so I was thinking he was a goner. Today he's perky though, so I have hope!


So the gobies have been pretty awesome. They aren't as cryptic as expected. I can usually locate one or both of them when I look at the tank. The smaller one likes to hang out on the sand, and the "less small" (haha) one likes to hang out under the Long Polyp Toadstool. The Toadstool was just supposed to be for filler and I planned to remove it once everything else grows in a bit, but now I'm torn. Trouble is, I already promised it to someone. Dangit.


When I first added the gobies, the bigger one went right into the rocks, but the smaller one dove face first into the Sunny D palys. One of the Palys was closing up on him, so I used a skewer to pull him out. For the rest of the evening he sat an inch away from the polyps looking dazed and confused, so I was thinking he was a goner. Today he's perky though, so I have hope!

It's like deja vu all over again.

I really like this thread. But then I was like I really like this thread.I really like this thread. But then I was like I really like this thread.I really like this thread. But then I was like I really like this thread.I really like this thread. But then I was like I really like this thread

Mindy's been acting really strange lately.