Nebthet's 56g Reef

[Nebthet]

Hardware:

- 56g tank
- 36" 234w 6x39w Tek T5HO light
- 30lb pacific black reef live sand
- 65lbs live rock fully cured.
- Aquaclear 70 HOB Filter
- Koralia 1 (will get another to upgrade to more flow)
- Koralia 3
- Vortech MP20
- Remora with Drain skimmer
- 300w heater

Livestock:

- 3 x SA Onyx Clownfish (Ordering an extra in case of issues. once paired. the 3rd will have a new home in my sisters' tank so it doesn't get picked on my the other two)
- 1x Picasso Clown
- 1x Bengaii Cardinal
- 1x Starry Blenny
- 1 x Blue Devil Damsel (If overly aggressive it will have a new home elsewhere)

- 6 hermit crabs
- 12 nassarius snails (will get more and cerith snails)


- Pulsing Xenia
- Elegance White tip, and purple tip.
- Aussie Duncan 24heads with babies
- Candy Canes Green 8 heads and growing
- Toadstool
- Zoanathids Peach eyed and Radioactive dragon eyes.
- Green Star Polyps
- SPS: Blue tipped tenuis, Tricolor Valida, another Tricolor, Green Bottlebrush, Red and Purple tipped Digitatas, Monti Cap Red and Green w/white rim.
- Burgandy plating algae
- Rainbow Chalice
- Tear Drop Maxima
- Blue/Purple Crocea or Maxea
- Ultra Blue/Green Crocea
- Orange and Green Bubble Tipped Anemone
- Sebae Anemone.




Well yestarday I took down the other tank and set up the 55g. I ended up getting what I needed in the mail. I am just waiting for the T5 lights which should arrive in the mail sometime around 10:30am.

Here are some pics of my progress of setting it up.

This is the empty tank sitting on the stand. Yes. I managed to get it up there all by myself. It was really heavy, but I was able to manipulate it by getting the end up first and then raising the rest up.
For leveling I put two boards underneath. This also ensures that the front and back rims of the tank are securely supported as otherwise it would not have fit. Thankfully I had those boards laying around from an old tv stand I used to have.


Tank shot showing the live sand.


Close up of the live sand. Pacific Black Reef.


Foggy tank shot. Thankfully it is clearing up bit by bit.


Tank shot tonight. Water is getting clearer. Once I get more rock in there tomorrow I will update with more pics. For now though all my fish are happy with the new room they have, especially my clownfish.

[Rbacchiega]

looks like you're off to a good start

[Nebthet]

Thanks. I am just happy all my fish are really enjoying it. I am getting the 30lbs more live rock tomorrow from a guy in my area who is taking down his one tank, so I am hoping I get some good hitchickers with it. I asked others how his stuff was and they all had good things to say.

I also find the larger size much more entertaining to watch.

[pterfloth]

Looks great!

[Gee]

Looking forward to the 90gal upgrade thread ... what, we all know how upgrades go ...

Looks great!

[Nebthet]

Ok. Here is a quick update with the new lights and 30lbs of live rock added in.



Closer front tank shot


View slightly from the right side showing the added caves.


Left hand side of the tank showing the space I left back there for the more shy fish to hang out.

[Nebthet]

Everything is progressing very nicely in this tank. I took some more pics tonight especially since I was feeding my sun coral.


Under the atcinics:

Blastos


Candycanes, Zoas and Suncoral


Cleaner Shrimp and GSP frags


Duncans


Frogspawn frag


Front Tank Shot



Suncoral Feeding Time:

Before


Using the top half of a 2Litre pop bottle to protect the coral and food during spot feeding. I use a mix of all frozen saltwater medly, brine shrimp and baby brine shrimp for the new baby heads appearing.


This Nassarius snail was adament he was gonna get something to eat.


He succeeded at it too!


After feeding


Suncoral looking much nicer and happy now!


and finally one of the scissortail gobies poking it's head out of one of the small caves on the left side of the tank.

[Nebthet]

Ever wonder why people would want an urchin?

Here is the answer;


And after he was done that spot. All nice and clean:


Once the other powerhead is done, it is on to this one next. Oh and you can just make out my BTA in the back right corner there. Happily sitting in his favourite spot away from the T5 lighting.


Feather Caulerpa growing nicely in the sectioned off back left area of the tank.


Couple close ups of one of my SPS I am thinking may be a tortusa.






Acro SP.


This Acro is starting to encrust back over itsself.




Zoa Garden again


Octo Frogspawn doing very well now. It likes the spot it is in.





Pods have significantly increased and there is no where I look where there aren't any. If things continue that way, I may consider a red mandarin goby.

The damsel is still being submissive to the other fish and has began to pick at the algae growing rather than eating the fish flakes. He remains to be fat and happy. He has a new territory around the skimmer intake and outtake (which the later I need to develop some s piping to reduce microbubble issues).

The baby Onyx are doing very well. It is a pain in the derier though to keep cleaning the breeding net. I am going to get one of those plastic critter keepers and drill small holes in it. I think with a little cleaning magnet it will help and the clowns will be big enough then not to slip through.

Of new hitchhikers I have with this tank there are 8 brittle stars, spaghetti worms. I have also been following along with the baby tubo snails I have had. There are still 2 of them in there and they have continued to grow steadily.

The sun coral has a bunch of new mouths growing on it. One of them is orange which was an awsome suprise. I would like to get a black sun coral eventually.

My Metallic Green BTA is happy in his spot on the top right corner. It doesn't seem to mind the water changes, when the water level goes down and then back up. So as long as it is happy, so am I.

Future plans for the tank:
- Red Mushrooms - only 1-2 to start they can do their thing on their own.
- Torch Coral frag
- Hammer coral frag
- SPS frags, for which I will hold out for an Oregon Tort.
- Black sun coral
- Firefish Goby
- Mandarin Goby (big maybe)

[Myka]

Looking good! Gorgeous Percula! Have you been monitoring ammonia, nitrite, and nitrate during the move?

[Nebthet]

Yes I have definately been monitoring all of that since the move, especially since I expected a soft cycle with the new live sand.

As of June 2nd, my perameters were the following:

Salinity: 1.025
Ammonia: 0
Nitrate: 0
Nitrite: 0
Calcium: 380 (touch low for acropora, but didn't want to start adding extras in yet.)
Alkalinity: 4.5 meq/l
PH: 8.3

I am checking my perameters about once per week the day before doing a water change.

When I first did the change over there was a small cycle where the nitrates got between 5-10 but that was expected.