75 Gal w 30 Gal Sump Reef(I told you guys Im back)

[bauder1986]

Not much to report. Other than this has been by far the best cycle I have had so far out of all 5 SW tanks I have had in the past!

Got some sea critters. 2 Chomis, 1 Occelerus, 1 Coral Beauty, 3 Common Crabs, Frogspawn, GSP, Blue Pom Pom Xenia.

Parameters are well with in tolerance.

Still want to shoot the skimmer. Now playing with the water level its submerged in to see if it can work.

Anyways, Pictures!

[bauder1986]

Well shit. The skimmer heard me swearing at it and decided its feelings were hurt. So the pump decided to show a brand new crack on the housing and let water on it and short out. Good thing the Apex Controller auto shut off the skimmer when it saw something weird with the electrical going on.

Anyways, decided that instead of paying $120ish bucks for a new pump for the Bubble Magus 3.5 NAC Ill just step in up one notch for the Bubble Magus Curve 5 for an extra $100 shipped. Thank you Reef Supplies Canada. Next week it will be here.

Now I just need to hope that this new skimmer will break in better and actually skim. Right now Im doing pretty good on bioload and its not a biggy to run without a skimmer but will need that new skimmer running strong with in the next two weeks for sure.

[bauder1986]

Got bored today. SO I decided to test out different cameras. First six was with an underwater Canon Powershot. Linked a video to it as well.

And the last 4 was with a Canon EOS from outside the tank.

https://i.imgur.com/WGPRIzz.mp4














Say the least. Im really liking the Underwater Camera.

[target]

Looking good. Always good when you get to add life to the tank

[bauder1986]

Yeah

It's starting it's long path to the image I have in my mind of mesmerizing display. Only thing holding me back is the $$$ hahaha

[target]

Lol, yeah that's always the problem for me too. Right now I'm waiting on my glass for my sump baffles before I can continue

[titus]

Hello

Looks like focusing outside the tank is difficult.

Titus

[Luffy]

Originally Posted by bauder1986

Want to cut me a single head of this? Haha

Following along. Great looking tank, can't wait to see how this will turn out.

[bauder1986]

Originally Posted by Luffy

Want to cut me a single head of this? Haha

Following along. Great looking tank, can't wait to see how this will turn out.

Let me grow it out for a few months first haha. It's got about 8 new heads starting to grow out. I'm excited to see its growth over the next while!

And thank you It's going to take awhile to stock it but I'm going to turn this tank into a garden of LPS and softies and Zoos and Palys

[bauder1986]

Alright. So it was time to start my dosing regiment. Now after going over how I did things with past tanks I determined that that process cost to much. I dosed a lot of different things to avoid products like Coral Snow and Reef Roids. I didn't want to have 6 or 7 bottles of product lying around and I didn't want to incur another $100 a month in maintenance. So after poking around for a bit and talking to the LFS guys here in Red Deer I decided to go with the ATI 2 Part Complete Dosing System.

This stuff is kinda impressive. Majorly covers the main Calcium/Magnesium/Alk/Potassium requirements but also claims to cover another 21 elements on top of that. So after some reading and research I determined that I am going to try this route.




So I am currently dosing at 3.5mL non diluted of each bottle each day starting today. According to the instructions, I am to monitor my Alk and Calcium everyday at the same time to determine if I need to raise or lower my dosing. So at day one my Alk is at 11.5 dKh and Calcium is at 500ppm. Dosed 3.5 ml of each part. So tomorrow we shall check again to see what I need to modify. Very interesting stuff.

If this product works out then it will drastically reduce my requirements for supplements and water changes. Plus at the max recommended dose for my tank at full stock it would take 4.5 months for me to drain these bottles. But I'm no where near that. Currently it will take me a year and half to drain them. Damn, that's cost effective at $90 for both of the bottles.

I do not believe that these will be the ultimate cure all for every requirement for the coral. Will still need to direct feed coral their favorites like mysis/phyto. And I might have to add specific trace elements to help certain corals along. But at least I will not need all the bottles I had in the past.


In the meantime, enjoy a pic of me playing with my camera and Xmas tree lighting.