Duckhams' 75G Reef Build - Eurobraced/BeanAnimal

[Duckhams]

This little hippo tang (about 2.5") had some nasty parasites buried in him. A fresh water dip brought them out wriggling, like thin little slices of a grain of rice, and it was quite traumatizing for him. But he recovered really well! and got really big! I attribute a lot of his recovery to good nutrition, garlic soaked nori is like penicillin for tangs.



This is probably 5-6 months later. He made a complete recovery! These poor little guys sometimes come in terrible condition from some fish stores, but are well worth the effort of looking after.


One of my favourite Gobies, we call this guy David Bowie because of the pink streaks on his face! He was pretty starved when he came from the LFS, he's a fat little sausage now.

[Duckhams]

We actually still have most of these guys still in the tank after almost 18 months. We lost a couple of hammers to a prazipro dosing (euphyllia do not like praziquantel), it took the survivors months to bounce back.

[Duckhams]

As the tank has developed things most of the corals have done really well. Even with a change from 150w metal halides to Kessil A360WE LED's. There was an adjustment period where colours changed and growth slowed in most cases, but overall things acclimatized very well and got back to normal, if not better growth rates and colouration! I love halides, but im very impressed with the Kessil LED's.

[Duckhams]

A few 'back to the future' shots of the new rockscape after a big 'rock scrub' last week. The red/pink monti in the middle is starting to colour back up after an alk swing that left it almost completely white. The fluorescent pink is really coming back quickly now that things are back in check. Love those monti's!

[Wretch]

Very nice. Has a very clean look that I like.

[Duckhams]

Originally Posted by Wretch

Very nice. Has a very clean look that I like.

Thanks!

[Duckhams]

TROUBLE IN PARADISE:
It's been a few months since my last update. The tank has gone through a few 'events', a big alk swing caused by a dosing tube that popped off, which created a nice slick pool inside the tank stand, a bubble algae outbreak and a small aiptasia infestation. Due to the alk swing I lost most of my SPS and chalices (enter tears here), it's taken the tank a few months to recover but things are finally getting back to normal.
WORKING ON A SOLUTION:
After manually removing as much as I could with a sharpened screwdriver, I added 6 emerald crabs to tank and they've taken care of the bubble algae since. Small bubbles pop up from time to time but they soon disappear.
Unfortunately, one or more of the emerald crabs took a munching to my german blue digitata and made short work of it over a couple weeks, a trade off I guess. And im still battling the aiptasia, they're not a major problem, but long term they could be an issue.

TO RESCAPE, OR NOT TO RESCAPE? THAT IS THE QUESTION:
SO, im toying with the idea of rescaping the tank. The BIG REEF was setup before I setup Big Reef Depot, so im thinking it could be time for a reboot. A Big Reef needs some big rocks, so im cleaning up some Pukani to see how it would look. Still not sure if i'll do it, im going to get it curing in a rubbermaid first, so I have a month or two to decide.
THE NEW BEGINNING:
I gave the Pukani a 30 minute, 15:1 ratio muriatic acid bath to 'etch' off the top layer of calcium carbonate which should limit P04 leaching as it cures and remove a ton of organic material. Right now its in a 10:1 ratio chlorine bath until tomorrow to remove any other organic 'mulch' that might be left over. The acid bath produced a nice layer of floating sponges, other critter bits and scum, which should also shorten the cycle/cure time in the rubbermaid too.
The pics below are BEFORE the acid/chlorine bath. I'll post more pics tomorrow of the cleaned rock.