G&D's Foray Into a 90G Tank (Take One)

[gridley]

Originally Posted by Coralgurl

Great looking tank, your patience has certainly paid off.

Just wondering, why soooooo many royal grammas? Love your fox face, what a poser, wish I could get pics of mine with his fins up.

Thank you! The reason for the number of Royal Grammas is simple - Deborah really likes them - "happy wife, happy life"!

Regarding the Foxface - yes he does seem to like to show off. Though the last pict of him was the result of having the camera on a tripod, using a remote and kind of watching TV for two hours waiting for the right moment!

[Leah]

I love all the grammas...the last couple I have tried QTing have not made it. Not sure what is up with that.

I am guilty of buying fish and then upgrading.

[gridley]

What amazes me about the Grammas is their ability to hide - they find an incredibly small pocket deep within the rock and are almost impossible to find - amazing how that bright of a fish can disappear.

[gridley]

Happy New Year everyone! Now that we have few corals I decided to take another FTS - wow, sure looks empty - I guess I'll have to go buy some more!



I also decided to post two other pictures -

I took this picture several evenings ago after the lights weere turned off. I am amazed at how the Foxface changes color and blends into the rock at night - incredible defence mechanism!



The last picture shows the new home that my shrimp has taken up. He spends a lot of time hanging out around the recently added torch coral.



Have a happy new year!

[gridley]

Its time for a project. Ever since setting up our tank I have not been fully comfortable with the "sponginess" of the floor. To the right of the tank is a step from the kitchen area into the family room and with multiple teenagers and their running up the steps and jumping down, the tank sloshes a bit more than I am comfortable with.




So, I've decided to brace the floor from below. Under the family room is a storage room with an unfinished ceiling so it will be easy to brace the floor. The plan is to build a simple beam using two 2X4s which will be supported by two posts aconstructed of two 2x4s and a bottom plate to spread out the pressure on the concrete floor.

A simple job that should take an hour or so. With my energy level we'll see how many days it takes!

Day One - a trip to the local lumbar yard to buy the material.

[gridley]

Yesterday was day two of the simple project of supporting the floor under the DT. I created gluelam beams out of 2X4s - very simple.



The next task is to get the storage room ready - but with the mess in there, that will be for another day -maybe later this afternoon I might take a shot at it.



Deborah and I also went to Concept yesterday and bought a couple corals and a new percula - I'll see if I can get reasonable pictures in a day or two.

[gridley]

Well, I still don't have the support wall completed But I do have the storage room clean!

On to more urgent matters. A little over a week ago someone pointed out a red algae on one of my rocks and suggested that it might be cyano. Over the next days I watched as it spread to another rock and the sand. By Thursday morning it had spread significantly. I tried several times to siphon it as best I could - with little result. I did some reading on line and came up with a possible solution.

Since cyano needs light to survive, the absense of light will kill it. The theory was to turn off the lights and either close all blinds in the room or wrap the tank in a blanket for three days. During this time the fish will mostly sleep and coral will survive.

So I gave it a try. . .


I continued with regular, but lighter feeding for the three days, made sure the skimmer was working well and hoped I was doing the right thing. At the end of day one there was no noticable difference. By the end of day two almost all the cyano was gone - there were still multiple red strands on the sand. By this afternoon the tank appeared complelty clean - an incredible difference! I wish I had before and after pictures, but never thought of that.

All the fish, snails, crabs, shrimp appear perfectly fine. The soft coral and LPS appear a bit "ticked off" but are already coming around and opening up.

Time will tell whether this is just a very temprary fix, whether significnat progress was made or the elimination of cyano was achieved.

So, maybe I'll finish the floor support project this week . . . LOL

[gridley]

Wow, I actually completed the floor support - not a large project at all - it just takes me time. Now there will be far less floor movement as the kids run in and out of the room and less "sloshing" in the tank.

Now onto another project . . . hmmm, maybe I could drill some holes in the floor, run the plumbing downstairs, get a larger sump, set up a tank room . . . that can't be that big of a project . . . can it?

[gridley]

I figured that I would do a quick update from the three day tank blanket wrap experiment. As of today (only 2 days later) there is no visable cyano - for which I am very glad. In addition the coral all seem to be happy critters. Here are pictures from yesterday afternoon.

[Leah]

I do not mean to rain on your parade, and hopefully someone else will chime in here.

I think you have the right idea sort of with the black out, but you need to cover the tank for three days. Do not feed the tank or even peek at it then on the third day you need to do a water change...just can't remember how much!
Then slowly turn your lights, say half a day for 2 days and full on the 3rd.

Leah