Myka's 90 gallon build & 3 province move (Pics Feb 6)

[reefermadness]

Wow....great job Myka.

[Myka]

Thanks Darryl.

Originally Posted by dreef

Very nice FTS Mindy..we don't care what you think :P That's the thing with acropora i like the most,a palette of colors.If you like yellow i have a golden yellow milli i'm bringing back from a very low light former life.

Haha, thanks. If it's from low light, are you sure it isn't a bleached out green? Post a pic if you want, I would like to see it!

Originally Posted by lorenzo

It has similar features... the polyps are throwing me off though. A.Tenius ussually have thicker polyps where yours has really thin ones. Your going to have to jeep us updated on that piece

I will post pics as it grows. It's getting green and bluer everyday...slow grower though so far.

[Myka]

The flesh suddenly fell off the Scoly yesterday. Why is it always the expensive pieces that have accidents and die? This hobby can be soooo depressing sometimes.

[JMes]

How's your Scoly doing? Was it able to pull through?

[Myka]

Thanks for asking JMes...the post right above you says it died.

[Myka]

Well, my tank is trying to crash, and I'm half-heartedly trying to stop it. I've been trying to clean up the tank after it being in the hands of a tank sitter for 8 months and the tank is resisting.

Here's the low down...

Calcium 420 ppm (Elos)
Alkalinity 8 dKH (Elos)
Magnesium 1350 ppm (Salifert)
Potassium 400 ppm (Elos)
Ammonia not detectable (Salifert)
Nitrate trace (Salifert)
Phosphate trace (Merck)

Prodibio Biodigest and Bioptim dosed on 1st and 16th of every month (started in June)
Zeovit Sponge Power 3 drops daily (started in July)
Calcium and alkalinity dosed via dosers.
250 mL BRS pelleted GFO changed every 6 weeks (not changed Apr-Aug)
300 mL Kent carbon changed every 6 weeks (not changed Apr-Aug)

Nitrate and phosphate were tested this morning before the algae fired up for the day, but I still don't trust those numbers.

When I quit working out of province and came back home in mid-July there was raging cyano covering most of the sand, and SPS colors were fairly pale. I had a lot on my plate at that time, so I pretty much ignored the tank until mid-August. I then did some waterchanges, vacuumed the sand, replaced resins, got in there and started cleaning things up. Cyano was knocked back, but still persisted. I cut back on feeding, and cut out frozen foods entirely. Cyano still persisted, and I ran out of patience.

In mid-Sept I dosed the tank with ChemiClean which didn't completely knock the cyano out...maybe 90%, but coral colors improved 50%. I was told to dose Biodigest weekly by a rep for 3 weeks right after the ChemiClean (and stick to the regular dosing of Bioptim) to help get the nitrifying bacteria up to snuff. This caused the tank to break out in a bacterial bloom of 2" long snot. Brilliant. Now the cyano is back to where it was when I started, and hair algae is just starting to tuft up pretty much everywhere.

Anyway...tomorrow, or maybe the day after I'm going to siphon the entire sandbed out of the tank, and hopefully catch the Jawfish to move him into a different tank (with sand). While siphoning the sand out I will probably end up doing a 30% waterchange. I am considering modifying the sump for chaeto harvesting, but that would mean putting the sump (and skimmer) off line for at least 24 hours. I'm also considering another dose of ChemiClean...I know it won't get rid of the problem, but it will at least get rid of the toxins that cyano releases. I'm also going to quit dosing Prodibio and Sponge Power until this is all under control.

At this point, I'm paranoid I'm going to wake up in the morning to massive RTN. I think the tank was too dirty for too long and the rocks absorbed a bunch of nutrients which are going to continue to leech for a long time.

I know the tank is close to the verge of collapse, and I just want to put my head in the sand. I have some really big projects on my lap right now, and I soooo do not want to deal with this right now.

[Myka]

...and a big flash of light just came from the sump, and then sizzling and red hot burningness. Apparently a heater was feeling a bit explosive tonight. I'm glad I was around for that.

[Hawkaholic]

WOW...if its not one thing...its another. Hope everything is ok.

[Myka]

Ya, when it rains it pours!!

I managed to get about half of the sand out today while only changing about 12 gallons of water, so that's good. I left the sand that was piled up around the Jawfish burrows because there's no way I can catch him where he is right now. I also have a Melanurus Wrasse that sleeps in the sand, and a couple of Fighting Conchs. The corals have better PE now, but that's probably because of the waterchange. I'm going to try to be more consistent on the waterchanges...I've been slacking.

[brizzo]

*waves*