120gal mixed predatory reef tank

[whatcaneyedo]

Saturday night, girlfriend is working, might as well take some more pictures of the fish.

[whatcaneyedo]

I've decided to go back to GFO and take the Vertex pellets out at least for now. Some combination of their use and my tank getting a little bit too warm (83ºF to 84ºF) for a week around the beginning of the month has caused all of my soft coral to bleach. I'm mostly blaming the pellets as my nano where I keep the mother colonies of my soft coral has been sitting at those high temperatures (and perhaps higher) for longer and the coral in there are coping much better. Also, I've found several posts from others using these products who have experienced the same. Apart from the bleaching and some slightly increased skimmer production I didn't notice any change in my system for better or worse during my month long trial.

Heres how my toadstool frags look at the moment. A sinularia and capnella look similar.

[skabooya]

Too bad about the coral but on the bright side is that they will colour up again just fine
Nice looking tank btw. Love your fu manchu and eel.

[whatcaneyedo]

The frags from Tang Daddy didn't make it but we were able to resolve that peacefully. So I placed an order with Oceanic Corals last week and got these three. We had a slight problem with the high school drop-outs who work at Greyhound but everything arrived alive and in good shape. These pictures were taken today. There's a Hawkins Enchinata, Pearlberry and Mellon Berry Chalice. I'm especially pleased with the chalice as I didn't have to break the bank on it, its a good 2" square and its one of the bluest LPS I've ever seen.

[whatcaneyedo]

Its been a bad year for clams in my tank. I've lost 4 now out of the 7 that I started the year with. The large maxima and crocea I had for about 5 years each while the squamosa and little maxima I only had for a year or two. I believe that the squamosa may have carried a disease or something that infected the others as it was the most recent addition. From day one the squamosa would exhibit classic signs of pinch mantle. In total I think I gave it 4 fresh water dips which would work for a little while and then the symptoms would return. I also routinely inspected all of them for parasitic snails but never found any.

What really confuses me though is how all of them died. The large maxima looked pinched on a Monday in April and was dead on the Friday. The Squamosa looked pinched for about 5 months starting in the Spring and finally died in October. The following day the crocea which looked perfectly normal the night before as it had for years was dead in the morning. Two weeks later the small maxima died basically the same way the big one had.

The three clams I have left are a 5 year old Crocea, 4 year old Derasa and 2 year old Maxima.

On the plus side the tank continues to look great and everything else is growing almost out of control.

[Delphinus]

I feel your pain, I lost several clams this year including my oldest ones (one was over 6 years in my care. ) It seems once one of them gets something it transfers to others fairly easily.

Nevertheless the tank still looks fantastic, great colours.

[lastlight]

Sorry to hear about your clams. Amazing FTS. Love the green on that cap. Not sure if mine is just a different strain or what but it's such a pale green...makes me jealous!

[zum14]

Originally Posted by lastlight

Sorry to hear about your clams. Amazing FTS. Love the green on that cap. Not sure if mine is just a different strain or what but it's such a pale green...makes me jealous!

Tell me about it! I have a frag of that very cap. It grows like crazy but I have yet to get it that green.....

[whatcaneyedo]

All of my bulbs are 250W 14K Phoenix MH. I'm not sure if thats all there is too it of or if its a water quality issue as well.

[lastlight]

Do you dose anything other than Ca,Alk,Mg?