General Cleaning

Seeing as it's the end of the month and the end of the year, I decided to do a little general cleaning. Plus the tank has been looking absolutely filthy. And what I've been trying to play off as thick fluffy coats of coralline algae are undeniably mats of red slime algae which is cyanobacteria.

Cyanobacteria outbreaks are often caused by nutrient buildup, specifically nitrates and phosphates. The odd thing is neither of these two are showing up in my water tests so it's hard to pinpoint exactly why they're growing prolifically in my tank. For now I was able to siphon these mats out during my water change but I will have to monitor their growth carefully to identify the source of the problem. Cyanobacteria is not only unsightly but can also cause complications in the grand scheme of things.

I scraped the front and sides of the glass to get rid of some nuisance algae that have taken over some of the tight spaces and bottom parts of the tank. I left the bank wall alone as I hope to allow coralline to grow in these parts. I shifted and stirred the sand to allow for circulation and to refill empty pockets that have been cleared out from the turbulent current created by the powerhead.

I also took out the powerhead and the heater to clean off all the crap that's been growing on them. Cleaning out the powerhead also helps circulation which has probably decreased a little over time from all the debris and detritus that's stuck in its intake compartment. I also changed out the Purigen as it has now become completely discolored.

Another Mysterious Creature From the Deep

 

I found another mystery creature while siphoning around the rocks during my water change. A worm-like creature, about an inch long, swam frantically out into the open. It was surprisingly big with an undulating motion as it darted from one end of the tank to the other. And just as it quickly appeared, it quickly disappeared never to be seen again.

A little video I caught of the worm:

Eight Weeks Later

To make up for the long inactivity these past few weeks, I decided to pick up a couple more corals, I stopped by a LFS I had previously visited before while my tank was cycling to "browse around." Instead I walked out with an orange ricordea and another zoanthid rock.

I was planning on trying my hand at some pulsing xenias and was thinking of getting some this time around. The store had quite a few of them around and in several sizes so at least I know that they have some readily available. What caught my eye was a rock with a pretty good sized orange ricordea. This is another specimen that I had plan on eventually putting in my tank so this was definitely a good find though a little pricier than I'd like ($65). To top it off, it's attached to a fairly small rock so I knew I wouldn't have a problem finding room for it in the tank. As my luck would have it, there's actually another smaller piece on the same rock. Also attached to this rock is a nice feather duster worm so that's another plus.

Another one I couldn't resist was a colony of green/orange zoanthids on a small piece of branching coral. Although I already have a colony in my tank, this one came on a small attractive piece of coral that I can easily tuck into a crevice. Also a bit more pricier than I'd pay for zoanthids ($40) but I found the colors too amazing to resist!

Acclimating the orange ricordea. Notice the feather duster worm poking underneath.

Green/orange zoanthids. Some of the polyps had already opened up even while still in the bag.

I acclimated them both for an hour, changing out the water every ten minutes. I decided to place them on the right side of the tank to balance things out.

The diva purple mushroom taking center stage, not to be outdone by the newcomers.

Mystery Hydroids

While acclimating the new corals I made an interesting discovery. I typically turn off the filter and the powerhead while acclimating to prevent unwanted turbulence in the water. With the water completely still, I noticed little movements in the water. Upon close inspection I realized that I was looking at some type of jellyfish or hydroid-like creatures. I found about four of them, pulsating vertically to the top and then drifting back down. Not sure what they are, how they got there and whether they're good or bad. But they're pretty nifty.

Here's a little footage I caught on camera:

Night Shots

The corals in my tank have adapted pretty well to the daily lighting schedule. Around 9:30 at night, thirty minutes before lights out, the blue zoanthids will start tucking its polyps away. The purple mushrooms begin to shrivel up at this time as well.

The orange ricordea has an odd way of closing up at night. 

Holiday Update

With the holidays under way, things are moving pretty slow in the nano reef. On the other hand this has given the corals some time to settle and for the tank to mature even more. Parameters have been great across the board and everything seems to be thriving. Aside from the pesky algae growth here and there, the tank has adapted to my routine maintenance. I should probably pick up a few more hermits to help keep the algae down, along with some new empty shells as they seem to be growing faster than I anticipated.

Coralline algae growing in nicely.

The blue zoanthids are looking good with new polyps cropping up in some places.

The purple mushrooms are also doing well. The big one is the most expressive one by far, changing through various shapes, sizes and color depending on its mood. Sometimes it worries me but I guess this is pretty normal behavior for them.

Santa has especially been kind and generous this year and got me a refractometer (thanks Mike!).

I'm super stoked because now I can accurately see where my salinity is at and not just rely on the specific gravity readings I get with the swing arm hydrometer.

View through the eyepiece as the instrument is calibrated to zero using RO/DI water.

First accurate snapshot of my water salinity. Much to my surprise, my salinity is actually 40 ppt which is close to a specific gravity of 1.030.

This is a little higher than where I should be at, around 35 ppt (~1.026). But now that I know for sure, I can gradually adjust my water to the proper level.

This weekend I might look into adding more livestock along with a couple more hermits to help clean up some of the mess that I can't keep up with.

Corals From A Meth Lab

With my water parameters in stable condition these past few weeks, I've finally put in some corals after a month of staring at rocks. Since the corals at my favorite LFS (Atlantis) are somewhat pricey I went on an adventure to find a bargain. The best deals are found online but this being my first experience buying corals and all, I wanted to see them before purchasing. And I didn't want to have to sit and worry if they're going to make it okay through shipping.

I heard about this place called Tropical Expressions (for all you locals, it's at Rainbow and Oakey behind Lee's Liquor) which apparently has good prices on livestock though I was warned about the strange woman that runs the shop. So I went with a friend to investigate and sure enough the place looked like a meth lab (that's what my friend described it as); not immaculate at all like Atlantis and there were strange tanks with pipes and beakers all over the place. Jackie, the owner, introduced herself and was pretty cooky and strange, like she hadn't had any sleep in days. But nice nonetheless. The best part was the prices on her livestock: I walked away with a purple mushroom coral and some blue zoanthids for $46.33. Not bad considering a regular mushroom coral at Atlantis would run you a good $80 while a colony of zoanthids can get close to $100. I also gnored the fact that her tanks were dirty and murky.

I ran home and acclimated the corals for an hour. I displaced some of the water from my tank to accomodate the weight of the rocks and floated them in.

I poured a small cup of water from my tank into the bags every ten minutes after throwing out a cup of water from the bags.

An hour into acclimatization I carefully placed them into the tank. I decided to place the rock with the purple mushrooms on the sand bed in the middle of my tank. The rock with the blue zoanthids I placed almost vertically on the left. At this point I'm realizing that I probably have too much live rock as I struggle to place my first two corals.

The blue zoanthids hid their polyps for the first two hours but eventually opened up. The purple mushrooms all opened up nicely except for the big one which is still pretty shriveled up from the transfer.

I found some pretty interesting hitchhikers on the coral rocks: bristle stars, some mystery anemones and something that looks like a feather duster but might very well be a coral polyp of some sort. At this point, it's too small to tell.

All in all the transfer seemed to have gone smoothly though I'm a little worried about the large purple mushroom polyp that's still pretty shriveled up. I'll just have to pay close attention to it over the next few days.