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.
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