Reeftastic!
12.11.2005
The whole tank after the Grunge and Janitors were added and everyone got settled. ¶ 12:07 AM 0 comments
12.10.2005
The Grunge Goes In!
I had been patiently waiting for my GARF Grunge and Janitors to arrive, and one great Tuesday, they did! The Grunge, a mix of who-knows-what, but what looked like coral rubble and very fine silt, was sprinkled over the sand and the rocks to 'seed' them, and in the process clouded the whole tank for about an hour. The snails and hermit crabs went in, and everyone was happy.
A funny thing happened when the cleanup crew was added; Hermie came to life! The Hermie we knew to be terribly shy and very attached to his home near the purple mushroom was suddenly outgoing and gregarious! He was all over the tank, cleaning up all the rocks and mingling with his fellow hermits. He even changed shells (there were a few extra) from his small ivory shell to a common, but broken, greenish shell. It's amazing what a little colony of crabs brought out in Hermie! ¶ 11:59 PM 0 comments
A funny thing happened when the cleanup crew was added; Hermie came to life! The Hermie we knew to be terribly shy and very attached to his home near the purple mushroom was suddenly outgoing and gregarious! He was all over the tank, cleaning up all the rocks and mingling with his fellow hermits. He even changed shells (there were a few extra) from his small ivory shell to a common, but broken, greenish shell. It's amazing what a little colony of crabs brought out in Hermie! ¶ 11:59 PM 0 comments
A Month In
By this time, I had been reading tons about my new hobby. I had a good basic book, The Encyclopedia of the Marine Aquarium (Red Sea), and was reading website after website. Some of my favorites were:
About.com's Guide to Saltwater Aquariums
Melev's Reef
Reef.org's Beginner Guide
Reef Central's 'So You Want To Start A Marine Tank'
These sites really got me started in this whole hobby. There were countless other sites that I found through various Google searches, but these were the meaty ones I most relied on to make decisions.
I continued to add rock and test the water for several weeks during all of this. My ammonia was low, but present, so I reacted by doing a few water changes. When the ammonia didn't budge, I decided perhaps the issue was my ammonia test, rather than my ammonia. I bought a new test, and lo and behold, my ammonia was gone.
¶ 11:04 PM 0 comments
About.com's Guide to Saltwater Aquariums
Melev's Reef
Reef.org's Beginner Guide
Reef Central's 'So You Want To Start A Marine Tank'
These sites really got me started in this whole hobby. There were countless other sites that I found through various Google searches, but these were the meaty ones I most relied on to make decisions.
I continued to add rock and test the water for several weeks during all of this. My ammonia was low, but present, so I reacted by doing a few water changes. When the ammonia didn't budge, I decided perhaps the issue was my ammonia test, rather than my ammonia. I bought a new test, and lo and behold, my ammonia was gone.
¶ 11:04 PM 0 comments
Damage Control
A few days after the diatom bloom reared its very ugly head, it was time to deal with the situation. I took the diatoms as a good sign that indicated a completed cycle, so I did a partial water change. While I was at it, I also added my fancy new EuroReef protein skimmer. A day or two later I visited the Sunnyvale LFS and bought two Turbo snails and two Nassarius snails to control the diatoms. The Nassarius snails quickly went to business taking care of what lays below the substrate surface, and the Turbos got to work on the tank walls.
While at the LFS, we also bought one huge (14 lbs) pink rock that would serve as a base rock. It wasn't all that exciting, but it didn't need to be. A few days later I realized the tank needed a good boost of life and a cleanup crew, so I placed an order to GARF for 12 lbs of their Grunge and a janitor pack for a 30 gallon tank, since my tank was very minimal at that time. ¶ 10:53 PM 0 comments
While at the LFS, we also bought one huge (14 lbs) pink rock that would serve as a base rock. It wasn't all that exciting, but it didn't need to be. A few days later I realized the tank needed a good boost of life and a cleanup crew, so I placed an order to GARF for 12 lbs of their Grunge and a janitor pack for a 30 gallon tank, since my tank was very minimal at that time. ¶ 10:53 PM 0 comments
The Rock Goes In
After the system was up and running, and the salinity and temperature were right, we picked up our first batch of live rock. It was 20 lbs of beautiful corraline rock from the downtown Sunnyvale LFS, straight from someone's tank they had broken down. It was expensive, but well worth it, in my opinion. We got 3 great pieces, covered in mushrooms, fan worms, and brittle stars. I remember seeing a copepod or two around this time, just a taste of what was to come.
Five days after adding the rock, two amazing things happened. One, we got the bloom - the diatom bloom! In a matter of two days, the rock and sand went from beautifully sparkly clean to brown and gross. There was a silver lining though; this was the first indicator that the tank had finished its cycle (or was at least close to doing so), and there was life, even if in the form of diatoms. The next amazing thing was the discovery of REAL life, in the form of a blue-legged hitchiker - Hermie! Hermie the hermit crab somehow survived during the cycle and emerged 5 days later busily cleaning his rock. By his rock, I mean there he stayed, on the same branch even, for almost two weeks. He cleaned up and down his little area, near the big purple mushroom, and he didn't venture far. During this time, if Lawrence and I ventured near the tank, Hermie withdrew into the safety of his shell until he thought we were gone. He sure was timid back in those days. ¶ 10:39 PM 0 comments
Five days after adding the rock, two amazing things happened. One, we got the bloom - the diatom bloom! In a matter of two days, the rock and sand went from beautifully sparkly clean to brown and gross. There was a silver lining though; this was the first indicator that the tank had finished its cycle (or was at least close to doing so), and there was life, even if in the form of diatoms. The next amazing thing was the discovery of REAL life, in the form of a blue-legged hitchiker - Hermie! Hermie the hermit crab somehow survived during the cycle and emerged 5 days later busily cleaning his rock. By his rock, I mean there he stayed, on the same branch even, for almost two weeks. He cleaned up and down his little area, near the big purple mushroom, and he didn't venture far. During this time, if Lawrence and I ventured near the tank, Hermie withdrew into the safety of his shell until he thought we were gone. He sure was timid back in those days. ¶ 10:39 PM 0 comments
I've been thinking about keeping a saltwater fish tank for a long, long time. I had my first fishtank as an 'adult' in my dorm my freshman year in college. We kept a terrible mix of fish that simply didn't belong together. Eventually, one very hungry frog ate most of the fish, and the tank was shut down - lesson learned! The fish-guy at the Oxford, Mississippi WalMart did NOT know his stuff.
After college and several moves (Mississippi to Texas to California, where I now call home), I started another freshwater tank at my desk at work. I kept a single-species tank of platies who were happy together and made many young platies. After my office moved buildings, the tank came home and was eventually given away.
I started thinking about a new tank in the last year or so, and after getting married and buying a townhouse with the PERFECT little wall space and tile floors, decided to just do it. I have a friend at work who has kept reef tanks for years, and started a nano-tank at his desk at the office. After seeing him start up this tank and eventually successfully stock it with fish and inverts, I decided I could do it too.
After reading about different set-ups and researching many systems, tanks, and stands, I bought my tank and stand from a LFS here in Sunnyvale, CA. I bought a 50 gallon plexi tank with a built-in overflow and a black back. I also ordered a sump and custom stand that had to be re-made to fit the sump. Once that was in, I picked up 60 lbs 'live' sand and a Current Satellite PC hood in 130 total watts (I know, it's not much, but it was a place to start). A heater, powerhead, and thermometer were also purchased at the same time.
Once everything was home, Lawrence helped me put it all together and we filled bucket after bucket (5 gallons at a time) until the tank and sump were full. The plate is in the picture because that's how we kept the sand from getting stirred up. After it was full and the salt mix had been added, we let it run for a week or so to ensure we had no leaks, and to give the sand time to start the cycle. At some point in that first week we also dumped in the remainder of a bacteria starter which we had put in Lawrence's 5 gallon (which he initially bought for me) tank at work. ¶ 8:09 PM 0 comments
After college and several moves (Mississippi to Texas to California, where I now call home), I started another freshwater tank at my desk at work. I kept a single-species tank of platies who were happy together and made many young platies. After my office moved buildings, the tank came home and was eventually given away.
I started thinking about a new tank in the last year or so, and after getting married and buying a townhouse with the PERFECT little wall space and tile floors, decided to just do it. I have a friend at work who has kept reef tanks for years, and started a nano-tank at his desk at the office. After seeing him start up this tank and eventually successfully stock it with fish and inverts, I decided I could do it too.
After reading about different set-ups and researching many systems, tanks, and stands, I bought my tank and stand from a LFS here in Sunnyvale, CA. I bought a 50 gallon plexi tank with a built-in overflow and a black back. I also ordered a sump and custom stand that had to be re-made to fit the sump. Once that was in, I picked up 60 lbs 'live' sand and a Current Satellite PC hood in 130 total watts (I know, it's not much, but it was a place to start). A heater, powerhead, and thermometer were also purchased at the same time.
Once everything was home, Lawrence helped me put it all together and we filled bucket after bucket (5 gallons at a time) until the tank and sump were full. The plate is in the picture because that's how we kept the sand from getting stirred up. After it was full and the salt mix had been added, we let it run for a week or so to ensure we had no leaks, and to give the sand time to start the cycle. At some point in that first week we also dumped in the remainder of a bacteria starter which we had put in Lawrence's 5 gallon (which he initially bought for me) tank at work. ¶ 8:09 PM 0 comments
Have I Become A Blogger?
I've been thinking about starting a blog since I started this hobby of building a reef tank. I want to share the lessons I'm learning as a newbie, because if there's anything I've learned in this short time, it's that to be successful you've got to do your research, and there's just SO much information out there. The best resources I've found are other peoples websites and all the forums on this topic. A book will often give you only one theory on how to do something, but learning from lots of different people's successes and failures is what's worked for me so far.
I also wanted a place to share this hobby of mine with my family, so they can see the progress of my tank, and my mom will stop asking, 'WHEN are you getting fish?!?'. There's so much more to a reef tank than fish, so here's my forum to explain why that new brain coral is just as exciting as a 'Nemo' fish would be.
I want to catch myself up to where I am today, so I'm going to trace my steps back from the beginning (not so long ago, just this summer), when my husband Lawrence gave me a 5 gallon fish tank for my birthday, thinking that would satisfy my itch for a fish tank. Little did he know that 5 gallon supposedly-goldfish tank would end up a 50 gallon starter reef tank! ¶ 3:50 PM 0 comments
I also wanted a place to share this hobby of mine with my family, so they can see the progress of my tank, and my mom will stop asking, 'WHEN are you getting fish?!?'. There's so much more to a reef tank than fish, so here's my forum to explain why that new brain coral is just as exciting as a 'Nemo' fish would be.
I want to catch myself up to where I am today, so I'm going to trace my steps back from the beginning (not so long ago, just this summer), when my husband Lawrence gave me a 5 gallon fish tank for my birthday, thinking that would satisfy my itch for a fish tank. Little did he know that 5 gallon supposedly-goldfish tank would end up a 50 gallon starter reef tank! ¶ 3:50 PM 0 comments
