Heidi's 150g "Cube" Mixed Reef

Tank still looks very nice. Your new camera takes some really pics.

 

very nice ... that RBTA?

 

WOW!!! So jelous!! Im setting up a 150 cube also, although you are a bit farther ahead than I am. Hope mine looks this good when I'm done!

 

Thanks so much guys for the kind words! They mean a lot to me

ok lol but they are really bad right now because of me removing the sand bed. I will need to do a few more water changes to get my nitrates down. This is the first time in this tanks history that I have had more then zero nitrates read on the api test.

Cal: 480
Alk: 143.2ppm KH **or** 8 dKH
Mag: 1700 ppm
Phos: .25
Nitrates 20ppm
PH... ??? I dont currently have a test kit for it, but figure as long as my Alk and Cal are stable PH is good to go

Anyhew, I feel like I just "aired my dirty laundry" lol I never have had N and P problems so this is a new thing for me, like new in the last week. I will be doing another water change in a couple days and will continue dosing my MB7 and running the bio-pellets. I will let you all know how it goes.

Heidi

 

Yes Rose Bubble tipped Anemone

 

I will be watching for a build thread Best wishes on your new tank, I am sure if you put the love, time and energy into it it will be as beautiful as mine in now time!!

Heidi

 

the ups and downs...

So the crushed coral just had to go. It looked so dirty, it was holding phosphates and nitrates and leaching out calcium...(can't prove that but my calcium was never under 500 and my alk was never high enough to make that ok) It was just crap, I should have been patient and bought good sand first thing...but alas.. so here is this part of the month in pictures...





Yup you read that right. I'm still not sure how since I did take out the sand over the course of 2 weeks. But during the last "sucking out" of the sand bed both of these tangs were super stressed and when the "sand cleared" the next day I found them both dead. All the other fish and coral were fine. A couple days later I noticed a Pocillopora starting to loose flesh, it stopped after a couple of days and is now just one little "bump" on the whole piece. everything else has been fine.

I replaced the crap with "sugar sized" Caribsea sand. I used only 2 30 pound bags and haven't decided if I want more or not yet. It is very white and looks GREAT imo but it does like to shift around because I have a lot of flow.

So I was thinking I would get a little diatom bloom..hehe YEAH I think I kicked my tank into a full out cycle. My Nitrates spiked to 40ppm, I had some MAD corals and phosphates were really high too. Most of my coral got pretty browned out so in the following pictures its still coming back. My phosphates are back down at zero and my Nitrates are on there way down as well. (20 to 30 yesterday) I am slowly getting color back and tomorrow when I do a water change I am thinking that will help even more with the nitrates. So here are the photos I took today. Enjoy!

Left side

right side

front

Thanks as always for looking and following along in my journey. What a ride.
Heidi

 

Sorry to hear about your losses. How did you add the sand to your system? I think that everything is looking great! A water change will help out with nitrates, the bigger the more nitrates you will remover.

 

Awesome transition Heidi. sorry for the loss on the fish, but in retrospect everything looks excellent! You have a great reef there girly

 

Well hell it still looks awesome to me!!! You have some great colors in there Heidi and it's does look really really clean with the white sand (thumbs up) I too am sorry about the loss of your tangs (hugs) Keep up the wonderful work.