My 20g Journal "Pic Warning" (now a 29g!)

[IDunnoWhy]

Looking nice

Automation really makes things a lot easier.

Thanks Lotus!!

Yea, automation has certainly made my lighting schedule easier to keep Now I need to set up similar systems on my remaining FW tanks.....I cringe when my electric bill shows up every month . Having things on timer hopefully may shave a few bucks off of it.

 

[IDunnoWhy]

I say you have a Great Looking 29 G there great job . hope mine come out looking that good .

Thank You

how do you like you sand bed ? is 30 Pounds enuff ? about how deep is it ?

Well, it moves around a bit but I'd say it's close to "4 in most areas. I had recently been reading up on Deep Sand Beds (per Lorna's Suggestions) and though I'm a little on the light side (Should be closer to 6") I'm going to give it a go, I can always add additional sand as needed. Hopefully Lorna or another DSB user will chime in with further suggestions

 

[TRe]

looking very good!! with the fuge light on at night though it looks like it may be a little too much as far as moonlights you may wanna try and block some of it out

 

[IDunnoWhy]

looking very good!! with the fuge light on at night though it looks like it may be a little too much as far as moonlights you may wanna try and block some of it out

Thanks TRe!

Yea, I'm actually going today to the craft store today to get some black "plastic sheeting" to cover a portion of the top rear of the tank for that purpose, the light looks nice, but I agree it's too much. My next light will hopefully have some luner lights built right into the hood.

 

[Lorna]

Looks great, you may want to add more sand as arragonite will deplete over time.....it actually dissolves and needs to be replenished to keep the depth. I would add another inch. Is that rock sitting on top of the sand? If so make sure it is stable if you add any sand sifting gobies etc.....you want to make sure you don't have a rock fall. otherwise you are on track....nice little kenya tree.

 

[IDunnoWhy]

Looks great, you may want to add more sand as arragonite will deplete over time.....it actually dissolves and needs to be replenished to keep the depth. I would add another inch. Is that rock sitting on top of the sand? If so make sure it is stable if you add any sand sifting gobies etc.....you want to make sure you don't have a rock fall. otherwise you are on track....nice little kenya tree.

Thanks Lorna!!

I put egg crate on the bottom, then I placed the rock in, and then I added the aragonite, so technically the rock is setting directly on the bottom, so it should be fairly stable. I didn't know aragonite dissolves (good info) so I'll definately keep an eye on the level, and look into getting some reef sand. to bring the level up a bit.

 

[Lorna]

it take time to dissolve.......this disolution is how it buffers the water. The high ph of the salt water dissolves the calcium carbonate of the sand. This is a good thing. Just add more sand later and a good way to do that is to use a piece of tubing or pvc to the bottom and pour the sand down the tube to make sure you don't cause a sand storm...

I have a diamond gobie who has moved most of my sand from the front of my tank to the back behind my rock work........I now either have to move the sand back.....or add more....

 

[IDunnoWhy]

10/8/07 Update...I've got Crabs!

Ok...I don't have Crabs, but my tank does

I picked up 2 Blue Legged Hermits on Sunday, after I acclimated them they went into hiding, but one came out for a photo shoot today.. The pics aren't great, but you get the idea.

I found a bunch of these guys in my tank recently, I don't know what they are, maybe feather dusters? (They come out of little white tubes, that it appears they made themselves).

I don't know what all the "white specs" are on the back of the tank, the pics don't show it, but if you look close, they look like little tops or corkscrews.

 

[di0nysus]

yea i had those white specs on the back of my tank too those white specs turned into coraline algae

 

[spllouder]

Nice shoot of the Blue Legged crab . I just picked one up myself too . He did not hide thou maybe . He started eat my sand bed , then climbed up on rocks and started going to town . with a fury of stuff always flying around where he was at .

Looking Good !!!

 

[IDunnoWhy]

Nice shoot of the Blue Legged crab . I just picked one up myself too . He did not hide thou maybe . He started eat my sand bed , then climbed up on rocks and started going to town . with a fury of stuff always flying around where he was at .

Looking Good !!!

Thanks!

Yea, I made a mistake and didn't turn the lights off after they got into the tank, The tank they came from was rather dim, and I think my bright lighting kinda freaked them out. They are both out now going nuts on the rock, busy lil' goofs LOL

 

[Lotus]

Those white specs sound like spiroid worms. They're harmless, but if they bother you, you can scrape them off.

The little polyp thing on the third and fourth pics looks like it might be an aptaisia

Cool hermits

 

[IDunnoWhy]

Hmmm Aptaisia huh? Well a simple web search tells me they are undesirable, but I'm not sure it's an exact match to the pics I saw (pretty darn close though).

For the sake of not having future trouble, I'll tweezer the thing out tomorrow. I did look close at it, and it's different than the other things I'm seeing in my tank, the other creatures, clearly come out of white "hard" tubes, where as the creature I have pictured appears to be more directly connected to the rock.

 

[Lotus]

If you poke it with something hard (not your finger), does it retract into the rock?

If it is aptasia, it's better to squirt it with hot water, vinegar or get a commercial "cure" to get rid of it. I think if you just do tweezers, it will grow back.

 

[di0nysus]

so if it retracts back into the rock its aptasia?

 

[Lotus]

Yes, I believe so. I never poked mine, just nuked 'em.

 

[TheFighterFish]

Wow, great thread so far. It really comes to show how patient you must be to be in the SW hobby.

Look forward to more updates and pics!

 

[TRe]

first of all nice pics...... but what you have pictured there is definitly aptasia when i first saw one of them i got all happy and thought it was some cool hitchhicker* before i knew it 1 turned into 20 i got a few peppermint shrimp and within a week they ate them all ..... theres no gaurentee that the peppermint shrimp will actually eat them but theres a good chance.... you may wanna think about adding one of those to your CUC *thumbsups oh yea and what you say has a "white hard tube" sound more like a feather duster to me

 

[IDunnoWhy]

first of all nice pics......

Thanks TRe! I musta took 50 pics to get those few Macro shots to look decent

but what you have pictured there is definitly aptasia when i first saw one of them i got all happy and thought it was some cool hitchhicker* before i knew it 1 turned into 20 i got a few peppermint shrimp and within a week they ate them all ..... theres no gaurentee that the peppermint shrimp will actually eat them but theres a good chance.... you may wanna think about adding one of those to your CUC *thumbsups

Well....That sucks I'll check out some peppermints at the LFS tonight, and if all else fails I'll grab some Joe's Juice.

oh yea and what you say has a "white hard tube" sound more like a feather duster to me

Yea thats what I was thinking too, I found a few pics online of some feather dusters, and they look the same as mine.

You can see the "tubes" in the background of my hermit pics if you look close.

 

[Lorna]

Actually the red legged hermit is not a scarlet which are the reef safe ones. That one is one of the more aggressive ones of which I have a few that I recently relegated to the dungeon for shelljacking.