Big Update
It’s been a while since I updated the blog! I hope I can remember what’s happened in the past week. Let’s see…
I chickened out on feeding that much food 3 times a day. I saw increased algae growth on the tank walls. I will likely need to do something different to add that much food to the tank. I want to continue knocking back the algae in the tank (slow but steady progress, I believe), and then I can consider increased feeding possibly in conjunction with carbon dosing (VSV). That will take some time I think.
I did not do a water change over the weekend, so I’m still running the same media in my reactors (carbon and phosphate). I need to change them out tonight, I think the filter pads on the reactors are clogged. Two nights ago I stirred up a bunch of detritus that had settled in the sump, and then repeated last night. My flow through the reactors last night went to almost zero in the span of a few minutes. I didn’t feel anything stuck in the impeller of the MJ900 pump I’m using, so I’m assuming it’s the filter pads… either way I need to change the media.
The chaeto in the sump seems to be growing well. I also have 2 other types of algae. A red branching bubble algae, and a type of sea grass. Both seem very easy to control so far, so I’m happy. The chaeto is doing great under the CFL lamp hanging over my sump. In fact, it grew so much it clogged the intake of the MJ1200 I was using for sump flow (and hence I had detritus build-up). I’ll need to keep an eye on that.
I have been seeing larger pods in the sump. There are still some flatworms, but they’re definitely not the red planaria and they are not experiencing a population explosion. Not going to worry about them for now, but I think I eventually will treat the tank. Aptasia is still a single stalk in the same place on the sump wall. Not regretting leaving that in yet.
Which brings me to the display tank. I may have finally killed off the one aptasia I had in the display. I had this photo of the monster posted on the hitch hikers page of our website.
Aptasia
The head was about the size of a silver dollar and I could never kill it with kalk paste, hot water, vinegar. It would react too quickly and pull back into the rock. Normally it never exposed more than just its head. Well, the other night at light’s out it was really extended. At least an inch and a half of body was sticking out the rock work. I thought – this is my chance!! I don’t know what I planned to do, maybe try to pull it from the rock, but I grabbed a pair of locking forceps and squeezed down as close to the rock as I could. It immediately tried to retract itself, but wound up ripping itself in half! I don’t know what kind of regenerative powers these things have, but I’m hoping it dealt iself a deathblow. Fingers crossed.
I noticed a sponge on the move. Pretty cool to see. It had been on a piece of rock along the back wall for quite some time – months and months – and several weeks ago started to travel. I was really surprised to see that. It extended thin strings and seemed to slowly pull itself along the rock. We’re talking fractions of an inch a day. Until recently. It happened to have been a few inches away from the new torch coral I put in the tank, which had a white sponge on part of its skeleton. Seemingly overnight, the other sponge suddenly moved at least 2 inches – right on top of the white sponge. It’s been planted there for a solid week now. I assume there’s some level of sponge-warfare going on. It doesn’t seem to bother the coral at all, so I’ll let it be.
Have been adding 2 rounded tablespoons of kalk powder to my top-off water, which is still hovering at about 5 gallons per 3 days. Measured the tank calcium levels the other night (quick test, didn’t do alk at the same time) and it was at 400. I think the parameters are pretty good, the corraline algae is taking off. A bit too quickly in my opinion, I can’t keep up with it on the tank walls. I need to buy a scraper, I think.
I may also need to buy new lamps and new RODI filters. Looking back at my records, the RODI filters are from 2007 and the Iwasaki lamps are a year old. I have never read anything definitive on the life of the Iwasaki 175W lamps, so I should plan on replacing them soon. If I had some fun toys I could take spectral analysis plots and PAR readings and track how the bulb degenerates over time. But I don’t have those toys, so I need to guess. On the other hand, I DO have the TDS meter I need to measure the output of the RO membrane and DI bed. I have the solid gut feeling all of the RODI filters need to be replaced – including the original RO membrane – but that’s an easy thing to test.
On the fish-front, Alvy has been eating well, swallowing larger pieces of food and fighting for position during the feeding frenzy’s. The dwarf angels are fat and seemingly happy. The pajama cardinals have been breeding regularly, but I haven’t done much about it. The only thing I did was turn the return pump off two nights ago when I expected the male to spit, so all the larvae would stay in the tank as fish and coral food. It seems to have been successful. The next morning his mouth was empty, but there were no larvae to see. I figure, if I’m not able to raise them, they might as well feed the tank inhabitants instead of the skimmer.
OK, I think that’s my big update. I’m sure there are some little things here and there that I missed, and probably something bigger that I really intended on blogging about. But that’s what I get for waiting a whole week before posting an update on the system.
Monday Night
I can’t believe I have only written one post since last Monday. What a week this was. Let’s see what’s up…
Pajama Cardinal is still carrying eggs. I expect he’ll be releasing tomorrow night.
The other fish seem to be doing just fine, eating heartily. I have been feeding PE’s frozen mysis or spirulina gut-loaded brine shrimp almost daily, on top of small portions of Rod’s Food, and it is having predictable results in the tank. Happy fat fish… and growth of algae. I think I should change my feeding patterns (obviously!!) and start rinsing the frozen foods (except Rod’s) before adding it to the tank. I think the flameback angels are getting enough food by grazing, that they don’t need the frozen stuff every day. As for Alvy, who I am still trying to keep fat while he matures, I think I can spot feed with some Spectrum pellets over the course of the evening before the daily Rod’s. As it gets lighter earlier these days, I may give him a few pellets in the mornings too.
To combat detritus and uneaten food, I’ve gone back to my habit of using a powerhead to blow out the live rock each night. If I could figure out how to add more flow to the tank without adding any powerheads, I’d do that in a heartbeat. I can’t figure out how to add another closed loop to the tank though. I’m going to hold off on VSV for a few days until I get things back under control. By this time next week I think I’ll be dosing again.
I also want to rethink how I’m doing my make-up water. Right now, my top-off is fed directly from the RODI unit, through my kalk reactor, into the sump. It makes up water a couple pints at a time. Works great at keeping the kalk stirred up, the salinity constant. I recently read that it’s really inefficient at the RODI unit, and almost counter productve. Apparently, and I need to look into this more, the DI cartridge will allow a few ppm of TDS to pass when used in this way. I tested my water and sure enough, with a fairly new DI cartridge that has only partially changed color, it’s discharging 4ppm. After letting this run for a couple seconds it dropped to 2…
Now I’m thinking: I will remove the make-up solenoid, fill a 5-gallon bucket with RODI water, throw a maxijet pump in the bottom of the 5-gal bucket, use some tubing to connect it to my kalk reactor, and use my existing make-up level controls to switch the pump on/off. Sounds easy enough… but where the heck do I put a 5-gallon bucket? And is cycling a maxijet like that going to work long-term? hmmmmmm.
Monday Update
It’s been a few days without any updates… Let’s see where to begin. How about a short update on almost everything.
Friday night the pajama cardinal released a few larvae. The female stayed immediately downstream of him gobbling them up. Wonderful. How’s that for gratitude for carrying her babies?!? He released the rest of them Saturday night after lights out.
All of the fish have been eating well. The flameback angels have really taken to frozen foods (especially spirulina gut-loaded brine shrimp; the mysis seem to be a bit too large). Alvy is getting much more confident and capable of pulling food out of the water column.
The new frags seem to be acclimating well to their new environment. The urchin (whom we’ve renamed “junkyard”) knocked over the teal stag tonight, despite my having epoxied it in place. I superglued it to the epoxy… hopefully that is effective. Once it encrusts the epoxy there should be no more problems.
I had to relocate the Acropora carolinas. The anemone seems happy in its new location but it was dangerously close to stinging the acro. I moved it to the other side of the overflow. It is in a very slightly shadier spot, and less direct current… it’s showing polyp extension but I’ll still keep an eye on it.
Seeing great growth out of a few other corals, real growth spurts lately. I think this is due to the finally stable alk & ca, and temps. Two in particular are surprising me. The green/yellow “ORA millepora” has started shooting branches in a few directions, really came out of no where. Up until 2 weeks ago or so it was a big colorful lump of coral. Also seeing great encrusting growth from the rainbow montipora. I think that a red millepora is about to take off too. It was a tan/brown color for a while, but I’ve recently noticed better polyp extension, deepening red color, and a light green growth ring around the base. Very cool.
Last night I did a double-water change, about 10 gallons. For no particular reason, just felt like I may have been feeding heavily lately. I forgot to dose the Prodibio BioDigest, but I did that tonight at lights out. It’s about time to purchase some more. I haven’t dosed VSV for about a week… for no good reason. I may pick it back up again, just not sure.
Cyanobacteria Photos After Dosing VSV
OK, yet another non-reef night. This time I was hard at work getting a report done for the guy who signs my paychecks… that felt important.
Since I didn’t have time to finish my thoughts on VSV/Bacteria/Algae (and quite frankly want to reread a bunch of resource materials so I don’t say anything foolish) I’ll just present some interesting photos. Will I include any commentary? I don’t know yet… but we’ll both have figured that out by the end of this post.
I have a few areas of my tank with cyanobacteria growth. It isn’t always present, and even over the course of the same day I have seen it spread and disappear. It does seem to reoccur in the same locations in the tank. Recently I noticed in particular that the cyano recedes considerably after dosing my normal amount of VSV in the evenings. Yesterday I decided to take some photos of it, which follow. Interestingly, tonight when I glanced at the tank I didn’t see any cyano at all… although it’s been present the previous 3 or 4 nights. Huh. Guess I took my photos at the right time.
The first photo is taken right before dosing VSV, and the remaining were taken every 30 minutes. In this first photo check out that thick mat of cyano covering everything in the photo frame.
Cyano at 0 Minutes
Cyano at 30 Minutes
Cyano at 60 Minutes
Cyano at 90 Minutes
Cyano at 120 Minutes
Cyano at 150 Minutes
Cyano at 180 Minutes
In the last photo, you are not seeing cyano – you are seeing the red cotton algae that was on the live rock under the cyanobacteria. The cyano is pretty much completely gone. To give you an idea of how much cyano receded, try to find the caulerpa in the first photo (not just the one exposed leaf). My halides shut off after this last photo and I wasn’t able to take any more photographs, but I could see the cyano further recede in the following hour. Most of the recession is captured in these photos.
I’ve read that different concentrations of the VSV components can contribute to growth of cyano. To me, these photos are further empirical proof that different bacteria do in fact thrive on different carbon sources. Obviously there is a bacteria present in my tank (presumably from the Prodibio BioDigest) that was able to outcompete the cyano… or is that not so obvious? Is there something in the VSV that would have killed the cyanobacteria? I find that less likely.
I think I can also conclude that VSV does not necessarily cause cyanobacteria, although in a different concentration than I am using cyano may thrive on it as a carbon source. Now does Prodibio BioDigest introduce cyano? … maybe. I have no idea. I have had cyano outbreaks in other tanks that weren’t dosed with Prodibio products. Frankly, I think it is always present (although not always visible to the naked eye) and any excess nutrients can cause it to rear its ugly head (am I crazy for not finding it too ugly? I guess it’s all relative when my choices are cyano or red cotton algae). Again, it’s one of the most prevalent strains of bacteria out there, so who knows when or how it got introduced.
Now my question to myself is… will cyano outcompete the red cotton algae for nutrients? If so I may try to find a way to encourage cyano to grow. I find it a lot easier to get rid of than the red cotton algae…
Hey what do you know, I provided some commentary.
Monday Night
I was planning on doing a big update tonight with some thoughts on VSV, Prodibio, bacteria and algae, the new frags, etc., but we went to a great dinner downtown and I just didn’t have time to get it done. So look for that later this week. It’s mostly conjecture based on my observations. Very little science to back it up.
Tonight I dosed 1.5ml VSV, and fed a few spectrum pellets before we went out and was happy to see Alvy eat 5 of them. To make it even better, I watched him grab the first, swallow it, and immediately grab a second before heading back to their corner of the tank. He is getting bigger, braver, and is able to eat larger pieces of food. This is fantastic.
When we got back home I fed a generous amount of Rods Food to the tank. I had missed a feeding last night and decided to feed ~50% more tonight. I also took a couple pieces of krill, broke them up, and fed them to the LPS in the tank. I fed the new bubble, which reacted immediately and pulled the piece into its mouth. While doing that I noticed a couple very small buds on the side of the coral – looks like I may have gotten a few baby bubbles in the purchase yesterday!! I also fed Mic Jagger (slow eater tonight, but a few heads did manage to eat from what I saw), the blue bubble, the torch, Anemone, and the plate coral. I tried to place a piece of krill on the maze brain coral but it got blown away – into a head of the hammer coral, which looked like it was eating it.
Saw good polyp extension on the two new SPS frags. I want to get some photos tomorrow night to document their size and coloration when I added them. I don’t know why, but I am expecting both to grow pretty well, with better turquoise coloration in the stag… but fading in the mille. Is it bad to go into this with those low expectations?
Regular Maintenance
Nothing special today. Pretty much the routine is coming back to me. This morning took the cursory look at the tank, the sump, the temperature controller, the skimmer etc. It’s still dark enough in the mornings that the fish are all asleep for the most part, so no feeding or anything that early in the day.
Got home late evening, shut off the return pump and dosed ~1ml VSV and fed the tank some frozen spirulina gut-loaded brine shrimp. All the fish seem to love it. The clowns, the cardinals, the blenny, the dwarf angels. I decided to feed an entire cube of the food tonight. Left the return pump off for about 30 minutes (man does the toggle switch come in handy, so much easier than unplugging the pump). Leter, after lights out, I fed the tank some Rod’s Food. Great reaction from all the fish, including the angels.
It has been great to see recently that Alvy is getting large enough to pull some really decent sized pieces of food out of the water column. In the past he would grab a big piece, swim away with it and hide while gnawing away, all the while the other fish are eating and eating. Ultimately he would give up, spit the food out, and search for some manageable sized pieces, while, of course, they had all been eaten. Now he has grown to a point that he can manage to pull some big pieces of food and swallow them quickly, and not miss much opportunity to continue feeding. It’s going to be a good turning point for him, I think. Hard to say what his coloration will wind up like. His second stripe has not fully come in, but his third stripe is almost complete and the black coloration is starting to expand around it. He may have gone through a brief period of malnourishment during development that permanently stunted his 2nd stripe coloration. The second stripe definitely has not developed any further in recent weeks (months). It will be interesting to see.
The pajama cardinals have not been on a regular cycle lately. I really feel like they were breeding much more regularly when the moonlights were functioning. Since the power supply failed, I think they have bred twice. It really messed up their internal clocks I think. Other factors, like food availability, have improved recently (I feel like I’m feeding a bit more heavily lately). I really need to get the 6VDC power supply back up and running this weekend… not to mention my safety controls (this has been on my to-do list for much too long).
