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Journal
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Reef Tank
Tank: 61 litres, Hexagonal
Lighting: Fluorescent, 2x Arcadia Marine White, 1x Arcadia Blue Actinic with 3x Arcadia reflectors.
Water Parameters: sg 1.025-1.026, 79-81°F
Heating: AquaEl heater, 100w
Circulation: MaxiJet MJ500, Eheim 1212 AquaBall with 2x HydorFlo rotating water deflector.
Skimmer: Red Sea, Prizm Deluxe
Livestock: Blackbelly goby, 3x Blue-legged Hermits, Stripe-legged hermit, 4x Trochus Snails, 4x Nassarius Snails, Montipora, Button Polyps, Candy Cane, Favites Brain Coral, Ruffled Ridge Coral, Red Mushroom.
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Oscar Tank
Tank: 260 litres, Long
Lighting: Fluorescent, 2x Sylvania Aquastar 36w
Heating: Newatt 250w
Filtration: Fluval 204 Canister, Fluval 404 Canister
Livestock: Oscar, Common Pleco
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Friday December 19th 2008
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Its been several months now since I last updated the site, and let me just say thing have been hectic.
Things did not turn out to well, the issues with my reef tank I last mentioned eventually went from bad the worse ultimately ending in a tank crash.
I restarted the tank last month with fresh live rock and live sand and managed to save my montipora fragments, my brain coral, hermits and my goby.
Nature's Ocean live sand proved to be a good investment as they claimed it to be instant cycling, and after waiting a week to be on the safe side I transferred my livestock and everything seems to have gone fine.
My montipora branches seem to be thriving again and have started to grow rapidly again, color has returned to my brain coral and the protopalythoa clusters are starting to regain their color again.
I have of course had to restock the tank a bit so I have added a few trochus snails, some nassarius and a nice mushroom coral plus a free Ruffled Ridge Coral fragment.
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Monday, July 7th 2008
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Some journal, its been like 4 months since I last updated it. Since then a lot of things have happened. My Hammer/Anchor Coral lasted for just a couple of weeks before it contracted brown jelly disease, end of that one and fortunately it did not spread to other corals. Ive also had to radically reorganize my setup due to a nasty cladophora infestation(see Macro Algae). A few rocks had to be pulled out of the reef tank because they were too heavily infested, unfortunately I had to break off all the branches of my montipora colony and sacrifice the encrusted part, but it was either that or "smother city". Fortunately some of the rocks only had a light infestation so I just took and flipped them upside down, burying the cladophora infested parts in the substrate.
Other good news is that I acquired some lovely Angel fish last week, and so i will try to have a facts page up soon, when I can find the time that is.
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Friday, February 22nd 2008
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Wow haven't updated for a couple of weeks, I guess I have just had too much on my mind latley. I returned to the LFS on Saturday last weekend and was allowed to buy a new colony for half price, but this time I chose a hardier Hammer/Anchor Coral. I also picked up a Monti frag of the same species that suffered RTN on me, fortunatley they both survived and are now settling in.
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Tuesday, February 5th 2008
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Casualties already, woke up Monday morning and found my new cleaner shrimp dead. Unfortunatley that was not all that was dead. It was a shock for me to find my brand new montipora suffering from "Rapid Tissue Necrosis", And yet my new coral fragments were all fine.
By today the whole colony is now just a white skeleton remaining, nothing was saved. After researching a bit I'm leaning towards stress combined with secondary metabolites, alleopathy, which is chemical warfare between corals to those who aren't familiar with the fancy terms. So I have now ramped up the skimmer to double effect, done a 20% water change and put in a new load of active carbon in the media basket. There also seems to have been mini-cycle as a result because I am experiencing a bit of a diatom bloom right now, but hopefully it will be all resolved soon.
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Sunday, February 3rd 2008
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Well its been a little more than a week since the evil crab showed up. I've been re-arranging a bit in my tank removing a couple of pounds of live rock, since theres been a wee bit too much and areas have begone to stagnate. I also just came home a few hours ago after a trip to the LFS store.
I have restocked my cleaning crew adding a new cleaner shrimp and a small squadron of five hermits. I also took the time to buy a couple of Blue Neon Gobies as well as a nice Montipora plate coral, I was even fortunate to come across a couple of cheap small fragments. More pic's to follow once the inhabitants have settled in.
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Thursday, January 24th 2008
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On occasion some prowling nasties show up in a reef setup, and just look at what I pulled out of my tank last night.
Ive been aware of his presence for several months now, and finally found his burrow. So I set a trap with a small Shot Glass dug down into the sand, filled with fish food that I know none of my reef inhabitants can resist(Ocean Nutrition Formula One, sinking pellets). And when I went to check on the trap 3 hours after lights out, sure enough there he was desperatly trying to scale the walls. So I guess thats one threat less in my reef tank. A pity I don't have a refugium though, because it is nontheless an interesting specimen.
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Wednesday, January 23rd 2008
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3rd entry and already its a setback. I just found this morning that my cleaner shrimp sadly had passed away during the night. He was laying on the bottom in a corner yesterday and I thought he might be molting. Sadly this was not the case.
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Monday, January 21st 2008
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Aiptasia Aiptasia, more just more Aiptasia.
Honestly if i see one more I think ill scream and break something. As if that wasn't enough Joes Juice seems to have been evaporating so I had to add a little water to loosen it up enough to use.
Ive nuked some of the suckers, but judging by the way they have been popping up lately I might just have to get a Peppermint Shrimp.
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Sunday, January 20th 2008
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Well, this is the first entry in my On-line journal.
And what can i say? Its launch day for this site. Don't be put off by the current lack of content on the site. As of yet i have only created the actual pages with a an entry or two on each, so you can bet that more content will be finding its way onto this site very soon ;)
Now this particular section, my "Journal", will be focusing on keeping fellow interested aquarists up to date on whats been happening with my aquariums.
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