The Official Asylum Reef Tank Thread

[shilala]

I made a video in hopes that you guys can help me figure out what this stuff is I have in my tank, and to see if that gonorrhea is really gonorrhea.
It'll be done uploading in about an hour. It's only 4 1/2 minutes long, but it's super duper HQ, so you guys should easy be able to figure out what this stuff is if you're willing to help me out. Please?

[kgoings]

Cool stuff! I have always wanted a reef tank or SW tank, but just never took the plunge.

[SteveH]

Nice - send me a link to the video !

The decorator came today along with the rest of my additional CUC....Ugly bastid; no wonder why they cover themselves !

[shilala]

New video so you guys can figure out what my stuff is.
I uploaded the video in hi-res, youtube made it far less resolute. I hope it'll still work. If not, I'll make a super quick video and upload it. That should help, it never crossed my mind till now.

Nice tank Scott. I got my book out but haven't figured out any you don't know. The Goni is definitely a Goni.

A note on the light issue:
The article made importance of the PAR and PUR values. Admittedly based on agricultural research. These values are tuned to chlorophyll. The zooxanthellae in coral don't use chlorophyll. Red wavelengths can't penetrate water to any significant depth, so these ranges are less important to reefkeeping. They are a large part of the PAR and PUR values though. I would want to read up on real life experience from various reefkeepers to correlate a better opinion on this. Also, it would be nice to see the spectrum sensitivity of zooxanthellae.

[shilala]

Originally Posted by BC-Axeman

Nice tank Scott. I got my book out but haven't figured out any you don't know. The Goni is definitely a Goni.

A note on the light issue:
The article made importance of the PAR and PUR values. Admittedly based on agricultural research. These values are tuned to chlorophyll. The zooxanthellae in coral don't use chlorophyll. Red wavelengths can't penetrate water to any significant depth, so these ranges are less important to reefkeeping. They are a large part of the PAR and PUR values though. I would want to read up on real life experience from various reefkeepers to correlate a better opinion on this. Also, it would be nice to see the spectrum sensitivity of zooxanthellae.

I noticed in there that the whole yellow and green (?) spectrums were also missing from LED. More artificial flavor, ya know?
There is some insight there on where the problems lie and how they're working on getting them ironed out. Controllers and new tech are expected.
While it helped to make up my mind to stay away for now, at least I know they're headed in the right direction. I like crazy bright light on my corals so I can see and enjoy them. I want the light to keep them healthy.
All that other stuff, I don't care, ya know? That's my consumer perspective.
I love my t5's just like you love your mh's. I'm not gonna settle for less than what I already like. What I'd really like to see is light that's brighter to MY eye, and better for the corals. That's not at all where LED's are right now.

On a good note, all my frozen fish food came today. Good thing, too. I found out the freezer wasn't closed all the way.
Foster and smith sent that stuff overnight in a styrofoam box with 13 freezer packs. My shipping cost was zero, and I paid less for the food than I do at my LFS.
I love that place more and more every time I shop there.

Oh, I ordered a D-D Refractometer while I couldn't sleep last night, too. It's supposed to be the best and you calibrate with RO water. I'm excited to see how close to 1.026 I really am.

[shilala]

Lance, I should also say that I read TONS of real life experience at both of my reef forums and then a bunch of others I don't frequent.
What you'll see if guys that have LED's saying they work great, but they just keep softies and fish. Guys with LPS and SPS don't use them. Other guys use Stunner strips and stick on strips to add extra lighting to their current systems.
I really couldn't find anyone who used strictly LED's to do what I want to do. A couple did, stuck their necks out and said they did with great results, then got crucified by reefer asshole know-it-alls that insisted it couldn't happen even though they posted pics.
I'll tell ya, brother, It's tough out there. It sure ain't Cigar Asylum everywhere. The lack of respect and keyboard thuggery at the reef forums is pretty pathetic. I'd rather hang with you guys. It's fun learning with you all.

My tank is really loving the 14Ks as opposed to the old 10Ks I replaced. Things are changing color. Pinks, yellows and greens are coming out on things that were mostly brown. I think they are not needing as much symbiont in their tissue and are decreasing it. If it goes too far it will cause bleaching. I don't think that will happen, though. From what I have read it is pretty hard to use too much light on a reef tank.

I have a mixture if soft, LPS, SPS, fish, inverts and plants. What survives is what's in there. I just read that you should not mix types of corals. Good thing I hadn't read that before.

[SteveH]

Originally Posted by shilala

The lack of respect and keyboard thuggery at the reef forums is pretty pathetic.

[shilala]

Originally Posted by BC-Axeman

I just read that you should not mix types of corals. Good thing I hadn't read that before.

It seems all of us are aren't very textbook. Amazing anything is alive at all, eh?

[Wolfgang]

I have never heard you shouldn't mix coral types...... Sure softies throw out a lot of chemicals if they get pissed off but all you do is fun some activated carbon and that will solve that issue. You shouldn't put anything close to LPS with long sweeper tentacles that come out to feed at night. A good 6" bubble around things like thatis a good idea. SPS for the most part will tolerate each other ive never had an issue with that. Zoanthids are a seamat and will fill in wherever they can assuming other corals dont zap them away. The only thing i would be wary of is anemones. They have a tendancy to move about the tank looking for their perfect home and if they contact a colony of any coral the nem will kill it.

[Wolfgang]

In your video the first ones are trumpets. The next one is a Pavona coral also known as lettuce or potato chip coral (thi has particularly long sweeper tentacles careful when placing other corals around this). That is a Maxima you are correct. They usually dont like being on the sand the best way to make them happy is to bury a flat piece of live rock in the sand so its just below the surface of the sand and put the clam on that. After a while the clam will attach itself to the rock. The "pipe organ coral" looks to me like ti may be galaxea coral but I cant say for sure unless I see it with the polyps retracted. The yellow anemone is infact an anemone all mushroom corals are. The ones you have are known as rhoactids. The "frogspawn" you showed may either be hammer coral or a torch coral. Frogspawn will have multiple nodes on each tentacle it looked to me like there were only nodes on the tips.

Your tank is looking great Scott! Keep up the good work.

[OLS]

I agree with Wolfie all around on nomenclature, and I also would add, that's one boss reef!. Mine is embarassing after that show. Some ideas since I saw it, if you feed all that stuff, just a blast in the water column of various stuff, it looks like everybody is gonna get fed, I would not worry about the excess food not getting trapped, looks like you have plenty of polyps open to pick up the tiny bits. As for the gorgonian, yours is a true "purple gorgonian", and even though generally that morphological variety seems to be non-photosynthetic, judging from the color of those polyps, it would seem to likely be photosynthetic. Not sure...but one thing is sure, yours and mine are miles different. Yours seems stiff, mine is uber-rubbery. It would seem that sometarget feeding with a baster would help some of your corals, I believe if you feed cyclopeeze when everything has polyp extension going on, you might do OK with your Goniapora. No one can tell, but your tank is much further advanced than I would have thought, from a recent move. THAT must have been a BEYOTCH! Just in terms of the mushroom rocks, that is a lot of stuff to MOVE UNDERWATER! Nice bowl you got there. My favorite coral right now, and I have very little true coral, but it's my lettuce/chip coral. ONE POLYP was alive, and now as I said earlier, it has fully encrusted over it's original skeleton. OHH, and don't be totally bummed if one day for some unknown reason, your yellow polyps start to slowly disappear one by one. Some specimens just grow and grow, some look healthy one day and a month later you have a bare rock. But I like em, too.

OH, and also as far as chemical warfare, I think the only time it gets really serious is between octocorals and cndarians, or however you spell the family anemones are in. They tend to fight from GREAT distances with chemicals. Most of the other trouble you get is sweeper tentacles beteen corals, and for most, you are talking about separation of a few inches. Anemones can kill from across the tank if they start getting chemically on ya. Or so I THINK I have read. Derh. I know very little about the kid of warfare that one would get concerned about in reefs.

[OLS]

I think your 4-16-11 video is also revelatory...That leather MIGHT be the one coral that is going to not
like having large anemones in with it. We'll see, but they do tend to pop out much more after a long adaptation.
If they get pi$$y they will just slough over and disappear for a few days, shed a yucky skin and come back out
when they please. Give em good flow and med light and in time, the worm will turn.

Gorgonians, star polyp, Xenia and leather are octocorals. It seems these are tough in that not much injures them except environmental factors. My Gorgo got shaded out by being overgrown by Xenia.
I've heard Zoanthids are the worst with the chemicals. I have never worried about it as I have a bag of charcoal in the sump.
Goniapora don't need sweepers, their whole polyps will reach out far with a very powerful sting. Nothing in my tank could withstand it. Hammer coral is very good at sweeping it's zone clear. I used mine to corral the Xenia until it died in a crash. Now I have put a frogspawn in to fight back against the Rhodactis. It seems to be working. The Rhodis work by slowly nudging other things away and then dividing themselves. They want to carpet the whole tank.
There is so much interaction in these tanks it's amazing. The subtle slow motion violence is pretty intense too.

[shilala]

Originally Posted by Wolfgang

In your video the first ones are trumpets. The next one is a Pavona coral also known as lettuce or potato chip coral (thi has particularly long sweeper tentacles careful when placing other corals around this). That is a Maxima you are correct. They usually dont like being on the sand the best way to make them happy is to bury a flat piece of live rock in the sand so its just below the surface of the sand and put the clam on that. After a while the clam will attach itself to the rock. The "pipe organ coral" looks to me like ti may be galaxea coral but I cant say for sure unless I see it with the polyps retracted. The yellow anemone is infact an anemone all mushroom corals are. The ones you have are known as rhoactids. The "frogspawn" you showed may either be hammer coral or a torch coral. Frogspawn will have multiple nodes on each tentacle it looked to me like there were only nodes on the tips.

Your tank is looking great Scott! Keep up the good work.

Thanks, Mark!!!
I asked Lisa, and she said that truly was a Galaxea. She remembers this stuff pretty good. The Maxima is hers, and you're right about attaching. When I was moving some stuff and gluing it the other day I tried to pick it up and it's attached itself to a big piece of junk it found. When it gets a bit bigger, I'll put a big rock under her so she can switch.
What was sold to me as frogspawn used to be tiny and really did look like frogspawn. Since I've fixed my water and started feeding phyto and all kinds of other stuff, it's gotten just as big as my hammer. The only differences in the two are slight color variations and the tips are slightly different. That gets more the same every day, really. I just checked it, and in fact, it does have little nodes and tiny branches off the big branches.
I think what looked like a yellow anemone is actually a carpet anemone, or was sold to me as such. It's cool. It's green with tight rows of brown things that look like tiny polyps. Looks way more like a coral than an anemone. I'll try to put up a decent pic of that one for ya so I can find out for sure.
There's also one other thing I'm not sure of, I don't know if it got in the video. I think it's a leather. It's insides are a beautiful blue. I'll get a pic of that, too.
Two pics coming up.
Thanks a million, Mark!!! I just took a test looking at the tank and I know what everything is now. Ya done good, that's definately not a small feat you accomplished.

[shilala]

Originally Posted by OLS

I think your 4-16-11 video is also revelatory...That leather MIGHT be the one coral that is going to not
like having large anemones in with it. We'll see, but they do tend to pop out much more after a long adaptation.
If they get pi$$y they will just slough over and disappear for a few days, shed a yucky skin and come back out
when they please. Give em good flow and med light and in time, the worm will turn.

Brad, that think that looks like a leather is not a leather. Its an SPS. I'm gonna post a pic in a second...

[shilala]

Originally Posted by OLS

Some ideas since I saw it, if you feed all that stuff, just a blast in the water column of various stuff, it looks like everybody is gonna get fed, I would not worry about the excess food not getting trapped, looks like you have plenty of polyps open to pick up the tiny bits. ...It would seem that sometarget feeding with a baster would help some of your corals, I believe if you feed cyclopeeze when everything has polyp extension going on, you might do OK with your Goniapora.

Brad, I have two 36" long telescoping basters that I use to target feed.
I have no less than 10 different kinds of food here, 7 are frozen. Freeze dried cyclopeeze is in the mail. Plus I keep phyto in the fridge and will soon be growing my own.
I make soup for the kids. I feed every other day. I use phyto plus four or five frozen blocks. I try to rotate the frozen stuff.
I have a cannister filter to trap junk, plus two over-the-backs that I clean every couple days. I also have two oversize over-the-back skimmers. I change water like a madman. I think I've changed 90 gallons this month, but that was just to unscrewup my water. I'll ease off soon.

The critters are exploding with wellness. I want them at their peak so I can watch them and let them tell me how the water is doing. Then I can rest easy.
I just needed everything to be right so I could learn from it, ya know?
I've kept animals all my life, more stuff than anyone would ever believe, let alone imagine. I've always let them tell me when things are right or wrong. It's always worked real well. What's awesome about corals is that they're very telling and very forgiving. Everyone says they're so fragile, etc. They're tough as nails, man. Amazingly resilient, too.
I'm having huge fun now that things are going well. It sure beats worrying all day every day.

My new lamps came today and I changed them out. Went from 10K to 12K by mistake. Actinics are the same. Everything looks more yellow/green to me, but Lisa says she doesn't notice a difference.

[shilala]

Wolfie, this is what I think is a carpet anemone that looked yellow...
(I see the colors are still a bit off. It's a dark green background and those rows are brown. I guess now that I got up and looked at them again, maybe the tips of what looks like polyps are yellow. They used to be brown. Everything is changing...)



This is the thing that smacks of a leather, but it's an SPS. You should be able to see the polyps. The inside is hard blue/white coral. Any clue what it is?

Your yellow anemone looks like a Rhodactis, carpet anamones have regular tentacles, Rhodacis have lumpy, branched tntacles.
The encrusting coral is Montipora.
You're making me want to get a new clam.