Blue Tuxedo Urchin

What did my BlueTuxedo Urchin decorated itself with this month?

It pulled on some red macro algae until it came loose. The Pulsing Xenia was already growing on the macro algae and couldn't help but come along for the ride. Now the urchin is making its way up the side of the tank to feast on the pink coralline patches growing there.
(Don't look too close; you may see some BGA on the algae. I've been working on that issue by changing out the carbon and Seachem biofilter matrix from the sump. Note to self: changed those out last weekend)

There are reports that Mespilia globulus also likes to eat algae, but I haven't seen any evidence of that here. If it's using the macro algae for camouflage, then the urchin will be attracting the attention of Tang and Pygmy Angels. Though, I haven't seen them nipping at its decor.

Bubble Vs. Hammer Coral

I'm not one to re-arrange the corals often in my mini-reef tank. It's difficult to find the right balance of shape & form that you might find written in a feng shui booklet where the couch is not expected to attack the coffee table.

My bubble coral expands to the size of a personal pan pizza (with extra cheese) when the lighting turns up. I have to be careful because the "sweeper tentacles" will seek out any coral placed too close. Last night, I re-arranged corals and got some results in the morning.

Here you can see one tentacle attached to the hammer coral. A few more zaps from the bubble's nematocysts and the hammer coral will eventually lose its head and expose the skeleton underneath! I've already got a dead head out of view that I conveniently use as a handle so that I can move this coral.

On a side note, this rainbow acan is showing a lot of new polyp growth at the base. I'm thinking of placing this coral in a better display location. The difficulty will be in getting it glued down properly.

Refugium Maintenance

The macroalgae started to take up 90% of the refugium and show some discoloration on the tips, so I removed them all and put back small samples of each. This method provides a good way to export nitrates from the main tank as long as the algae is intact and not dying. I keep 3 types of Red Macroalgae. Their common names are: red grape kelp, red feather kelp and gracilaria. The other macroalgae is "dragon's tongue". At some point, I'd like to add a green "Neptune's Shaving Brush" to break up the monotony of red.

This picture shows the refugium (Lifereefugium 20") featuring a 6" deep sand bed (DSB) and frag rack illuminated by power compact (PC) lighting.

Even after removing a majority of the macro algae growth, blue-green algae (BGA) or cyanobacteria can be seen growing on the macro algae as a fine, dark reddish, slimy film. It's also seen creating a coat over the DSB. I decided to take action by increasing the rate of flow for a few hours in the refugium. This action should help dislodge the film where it will be caught in the main tank's filter sock. After that, the macroalgae should be able to compete for nutrients and drive down the growth of the undesirable BGA.

Since moving the Emerald Crab to the main tank, the green bubble algae has taken a foot hold in the frag rack. I used a pair of forceps to help remove them. They'll go down the toilet where the water treatment plant will neutralize them. Again, once the Red Macroalgae get a boost from my efforts, they should out-compete the green bubble algae for nutrients.

Sea Cucumber & Favia

I found this activity going on in the reef tank early this morning.

The sea cucumber has been consistently "vacuuming" the sand with its sticky tentacles when the lights go out. It has also grown in size over the past several months. This is the same sea cucumber I inherited with my tank "upgrade". After I initially set up the tank, the sea cucumber would invariably crawl up the side of the tank during the night and end up going over the overflow and landing in the sump. Because it has decided to stay in the main tank now, I consider this as a stamp of approval on the tank's condition.

Before it crawls back to a dark cave for the day, here it is posing with the slowly recovering "x-mas" Favia coral.

Blue Throat Trigger: R.I.P.

I wish I didn't have to bother with negative news. But, it's only fair to balance the blog with all sorts of news of the goings on in my reef. So, here it goes:

Even though I selected him for his different body shape and colors, the Blue Throat Trigger had a bit of a tough time in my reef tank. It was revealed that Adebisi (I wanted to name all my fish after the characters in Oz at some point), the Purple Tang, had asserted himself as the queen bee of the tank and had his misgivings about the trigger. I noticed that the trigger was allotted the left side of the tank where he was allowed to swim figure eights around the two Vortechs nearby.

I noticed that the few small patches of "fin rot" were clearing up on the trigger. Maybe he was getting a midnight cleaning treatment from the coral banded shrimp or skunk shrimp? Or maybe the water quality and circulation was better in the main tank rather than in the quarantine tank (he stayed at least 5 weeks there)?

From afar, things looked like they were going well. But whenever I would get closer to the tank, Adebisi would become more aggressive and try to use his special scalpel weapon on the trigger. The behavior reminded me of a dog becoming aggressive to other dogs when a treat was about to be given out. I doubted that I could use any advice from The Dog Whisperer because the fish wouldn’t be able to hear my “CHT!” through the tank.

Adebisi, the Purple Tang (the queen bee. 8! CHT!)

The day came when I finally realized that the trigger had truly disappeared. I knew the night before that I noticed he was missing. There was nothing I could have done because some friends had visited and we were going out for December Nights in Balboa Park. So, while I was chowing down on funnel cakes drenched in strawberry preserves and whipped cream and an orange chicken rice bowl washed down with hot chocolate and enjoying the festivities, my blue throat trigger had gone carpet surfing.

I had given him a few days to magically reappear so that everything would be all right. Then, I pulled out my flashlight and went on a search. First, I checked the surrounding carpet. I checked under the sofa and chairs in the living room because I’ve read that some fish may surf across the room. Usually, in the stories, it’s found that their pet cat is the culprit. I don’t have any pets, so he’d have to get across the room by a human’s foot kicking action. I tried to simply use my sensitive nose and it lead me to the sump area. No where to be found, I then checked the back of the tank setup.

There, amongst the shadows of Vortech, battery backup, ATO wires and refugium tubing, I saw a small shape at the bottom. The access to the area was 4 feet from the side and two feet from above and my arms did not fit. So, even if I had located the trigger on time, I would have probably had to kill him in the process of retrieving him. I was able to use my 2 foot “multi-tool” tongs to whack the body around until I was able to clamp down on it.

When I examined the body with its sunken eyes and trigger fin fixed in the up position, my first impression was “fish jerky”. I didn’t want to snap a picture of him for the blog. I used him, instead, as fertilizer for the yet-to-arrive, new fruit trees in the back yard.



PS: the pipefish are gone as well; I couldn’t keep up with their demands for fresh baby brine shrimp every day. The baby Bangai Cardinal still lives, though. There is still hope, Mr. Frodo.

Random Coral Pics

After another arduous water change, I decided to relax and snap a few shots with my Canon Rebel XTi. I turned off the main pump and the Vortech pumps. It was interesting seeing gas bubbles streaming up from the crusty brown algae called (I forgot its name, it just looks like caca, anyway).

Here are some Candy Cane corals and some palythoas.

My blue tuxedo urchin likes to peel off some of that brown, crusty algae for camouflage. The green Sinularia is coming along fine. The yellow parazoanthids have been there since I started the hobby.

These orange Bam! Bam! zoanthids died off until I had 2 left. Now, they're recovering fully (because of my good husbandry!). The rock takes a tumble every once in a while since I haven't glued it down.

Coral Attack!

I looked through my recently cleaned acrylic walls today and found this activity going on.

The Echinophyllia sp. or "chalice coral" on the right is attacking one of my prized Aussie acans on the left. They've both been glued down in place for several months, so I'm not about to go in there and separate them.

Here's a close up of the threads being sent out from the chalice coral. Why is it that my pretty ones have to get zapped?! I guess in the coral world, they must be saying to each other: "Don't hate me because I'm beautiful"!

Fish Papier-mâché

My sister came by for a week's visit (and now the main fish tank hasn't had its water changed in about 3 weeks!!!). We spontaneously decided to make some fish Papier-mâché (does the beer bottle in the background give you a clue as to why we did this?). The bodies are made out of balloons which have been wrapped with the sticky strips of newspaper and I use tape to attach the manila folder fins.

Here they are drying in the Santa Ana Winds.

I was amazed at how that gooey substance solidified after a day in the sun.

Someday, I'll get around to painting them. For now, they're back in the garage.

Fish Closet

One of the essential items for the reef keeping tank is a Fish Closet. This is where you keep your testing kits, aquarium scrapers & sponges, excess tubing, left over egg crate, acrylic rods, fish foods, dosing chemicals (Alkalinity, Calcium, Magnesium, etc.), carbon, sump sponges, replacement pumps, refractometer, various tubing, digital thermometer, extra pH meter, plastic bags for fish, various containers for coral transport, towels and more towels for avoiding any oceanic spills and other materials you somehow inherit. (Water changing 5 gallon buckets, pumps and sump sponges are stored in the garage where they can dry out after each use).

Close the Fish Closet door, et viola; your visiting guests will only see your reef tank and have no true idea of how much maintenance is involved!

Stuff started piling up in a disorganized manner, so I decided to empty out my Fish Closet and reorganize.

I was using two old CD racks to hold various items. Nails were driven in the wall to hold maintenance tools.

The garage was being rearranged and this rack was made available.

Luckily, for me, it fits nicely in this under-the-stairs closet. Now, I can stuff it full of more junk!

Blue Throat Trigger

Okay. Without further delay, here are a few snapshots of the Blue Throat Trigger Fish.

I had to take these pics from several feet away.

He's looking all "blue throat" lately.

Camera Shy: Blue Throat Trigger Fish

I've had the Blue Throat Trigger Fish in my 26 gallon quarantine tank for a week, so far. He was purchased at Fountains in San Diego. I noticed him there the previous 2 weeks before with about 5 Niger triggers. His species is listed as one of the few "reef safe" triggers. Although, I'm nervous about him nipping the T. crocea and T. derasa clams when I introduce him to the main tank. I think the Coral Banded Shrimp and Skunk Shrimp will be able to defend themselves; they're kinda large.

He's gained back some color and scarfing down some food pellets.

When the camera comes out, he goes for a hide.

It took me a while to figure out where he's hiding in the sparsely populated QT.

Instead of a fish pic, here's a doctored up pic of the macro algae in the QT called "Dragon's Tongue"!

DIY Fish Food

This is my third batch of fish food in about a year or so. I started out with the recommendations in Robert Fenner's older edition of "The Conscientious Marine Aquarists" which worked well enough. I think I added too much seaweed in one batch and it reeked so badly that I got tired of handling it. Also, I didn't like adding gelatin because you had to heat it up and the stuff was always sticky at that high consistency which you were never sure of having attained.

For this batch, I make a few modifications like subtracting the gelatin and the veggies.

I figure that the resulting proteinaceous muck will hold itself together (after all, gelatin is just another protein. Why add more?).

Also, I like feeding seaweed separately on a clip.

Finally, I'm trying to see if this batch will have less "floaties". I don't know what contributes to floating food in the other batches, which ends up going into the overflows when the main pumps turn back on, but I'll reduce the recipe to see if that helps out.

I just threw in a Bay Scallop and it sunk. So, there's one ingredient that I'm going to keep including. The Timor Wrasse went wild with it once he figured that it wasn't a (sinking) marshmallow.

I forgot to take a picture of the scallops. They just looked like miniature marshmallows.

I was unsure about the treated and cooked imitation crab, so I removed them all.

INGREDIENTS:

1) 16 oz (454 g) Seafood Combo (squid, octopus, monkfish, crab, pollock, etc.)
2) 0.3 lbs Bay Scallops
3) Dashes of Freeze Dried Cyclop-eeze®
4) Pictured, but not used: Marine Gro pellets. If I'm in a hurry to feed, I'll just feed the fish flakes or pellets. So, adding these things to the mix is not necessary.

STEPS:

1) Thaw and rinse Seafood Combo in colander over the sink. I wasn't sure about the imitation crab; it was listed with sodium pyrophosphate, cooked and treated with sugars, so I removed them all. (I couldn't find the seafood combo I bought last time and I forgot to even read the ingredients with this one.)
2) In small batches, place enough Seafood Combo in Cuisinart food processor.
3) Add a handful of Bay Scallops.
4) Sprinkle on some Freeze Dried Cyclop-eeze® until you're about to sneeze.
5) Process on lowest settings until chunks are small enough to fit in your pets' mouths.
6) Using a large, 1 gallon Zip-Loc bag, combine all batches (I processed about 3 batches).
7) Press down and evenly distribute the food.
8) Place on a support and freeze overnight, preferably in a frost freezer.

Don't overfill! Sprinkle Cyclop-eeze® in the processor. That'll get them sinkin'!

Place all batch mixes into 1 gallon Zip-Loc bag. I picked up this trick watching an old episode of Reefcast.

Nice and squared for the little OCD in you. After freezing, you can break off stamp-sized chunks for thawing and feeding.

Full Tank Shot (FTS)

Here's my attempt at an FTS dated 9/20/2008.

At least you get a full perspective on what I'm managing (to keep alive).


Click for an in-depth display

Sump Cooling Fan DIY

I finally got around to modifying the egg crate that was holding a fan on top of my sump. The fan was being controlled by the RKE to help cool down the water instead of using a chiller. When temperatures got really high, the chiller would then take over. I'm not sure how effective the fan was at this point, but when the RKE allows for data download, I may analyze it in the future.

I cut the egg crate down to the exact size that would fit on top of the sump by using wire cutters.

Then, black plastic mounting ties were used to fasten an extra piece to prevent the egg crate from sliding out of position and falling into the sump water.

Here's the open top of the LifeReef sump.

And, now it has the modified egg crate with a simple cooling fan on top. The air blows downward to help chill the water by evaporation.

Pre-Halloween 2008

Spiders are starting to spin their webs at our place.

This spider is attached to a pulley. I'd like to drop it down on visitors, but it'd be a lot of work being on standby!

This one spun a web under the pergola. It's waiting for its next meal to come for a visit.

How many fish and corals does this tomb represent?

Aye, scurvy dogs, we're going hunting for corals!!