Still Growing

The Red Planet, and a few other SPS corals, is growing nicely in my LED-lighted tank. I've run out of B-ionic and starting making my own two-part buffering system. It seems to work well, although the alkalinity still goes down to 7 dKH when I'm trying to keep it at 8 over the week. I just don't feel like testing every day. At the most, I'll correct the balance on the weekends.

Florida ricordeas in the refugium

The Florida ricordeas are recovering from being covered up in green hair algae while in the refugium. After plucking off the algae a few times, the growth seems to have stopped on its own accord.

Hair Algae

I thought I had gotten rid of my hair algae problems by increasing the magnesium content of my reef tank. But, it continues to grow in patches here and there. I think it might be related to alkalinity swings and perhaps the temperature. Since the Scripps Pier spigot has been closed off, I've had to consider ordering synthetic salt water. I'll be making the switch soon, so who knows what problems await me further down the road? I'll be sure to measure magnesium, alkalinity, calcium and salinity of the new mix. I wonder if the corals will like the change?

Here's some hair algae. I bought some Aqua Medic Aquarium Tweezers, but the siphon attachment didn't have enough power to suck up the dislodged hair algae. So, in this case, the product didn't "suck enough", so it just sucked. I had to resort back to the good old fashioned thumb and forefinger method of plunking out the hair.

Et, voila! Oh, look, there's some Florida Ricordea growing on that rock!

Here's a cup of fresh water in which I put the hair algae after plucking it off the rocks. What a great way to export nitrogenous waste! Sigh....my fingers are waterlogged after spending hours in there. And, I didn't get it all.

Leather corals and Montipora

The red Montipora sp. coral has grown to a nice size. I placed two different colored leather corals near its base to create a color complement. The tank is still "re-cycling" and re-adjusting since I repositioned a lot of the live rock a few weeks ago. I've had to siphon out bluegreen algae (BGA) here and there during the water changes. Over time, I've noticed that the BGA's growth has slowed down. But, now, there's an increase in green hair algae. I'll manage that by manually removing it over time and the tank should be back to being well-balanced in a few more weeks.

Oh, and since the introduction of a dozen peppermint shrimp, I noticed that all my Aiptasia have been eradicated. It took a few weeks before the shrimp actually managed to wipe out all of the pests.

Long Tentacle Anemone

After changing my mind about purchasing a Copper Banded Butterfly fish (who wants to feed a fish live food twice a day?!), I decided to go with an anemone at Vets-Pets. An anemone still requires feeding, but it'll catch food during feeding time and I'll hand feed it once a week or so.

I created plenty of space for this new, purple animal on the right side of my 110 gallon reef aquarium. The LTA (Macrodactyla doreensis) is known to expand to 18" in diameter. I think after reefkeeping for a few years, my tank (and I) would be mature enough to support the anemone. Plus, this is one of the more hardy species of anemones to keep in a reef aquarium.

The clowns were not happy because I moved their egg-bearing mushroom rock to make room for the new anemone. They were swatting at the new arrival with their tails and pouring sand on it after I introduced it to the tank.

Here is the poor anemone trying to adjust after a 1 hour drip-acclimation:

This is the adjusted anemone the next morning. I even added several cups of sand to surround the foot. The clowns don't see it as a threat anymore. I think they may considering using the new real estate containing the purple mansion as an upgrade home for their expanding family.

Here's a flash picture of the anemone. The tentacles are conforming to the corkscrew shape characteristic of the "corkscrew anemone". Now, the trick is to keep this animal comfortable enough to stay in one place. Otherwise, it'll wreak havoc by stinging my other corals to death. How do you keep an animal with no brain happy? Feed it!

Purple Tang Removal

I tried using the 2-liter empty bottle method for capturing the Purple Tang, but the fish was too large. I even tried a plastic spaghetti holder with food placed at the bottom, but was only able to capture the Naso Tang. So, after moving the Naso Tang to the QT tank, I locally rented a larger fish trap from Aquatic Warehouse.

The Purple Tang took a few hours trying to figure out how to get inside the acrylic box trap. I had to use the turkey baster to swirl the Mysis Shrimp food to gain back his interest. He kept pecking from the outside of the box. When he finally entered the box, I yanked on the fishing line to close the trap. The box went up in the excitement, landed on my yellow bird's nest coral and broke it off.

Once the Purple Tang was caught, I called up the guy waiting to purchase the fish. He came to my house within 1/2 hour to take the fish to its new home.

While I was waiting, the Naso Tang was taken from the QT tank and placed back in the main tank. He was a little disoriented, but seemed to be saying his goodbyes to the old bully as he swam against the fish trap containg the Purple Tang.

Coral Extraction

I pulled out a large piece of live rock with a large Acropora coral. This coral is very hardy in my tank, but it needs to be exposed higher in the tank (and closer to the light source) in order for it to produce nicer colors. I decided to remove this one and start over with some smaller frags. I've already got some growing in a higher location where it has better color.

Here it is sitting in a 9 gallon glass tank. I'll see if I can trade it with other hobbyists.

Arrow Crab

Here's my Arrow Crab (Stenorhynchus seticornis) specimen in the QT tank. My neighbor thought that it was some sort of spider. Although, there are such things as sea spiders.

Kill Majanoes!

What a better way to start off the New Year than with a new commitment to eradicating the reef tank of all Majanoes? My supply of Aiptasia-X has run out, so I'm going to use the Kalkwasser method, instead. Both of these methods seem to work equally well with the permanent death of the Majanoes and the temporary relief of the Aiptasia which tend to grow back more often than not. I would agree that the Aiptasia-X product is less toxic, but I don't have any "prize winners" in my tank to worry about. Come to think of it, I don't know if prize-winning corals exist, yet.

Here are my easy steps to using Kalkwasser to knock out unwanted pest anemones in a 110 gallon mixed reef tank:

1) Add 1/2 teaspoon of Kalkwasser (or Mrs. Wages Pickling lime) to a small glass or porcelain container. I'm using some sort of finger bowl I found in the kitchen.

2) Add RO water in a 1:1 volume ratio. Don't breathe in the dust (calcium hydroxide) or get it in your eyes! You want to keep the solution dense/concentrated so that when you apply it in the tank, it will sink down on to the pests.

3) Heat the solution in a microwave on high. Use 10 second intervals and stir. You want the vessel to get hot to the touch, but not crazily steaming and boiling!

4) Turn off main pump and all power heads in the aquarium.

5) Use a syringe with a wide bore needle to draw up a volume of the kalkwasser. I used the left-over syringe and needle that is found in the Aiptasia-X box.

6) Cover each pest with the sinking solution. I tend to keep the needle from touching the pests because they can clog up the syringe with some sorta goo. (using a finer needle, I've read that some people inject the solution into an Aiptasia -- I haven't tried it, yet). The solution may damage your larger animals, but they'll soon recover.

7) Leave all pumps off for at least 20 minutes. After the main circulation pump is turned on, I don't turn on my power heads until an hour or so later.

8) After you run out of solution and you still have pests left to treat, you may want to give your tank a week's break before going for another round of treatment.

Here are some before/after pics of today's treatment:

My battle is far from over; I've got Majanoes in places inaccessible to me and my syringe. But, at least I can provide some relief to my favorite corals. I plan on moving some of the live rocks to get at the remaining Majanoes at a later time. As for the Aiptasia, I'll be adding some peppermint shrimp to help out with that problem.