SessionThree's 110g Tank

[sessionthree]

Ok, I have been keeping my own blog about my tank, but I thought I would go ahead and start my own thread here. Also, I apologize that some of these pictures are in some other posts here in the forums, but I want to get everything here in one thread.

Initial Setup - 9/19/08

So far things have gone well. I have the RO/DI unit installed and operational, the main tank and lights in position, and the basement sump/refugium is filled with water and operational. Pictures are below:

110 gallon aquarium (main display tank)



55 gallon sump/refugium in basement



Sink area with RO/DI unit installed

[sessionthree]

To check the plumbing setup and make sure things were operating as planned, I started filling the main tank by pumping water up from the sump. The picture below shows the tank half full. Eventually, the tank was filled and the circulation between the main tank and sump was started. Everything works great. The only problem is that the overflow box is quite noisy (sounds like a toilet flushing every 10 seconds or so.) I'm going to fix this by using stockman standpipes or something similar in the overflow drains.

Main tank filling up with water

I have 210 lbs of Aragamax sand and 2 buckets of Instant Ocean salt on order. Hopefully, I'll get those before the weekend and will add salt and sand to the tank.

[sessionthree]

For the last day or so, the water in the tank has been crystal clear (I put some bags of carbon in the sump.) Tonight, I cleaned the front glass of the display tank and noticed several scratches dead center of the glass. Since I was going to take some water out to put sand in anyway, I decided to take the opportunity to turn the tank around and use the other side as the front (it doesn't appear to have scratches near as bad.)

Before I turned the tank around, Austin and I ran to the Aquarium Center of North Carolina and bought a black background. I attached the background to the tank, emptied the water out of it, and turned it around. Turning it around was a chore and required some help from Emily. Ultimately, I'm glad I found the scratches. I was regretting not putting a background on the tank, so this gave me a good reason to go ahead and do so.

I put 7 bags (210 pounds total) of CaribSea Aragamax sugar-sized sand into the tank. I was planning on getting 5 inches worth, since I'm going with a deep sand bed (despite the trend to go bare bottom now days). However, I believe I'm more like 4 inches. I may add another couple of bags later or just add live sand. I still need either sand or mud for the refugium section of the sump tank.

Below is a picture of the tank not long after I added the sand and filled it back up with water. I'm hoping that the water will be back to clear by tomorrow.

Aquarium before new sand has settled

[sessionthree]

Over the weekend the sand settled pretty well. There's a thin layer of sand over the glass and powerheads in the tank, though. I'm not sure how to get rid of it all.

Tank after sand has settled

I also bought a full sheet of egg crate and made a kind of guard to (hopefully) prevent fish from jumping out of the tank. When we had our 30 gal reef in Dayton, OH, we lost a yellow watchman goby (Emily's favorite fish) and never knew where it went. When we moved, we discovered the body behind the tank stand. Hopefully, this guard will at least help prevent this from happening.

Fish jumping guard made out of egg crate

In preparation for putting live rock in the tank, I made some rock standoffs out of 3" PVC. They will be used to hold the rock up and provide stability. I want to prevent avalanches that could happen when critters start sifting through the sand under the rock work. I drilled out holes so that sand, water, and creature movement wouldn't be totally hindered by the PVC in the sandbed.

Rock standoff platforms made from 3" PVC

Everything is going pretty well. I have a 500W Titanium heater (made by Azoo) in the sump and it's holding a steady temp of ~80 deg F. The salinity in the system is lower than I'd like. It's around 1.023, but I'd like to get it up to 1.025. I will start regularly testing water parameters sometime this week - especially if I end up getting live rock this week.

[sessionthree]

I received my gulf-view live rock today and put it in the tank. I was actually able to create a rock structure somewhat like I had envisioned. I'm pretty happy with the result.

Live Rock without flash

Live Rock with flash

One thing I noticed tonight is that one of my PC Actinic light's isn't coming on. I'll have to look at that sometime this week.
Now that live rock is in the tank, the only thing left to do is to let it set so that the tank cycles. I should be ready to add a fish in 8 weeks or so depending on how the cycle goes.

[sessionthree]

I experimented some with the camera tonight, and I believe I was able to get some pretty decent pictures. Click on each one for a larger version.

Full tank shot - 10/2/08

Encrusting red sponge

Orange sponge and anemone

Cup coral

Encrusting sponges

Sponge

Macro algae

[sessionthree]

Yesterday, I added 3 Blue Green Chromis (Chromis viridis) to the tank. They are a schooling damsel fish that are pretty hardy. Today, they seem to be doing well. Austin named them Jennifer, Pretty, and Over. I have no idea what that means.

The picture below is not that great, but it's the only picture out of about 50 that had all three in it.

Blue Green Chromis

The tank is doing pretty well. Ammonia has spiked and gone back down to 0 ppm. Nitrites spiked at about 0.25 ppm and are coming down (they are about 0.125 ppm or so now.) Nitrates were 20 ppm yesterday, but are down to about 10 ppm today. I'm going to add a page to this site soon that shows the trends of all the parameters I measure.

Yesterday, I spent some time pruning all the macroalgae on the live rock (mostly the Halmedia). I still have a bit more I'd like to prune, though. I added some Chaetomorpha macro algae to the fuge yesterday, so I hope it does well and starves any possible nuisance algae from growing in the main display tank.

[sessionthree]

Here is a chart showing how ammonia, nitrite, and nitrate has trended during my cycle so far. It's always satisfying to plot ammonia, nitrite, and nitrate on the same chart and observe that the trends really do what they are supposed to do!

Cycle Trends

[sessionthree]

It has been awhile since I've posted an update. The tank has finished cycling and is going through somewhat of an algae bloom (mostly green hair now that the diatoms have died off.) The macro algae on the live rock is doing very well (almost too well.) Since the last update, I have the following live stock (I've moved way too fast... do as I say, not as I do, right?):

• 5 x Blue Green Chromis
  
• 2 x Yellow Watchman Gobies
  
• 1 x Sohal Tang
  
• 5(?) x Peppermint Shrimp (I only see 2 regularly)
  
• 2 x Skunk Cleaner Shrimp
  
• 4 x Serpent Sea Stars
  
• Various hermits (mostly blue leg) and snails (Nerite, Cerith, Narcissus, Fuzzy Chiton,Dwarf Planaxis)

The Sohal Tang is known to be quite territorial and aggressive, but he isn't bothering the Chromis at all. The gobies are freaked out by him, though. He's enjoying the micro/macro algae buffet in the tank very much. I love how he tears off huge pieces of hair algae at a time!

I took some new pictures of the tank tonight. Look at how pink and purple the rocks are from the fresh coralline growth. I've got quite a few spots of coralline growing in the fuge as well. (I'll post an update with pictures of my fuge at a later date). The Sohal is attacking the algae quite agressively. I'm aggressively wet skimming to get rid of his waste before it just creates more algae.

Full Tank Shot - 10/22/08

Middle of Tank (with Blue Green Chromis and Sohal Tang) - 10/22/08

Blue Green Chromis and some Macroalgae

Grape Caulerpa Macro Algae

Macroalgae, sponges, Muscle, Blue Green Chromis

Red Sponge, Caulerpa, and other Macro algae

Yellow Watchman Goby

[PharmrJohn]

Your tank has progressed nicely. I especially like the location. Now, if I remember right, did you not set it up, put water in it and watch an empty tank with your boy one night? I think that was you. Very cute. And please don't tell anyone I used the word cute.