Author Topic: My 55 gallon (Read 8785 times)

Arcade_Guy · « **on:** January 08, 2009, 14:26:47 »

This is my first salt water tank.. going pretty decent so far.

Used mostly dry rock to save some money.. coralline is already starting to grow on a few pieces.

Not very stocked yet, only a royal gramma and a dragon goby... also have a sea hare. He's very entertaining to watch!

Oh and I know it's dirty, i'm workin on that

Arcade_Guy · « **Reply #1 on:** January 08, 2009, 14:29:32 »

UD Flyer · « **Reply #2 on:** January 08, 2009, 19:05:00 »

Its a great start, much better looking than mine.

I gotta question though. Does your overflow make any noise? And is there any holes drilled into it up towards the top?

MechanicalEngineer · « **Reply #3 on:** January 08, 2009, 19:12:34 »

Cool stuff....how long has it been up and running? What sort of lights/filtration?

lazylivin · « **Reply #4 on:** January 08, 2009, 19:19:04 »

Looks like the start of a nice aquarium.

Whacha feeding your seahare?

jake · « **Reply #5 on:** January 08, 2009, 19:36:51 »

That maze fit in there just right I see. Has that big sps started to lighten up or change yet? I bet it will just give it a few.

Looks good to me. Looks like the hair is eating all the algae hardly a dirty tank.

Arcade_Guy · « **Reply #6 on:** January 08, 2009, 19:52:26 »

the sea hare lives off of the algae for the most part, i give him a little piece of a nori sheet every once in a while....

overflow doesnt make hardly any noise, and yeah there are a couple holes drilled up on top

been running for about 3 months... lights honestly i'd have to look.. like i said i'm a noob lol jake probably knows better than i do, which is sad.

filtration, just rock and sand, i have a refugium under the tank with chaeto as well.. getting ready to put a bunch of rock in the sump as well.

Whew.. i think i hit everything lol

Thanks for the positive comments guys!

jake · « **Reply #7 on:** January 08, 2009, 20:15:14 »

He got a used hood from Joel that had a dual pc maybe dual 65w. Maybe 95,but I think 65

lightningfront · « **Reply #8 on:** January 08, 2009, 21:17:48 »

It looks good, I definatly need to get one of those hammers.

Arcade_Guy · « **Reply #9 on:** January 09, 2009, 22:12:35 »

we got 3 new fish tonight, picked them up at monfort.

six line wrasse

pearly jawfish (my fave, and he's hangin out with our dragon goby)

and a mandarin goby

i'm pretty sure we have a large enough pod population to feed the mandarin.. hopefully he will do well!

We're picking up some corals this weekend.. a frogspawn and some frags thanks to jake, i'll post up some pics when we get em

jake · « **Reply #10 on:** January 09, 2009, 23:09:06 »

I doubt your tank is ready for a mandarin better hope he eats frozen

Ya looks like your jawfish already has a home picked out

lightningfront · « **Reply #11 on:** January 09, 2009, 23:15:00 »

Quote from: Arcade_Guy on January 09, 2009, 22:12:35

We're picking up some corals this weekend.. a frogspawn and some frags thanks to jake, i'll post up some pics when we get em

That frogspawn looks pretty good in my tank, I mean what frogspawn. We couldn't find any

lightningfront · « **Reply #12 on:** January 10, 2009, 00:31:28 »

Here ya go preview

Arcade_Guy · « **Reply #13 on:** January 10, 2009, 00:33:39 »

uh huh, right lightningfront. lol

if only "the boss" would've let me come get it tonight. ah well.

yeah my jaw fish burrowed up under that rock already. he's totally rad. jawfish might just be my favorite salt water fish. very cool.

amanda picked out the mandarin... you know women you can't change their minds. The dudes at monfort acted like it wouldnt be a big deal for us to keep him and have him healthy. We bought some cyclopeeze, maybe he'll eat that or perhaps some frozen shrimp.. i know we've got pods, aparrently maybe not enough, but we'll see how it goes.

cool man! it does look nice. i'm glad i went for that over a few mushrooms.

BTW, have you seen that colored plate coral monfort has in their little display tank in the fish aisle? I want that damn thing!

you have a mandarin don't you jake?

jake · « **Reply #14 on:** January 10, 2009, 11:22:55 »

No. Ya plates are cool. Be careful what is above them if it falls in it will kill what hits it pretty quick.

All your stuff is gonna die. I suggest bringing all the corals and the jawfish to my house to keep until you can get a suitable tank.

Arcade_Guy · « **Reply #15 on:** January 10, 2009, 11:31:38 »

Quote from: jake on January 10, 2009, 11:22:55

All your stuff is gonna die. I suggest bringing all the corals and the jawfish to my house to keep until you can get a suitable tank.

yeah, and my mom doesn't have tight army pants either. lol

i'll take that as a compliment

Arcade_Guy · « **Reply #16 on:** January 11, 2009, 21:30:55 »

so my buddy was over and he was starring at the tank (just about all he does when we hang) and he noticed something in that big chunk of digi (i think thats what it is? Some SPS)

Anyways we all crowded around and try to see what he was talkin about and i swear it's a friggin lobster. no shell like a hermit, blood red with white little eyes..not a shrimp he's got pinchers for sure. when we feed he comes out from the coral just a bit and you can get a good look at him, have yet to capture a pic of him tho.

i don't know if it really is a lobster, but it's all i can think of that would look like that. i'll try to get a pic tonight or tomorrow.

pretty cool tho no matter what he is.

UD Flyer · « **Reply #17 on:** January 11, 2009, 21:43:17 »

Does it lood something like this?

http://www.liveaquaria.com/product/prod_display.cfm?c=497+525+697&pcatid=697

lazylivin · « **Reply #18 on:** January 12, 2009, 01:40:16 »

Most likely a type of Trapeziid crab AKA Coral Crab or Acropora Crab hosting the digi. If so then congrats! They are neat to have and it is more likely that your Digi will be sucessful. Here is a link to some common types of Trapeziid crabs. Any look familiar.

http://www.chucksaddiction.com/coral_crabs.html

Arcade_Guy · « **Reply #19 on:** January 12, 2009, 02:06:26 »

its not a blood/fire shrimp. those guys are awesome tho, i'd love to get one.

and it's not any of the crabs in the link lazylivin posted. i'm just gonna have to get some pictures tomorrow before work if i can find the time.

i'm tellin you guys, it looks like a little baby lobster lol
he's got some decent sized claws on him... but body shaped like a shrimp almost. but shrimp dont have claws like this guy has. obvious pinchers you know.

i tried googling for even pictures to try to find a match, but none really look like him. he's probably only 1". the main difference i noticed between him and some of the reef lobsters i found googling is that his eyes are white, and all of the reef lobsters have black eyes.

i mean, shrimp dont have claws right? lol

lazylivin · « **Reply #20 on:** January 12, 2009, 02:49:11 »

Cool looking forward to the pic!

jake · « **Reply #21 on:** January 12, 2009, 04:31:19 »

Its not a digi more like a pocillipora ish

Arcade_Guy · « **Reply #22 on:** January 21, 2009, 14:03:22 »

so i have some good pics of the lobster! He's grown a ton, and I'm pretty sure thats what he is. I may be wrong tho!

with flash

his pinchers (he seems to hammer on the rock he's in with them..)

also have this mystery creature... can anyone identify it for me?? It takes it's tentacles and then sticks em in that mouth in the center... collecting whatever it is that it eats out of the water, then these 2 shorter arms come in and appear to clean it's mouth... i've spent many hours watching him eat lol he came with that rock from joel, nearly quadrupled in size since we got the rock tho.

Arcade_Guy · « **Reply #23 on:** January 21, 2009, 14:06:47 »

the live rock i just added really helped the overall look of the tank IMO..

my frogspawn

and my pearly jawfish

UD Flyer · « **Reply #24 on:** January 21, 2009, 16:47:04 »

Iâ€™m almost positive that is not a lobster. Itâ€™s really hard to tell from the pictures, but when you say â€œhe seems to hammer on the rocks when heâ€™s in thereâ€ gives me the inclination that you have a pistol shrimp, not a lobster.

Look up all the different types of pistol shrimps and see if you can ID what you have. I have one and he makes loud snaps when anything gets near his hole.

It could be something else since its living in that coral and most pistol shrimp live under rocks and/or sand.

Just my .02

Arcade_Guy · « **Reply #25 on:** January 21, 2009, 17:31:04 »

after some google image searching on Pistol shrimp, i do believe you are correct!!!

I forgot all about pistol shrimp, and had never seen one.. Didnt know their arms/pinchers were so big! Remember guys, i'm new at all this

Thanks a lot for the I.D.!

Any ideas on the other one?

jake · « **Reply #26 on:** January 21, 2009, 18:56:59 »

Looking good brother

jungliztkruger · « **Reply #27 on:** January 21, 2009, 20:51:26 »

looks like a sea spider

lazylivin · « **Reply #28 on:** January 21, 2009, 21:42:38 »

Those white eyes look freaky

jungliztkruger · « **Reply #29 on:** January 21, 2009, 22:40:37 »

look alot like these. there was another link to info about these but i'll have to dig it up
http://www.wetwebmedia.com/pycnogonids.htm

Arcade_Guy · « **Reply #30 on:** January 22, 2009, 04:33:35 »

i took a decent video of it tonight, but apparently it takes a year and a half to upload to youtube...

should have the video posted up tomorrow afternoon tho. not the best quality but it'd prolly help with the identification process.

It does look kinda like some of the sea spiders i've googled since you posted up that link, but i'm not 100% sure that's what it is. Hopefully the video will help like i said

Arcade_Guy · « **Reply #31 on:** January 22, 2009, 05:26:45 »

heres the video

P.S. can't embed, not sure if it's this way on purpose, but there are youtube mods for SMF forums that would allow us to embed things like this right into the post. just a thought

jeblin · « **Reply #32 on:** January 22, 2009, 08:42:17 »

is it just me or can anyone get the video to play?

micki · « **Reply #33 on:** January 22, 2009, 09:16:17 »

It just says this video is unavailable

lazylivin · « **Reply #34 on:** January 22, 2009, 09:59:28 »

That would be cool to be able to embed video in our posts. ohioreef is that functionality something you would consider adding?

micki · « **Reply #35 on:** January 22, 2009, 10:19:31 »

I've added video on here through photo bucket.

This is one I made a while ago.

http://smg.photobucket.com/albums/v637/Mickis125/VIDEO/?action=view&current=a7b90f2f.pbr

Arcade_Guy · « **Reply #36 on:** January 22, 2009, 13:48:36 »

Sorry if the video wasn't working before, it may have still been processing. It's up and goin now.

UD Flyer · « **Reply #37 on:** January 22, 2009, 14:17:52 »

I have no clue, if not a spider how about some sort of star

Either way it looks pretty cool

lazylivin · « **Reply #38 on:** January 23, 2009, 00:25:01 »

Whoa that thing is really cool. Looks like your live rock has a lot of life, could see some other worms in the video as well. How about another video to see FTS?

lightningfront · « **Reply #39 on:** January 23, 2009, 03:17:26 »

Whatever it is it's cool

Arcade_Guy · « **Reply #40 on:** January 23, 2009, 03:31:31 »

yeah i'll do a full tank video here this weekend. having an algae problem right now... i have to clean my glass off every day almost. its pretty much just algae collecting on the glass, no GHA or anything, tho i have spotted and removed a bubble algae.

I'll probably put more snails in and i've been told i need to increase flow.

I want my tank to look at clean as yours, lightningfront lol

also, i noticed a feather duster! dunno where it came from, just popped up on one of my rocks. neat lol

Arcade_Guy · « **Reply #41 on:** January 23, 2009, 14:50:25 »

so it's a filter feeding cucumber!

thanks to joel for the I.D.
some dudes on 3reef just confirmed it as well...

jungliztkruger · « **Reply #42 on:** January 24, 2009, 00:56:06 »

very good.... after seeing that video i had no idea what i was looking at. i was expecting spider like movements and the got just the opposite lol.

jake · « **Reply #43 on:** January 24, 2009, 11:09:43 »

did those corals puff up yet?

Arcade_Guy · « **Reply #44 on:** January 25, 2009, 00:18:54 »

the pulsating xenia has, the blue xenia is starting to.

i think that the extra 850 GPH may have been a bit too much, jake lol

i mean it looks good, had more algae on the glass quicker tho actually (just 1 day and the front was covered pretty well) and i just can't aim the damn powerheads right or place the xenia in a spot where it doesnt look like it's getting hit by Katrina or somethin you know?

I have it in a spot now that just gives it some gentle flow, nothin intense, but it's definitely made coral placement interesting, not to mention i'm running out of room... which saddens me because i'm addicted and i really can't stop adding corals... so a new tank will be in order before 2010.

Hopefully we have robot servants by 2010, thats what all the sci-fi films and comics said would happen by then!

jake · « **Reply #45 on:** January 25, 2009, 03:02:42 »

Not to much flow man cant be

. You might be ok now if you think its to much it must be just right. You might have a mini cycle just from the extra stuff thats gonna get kicked.

Seen that mandrin?

lazylivin · « **Reply #46 on:** January 25, 2009, 03:14:57 »

I have also noticed that where the powerheads are pushing the current hard against the glass that the algae will grow there the quickest.

Arcade_Guy · « **Reply #47 on:** January 25, 2009, 05:08:32 »

thats interesting, you think the more flow against the glass would push it almost too much to be able to collect there, but i guess it's the opposite.

yeah it just seems like the few spots i have to put corals, some of them are getting more flow than they should really. I'm going to see how everything looks in the morning after the lights are on for a few and then maybe rearrange stuff a little depending.

lazylivin · « **Reply #48 on:** January 26, 2009, 14:29:34 »

Quote from: Arcade_Guy on January 23, 2009, 14:50:25

so it's a filter feeding cucumber!

thanks to joel for the I.D.
some dudes on 3reef just confirmed it as well...

Stumbled across this video.

The Website is here http://www.divingthegoldcoast.com.au/index.asp?PageID=animal&CritterID=1762

Arcade_Guy · « **Reply #49 on:** January 28, 2009, 23:17:43 »

very cool video! thanks

jake, the mandarin is MIA... what sucks is he was eating, and seemed nice and fat. Belly wasn't concave... But either he croaked and the shrimp and such ate him, or he jumped out some how and my dog ate him. Don't think they are much of jumpers tho... but when i redid my rockwork, he was nooowhere to be found.

A couple of pics:

Also Amanda spotted a crab.. he hides pretty well in one of the rocks but we can catch a glimpse of him when we feed.. that link lazylivin posted when we were tryin to ID the pistol shrimp came in handy! It looks most like this this guy here.

Not an exact match, but pretty close to him.
Also noticed a couple feather dusters, yay lol

lightningfront · « **Reply #50 on:** January 28, 2009, 23:20:52 »

Looking good. Nice pictures also. Hope you get the skimmer figured out. If you can't it's no biggy if you don't want to keep it.

Arcade_Guy · « **Reply #51 on:** January 28, 2009, 23:26:03 »

i wanted to get it fired up today since we were off, but i ended up doing taxes instead. oh boy.

anyways i think i'm going to have to cut some holes in my canopy and hang it on the back... and maybe just use the return pump i have down in my sump now to push it and have it drain obviously over the back, into the tank.
It seems like that'd reduce my flow quite a bit tho, i'm gonna have to think on it and hopefully get some good advice from all y'all lol

and thanks man.. its dirty right now tho, i need to do some cleanin and a water change this weekend actually

jake · « **Reply #52 on:** January 29, 2009, 19:27:42 »

the shots of the blue xenia when its on the right are nice. It is getting more color here too. I like the rock work its hte best it has been. I still say fluff it like cottoncandy ,but hey. Its really starting to get there man. I'm afraid of what will happen when you get your hands on tax money.lol

lightningfront · « **Reply #53 on:** January 29, 2009, 21:17:26 »

Quote from: jake on January 29, 2009, 19:27:42

I'm afraid of what will happen when you get your hands on tax money.lol

Pin ball machine?

Arcade_Guy · « **Reply #54 on:** January 30, 2009, 03:19:09 »

Quote from: lightningfront on January 29, 2009, 21:17:26

Pin ball machine?

i wish... i'm supposed to use it to buy an engagement ring

lol
she already told me she wouldn't accept an "engagement pinball machine". too bad really. way more fun than a rock tbh

I'm gonna post up a video of my whole tank here soon, i took one but wasnt happy with it.

Arcade_Guy · « **Reply #55 on:** February 01, 2009, 12:57:35 »

my girlfriend picked some fish:

We're probably pretty close to stocked on fish. Maybe one more small guy lol

And some good growth on my zoas:

lightningfront · « **Reply #56 on:** February 01, 2009, 13:06:05 »

Nice, copycat. Just kiddin I love black clowns. I like those zoos too I'm gonna have to figure out how to get a couple different colors on one rock sometime.