Her 20 (pics)

[mnat]

We have decided not to setup the 57 gallon until we move into a house so this thread lives on. Since we are not doing the upgrade, we decided to replace the tank because it was so scratched and had a little chip in it. I also took the mp10 off of the 30g and put it on here (the mp20 waiting for the 57 was added to the 30g). We also fixed the leaky refugium so that was added back on. We also added a ceramic frag rack we had gotten at MACNA. The tank was reaquascaped and here it is in the current form.

Good shot of the ceramic frag rack with our shrimp (which are pregnant):

Top side of the frag rack with Oregon Tort:

Borealis:

Candy Canes (splitting nicely):

Dracula Goby:

His nemesis the flameback:

The rainbow acan from montepora (thanks again) wiht our setosa:

Our rics:

Our fast growing other ORA:

The final FTS:

 

[mnat]

An update and some pics. We bought a new T5 setup so we went from a 4 bulb to a 5 bulb. The bulbs are setup like this back to front:

Geismann Actinc+
Geismann 6000k Daylight
KZ Figi Pink
Geismann 6000k Daylight
Geisman Actinic+

All the color bulbs are on what plug and the two daylight bulbs are on their plug.
The corals are growing well and I just introduced the dosing regimen this week so we will see how that goes. Several day in everything looks great. Here are some pics we took tonight after the white bulbs went off, so this is all actinic.

The only exception is our new cleaner goby who has himself a little home:

Onto the corals, here are some of our acans and purple haze watermelon chalice:

Mummy eye chalice:

Different chalice with ORA borealis and zoas:

Purple efflo with ORA Ice tort and Purple Bonsai:

Setosa from smcooler with a hermit:

ORA birdsnest, ORA Echinata, ORA Pearlberry, ORA I want to say verde or something like that (Purple body with green "tentacles":

New ORA up front with ORA validia in the back:

I will get some pics up with all the lights on at once. I still need to get some pics of mervs corals up there. Yes we like ORA corals because they seem to do the best for us and have the best growth rates. We just pop into our LFS and they just happen to have some nice pieces, so they come home with us. Stay tuned....just ordered Rommel's original rainbow acro and some raspberry lemonade acro should be here friday.

 

[mnat]

We did some reaquascaping and added a yasha goby and a pistol shrimp. The pistol has a nice little burrow up front, could not get any pics of them. Yasha is small so tough to place among all the LR. Here is a pic of the cleaner goby instead.

 

[mnat]

A couple of our new corals we picked up:

 

[mnat]

Took a bunch of pics the other day:

The FTS:

 

[mnat]

So this post will delineate the B.C. A.D. tank (remember Before Crash After Disaster). It is almost quite depressing when you look above and then look at our new FTS:

This was kind of before and in between the when we added in the remaining coral frags. Just a quick shot of our acro crab because he is a survivor.

 

[JRWOHLER]

Well I can say I like the new rockwork better. :-\
Shame for sure, it is a real kick in the pants to get a generator of some sort so that is a positive.
It is a cool crab glad it survived.

 

[mnat]

We are also much happier with the aquascaping, and very much looking foward to filling it with corals.

 

[JRWOHLER]

Let me know if I have something you want will gladly try my hand at fraggin for you.

 

[kason42]

+1 on new aquascaping ;D

 

[Mbodell]

what is the glass tube? I don't recognize that sps?

 

[NikkiT]

what is the glass tube? I don't recognize that sps?

The glass tube is one of the few survivors. I believe it is acropora tempraturata

 

[redfishbluefish]

The glass tube is one of the few survivors. I believe it is acropora tempraturata

Yes…it has minimal light needs and can take wide swings in temperature. The interesting thing is that with increasing temperature, a red line appears along its lateral side. The one problem is that they are extremely slow growing. I’ve had mine for years and see minimal growth….should have taken pictures to compare. ;D

 

[NikkiT]

The glass tube is one of the few survivors. I believe it is acropora tempraturata

Yes…it has minimal light needs and can take wide swings in temperature. The interesting thing is that with increasing temperature, a red line appears along its lateral side. The one problem is that they are extremely slow growing. I’ve had mine for years and see minimal growth….should have taken pictures to compare. ;D

I know, right? They do tend to develop coraline growth as well, I keep having to remove the coraline, so that I can see the pretty red line!

 

[mnat]

So we got sick and tired of the bare bones tank and decided it was time for some coral. So between ebay, Unique corals and AO we look pretty stocked now.

FTS:

Left side:

Right side:

Center shot:

Acans:

Chalices:

More chalices:

 

[mnat]

For those who want to know names they go as such:

Acros:
Rommels Rainbow
Rommels Avatar Acro
Stawberry Shortcake
Paintbrush
ORA Joe the Coral
ORA Plum Crazy
ORA Validia
ORA Purple Plasma
ORA Bellina
ORA Ice Tort
ORA Pink Hyacinth birdsnest
Pink Lemonade
Miyagi Tort

Monipora:
Undata

Chalices:
Pink panties (god that is the best name for a chalice)
Cornbreds watermelon
Not my miami
Four color water melon
Rommels Rainbow
Hulk Chalice
Emerald mummy eye (completely brown right now)


Zoos (not pictured)
Purple Hornets
Rastas
Unattainable palys

 

[NikkiT]

We added a few more babies to the tank this week,

1. moved our gold assessor basslet into the 20g
2. purchased a yasha goby & tiger pistol shrimp from AO
3. bought replacement garf's purple bonsi and rainbow monti from AO
4. picked up a Purple Monster and another acro frag (Mike chime in here love)
5. picked up a ORA green birdsnest and cleanup crew from Trop

The corals that survived are starting to color up again, our ORA Hyacinth birdsnest is looking more pink and less orangy/brown, the ORA tricolor validia we saved is starting to become tri-color again rather than brown. The ORA pearlberry is still looking less than great, but it no longer looks as if it is on the brink of death.

We have a couple of baby frags (less than .5") that we clipped off of dying colonies post-crash, most of them look like they are going to make it, which is exciting. . . if only I remembered what was what. I think we are starting to hit the point where corals are either going to recover if they have not died yet. Right now, our garf's purple bonsi from BC is nearly dead, just a little bit of tissue left around the base, but it is staring to color up again, and it is the frag that looks to be in the worst shape to me.

Will post pics tonight.

 

[fcruz420]

Im happy to see everything is coming together again ;D
if you dont mind, which frags came from ebay?

 

[NikkiT]

I buy pretty much all my ebay frags off of the same guy, just put in my 3rd order last night. His name is rnegret258 and I got the purple haze watermelon chalice, hybrid watermelon chalice, not my miami chalice, candy apple reds zoas, and i just ordered the mummy eye chalice. He is awesome to deal with, shipping is $50 but you can combine items and his shipping is amazing. He puts up auctions like every week or every other week. I also got the 4 color watermelon off of ebay, good price great shipping as well.

 

[mnat]

Good shot of our new goni: