5 Gallon Hardy Reef

[waylon101]

This is a new journal for my 5 gallon reef. As most of us know, nano reef keeping can be very hard and very unstable. So I will be using only 'hardy' corals and shrimp. At this moment, there is only a small patch of green star polyps and two blue legged hermit crabs. I am happy to be starting a new journal!


The equipment:
5 Gallon Aqueon with Lid
AquaClear 20
Aquatop Heater
Aragonite Carib-Sea Gravel
18 Inch Marine-Glow Actinic Flourescent
White LEDs

Pictures:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/3ch2g2rtzuhrbmw/20170309_174040.jpg?dl=0
https://www.dropbox.com/s/kxhb41wpa17yzse/20170320_151853.jpg?dl=0
https://www.dropbox.com/s/55hsr5p41dujuch/20170317_224734.jpg?dl=0

[Slaphppy7]

Good luck with the new SW tank!

I didn't know SW was even possible with 5G, but I've no experience with the salty side.

[AmazonJoe]

Whoooo! New journal looking forward to watching it unfold. :18:

[OnTheFly]

I too had never heard of such a small SW tank. That has to be tricky. Good luck and I will be following along.

[waylon101]

There are lots of them if you look on other forums and youtube videos. Now, as for how long they last without crashes, varies. :14:

[TexChuck]

Hey Waylon, that looks great!!! I love your rocks. I can't wait to see this progress.

My 'new' SW LFS has a 5g nano next to the cash register, with hardy corals, a shrimp, and a cardinal fish of somesort. I don't recall the whole filtration setup, but there was no sump and it wasn't an AIO like my BioCube. I did see a bag of Purigen in there.

The owner said it had been going for 18 months, so stability is possible :)

I'm looking at some hermits for mine -- just have some green star polyps, a mushroom frag, a cleaner shrimp, a SPS frag I shouldn't have bought, 6 trochus snails, and a bunch of hitchhikers.

I'll be following with interest!

[AABatteries]

My 2.5g pico made it about 8 months before it crashed. Good luck!

[mac]

One of my old LFS's which was the best near me, use to have nano reef tank. It lasted 4 years while I shopped with him. And when he shut down the shop due to the earth quakes in NZ people asked for the small reef tank. But he kept it. It only had a small internal filter and some live rock LPS and a few shrimp. That was all.

[waylon101]

My 2.5g pico made it about 8 months before it crashed. Good luck!

What happened in your case?

[waylon101]

51199
51200
I call my creation, "Diatom City" :hmm3grin2orange:

[flchamp89]

My last reef was a 5.5g. You have the skill Waylon. The reason small tanks in general fail is stocking.....seems sw aquarist in general practice better stocking. I made alot of mistakes with mine. Corals out grew tank but I ran it for 4 yrs.

[waylon101]

My last reef was a 5.5g. You have the skill Waylon. The reason small tanks in general fail is stocking.....seems sw aquarist in general practice better stocking. I made alot of mistakes with mine. Corals out grew tank but I ran it for 4 yrs.

Well its only been up for a month so we'll see if I have 'the skill' but thanks for the encouragement! :19:

[flchamp89]

Im joing you. I tore my ten down

[carebearcatz]

Good Luck with this tank. You're on the right track by starting this journal :) I love picos/nanos. The one major thing I've always struggled with is temperature. Never trust an aquarium heater and be prepared for rapid fluctuations in temperature. If you do not have a climate controlled house/apt (heater/air conditioner), be prepared for the summer heat w/ a fan and extra RODI water to increase evaporation and lower the tank temp.

I highly recommend finding your local reef club. They're a great resource for learning more about the hobby, Finding particularly hardy strains of coral that have been propogated locally (and have often survived there fair share of ups and downs) and best of all getting to hang out with people who are passionate about aquariums.

Also you mentioned having white LEDs, are there also blue? I believe coral needs blue spectrum lighting to properly photosynthesize. (Not to mention they will look more vibrant under bluer lights)

[waylon101]

Unfortunately the closest reef keeping club is in Kansas City for me. I get all my conversing with my friends at the LFS. Yes I did mention White LEDs but they are underneath a 18 Inch (15W) Marine-Glow Actinic Flourescent. So there is a good mixture of different light spectrums.


Also you mentioned having white LEDs, are there also blue? I believe coral needs blue spectrum lighting to properly photosynthesize.

[waylon101]

Well, Good News and Bad News
The Good news is that I'm starting to get some coraline algae!
The bad news is that my tank is infested with Red Bugs. I've done some research and understand that the cure is a Dog heart-worm medication. I don't want to have to go through the trouble of getting a prescription. Has anyone used an over-the-counter brand?
51279

[carebearcatz]

Unfortunately the closest reef keeping club is in Kansas City for me. I get all my conversing with my friends at the LFS. Yes I did mention White LEDs but they are underneath a 18 Inch (15W) Marine-Glow Actinic Flourescent. So there is a good mixture of different light spectrums.

That's a bummer. I dunno how far that is from but it may be worth going to their big events if at all possible (people came from 6+ hours for ours). We would have coral swapping, raffles and vendors at our largest event of the year.

As for the red bugs. Here's my two tips: Check out advance aquarist & buy a coral dip (like Revive or if you're a bit more adventurous bayers bug killer but do your research first). I could (and have) spent hours scrolling through advanced aquarists beautifully laid out and interesting articles. They are well researched and thought out. Here's a link to their article on red bugs: http://www.advancedaquarist.com/2010/3/corals

Make sure that what you have are actually harmful red bugs and not tigger pods or something else that's beneficial for your tank. Medications should always be a last resort in a reef tank.

[waylon101]

Maybe. I don't see any affect on the GSP so I'll probably hold off until I know exactly what they are.

[mac]

Very interesting reading that article. I can see how a sw quarentine system is so so so important.

[waylon101]

Saw some copepods non the glass today and the coraline algae is spreading :thumbsup: I'm happy to see the tank maturing!

[mac]

It sounds like a marine tank is more art work than a fw

[waylon101]

51382
For those wondering, I do water changes using an aqua lifter pump. I use it for draining and for refilling. The GPH is 3.5 and I take out about 2-2.5 gallons per water change. Unfortunately right now I have to mix it by bucket each week but I'm looking into investing in a water container and mixing the salt in that. This would help with keeping salinity levels consistent.

[waylon101]

51412
Getting some different Algaes started. Going to be adding a shrimp and a little piece of live rock soon

[waylon101]

Ive been looking up some "Salt Water Plants". So it looks like this may be leaning more towards a refugium build in the near future. You all know how much I love plants so when I learned about "turtle grass and caulerpa", I had to get some. I recently got a little piece of Live Rock from a friend. Thats it on the right. https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20170418/462d10e2badfad0daf7b765458f8c65f.jpg

[mac]

I really just had a funny and odd idea.
Make a second 5g tank and add it through a return pump. One a refrium planted sw the other a 5g reef

[waylon101]

Interesting lol

[waylon101]

Just a quick update on the tank. Its starting to get a good amount of different algaes on the dry rock. I'm seeing an orangish red, standard green, purple but also some white. I've looked at some stuff online and some say the white is a bad type of algae that is hard to get rid of, others say its the start to a variant of coraline algae. Only time will tell I guess. I'm just about ready to start adding some shrimp here soon! I'm thinking about a coral banded shrimp.

[mac]

Pictures??

[waylon101]

Pictures??
Lol i tried on my pc but it wasn't working. This is from my phonehttps://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20170501/fb20246c7eeb8b7a82b099f3f0ee8b71.jpg

[mac]

That's starting to look really cool.

[waylon101]

I went to my LFS with cash in hand, excited to pick out a shrimp for the tank. They had some high price stuff ($35 for some large fire and cleaner shrimp). I decided that 1, I can't justify buying a $30 shrimp to my wife lol and 2, I don't trust my self to acclimate such a pricey shrimp yet so I went with a pistol shrimp. It was around $20 and my LFS friend said the shrimp should be fine in the 5 Gallon. I came home, started doing some research and then came across this http://video.nationalgeographic.com/video/worlds-deadliest/deadliest-pistol-shrimp. I had no idea this was even possible lol :hmm3grin2orange: I did not realize how scary these things are.

[Slaphppy7]

A pistol shrimp in a 5G tank?

Oy!

[waylon101]

The only other thing in the tank is an emerald crab. I've looked at some other forums and they believe it will be fine.. I guess I'll just have to be careful doing any in-tank maintenance from now on.

[Slaphppy7]

You don't think he'll "shoot" the crab?

I know zilch about SW tanks, but I've read these are deadly little rascals...neat, but deadly, lol

[waylon101]

I had the same question. I guess its kind of up in the air. From what I hear, the pistol will sort of burrow and keep in a generalized area and if a perpetrator pursues to infiltrate, there will be some fireworks lol

[Slaphppy7]

I thought they "shot" them to stun and eat them?

It'll be hungry sooner or later...do they require live foods?

[waylon101]

We'll have to see. The tank is covered in copepods so hopefully he will pick those off like popcorn chicken and then I will add some supplimental algae disks.

[Slaphppy7]

What about the symbiotic relationship they have with shrimp gobys?....this site advises not having one w/out the other

http://www.aboutfishonline.com/articles/tiger-pistol-shrimp.html

[waylon101]

I think the article was a good opinion to think about upgrading for the future but I believe I will have it by itself for the time being.

[waylon101]

Also, I'm not doing my internship in Ohio but found a replacement here in Missouri so I won't be moving.. I ended up getting a job at Panera for the summer so I am planning on doing some tank upgrading soon anyway.

[Slaphppy7]

Good that you don't have to move.

[waylon101]

Good that you don't have to move.

I am too. Mostly just cause I didn't want to move everything there.

[mac]

That and moving is also stressful as well.

[waylon101]

I know I haven't updated in a bit so I thought I'd make one. I ended up trading the pistol shrimp back because he was shredding up corals for fun. What a jerk lol! I am currently having hair algae problems. I have been using tap water but will be switching to RO/DI water to discourage nuisance algaes. I have also been dosing 2ml of Seachem's Reef Complete 2x a week for the new Montipora. https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20170611/be617296b92fc13c128de99ac7910273.jpg

[mac]

Question regarding hair algae. How terrible dose it get like the bba for fw?

[kaybee]

Responding to an older post in this thread (not sure if these critters are still dwelling in your tank):


...my tank is infested with Red Bugs. I've done some research and understand that the cure is a Dog heart-worm medication. I don't want to have to go through the trouble of getting a prescription...

These pests target acropora corals specifically. If those are in fact red bugs, they will die off without that particular food source.

Several pests (and some stock) on the reef side of the hobby are obligate-feeders and have evolved to consume only a certain type of food source.

[waylon101]

Question regarding hair algae. How terrible dose it get like the bba for fw?

Its annoying but I believe its the easiest to get rid of. (That may be wrong). Hair Algae often thrives from nutrients in the aquarium but also from metals in most tap water. Most reefers use RO/DI to remove those metals which in turn, is believed to discourage the growth of nuisance algaes.

[waylon101]

Responding to an older post in this thread (not sure if these critters are still dwelling in your tank):



These pests target acropora corals specifically. If those are in fact red bugs, they will die off without that particular food source.

Several pests (and some stock) on the reef side of the hobby are obligate-feeders and have evolved to consume only a certain type of food source.

I agree with you. I believe that is what they were. I did not add the monti until about 2 and a half months later. By then, I did not see a single one and still haven't. I believe they did die off.

[mac]

Thank you for the answer there Waylon.

[waylon101]

:thumb: :goldfish:

[Slaphppy7]

How is the pistol shrimp doing?

[waylon101]

I gave him back. He was a coral eater. They are listed as "reef safe". I kept him well fed with Hikari algae disks and frozen brine but I guess he just enjoyed eating corals or something.

[waylon101]

Here is a quick update. Im using Margarita Snails to fight hair algae issues. Im getting a ton of diatoms on the sand. I will clean it up and it will be forming back within 15 minutes. Pretty crazy. Im starting to realize how long it takes to cycle saltwater setups compared to freshwater. Tank has been up for coming up on 4 months.
Current livestock:
1 Emerald Crab
1 Peppermint Shrimp
4 Margarita Snails
1 Nassarius Snailhttps://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20170629/b53c605295a49d25d08bbeb7414df127.jpg

[Boundava]

WOW 4 months! Would that be why many use live rocks instead?

[aquariumlover10]

WOW 4 months! Would that be why many use live rocks instead?

yeah, using live rock is like putting already cycled filter media in a freshwater tank.

[waylon101]

WOW 4 months! Would that be why many use live rocks instead?
Yes! I "seeded" it with live rock. The majority was dry but added a softball sized portion of live rock. It then spread to the dry rock.

[waylon101]

I added a Maze Brain coral that I received from a friend. We also got some nice Fuji Live Rock into the shop (a while back ago. I let it cure). I couldnt help but take it home when I saw the coraline and sponges on it! Its in the tank now :)https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20170702/8746a970dc156ced4b256f226ae729c5.jpghttps://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20170702/ce98baf872de86d4653f43bd3ea6c9f7.jpghttps://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20170702/2ed12235174eddb3e72ba045335dcd9a.jpg

[Silbar]

Congrats, those are both great finds and additions to your tank.