Today my tank completes one year of age!
Unfortunately I got home after the "sun" set (after the lights went off) so I couldn't take a full tank shot similar to the one in my inaugural post (http://rcsnorkeler.blogspot.com/2009/08/this-is-my-tank.html) to show what it looks like now. Will try to do that in the following days.
Overall I would score this first year as partially successful as some of my objectives were not reached and we had some dead inhabitants.
Of highest significance to me was the water quality, which clearly hasn't reached a stable quality level. We have a lot of valonias in the tank, and a lot of green hair algae in it, and that is testimony that the tank doesn't yet have the right balance between waste generation and waste processing/removal.
The tank has a nice skimmer, and it seems to work well, it has the right amount of live rock and substrate to process waste into Ammonia, then into Nitrite then into Nitrate, I dose Vodka to help eliminate Nitrate and my Nitrate readings are zero ppm while my Phosphate readings are around 0.2ppm. But, the presence of algae tells me this is a "false reading", that there is more Nitrate and Phosphate in the water than the tests indicate, because the algae are eating them up in their growth process.
The refugium I expect to add in September with the new sump, plus the daily automated water change should resolve that problem once and for all. Feeding less food (something I'm doing for a month now) should help also. In fact, excess feeding is probably my key issue or the root cause that lead to an accumulation of excess organic matter.
In terms of reef keeping I had several losses.... my three trumpet heads and my Acan (introduced in http://rcsnorkeler.blogspot.com/2010/01/new-fish-new-corals.html) died. My beautiful orange Zoanthus (introduced in http://rcsnorkeler.blogspot.com/2009/10/new-inhabitants-added-on-saturday.html) is almost dying too. It isn't dead, but it barely opens and polyps are shrunk. Only my Hammer and my Green Zoas are doing OK. The Green Zoas in fact are growing, expanding, a branch of the colony finally grew beyond the original rock and onto the live rock the original rock it was glued to.
Water parameters have been OK in term of salinity, pH, NH3/4, NO2 and NO3, but not Alkalinity (which I was never able to bring above 7,28 dKH) and Mg concentration (which I was only able to bring to the optimal 1200 ppm once, and it fell afterwards). In fact it is still a mystery to me why Mg is consumed so much by my tank, given that I only have one small stony coral and nothing else that could be a strong magnesium consumer. Gotta check with the ReefKeeping water chemistry gurus what they think....
So, not a completely successful first year but definitely a year of learning. I was patient in everything, not doing anything in haste, as recommended by all the online gurus and book gurus.
I hope with the addition of the fluidized reactor with PhosBan plus the larger sump with a refugium growing macroalgae plus the automated daily low volume water changes we'll finally be able to have stable good water quality and get rid of the green hair algae, valonias then successfully introduce and keep some new Trumpets and Acans in there.
I took up this hobby for the visual delight and the intellectual challenge, so I can't complain :-) . It has been fun to learn so much about the delicate marine environment in a captive reef, sometimes it makes me stand in awe of God's marine creation so balanced it is out there in the wild where there are so many more variables than in my little glass box....
flpaoli, aka snorkeler
Thursday, August 12, 2010
Wednesday, August 11, 2010
New Mg buffer
Published with Blogger-droid v1.5.1
Monday, August 9, 2010
Designing new sump and water change method
I'm in the process of getting an extra side cabinet for the aquarium, into which I intend to house a plastic jerrican based ATO (freshwater auto-top-off system), put in an automatic daily water change system (also plastic jerrican based) and with that change my sump.
The new sump will be a little larger than my current one (10 cm deeper, 2 cm taller), and should house a refugium where I intend to grow macro-algae to eat up water nutrients and also some live rock on/in which I hope pods will grow to become extra food for the display tank inhabitants.
It should increment the total water volume by 30L, upping it from ~220L to ~250L a 14% increase (58 gals to 66 gals). Nice considering this is a low water volume system.
Here is a picture of my intended new sump (Portuguese text, sorry for that if you're not Portuguese enabled :-) , refugio means refugium, retorno is the return pump area, skimmer is, well, skimmer.... :-) ):
My daily plastic jerrican automated water change system is going to be like this:
A. One 20L plastic jerrican will hold new, virgin satwater. Inside the jerrican will sit a slow 60 L/h water pump, connected to a hose that takes the water to the sump.
B. Another 20L plastic jerrican will serve as a container for removal of used/old satwater from the sump. In the sump a slow 60 L/h pump will sit, connected to a hose that ends inside this "B" jerrican.
C. Using timers I'll turn on pump "B" for 2 minutes every day, removing 2L of used water, after which I'll turn on pump "A" for 2 minutes, adding back 2L of new water.
Every 8 to 9 days I just remove jerrican "B", empty it and put it back in the cabinet, remove jerrican "A", refill it with new water and put it back in the cabinet. I'll do that moving them with a dolly (a homemade "skate") so I don't have to carry weight around, after all, wheels were one of the first inventions of mankind, right? I'm not in need of "heavy jerrican" workouts.
If I travel I can setup the timers to change water slower (i.e. 1 minute per day), extending the autonomy of the system but still ensuring water is changed.
I was inspired to create something like it by the article linked below, and also because I want an easier way to change water frequently. Doing a half an hour to 45 minute 20L to 30L water change during the weekends is something I haven't been successful in keeping up with.
Reefkeeping October 2005: Water Changes in Reef Aquaria (http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2005-10/rhf/index.php#13)
My plastic jerrican based ATO (freshwater auto-top-off system) will follow the same reloading principle. The basic operation is like any other ATO with water sensors and a pump in the freshwater container. But the freshwater container will be one or two 20L plastic jerricans which I'll refill as needed, moving the jerricans between my RO/DI filters and the cabinet on my dolly.
This plastic jerrican "design" is somewhat inspired by the ink cartridge change in ink jet printers. Remove the used cartridge, pop in a new one. The concept is the same. No carrying buckets, doing siphons in the living room, no accidentally wetting the living room floor, like I've done so many times, etc..
flpaoli / snorkeler
The new sump will be a little larger than my current one (10 cm deeper, 2 cm taller), and should house a refugium where I intend to grow macro-algae to eat up water nutrients and also some live rock on/in which I hope pods will grow to become extra food for the display tank inhabitants.
It should increment the total water volume by 30L, upping it from ~220L to ~250L a 14% increase (58 gals to 66 gals). Nice considering this is a low water volume system.
Here is a picture of my intended new sump (Portuguese text, sorry for that if you're not Portuguese enabled :-) , refugio means refugium, retorno is the return pump area, skimmer is, well, skimmer.... :-) ):
My daily plastic jerrican automated water change system is going to be like this:
A. One 20L plastic jerrican will hold new, virgin satwater. Inside the jerrican will sit a slow 60 L/h water pump, connected to a hose that takes the water to the sump.
B. Another 20L plastic jerrican will serve as a container for removal of used/old satwater from the sump. In the sump a slow 60 L/h pump will sit, connected to a hose that ends inside this "B" jerrican.
C. Using timers I'll turn on pump "B" for 2 minutes every day, removing 2L of used water, after which I'll turn on pump "A" for 2 minutes, adding back 2L of new water.
Every 8 to 9 days I just remove jerrican "B", empty it and put it back in the cabinet, remove jerrican "A", refill it with new water and put it back in the cabinet. I'll do that moving them with a dolly (a homemade "skate") so I don't have to carry weight around, after all, wheels were one of the first inventions of mankind, right? I'm not in need of "heavy jerrican" workouts.
If I travel I can setup the timers to change water slower (i.e. 1 minute per day), extending the autonomy of the system but still ensuring water is changed.
I was inspired to create something like it by the article linked below, and also because I want an easier way to change water frequently. Doing a half an hour to 45 minute 20L to 30L water change during the weekends is something I haven't been successful in keeping up with.
Reefkeeping October 2005: Water Changes in Reef Aquaria (http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2005-10/rhf/index.php#13)
My plastic jerrican based ATO (freshwater auto-top-off system) will follow the same reloading principle. The basic operation is like any other ATO with water sensors and a pump in the freshwater container. But the freshwater container will be one or two 20L plastic jerricans which I'll refill as needed, moving the jerricans between my RO/DI filters and the cabinet on my dolly.
This plastic jerrican "design" is somewhat inspired by the ink cartridge change in ink jet printers. Remove the used cartridge, pop in a new one. The concept is the same. No carrying buckets, doing siphons in the living room, no accidentally wetting the living room floor, like I've done so many times, etc..
flpaoli / snorkeler
Sunday, August 8, 2010
Installed but not OK
Put the Phosban media in there but it isn't Ok... the water flow is too weak... thr media isn't tumbling as it should, need a stronger feed pump it seems.
Well I gotta go now, so that will have to wait till later.
Published with Blogger-droid v1.4.9
New Fluidized Reactor
Putting in a new fluidized reactor to absorb Phosphates... here testing it with only water, no media yet.
Published with Blogger-droid v1.4.9
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)