I Did It

About $6 for a bag of dainici pellets, there are thousands in there and the fish only eats 2 or 3 at a time, I buy the baby sized ones. I also give him spirulins enriched brine and mysis shrimp from a medicine dropper once or twice a day, he only eats 2 at a time, the fish is curently about 2 cm in length.

I've never had a fish other than my Green Spotted Puffer that would eat from my fingers.

SLC

SLC Flyfishing said:

I've never had a fish other than my Green Spotted Puffer that would eat from my fingers.

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My Clowns, Fairy Wrasse, and Chromis all will. I think its a matter of training, getting the creatures trust, and consistancy if you want to try and hand feed.

OK I can still not test nitrate or phosphate in the tank water, but have been getting algae growth. Not a ton mind you but still it irks me. Then yesterday I realised that the nitrate and phosphate that is likely causing my algae is tied up in the algae, that is that as soon as there is phosphate, the algae consumes it then as some algae dies and creates more nitrate and phosphate, it is in turn consumed by more algae. I've put the sponge into the filter chamber and it catches the algae that the emerald crab throws into the water column then I rinse it thourouly every afternoon. algae seems to be backing off drastically now.

I want to know about phosphate sponges. Do you really just rinse and dry and then use them again as it says on the labels? I can only find seachems phosphate remover, everything else seems dodgy.

Any way stats still the same

Amm: 0
Nitrite: 0
Nitrate: 0
Phosphate: 0
temp 79 deg F
S.G. 1.026

Yeah, removing algae is in itself a form of nutrient export . I've been singing its praises for a while now, and I'll continue to sing the praises of rowaphos as a phosphate remover. if you cant find it locally, marinedepot.com has some

is rowaphos really the best out there?

I haven't found an iron sediment based option better than rowaphos yet. It might be out there, but if it is, its not popular

demonmagus said:

is rowaphos really the best out there?

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From what I've heard yes, its the only one I've ever used mind, but I've never had any algae in my tank yet....except for a few diatoms, but I don't believe they run on phosphates.

O.K. Now that i've been using the sponge to remove detritus from the water column i've noticed a HUGE! difference. Algae hasn't come back, the big tuft of hair algae all but died overnight and the water stats are still spot on. I will look into getting rowaphos online, thanks for the reference. For now though it all seems to e quite under controll, I just added one more thing to my list of stuff to do daily as maintenance. I had three sponges that came with the tank, so I keep one in there at all times, they cycle so that they all have time to dry thouroughly from the tap water rinse before i replace them. I'm thinking of getting another fish today, that will make 2 and probably all that I'll have. Again thanks for all the help!!!

SLC

I got the new fish yesterday, its a 3/4 inch clown goby. Bright yellow colored, and I must say that with all the purple corraline algae that has encrusted my rock the yellow of the fish looks quite stunning. I only had to pay $9 for the fish to boot.

SLC

So when do we get pictures??

Coming soon I hope, I'm buying a very expensive new digital SLR in the next few days and there will be plenty of pics to go around when that happens I'm sure.

SLC

Also I think I may have a sponge growing on the side of the live rock, it's about the size and shape of a piece of jet puffed rice and it has what appears to be a mouth opening at the top with a crown of tentacles sor something along those lines. I'll get a pic soon. I replaced the pink 10,000 K with a 50/50 as well.

Sounds like a common tunicate. Wait a couple months and then take your rock stack apart and look underneath them, you'll find TONS

And wow I cant wait to see the pics you come up with. Cannon SLRs make some of the best macro shots I've seen.

SkiFletch said:

And wow I cant wait to see the pics you come up with. Cannon SLRs make some of the best macro shots I've seen.

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Well I'm getting a Pentax K10D but we'll see how it does.

SLC



So What do you think? (note that this was not taken with the K10D. it was with my 5 MP optio point and shoot. I'll get the K10D when my tax return arrives.)

Here's a few pics of my new fishes. (my wife has an unnatural fear of clowns so I don't know why she is so attached to these guys.) An Ocelarris clownfish and a Clown Goby!

Got a painful update, the fire worms have emerged! I got stung by a worm that came out of my liverock today, the bluelegged hermit tried to kill it, but it went back into the rock. must have a tunnel in there at lease 2 inches long because that's how long the worm was.

SLC