Feel free to hurl insults at your newbie.

[caferacermike]

I am new to the forums here at Maast. I had heard of Maast since I got my tank set up almost a year ago but could not find a link as I was spelling it M.A.S.T. in my searches. A little about me and my set up.

75g ocean view drilled with over flows.

2x 175w MHQI 20,000 and 2x 96w PC 50/50blue actinics in a 48" cabinet

Tunze comline filter box adapted with power head, mismatched outlet to slow down pulse, with pulse controller box. It makes a nice gentle push.

Triggerfish systems sump the larger model, barely fit in stand. Dual 1" spray bars over removeable cleaning filter tray. No bio balls, about 12 pounds of coral and live rock frag as a media instead. 2 stars and about 50 snails live in wet area. frags stay wet at all times but are saturated in O2 bubbles. Over flows into holding tank with Euroreef skimmer, a big ol thing about 18" tall. Through bubble traps, PH monitor and digi temp to Eheim 1262 return pump. About 6" above the pump is a tee that and ball valve on the bullhead side, not the straight through side. The staright through goes back to the tank as a 3/4" pipe. From the tee is a ball valve which feeds water to a 7 gallon built in fuge. I regulate the water heigth in the sump with the ball valve. Currently the sump is full of caulerpa and a nice little yellow/green with pink spot frogfish (he has a new 24g nano waiting for him), a few snails, couple of hermits, and a branching coral. The water moves to quickly throught he fuge to be much good but I do grow a lot of pods in there. Maybe a plan to get a smaller return pump in future. 18w PC on at all times above fuge to help stabilize PH.

200lbs of live rock, whittled down from 300lbs as I got a super deal on rock when setting up.

Fish, scooter blennie, lawn mower, green dragon wrasse of some unknown origin, panther grouper (hold on yes I know he will need to run a classified ad for himself in a few more months) 2 maroon clowns (yellow stripe) that beat bubble tip corals to death.

inverts, about 400 nassarius snails (Get em off ebay for pennies and the wrasse eats them at will), 20 astrea snails, 4 bumble bees that came in rock, a few Kytie (?) mussels, 3 brittle stars (2 nasty mean green ones and one black one), 20 hermits, 10 cool snails of some sort (hahha sorry), tons of mini stars. tons of fans sprouting up in giant tangles everywhere, 6 kickin *** cukes in black, tiger, yellow and then the super green filter feeder type, 2 sea hares one green dwarf and one regular, 2 sand shifter stars, big crocea and a derussa that screams orange and pink.

corals? Not to familar with names yet but I gots em. Lots of em. green star polyps, open brains, favia, hammer in 3 colors, torch, frogspawns, cauliflower, 2 acros, encrusting monti types (including a snail covered in sps) loads of zoos and buttons green, blue, red, pink, purple, large small people eaters, scolomia (?) one red one green (those are the pride of my tank as from a 1" base they get over 6" everyday) some new eird stuff, a few stag horns, some soft leathers (that I think are poisoning the brains from what I've read), christmas rocks in bright colors (well those are actually inverts huh?)

Anemones, had a monster of a rose bubble until my maroons beat it to within an inch of it's life. It has moved off at about an inch to recover somewhere. had a 4" neon green bubble meet my Tunze power head even though it was screened off. I now have 5 fully recovered 2" clones cruising around. I have about 20 of those little dime sized mini bubble looking jobs and they split about once every 10 days. a couple of flowers.

So I try and feed heavily everyday as my skimmer keeps my parameters at zero. I kill the return pump for about 2 hours at main feeding time. I add a few drops of Kent suspension foods throughout the night and when I wake up. Some pellet foods from new spectrum, seaweeds from little fishes, and mysis from hikari. Also add 2 tablespoons of brine a week and release about 30 guppies a week.

I think my lighting is too heavy and cut back on my HQIs to 3 hours a day and 10 hours total lighting. May have the wrong spectrum bulbs.

All of my fish are great. About 80% of my coral is excellent but I know I could be doing something better for my brains and acros. I would appreciate if any members would like to come by the house and advise what they see. I live in Central Austin and would be willing to barter coral for such a trip. Maybe come by and make suggestions and we could head of somwhere on a shopping trip? Don't really wish to frag at this time as anything in the tank is there because I want it there. Well ok I have some kenyan branching and some colt you can have.

Mike Pawlowski

www.harvestclassic.org

[GaryP]

Mike,

Welcome to MAAST and thanks for the excellent info about your system.

[caferacermike]

Should also add that I have about a 3" aragonite sand bed.

Calcium, off the charts. Was using Seachem Reef Complete but somehow it got over 500.

PH, steady at 8.27-8.3 using Seachem Reef Carbonate to control PH and alkilinity. Tried Kent Superbuffer DKH but didn't like the powder form. Would somehow precipitate over my corals and the falling debri seemed to melt holes in my charges and I can't have that happen to them.

Have used Kent Kalkwasser and IV drip but found it a hassle. Maybe thinking of getting a calcium reactor after my new zebra plecos are all settled into their new 150g tank. Getting the blue eyed pleco into his 125g **** near killed my finances. plecos plecos plecos.

Nitrites, nitrates, ammonia all zeros tested at RiverCity for the first time about 3 months back. This was about 8 months after set up and had not done a single water change. Still reading zeros 3 months later with weekly testing.

Temp was reaching around 83F for about 4 weeks at the begining of May. I think the house has finally cooled down enough that the AC keeps the tank at 77F during normal hours, including lighting. I have a 1/2HP drop in ready at hand if ever necessary.

[hobogato]

sounds like a great (and well planned out) system! pics??

[brieman]

Welcome to Maast, sounds like a very good set up. I will never have another pair of maroons, they killed 2 of my anenomies.

[GaryP]

Tried Kent Superbuffer DKH but didn't like the powder form. Would somehow precipitate over my corals and the falling debri seemed to melt holes in my charges and I can't have that happen to them
Solid buffers have to be dissolved in RO water and then dripped in or slowly added in a high turbulence area. The precipitation may have had a lot to do with your high calcium. When the two are out of balance, that's been known to happen. Increasing your magnesium concentration (1400+ ppm) will help prevent precipitation.

The advantage to solid buffers is cost. You're not paying for water and the shipping of it.

[Sherri]

Welcome to MAAST caferacermike - glad you found us. Sounds like you're doin' pretty good so far! :)

[caferacermike]

Thanks for the advice Gary but I had been informed at time of purchase to dissolve the buffer in RO water. I only use RO from The Tek. I was mixing it in one gallon shots as i evap about a gallon a day. I would add it directly to my return pump so it could come out the return pipe. Upon returning to the tank it would then form clusters and begin falling out. I don't seem to have that problem with the Seachem liquid line. I do realize it is due to a high calcium rate. I had been told that using buffers and alkilinity mixes would help the absorbtion rates of the corals making my calcium more soluble. I had been maybe misguided into thinking that they would also lower the calcium in suspension to a better amount of around 400. Using the Seachem line only clouds the water for about 3 minutes and then all is well. Not saying their is anything wrong with using powder buffers from Kent, I use many of their other products, it's just it didn't seem to be working well with my current tank setup. Once the calcium levels drop and I learn more about keeping water parameters in check I will have a large tub of it to use then. Anyways I'm still looking for an offer of a more knowledgable member to help me sort what I have.

[matt]

We're much more likely to hurl insults at each other and be polite with a new member. Welcome to MAAST!

I don't know what a 175W HQI is; HQI is a ballast type and I've never heard of one in 175W. 150 and 250W only, and there's a "sort of" HQI 400W ballast; it's not really an actual HQI but will overdrive bulbs like an HQI ballast. Are you running 175W mogule base bulbs or 150W double ended bulbs? Either way, if you're using 20K bulbs, you have no worry whatsoever about too much light. Lots of people use 2 400W bulbs, 10Ks with probably 5 times the PAR as 150W 20ks. What you have is considered pretty low light for stony corals in a 75 gal.

Probably your calcium isn't as high as you think, especially if you've had a snowstorm. It's really easy to get a wrong reading with most test kits; I once tested my system 3 times in a row with the same kit and got very different readings each time, then tried comparing those to a Salifert kit and it was off by more than 100PPM.

[caferacermike]

Matt thanks for the reply. My calcium numbers were coming from tests done at RiverCity here in ATX. Honestly I couldn't imagine why or how they'd get that high as I'm not a religious doser nor do I have an over active reactor.

Ok so yes I have the el cheapo lights from Oddysea or Jebo. A friend of mine wholesales the stuff and I got the newest 48" fixture cheap to test it out. It kind of came down to the point where spending $2,000 for quality lighting would have kept me from going further with the hobby and I would have stuck with my plecos. But for under $500 with bulbs I figured I'd give it a go. Bulbs are indeed stamped 175W double ended. I'm not to sure about it as I know you are absolutely correct about there not really being a 175. I have read every copy of FAMA, TFH, Coral for the past 2 years in anticipation of starting a salt tank so I have a general idea of what is out there and I haven't seen any other 175 offered. Maybe those dang Chinese manufacturers are attempting to fool us and mislead us with the 175 stamp. I always sorta figured that the bulbs were the single most important part of the lighting system and felt that as long as I could get up and running with this fixture that 8 months down the road I could switch out bulbs to a different manufacturer and continue with the fixture and ballast.

EDIT: To ask that you think 600w may be a little low for my lighting needs? I only have 2 acros and they seem to be doing well. In fact one was a 1/2" frag that has started to grow up and over it's epoxy base. It's my softies and mushrooms that seem to melt under it. When the Halides come on they close up. Man this is why I wish someone with the know could come by and help access my tank before I get frustrated with it. I think I'm on the right track but only need to fine tune it.

[GaryP]

Mike,

Any cloudiness is an indication that you are precipitating calcium carbonate whether you are using the liquid or solid. The liquid is probably just less concentrated and you are seeing less of it. I would highly suggest that you have your magnesium tested. As I said earlier, magnesium acts as a inhibiter to precipitation. Often reefers mistakenly believe that because the cloudiness quickly dissipates that it has dissolved. In reality, the crystals are just so small that you just can't notice them anymore with the naked eye. Calcium carbonate precipitation is not reversible at the pH that we run our systems. In the long run, you will need to get your calcium level down to get the system back in balance.

High calcium levels are not uncommon in systems that have low calcium demands and are using high calcium reef salts. We've all done it at one time or another. I would suggest you get some test kits of your own and do weekly testing until you get it back in balance. With high calcium and low alkalinity you're not going to get a lot of growth. Alkalinity goes down a lot faster then calcium because there are other things besides coral growth that deplete it.

I'm not really sure what they told you about absorption rate of corals. Corals use a process called calcification to take calcium and alkalinity from the water and build new skeleton. If the calcium and alkalinity are out of balance, precipitation occurs. Also, when you add a supplement, whether calcium or buffer, you are creating an area with a high concentration of the supplement at the point of addition. This localized area of high concentration results in precipitation.

There are a couple of ways to prevent this. 1. Add the product slowly in an area of high flow, such as in front of a pump to quickly disperse the product, 2. Slowly drip the product in, again in an area of high flow and turbulence is better, 3. Further dilute the supplement by mixing it in your make up water. I use a combination of all 3 in my system.

Since yo don't have a lot of SPS I wouldn't think you would be using a lot of calcium. Most LPS are not usually fast growing and dont't use that much calcium. The softies that are fast growing (Xenia for example) do not use much calcium. Some studies have shown that a high alkalinity rates is more important than a high calcium concentration in getting good coral growth. If there is a trade off to be made, I would go with alkalinity over calcium.

When I went back over your original post I noticed you had a cauliflower coral. Is it this guy?

http://www.liveaquaria.com/product/prod_Display.cfm?siteid=22&pCatId=640

or this guy?

http://www.liveaquaria.com/product/prod_display.cfm?pcatid=645&N=2

If it is the second (Dendronephthya), be aware that they are very difficult to keep alive in captivity. Almost impossible in fact, unless you have a system set up specifically for them. They require a constant drip of phytoplankton. The first guy (Cladiella) is pretty aggressive and can kill other leather corals that are nearby.

[caferacermike]

Gary thanks for the further reply. I had noticed that a lot of my corals had begun to shrink as if irritated when I began using the alkilinty suplements. Because of this I had been cutting back on it's usage and had seriously cut back on the amount of Reef Complete I was adding, about 1/4th the recommended dose. I will begin adding the alkilinity suplements again, but very low doseages. Hopefully they won't shock again.

As to which of those 2 corals you showed me, it is hard to tell. I can honestly say that I do not have the bright reds of the second picture, but I think I remember seeing them at purchase. It shrinks and swells all day long. At the moment it is a small single branch, not a cluster. That makes ID even tougher for me. It was sold to me by a small distributor as a cauliflower and that's all I know. If it is the first one, I do not have the branching cluster look yet, nor the brown color.

I will attempt to post pics this weekend. I have really nailed down taking pics of my freshwater tank but my salt has me skunked. It is difficult for me to get nice clear pics as all the light in my tank destroys the look of any prints. Current set up is a 6.1 Kodak. I've tried taking pics in the bright of day, at night, they always appear a blueish an washed out color. But I suppose with enough work and a charged battery I could get some pics of my corals themselves.

[GaryP]

They're probably more irritated by the low pH and alkalinity. Expect a lot of precipitation until your calcium comes down. See my comments above about how magnesium can help prevent this. When you are done getting your calcium/alkalinity back in balance, you'll probably need to pull all your pumps out and clean them. Carbonate scale forms in the pumps first and will cut down their efficiency and cause them to seize and/or burn up.

[GaryP]

I have a really important question for you...

Is there suchg a thing as a caferacer anymore? :) You got a garage full of Nortons or Triumphs or something? Maybe a Vincent or a BSA?

[caferacermike]

Gary is 8.3 to low for PH? I thought that was ideal and that was what I have been shooting, and obtaining.

Obvioulsy you did not look at the link under my signature in the first thread.

I am Mike Pawlowski top level sponsor of the Harvest Classic in Luckenbach.

Bikes,

1976 Triumph Bonneville
1972 Norton Commando
1974 Honda CB350F full cafe.
1969 Rickman
1964 Hodaka Ace 90 x2 One is in full street race trim with custom under frame expansion pipe and screens
1963 Puch Sears Sabre 50
1964 Puch Sears competition model 50 track racer
5 RD's
1965 Gilera 106
sold a BSA Victor recently
1973 Honda cb twin 350
1998 Italjet Formula 50 LC
1990 Yamaha FZR400
2004 Derbi GPR50 (kitted and tuned to run 95mph
Had a yamaha YSR50 stolen
1969 Vespa Smallframe bluebadge

Check the link, then starta new thread and we can chat all you want about bikes.
I do own a car, a 1964 Toyota Corona 4 door, 3 on the tree. 3RC castiron 4 cylinder. My only true transportation is my trusty Norton Commando. 14,000 miles a year on that bike.

[caferacermike]

I have some pics from this morning at lights on. Wish to post them and then some from this evening. I do not use photobucket as it seems a hassle to me. How do I create a user gallery?

[hammondegge]

i believe the board members are creating them on request now. this post may do it. though you might try to post in the charter member forum.

[caferacermike]

OK so do I need to join as a paying member? That's not really a problem, it will just take me some time to getting around to it. I've red some of the benefits of being a card member and it all sounds good to me.

[hammondegge]

well mike, i dont know. we had a vote a while back to define priviledges but i dont recall seeing the results. we could use a sticky somewhere to explain both of these issues. i make a post to the charter forum and get back to you

[hammondegge]

i just read the membership benefits statement under the 'membership' link. it states there that the album is a charter member priviledge.

[Richard]

I think you can still upload some pics from your computer. You just add the jpeg as an attachment when you post a reply (not the quick reply). As long as the file sizes are not too big you can add up to 3 pics per post.

At least that's how it used to work.

[hammondegge]

yep, you can still post pics in the forums

[GaryP]

Gary is 8.3 to low for PH? I thought that was ideal and that was what I have been shooting, and obtaining.
No, you are absolutely correct. 8.3 is at the top of the range. I'm rather surprised that you could have that high of a pH without a pretty high alkalinity level. Apparently your Seachem is doing a good job. I still suggest that you test for it.

[caferacermike]

gary I have a pinpoint PH monitor running continously in my sump. That's how I can give you range fluctations for evning and day time. I also have a lot of calibration packets. I've tried uploading direct from my PC but I am not any good at it. I prefer to have a gallery to host a pic and then load it up. I have a sneaky underhanded way to circumvent this and will do it later tonight.

[Instar]

Welcome to MAAST. Just a question (after going over your first post) that hasn't been covered yet...


I have about 20 of those little dime sized mini bubble looking jobs and they split about once every 10 days. a couple of flowers.

From your first post: Are these majano anemones your post refers to?

[caferacermike]

Instar that is a good question and one I asked myself when I first bought a tube of Joe's aptasia remover for 5 little aptasia that grew in my live rock. I guess I should go and look it up. :innocent Um yeah they are. Isn't the internet great? Ok so those guys are invasive and a nuisance right? Well I like them and they are going to stay. I feel like a superstar slat keeper knowing I bred about 20 of them from one parent. Woohoo, I rock.

Ok better things.

My tank pics from this morining right at lights on so nothing is inflated.

The whole thingie.
http://www.plecofanatics.com/gallery/data/500/100_1073.jpg

Holy He11 after checking preview it worked. I'm an internet genius.

under cabinet.
http://www.plecofanatics.com/gallery/data/500/100_1075.jpg

right hand side
http://www.plecofanatics.com/gallery/data/500/100_1079.jpg

Left side
http://www.plecofanatics.com/gallery/data/500/100_1081.jpg

Pic of my pinky after amputating it last summer because I'm having fun after learning how to post images
http://www.plecofanatics.com/gallery/data/500/finger.jpg
Did the same thing to my thumb last Saturday. Spent the day in the hospital, did a brake job on the girlfriends truck that night.

[caferacermike]

Haha, found this in an old folder, pics of my "nano" 20g. What do you think?
http://www.plecofanatics.com/gallery/data/500/000_0540.JPG

[GaryP]

Ok so those guys are invasive and a nuisance right? Well I like them and they are going to stay. I feel like a superstar slat keeper knowing I bred about 20 of them from one parent.
Just be aware that they can take over your tank and they do pack a pretty powerful sting. One sting won't kill a fish, but a few might. Even if they don't kill your fish directly, it could stress them enough to result in an outbreak of a disease such as Ich. I'll let Instar give more and better advice on mojanos. He's our resident nuisance anemone expert. Luckily I have never had mojanos, only aiptasia. Aiptasia are a lot easier to control then mojanos.

[Instar]

Ok so those guys are invasive and a nuisance right? Well I like them and they are going to stay. I feel like a superstar slat keeper knowing I bred about 20 of them from one parent. Woohoo, I rock.

:lol That's the same thing I thought about my first aiptasia. 1 had 10 babies and then so along it went. I thought I would sell them later and be rich for doing the tank raised thing. LoL... little did I know.

Actually I like the majanos too. You should see a grouping of green, orange and blue ones together. I just keep the rocks in such a way that they have to colonize the rocks I want them on and not the ones I don't want them on, much like zoos and green star polyps as far as controlling them. It worked so far at least. (Now don't ask for any, I took that tank down so I could grow some more aiptasia! :blush )

[Instar]

BTW, your setup is real nice. The research pays off and that is obvious in the pictures.

Amputated your finger posting pics... harder to post than you thought I guess? For the fresh injury to your thumb, please wear a glove if you have to get into the tank. Marine bacteria species can cause a problem in a deep injury.

[GaryP]

Many people like majanos. The larger, more colorful ones are sometimes even sold as "rock anemones" and while they do have a strong sting, they are not as bad as aiptasia from the research that I have done. The key to keeping them under control and not spreading all over your tank seems to be water quality. They like a tank that has high nutrients and a lot of particulate food (same as aiptasia).

[caferacermike]

More pics from today I'm getting better all the time.

http://www.plecofanatics.com/gallery/data/500/100_1088.jpg
http://www.plecofanatics.com/gallery/data/500/100_1084.jpg
http://www.plecofanatics.com/gallery/data/500/100_1093.jpg
http://www.plecofanatics.com/gallery/data/500/100_1091.jpg
http://www.plecofanatics.com/gallery/data/500/100_1094.jpg
http://www.plecofanatics.com/gallery/data/500/100_1107.jpg
http://www.plecofanatics.com/gallery/data/500/100_1108.jpg
http://www.plecofanatics.com/gallery/data/500/100_1106.jpg
http://www.plecofanatics.com/gallery/data/500/100_1085.jpg
http://www.plecofanatics.com/gallery/data/500/100_1086.jpg
Yes he poses and dances for me everytime I look his way.

What the hex is this ugly (beautiful) coontraption?
http://www.plecofanatics.com/gallery/data/500/100_11001.jpg
Oh and Gary that white piece is the cauliflower coral in question. Speaking of which, Hey you get off my hammer!

[GaryP]

Yea, that looks like the carnation to me. If those are the mojanos you are talking about they are cool. Keep 'em. Those are similar to what most people call a rock anemone. Not the smaller pest type.

[caferacermike]

Nah those aren't the Majano's. The majanos are majanos. I set up a tank for a friend a few months ago and got him some frogspawn and about 20 rics as a gift. His tank is a polar opposite of my sterile tank (******* it's doing better than mine with zero maintenance), no filtration, all my leftover liverock (about 60lbs in a 40g) and he feeds super heavy. His coraline algae has completely sealed off all of his live rocks pores. Looks like dripping wax, awesome. A single head of frogspawn swells to the size of a softball everyday. He has a hair algae problem but we both agree it makes the tank look natural. His rics split all the time, inlcuding the 4 color oranges. Mine melt under the lights.

So anyways we go and check out a home coral seller and he had that thing. Didn't know what it was. Since I kept staring at it my bud bought it for me for setting up his tank. So yeah now this uhm,, gifty thing is in my tank. That was how it looked at the sellers and it still looks the same. Appears to have a mouth at the end of the stalks.