Day by day log of a newbies 75 gallon, TBS startup tank

[lessans]

wooglin, I'm thinking of starting a 75 gal or 65 gal reef tank. Which size would you recommend since I'll have to take it down in 2 years? And considering the financial part of the tank, how much have you spent total if you know so that I can estimate mine based on yours?

[wooglin]

75 or larger. If I had it to do over again I would get a 6 foot with 4 foot lighting. Same stuff I have in my tank, just more room for sand and empty space.

[wooglin]

I am leaving on a mission trip to Mexico until June 3rd, so the thread will be without pictures till then. When I get back I plan on turning it up a notch with my new camera. Should get some nice shots of the whole seutp.

[H2OLUVSME]

wooglin, im just glad you are posting this much. with the new camera and new pics id like to see this thread rolling like the old days

BTW, the pics with the new camera really are crisp.

[rjwilson37]

FastUno: Here is the growth from two of my Caps.

Orange Cap & Brown Cap on September 1st, 2004. The Orange Cap is in the middle left and the brown cap is right in the middle above the Green Star Polyps.



I moved the brown cap above the orange cap, and here they are March 17th, 2005 which is about 6 and a half months growth.

[rjwilson37]

I had to break some of the left of the Orange Cap and a whole lot of the left of the brown cap as well as some of the front of the brown cap.

Here they are now as of May 25th, 2005

[FastUno]

Wow, now that is some good growth there. Nothing like what I started off with. It seems like my cap is growing faster as it grows more. For instance I see a significant increase from just 2 weeks ago, almost more growth than what I have seen from the first 3 months. Your growth is outstanding.

rjwilson37, what truly amazes me about your tank is how close you have certain corals in relation to others. My experience has been that nothing wants to co-exist next to anything else. A sting here & a sting there. Here is my sting list:

yellow leather vs maze brain (winner is maze brain)
brown ugly polyps vs favia (polyp)
fuzzy ushroom vs monti dig (mushroom)
gsp vs mushroom (gsp)
very funny that I had a galaxia in a 26g tank next to green leather & other corals & that it had not stung a thing. Yet, something like a polyp that brakes off a colony to somehow manage to sting a favia. Simply amazing!

[rjwilson37]

Yep, the larger they grow the faster they grow because there is more of them to grow. That orange cap started with just the one circle pedal glued to a small rock. Now it has mulitple pedals all growing at the same time to help it get larger and larger, I will have to frag it soon I am sure.

Here is a closeup of the Orange Cap! Digitata's lose against Caps for growth rights, which is why a digitata can grow out of the middle of a cap.

[FastUno]

I have to say that when I first took notice to RC, this was one of the first threads that I have visited. rjwilson37 & wooglin served as a source of inspiration to me & it's great to watch their tanks grow. Gives us hope that we may someday achieve their success.

[JSB5776]

Wooglin any pics of your sump??? How many inches of sand do you use in it? Sorry to ask without searchin, I dont have time to read the whole thread here at work.

Thanks,
Jeff

[docklink]

Originally posted by JSB5776
Wooglin any pics of your sump??? How many inches of sand do you use in it? Sorry to ask without searchin, I dont have time to read the whole thread here at work.

Thanks,
Jeff

Woog's out of town for a few days. He won't be back till after Friday.

[eboonaman]

RJ, Nice setup ! I was wondering how much LR you have in your tank? I'm starting a 55gal and trying to get an idea of how much LR I should order for my tank.
thanks
chuck

[rjwilson37]

Originally posted by eboonaman
RJ, Nice setup ! I was wondering how much LR you have in your tank? I'm starting a 55gal and trying to get an idea of how much LR I should order for my tank.
thanks
chuck

I have about 70-75lbs of LR.

[eboonaman]

Thanks RJ for the quick Reply, I am going to buy 88lbs of Tonga LR from Reefermadness.us next week and was a little concerned if it was too much. But after seeing your tank I think it will be just right and not cramped...
I can only hope my tank will look as good as yours and the others in this thread....
thanks again
chuck

[rjwilson37]

I have mostly Fiji LR which is not as dense as some LR, so it is working well for me. I don't like the LR to be to dense which means you need more lbs to fill the tank, and I like the way the Fiji rock looks in the tank.

[wooglin]

I am back in town. I am unpacking from a very inspiring mission trip to Ensanada Mexico. Wont be able to post much yet, but I will soon.

Thanks,
Wooglin

[Bax]

Welcome back

[jeffman1]

I finally figured out why all my stuff died. My salinity was at 1.044, the refractometer that i was using was not calibrated.

So of course everything dies with that high of salt.

I fixed the salt level last week and added a few chromis and turbo snail.

Well the snails still die in a few hours, the chromis have been a live for about 5 days now, but hides mostly and i never see them go for any food i give them.

The ammonia, nitrate and nitrite are all 0, but the ph has been dropping, it is 8.09 right now with a 79.5 temp.

Does this mean that my tank is not cycled? Any suggestions on what i should do?

[skwo]

Wooglin,

You're tank is quite inspiring. Thanks for sharing all the detail. I was wondering how much preparation/testing did you do before buying "The Package"?

I'm totally new to this money sucking hobby and would like to take the right steps to make sure that the tank doesn't become a death trap. I'm reading as much of the thread as I can.

It's amazing how well your tank looks just after a few months. My expectations are pretty low. I'd be happy if my tank looks like your 4 month picture in a year or two.

My apologies if this was answered before.

[wooglin]

New 8-line wrasse


Some of my acros


Another shot of some of my acros


Unlikely friends


Derasa


Fire, boy it hurts


More fire


Take me down to the soft city, where the grass is green and the girls are pretty ( oh never mind, most of you probably dont recognize the song)

[Timbor]

paradise city...

[wooglin]

Right you are.... My version is somthing like take me down to softie city where the sand is white and the corals are pretty.

[phil519]

GNR...thought i'd at least throw in the musicians...and to make this a reef-related post...

in the "more fire" pic - I can see some tbs tube corals still hanging in there...have you noticed if the tbs hitched corals are still going strong or not?

[wooglin]

Yes there are lots of TBS corlals, still alive.

[rjwilson37]

Your Soft City looks awsome Wooglin, just as healthy as can be.