Angela's 270 tank thread - Page 3

TitansFan · #51 08/18/2006, 08:27 PM

Yah, I thought you had told me you were not going to hypo the 80 with the rock in it? The hypo like Chris, mentioned would kill pods and more important the bacteria. It could turn that rock into basic brand new base rock. Starting the tank off with all the fish you have mentioned you will needs the bacteria. Water changes on that monster tank will be fun. Have you decided on a skimmer?

The kids look great! I knew you had to do the kids in the tank shot. I think its required on all new large tank setups. Its good to read that you did a proper acclimation for them. I can't wait to come over and see them with snorkles and algea scrapers inside cleaning the tank. They look just like their mom.

CKreef · #52 08/18/2006, 09:19 PM

Angela my maroon is just as mean as yours to my hand but she has never even chases off a fish. I think they would be fine in the tank as long as the other clowns were far enough away

platax88 · #53 08/18/2006, 09:21 PM

Hey Angela! ill take that yellow tang off your hands in a few weeks. I was planning on getting one, but prefer one already in captivity. Let me know if you want to sell it.

Angela Short · #54 08/19/2006, 01:07 AM

Oh no, sorry if I was confusing

. I am pulling all rock coral and cheato from the sump. Then siphoning out the old sand, then dropping the S.G. I am putting in PVC and fake plants/decore for hiding places in a bare tank. The lights will not even be on because they are going with the coral.
I have a huge bag of ceramic rings very well seasoned in the sump and my 3 large filter pads I haven't replaced in well over a month to keep the bio on them. I hope this will be enouph bio for the 6 fish going into hypo in the 80. If not I guess lots of water changes are in store.
I just hope enouph pods are not lingering in all the Power heads and cracks in the sump and filter pads to cause a ammonia spike when they die...I will just have to watch it. Thanks for looking out for me though. I am sure I will do some bone head boo boo and kill off all my stuff before this thing is done!

Angela Short · #55 08/19/2006, 01:14 AM

PM sent back platax88

My little maroons will stay where ever there bubble coral takes them

They have made a bubble coral there home. They had no choice, it was a lone coral I got as a freebi on some rock and dumped it in there little holding tank (other than zoos) and they went right to it. They are very cute in it. I kinda wanted to keep a pair of clowns in my zoa wanna be tank anyways especially with the ocilaris/onyx pair in the big one.

crumbletop · #56 08/19/2006, 06:55 AM

Angela,

when you do hypo, do you keep your salinity exactly at 1.009 or does it vary a little bit. Do you cycle the hypo tank before you put the fish in, or do you keep up with stuff like prime and water changes? How are you keeping your pH in line in the hypo tank?

I've done hypo with partial success and am wondering what your technique is. It sounds like you have a bunch of fish in hypo right now and they all sound like they are doing well.

Jack

Angela Short · #57 08/19/2006, 09:20 AM

I have done hypo in the past with great success. Once I get the SG down to 1.009, which takes a ton of fresh water, I just try to keep a eye on it daily. I sometimes accidentially go to 1.008 and let it creep back up a little but try to not let it swing up past 1.009. This is the acceptiable highest level you can go without a small chance of the free swimming stage to survive.
I only ever ran NO lights so the SG didn't swing much from heat and a daily small top off was all it took to keeo it low in the past. I use a little of my PH side of my 2 part mix to keep the PH up as I go down. The PH does bottom out with no buffers in the tank, mine did.

In the 80 I will have to moniter the SG 2-3 times a day as it has a spray function in the sump and it burns 1/2 gallon a day without lights running. I may just hook up a drip to keep it in check better.

The trick to being sucessfull is patience. You start counting your weeks "after" the last visiable spot disapears, not from the minute you hit 1.009, a common mistake. Hypo only kills the free swimming stage and not the encysted stage or while it is on the fish. So you have to wait out all the possiable stages of the cycle because you can have the bug at all 3 stages in the tank at once. ON the fish, free swimming and encysted on the substraite ready to release lots of new free swimmers.
It is very important not to cross contaminate water from the display back into the treatment tank via refractometers or hoses,nets and such. We are dealing with microscopic parasites so it can easily be done.
You can safely drop a fish straight in a cycled hypo tank as long as the PH matches (I did it) but when droping a new tank from regular SG down to hypo it is best to go slowley over a few days for the bio to adjust to lower Salinity and keep up more than the fish adjusting. I keep sponge filters in my sump at all times seasoned with bio (keeping the other tank stable right now) and I am hopeing my biorings and filter pads will be plenty of bio to keep the params in check in the 80.
A common misunderstanding in setting up a tank (hospital or other) is that if you use dirty water from a display you are cycled whicjh is just not so. The water is cycled when you put it in but has no bacteria mass to process all the waste the fish will be putting off in the new tank. In other words it doesn't have a biofilter established on the substraite, filterpads, aquarium walls ect, ect... The "dirty water" will add some bacteria to kick start your biofilter but is in no way a "cycled" tank ready for inhabitents. You will get a huge ammonia spike if this is how you set up a QT. If you are not ready with instant bio (ceramic rings, sponge filters....) you have to keep the tank from ever going in a cycle with daily water changes to keep ammonia down. OK I have to get buisy, sorry so long on the QT spill...

crumbletop · #58 08/19/2006, 09:55 AM

Thanks for the details. I am getting ready to start stocking more fish in my display and have been thinking about doing hypo on all new aquisitions as you are. I have already gone through letting the tank sit fallow (I went 6 weeks), and hypo for the fish. Not all of them made it through hypo, so I was wondering about some of the details. I pretty much did as you described, although I went though a monster cycle in the hypo tank. I used a biowheel that had been in my sump for about 6 weeks and I guess I must have dropped the salinity too fast for the bacteria to adjust.

Angela Short · #59 08/19/2006, 10:37 AM

I would say the bio wheel just didn't have enouph bacteria to support the fish load. The increased stress of ammonia will let all sorts of other bad things start happening with the fishes health. Sorry you lost some fish.
People who have bad luck with a QT ussually have a uncycled one they lost fish from. I need to put up a pic of my plastic decorated QT with the 5 fish in it, They are happy acting as if they were in the reef. To be honest I feel the blue spotted Kole may have been unable to thrive in the 80 if just dummped in. He was unbalivably shy and NEVER came out of his fake tree branch hole, even to eat for a few weeks practically. And him and the dottyback were the only fish in there in a spare bedroom, with no comotion going on. If he was out and saw me sneak in the room he would flee. He has adjusted and lets me look in at him all the time now. He was so timid I would bet he would have never taken to prepared foods in the 80 with the super intense lights, kids screamming in the room, and all the other fish putting him in his place and scareing him. He was very slow to take prepared food in his "safe" home anyways.
I had a flame waste away from that exact senario when I first started. It never left its hiding spot ever. It stayed in the same fake tree root hole as the tang lives now only that was "cool looking" in my reef wannabe tank way back then!

It is saved for hiding spots in the QT now

He may have made it if knew then what I do now.
I really like those glass bio rings in a mesh baggie. Theyhave a lot more surface space than a bio wheel. And I have the sponges from a whisper HOB filter I use also that I keep in the sump. 2 of them filter pads from the sump and a peice of old dried out figi rock I had in the QT tank while a big ugly damsel helped seed it is all the bio in the 29 keeping the ammonia in check with the 5 in hypo now. 3 are tiny though and the other 2 are smallish for tangs.

Angela Short · #60 08/23/2006, 03:19 AM

Wow, this thing is gonna kill me! I have been working on this thing every night till 1-2 AM and am just now shutting down at 3 this night....morning. I had a burst of energy because I got sand and rock in tonight. I have added 250 lbs of sand and about 150 lbs live rock, 30 lbs home made cement rock and 25 lbs dry high rock. Sadly the rock is looking very sparse. I built up from the glass so it took a lot more to get any highth and the extra tall tank is burning up rock getting highth. I have about another 150 lbs of live to add tommorow and hopefully with some creative stacking and lots of epoxy it will be enouph. I am so over working on this thing its not even funny but I know it will be worth it after its all done.
Pics to come this weekend of the progress and me having to practically get in to aquascape this thing!

platax88 · #61 08/23/2006, 07:04 AM

Keep at Angela... it will be worth all your hard work.

Have you though of maybe making a platform otu of PVC for the rock so you dont burn up so much rock that will just be burried. Make a platform just to give you the height on the back then stack as you normally would on the front to cover any PVC legs....

What kind of epoxy are you using? is it to glue the rocks together? Does it work? the "Two Little Fishies" epoxy i have SUCKS!

Angela Short · #62 08/24/2006, 10:39 AM

I wish I had of used some big PVC under the sand in hindsite because I have a ton of rock just burried. I went with a pretty deep sand bed to help get the sand dwellers up closer to the light as possiable.

I use tons of aquamend 2 part from home depo. Same as yours I think as far as texture. The trick is you have to really work it in a crack or something and hold it where you want it till it sets up which can be 10 mins or better with your arm killing you underwater. But it allows you to make cool spans in your rockwork.

Fanof49ASU · #63 08/24/2006, 11:26 AM

How deep of a sand bed did the 250 lbs give you?

Angela Short · #64 08/24/2006, 12:08 PM

5" or more but I had a ton of rock on the glass so it tookup a lot of sand space

CKreef · #65 08/24/2006, 12:10 PM

Time for pics Angela

Angela Short · #66 08/24/2006, 01:40 PM

The water is still so cloudy I am aquascaping blind

. I even washed the sand and they say not to wash it to keep the tiny particals in there. Man it washed some foamy nasty out and it would have taken weeks to clear up.
I added the top 1-2 inches of my old sand yesterday so hopefully it will help settle all the cloudy particals out. I rinsed the old sand well with water from the 80 and I must say it was NASTY. DSB's are definetly septic tanks! But I like the look of them. I was afraid I may have rinsed out but I saw lots of little spag. worms and critters out in the sand last night.

gflat65 · #67 08/24/2006, 03:36 PM

What are you doing to clear it up? It took almost a week for the 120 to clear up with three bags of southdown and some crushed coral. I used a HOB with a micron filter along with filterfloss in the sump just upstream from the return pump. I didn't think the filter floss would really do anything since the particulate is so small, but I pulled it several times and replaced and it always dripped white... I still have some of the foam in the sump stuck to walls.

ocd_mariner · #68 08/24/2006, 06:02 PM

Did you wash your sand before putting it in gflat?

Im about to dump a ton of sand in the tank, they say dont wash (and I really dont want to

), but I'd rather spend a little time washing like Angela then getting a horrible mess that takes weeks to clean up.

gflat65 · #69 08/24/2006, 06:07 PM

I washed the crushed coral, but not the Southdown. Southdown is so small that if you rinse it, you'll be left with very little

. The foam comes from the Southdown, but I can live with it. With store bought sand (larger sized like the sugar sized, etc.), I always washed.

techrach · #70 08/25/2006, 01:07 PM

Angela,
sounds like your tank upgtade is going really well. Can't wait to see pic's.
I have a 75 gal and one day hope to have a big tank. I have the room I just want to be successful at the 75 gal first since this is my first tank.
keep us posted.

ocd_mariner · #71 08/25/2006, 01:21 PM

Here is an odd question:

150 is sitting on the stand. If I put sand in, then dribble the rodi water in, then mix the salt water..... is the water going to move through the sand bed enough to mix well?

Angela Short · #72 08/25/2006, 01:47 PM

I washed the SD in a big rubbermaid tub (40 gallon) I used the hose and rinced,stirred well and dumped the goopy water off like 5 times till it was realativly clear. I didn't seem to have much sand in the grass IMO. They say to leave the "dust" in but I also washed out some hunks of nasty grey clay. I feel the SD is small enouph without the dusty stuff left in to goop up the water.
Mine cleared up pretty well in 3 days. I added the top layer of my old sand over the new and it helped get the bacteria going all over it to weight it down so it doesn't sand storm as bad. Bed at 3:30 AM last night again but 95% of coral is in place. This is the third day without light so I am running my PC fixtures over the tank for a few hours just to give them hope that there food source is comming. Hopefully lights will be up and running tonight. I need a nap right now though!!

ocd_mariner · #73 08/25/2006, 04:51 PM

Angela -

Thanks for the idea of hooking the RO/DI straight to the tank. I filled 2 32 gallon trash cans with water. Then laziness kicked in. Flash forward one hour, with 100 feet of 1/4" tubing draped from the garage to the back room taped to random door frames throughout the house to discourage curious kitties.

My wife is gonna flip when she wakes up

(she works night shift at the hospital).

Pickupman66 · #74 08/25/2006, 08:05 PM

OCD>>> LMAO!!!!! I can so see that....

Angela Short · #75 08/25/2006, 10:45 PM

Thats funny! Yea, you can run as much length as you need to!
Well, small flood tonight. I forgot I hadn't hooked up a return under the tank for the sump return in one of the overflows. I was not sure wether I would use 2 seperate pumps or one and split the return yet so I had one not connected yet. When I fired up the sump to watch my handywork in progress I was very unpleasently surprised to the sound of a flood. The main problem is I still am waiting on some lockline to get here to cap the returns permantly. I have the one I was using to get my water from the sump to the tank temporarily glued up with PVC is why I never thought of the other return in limbo just being a open tube with no plug in the bottom!! I broke down tonight and mixed up about 40 gallons of SW from the tap to finnally have enouph water to get the sump and overflows working. My poor RO is wore out and barely working.
All 4 of my power strips got seriously flooded and tripped both GFCIs. Hope they are not ruined

.