Cali Kid Corals

"The Lab" - Josh and Tiffany's IM Nuvo EXT 200

I'm slowly going to raise up the PAR, since I'm currently running these lights at only about 65%. I just don't want to bake my torches just yet.

EDIT: IIRC, he had XR15s (not XR30s) and G5s vs G6. I'd argue that 10x XR15s outpeform 4x XR30s, but the light spread is noticeably better on the G6s so it's probably not *too* bad once I bump it up a bit more after getting more acros.
that is correct, i had 10x xr15pros g5 over a 48x36 tank. at one point i had 12 xr15s just for fun.
 
4-29-24

Photo dump.

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i recommend 2 led bars, great coverage, helps with shadowing of sps and coral (later on), and par increase also nice coral pop. Good one is OR3 Blue bar from orphrek or reef bright. at price of one xr15 you get two OR3 Blue light bars (48inch bar $200/ 60inch $325)
 
i recommend 2 led bars, great coverage, helps with shadowing of sps and coral (later on), and par increase also nice coral pop. Good one is OR3 Blue bar from orphrek or reef bright. at price of one xr15 you get two OR3 Blue light bars (48inch bar $200/ 60inch $325)
Quantas are a pretty good option too. 6' bar is like $300
 
7-10-24

Tank's been chugging along well. No further losses of torches (which makes me more convinced it was, in fact, something that was treated by the interceptor). We've also slowly but surely been adding acros to the tank, and I'll have all the goodies I got from the swap (and a TCK master torch) ready to come out of QT next week! For now: photo dump.

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7-10-24

Tank's been chugging along well. No further losses of torches (which makes me more convinced it was, in fact, something that was treated by the interceptor). We've also slowly but surely been adding acros to the tank, and I'll have all the goodies I got from the swap (and a TCK master torch) ready to come out of QT next week! For now: photo dump.

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Update 7-14-24

Coral QT tank has had flatworms for a few weeks now; I've been religiously dipping the corals with potassium chloride every other day for the last week, but I'm still getting a few off every dipping. My suspicion is that these are the harmless red planaria making their way onto the coral. However, since I'm pretty sure a few coral had euphyllia eating flatworms at some point (given how irritated they were with flatworms on their flesh), I don't want to risk it. So today I bit the bullet and used Flatworm eXit. Given there were enough flatworms I could see them on the glass, I was very careful and did the following:

  • Removed all snails from the tank, rinsed them in fresh saltwater, and put them into my display tank (since they'd been in the tank for the full QT period)
  • Removed all the coral from the tank, dipped in potassium chloride, and placed them in a bucket of fresh saltwater as a holding tank
  • Treated the tank with Flatworm eXit following manufacturer's instructions
  • After 30 minutes and seeing flatworms floating around the tank, performed a ~90% water change
  • Ran activated carbon for 30 minutes on the tank to clear out any traces of toxin
  • Put the coral back in the tank
  • Monitored closely for any signs of corals being pissed off
So far so good; I'll be treating the tank twice more (once Tuesday, once Thursday) before adding the corals to the DT.

Next steps/plans for the tank

The big one is I'll be swapping the tank over from Neptune Apex to CoralVue Hydros. I currently have an X4 running on the QT/frag tank and have really liked it, as well as trusting the components to be a bit more robust/water-resilient than Apex. My planned setup for the display will be:
  • Monitoring: Hydros X4 (1x pH probe for tank, 1x pH probe for calcium reactor)
  • Control: Hydros XP8 energy bar
  • Testing: Hydros Maven
  • Dosing: Hydros Sole
After a lot of thought, I've opted to go for the Maven over the X10. This was largely due to reduced maintenance and multi-parameter testing (though I admit both of these are hypotheticals), specifically:
  • The X10 is based on pH and acid titration (similar to KH Guardian and KH Director), while the Maven will is based on colorimetric readings (similar to the Trident). pH & acid titration is cheaper in the long run and you can DIY your reagent; however, a lot of the reports I read indicated bubbles in the dosing lines could throw off readings. While this isn't a huge deal (I think it was usually in the range of 0.3-0.4 dKH flux), minimal maintenance is absolutely a priority to me.
  • Calcium testing on the Maven; since I run a calcium reactor, calcium creeps up over time and I'd like to automatically keep an eye on it, rather than testing manually.
Additionally, I'm opting to swap out my FX-STP2 when the Sole launches because 1) easier/more seamless wireless control, and 2) it can be wall-mounted, while the FX-STP2 is built like a tank (meant as a compliment) but is a giant hunk of metal that's awkward to position. Given the layout and configuration of my tank, I think this will make things a lot tidier and help with cord management and aesthetics too.
 
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