The tentacles on that still look like aiptasia to me except difficult to say with a side shot. Can you move the rock and take a straight on shot of it?
I also would not use the crushed coral and instead use a good aragonite mix. It is also natural but far easier to keep healthy.
Alight, out with the crushed coral. Went to the LFS today and picked up 30lbs of CaribSea aragmax, and 10 lbs of arag-alive. I rinsed all the aragmax, but am still left with a cloudy tank. Pictures will go up as soon as the tank clears. I'm also off to Petco to pick up a cheap 10 gallon tank to use as a QT.
Question - I bought some pure ammonia today to jump-start the cycle. How much should I put in the tank?
While I wait for the tank to clear, I thought I'd share my wish list for the fish I'd like to put in the tank. Comments and suggestions are welcomed!
Here's what I'd like, in order of addition:
Algea attack pack standard for 75g from drsfostersmith
3-4 blue/green chromis
2 Ocellaris clownfish
1 Lawnmower or one-spot blenny
1 Coral Beauty Angelfish
1 Saddle Valentini Puffer
1 Yellow Tang
Concerns:
Firstly, I'd be adding the fish very slowly over a long period of time. Especially after the blenny was added, I'd want to make sure the tank is well established before moving on to the rest of the fish.
Would this be an overcrouded tank?
I've heard mixed reviews about including a valentini puffer in a tank with invertebrates. Some say that as long as it's well fed, it won't touch the inverts. Others say that inverts won't last long, even with a toby. Anybody have any insight or experience?
Any substitutions, additions, or subtractions that you guys might recommend are welcome!
also that aiptasia looks more like a majano anemone... i had one but blasted it with boiling water to get rid of the bugger... they are both very similar and will reproduce all over your tank, irritating any possible corals you add...
Time for an update! Substrate is in, tank isn't cloudy anymore. I decided to zap the purple anemonies for fear that they weren't good. I figure that if I want any of 'em, I'll put them there myself! I've been a little ammonia every day - up to about 1ppm right now.
It's exciting to watch my live rock become.... alive! I've got a nice crop of hair algea starting on one rock. Some leafier growth appears to be emerging on other rocks. I'm quite curious to see what it looks like by the time I can put a cleanup crew in there.
Speaking of cleanup crews- do I need to QT them too, before putting them in the tank? I suppose that there's not much you could do to save them, being that the medications often kill them. I've got a 10 gallon QT tank up and running too. Now I just need this tank to cycle, and then we're in business!
beautiful tank!!! lots of space for corals in the future
the leafy stuff is macro and that will spread like wildfire... i take mine out by hand... the pic on the right looks like hair algae... your clean up crew will love you for that!
