Eric's 75 Gal Mixed Reef

[eric the red]

I just set up a reef tank Sat. It has a metal halide and 4x54 t5 two blue two white. It has a sand substrate. 65 lb of live rock. 25 gal sump with chaeto and rubble rock. It has a GFO reactor. UV sterilizer. and Protein Skimmer. My livestock consists of a 6 IN Yellow tang. 6 line wrasse. Sea urchin. Sand sifting sea star. Two clownfish. Blue Green Chromis. White Bubble anemone. Skunk cleaner shrimp. and a Coral Banded Shrimp. I just tested my calcium is 360 which is a little low. The alk is 11. I think might be a little high. The phosphate is showing up at .25 which is decent. I think these are pretty good numbers. Im going to work on getting the calcium higher.

[bluwtr]

Your calcium needs to be 425 or a little higher. 360 is really low. Your alk is high and needs to come down to 8.5-9dKH. As far as your phosphates, they need to be 0.03ppm or less. Not sure what kit you are using, but you need a higher resolution test like the Hanna Checker--fast, easy and accurate.

In your other post you mention the red hair alage. I've been fighting a RHA for over a year. Is yours the species that is very tough and hard to pull off of your rock? If so it is the same stuff I have and it's also known as "wire algae". H2O2 will kill it, but you have to dip the entire rock in a diluted solution of the peroxide and SW. Leave the rock submerged for 3 minutes, then rinse it in pure SW. After that you can put it back in the tank. It will take 2-3 days before you see a change, but when you do it will die quickly. You just have to be on top of it and if you see it again, dip again. The H2O2 will not bother any of the stony corals unless it is too high of strength. The only coral I found that didn't like it is Xenia.

HTH and good luck.

[eric the red]

Im using the cheap api test kit. I know they arent known for the most accurate test kits available. I used a calcium alkalinity calculator and it said I needed to add 283 ml in 3 doses to bring my calcium up. That seems a little excessive. Im going to spread it out over 2 weeks. Im going to try the peroxide method again. This time with the dip. What ratio do you use?

[Xfactor1315]

I have poured it straight on the rock from the bottle before. Would only do one rock at a time like that though. Will kill coralline but it comes back fast.

[eric the red]

Today I added 4 blue green chromis. I already had one in the tank. At first everything was cool. After a little while my six line wrasse started acting really aggressive towards them. Later i turned off the lights except for the blue moonlights to show my grandmother. When I turned them back on one of the chromis was cowered in the corner with scales missing. I wanted to take the wrasse out and put it in my 30G but I couldnt catch it. So I put all the chromis in my 30.

[bluwtr]

One thing about Chromis is that for some odd reason, they like schooling in odd numbers. I've never experienced it, but have read it many times. People claim that if they put six in the tank, the smallest will be "culled" by the other five and then everything is happy, happy, happy. Also, six-line wrasse will get pretty territorial. Mine has been a terror at times, having killed a bunch of shrimp and a purple firefish. I added a coral beauty and that seemed to calm him down. I guess he figured he wasn't quite the bad ass he thought he was! Some people never have problems with their six-line, but it seems to be more common than not. I tried catching mine several times but he just wouldn't go into the trap. I finally gave up but since I added the coral beauty it has calmed down like I said.

[eric the red]

I actually had 5 chromis altogether. I already had 1 before I added the 4 more. Thats what was so crazy about the six line being so aggressive. He didnt mind the first one that was in there. But after I added 4 more his temperament quickly changed. He was trying to attack all 5 of them. I thought about adding another fish that was bigger to make him chill such as a flame angel. But I think Im going to try to catch the six line with a trap. Hopefully mine will be dumb enough to go in the trap. Then trade him in for a watchman goby.

[eric the red]

I wasnt able to catch the wrasse with a trap. I added 3 bangaii cardinal fish to see how the wrasse would react since these fish are bigger than the wrasse. It seems the wrasse has bowed down to these new additions.

[eric the red]

Just fed my tank some frozen food. My yellow tang straight demolished the majority of the food. I think PAC-MAN is a suitable name for this beast.

[brianjoy81]

That is the name of my yellow tang!

[eric the red]

I wonder if that is a common name for a yellow tang. Today I tested my cal and alk. Cal was 460 and alk was 10. I think I'm going to take a sample up to gerwins to see how accurate my test is.

[Xfactor1315]

what kit are you using?

[eric the red]

API test kit

[eric the red]

Im seriously thinking about getting some leds. Does anyone have any suggestions on the best bang for my buck?

[Shadow1]

I have Radions the originals are on sale while supplies last, Gerwin has 3 or 4 different ones set up in the shop I suggest go and look for yourself. Also Scott Allen has some for sale look him up at Allen Hundai (sp)