Jesse_Emel's Oceanic Biocube 29 Gallon

[Jesse_emel]

Livestock Update

I took some pictures with my Iphone5 which actually turned out pretty good. Went to Iamjosh's house and rescued a few coral frags form my old tank.

Here is the Acan and the new yellow zoo in the background to the Left, Can you see the sexy shrimp?.....

And the Blasto is making a recovery.....

Grabbed some Hammer Coral Heads you can see they are pretty stretched out and were under very low light for awhile.....

Mushrooms that have never split or grown, can't figure these guys out but they are also recovering and coloring up.....

You can also see the bristle worm cleaning up the tank.

Some more Hammer Heads and you can see the bigger of the 2 clown goby's in the background and the new fighting conch.....

The smaller clown goby came out to see what i was snapping pictures of.....

And the Catalina Goby is still alive and well.....

And an encrusting stony coral showing some polyp extension now.....

The only thing missing right now is the Yellow Striped Cleaner Goby. I think he is in the heater compartment where i can't reach him under a plastic grate piece. Every once in awhile I see him swim around in there. I think he may be to fat from eating all the tiger pods, amphipods and copepods I have put in the tank and can't fit back through the overflow grate.

 

[MGDMIRAGE]

I'd run the tank 75-76 for that catalina, their lifespan shortens at higher temperatures.

 

[chickenofthesea]

Awesome setup. I just purchased a bc14 and will probably taking some cues from your mods, although I will be doing custom Cree 3up LEDs but I love the media basket. Do they make it for the 14g? I live in Hawaii so I'm excited to see what I can catch and keep in my new tank. I'll be following along.

 

[Jesse_emel]

Awesome setup. I just purchased a bc14 and will probably taking some cues from your mods, although I will be doing custom Cree 3up LEDs but I love the media basket. Do they make it for the 14g? I live in Hawaii so I'm excited to see what I can catch and keep in my new tank. I'll be following along.

Looks like they do almost everything for the BC14, check them out here.....

BioCube 14

Good Luck with the build. Aloha!

 

[Jesse_emel]

Mystery Baby Crab

Cranked up my MP10 in the BC29 the clean off the orcks for a second and found this guy floating around in the water. So I netted him and took a few quick pictures. Can anyone tell me what he is?

He's so cute I shall name him squishy and he will be my squishy

 

[blk822822]

When it was wet in the first pic it looked like a zoa spider. But the last pic its green and more crab shaped and not so much like the zoa spiders.

Heres a zoa spider

 

[IPisces]

He's so cute I shall name him squishy and he will be my squishy

Oh my gosh its so cute. Hopefully its a good crab.

 

[Jesse_emel]

Mystery Algae

Can anyone identify this form of algae? and also how do i get rid of it? I tried scrubbing it with a toothbrush and it's very well attached and difficult to remove. I actually have to pinch them off with my fingers to get the whole thing. I'm worried scrubbing them off actually will spread them.

 

[IPisces]

That is actually a good macro algae. Its Neomeris annulata. I'd love to have that in my tank.

 

[chickenofthesea]

Im not sure but I think it looks kinda cool. Maybe an emerald crab would help get rid of it if it bothers you.

 

[Jesse_emel]

That is actually a good macro algae. Its Neomeris annulata. I'd love to have that in my tank.

Well feel free to come and take as much as you want, before it takes over my tank. HaHa

 

[Jesse_emel]

Im not sure but I think it looks kinda cool. Maybe an emerald crab would help get rid of it if it bothers you.

I have 2 emerald crabs who are currently dining on the hair algae but don't seem to pick at this stuff yet. You can see some of it is turning white at the base. Perhaps if i keep my water clean it might die off. I'm worried when i start mounting corals to the live rock it might take over and choke out expensive corals.

 

[Jesse_emel]

I just don't want my tank to end up looking like this.....

 

[estanoche]

haha well not much will eat it - its a calciferous algae.... John had quite a bit in his tank too and we couldn't find anything that would readily eat it unfortunately.... lower calcium levels might starve it out though?

 

[Jesse_emel]

haha well not much will eat it - its a calciferous algae.... John had quite a bit in his tank too and we couldn't find anything that would readily eat it unfortunately.... lower calcium levels might starve it out though?

I agree nothing in my tank currently touches it. I spend about 1/2 hour scrubbing with a toothbrush and removing the ones i could grab with my hands. I did as much as I could before my arm cramped up and my back started to hurt. It looks much better but still have more to get.

 

[Jesse_emel]

Couple of updates:

About a week ago I treated for red slime. I grabbed as many frags as I could from my old tank before iamjosh sold the tank and they were all covered with red slime. I did a fair bit of scrubbing 1st and then treated. Water change a few days later and the red slime appears to be gone for now.

I started using Kent Marine Phosphate Sponge in a media bag in my refugium basket and it has greatly reduced the existence of my green hair algae. The tail spot blenny, unchin and fighting conch seem to be taking care of the rest. So the tank looks much better.

I also treated this AM with Flatworm Exit. I have to say i derived some joy while sucking out the dead lifeless bodies of the dead flat worms. It's been about 1.5 hours since I started the process and the tank seems to be clear right now of those nasty little creatures. The livestock seems to be un-affected from the treatment. I'm also running a small bag of carbon right now as per the instructions. Hopefully I can take some picture soon once the tank settles from the water change during the treatment.

 

[Jesse_emel]

Looks like there are a few surviving small brown flat worms. We will be re-treating the tank this weekend and hopefully killing the rest of them. I hope these things will die this time.

 

[mrturritos]

Flat worms..... oh man aren't they a pain! I had to do a 10 gallon water change with air line tubing sucking out as many of those little bastards as I could.

 

[Jesse_emel]

Flat worms..... oh man aren't they a pain! I had to do a 10 gallon water change with air line tubing sucking out as many of those little bastards as I could.

Agreed, and I use some refrigerator ice maker line which slows the siphon even slower for maximum flat worm disposal. it takes awhile but is totally worth it. Round 2 this weekend. Ding Ding!

 

[Jesse_emel]

Flat worm treatment #2 is complete. I could tell there were not as many as last time but still a pretty healthy population of those little reddish/brown planaria. The whole treatment including siphoning for about an hour with a small piece of refrigerator line, water change, clean BC29 filter and replace with a new one, added a bag of activated carbon to a high flow area in the media chamber. I then did a good glass scrubbing and cleaned the skimmer. I hope tomorrow when i arrive to check up on the tank it will be crystal clear and free of flat worms. I hope to take some pictures tomorrow as well.