Adalius's Biocube 29

[adalius]

So I added a smaller blue/pink watchman goby. Probably the last fish I'll be putting in there as it's a small tank. I also got a single thick stalk of xenia with the intent of it growing. Made more sense than spending a buttload for a full rock of the stuff when I can get the same with a little patience.

Unfortunately, I think I may be losing one of my occy clowns. He's been chilling at the top of the tank all day for a couple days now, he looks skinny and isn't eating. I've tried two types of sinking pellets, frozen spirulina/brine shrimp/etc, that new Instant Ocean gel food (cyclops), and flakes. He doesn't seem to want to eat anything.

I'm going to try a water change tomorrow. All my tests are indicating that the water is in good shape but I keep reading that they might not eat if there's water problems, so it can't hurt.

[adalius]

And as predicted, my wife just called and said the one clown is dead. I keep thinking it had to be something with him specifically because I can't find any indication of it being diseased or a water quality problem.

[Sir Patrick]

Sorry to hear about your clown....

I noticed a bit of a film on your water surface. You might want to break that up with some flow/water movement. Disolved oxygen levels could have lead to stress for the clown- but just a thought.

[adalius]

The film comes and goes, the pump has a hydor flo rotator on it so when it points up the surface is almost like a fountain shooting up out of the water, luckily not high enough to hit my splash guard. But there's also a trickle filter in the back of these units so I'd like to think that's going to offset the issue and pump a bit of oxygen in to the water.

I'm thinking of springing for a O2 test kit to see if that might be the issue as I'm at a loss otherwise. Nothing else seems to be distressed at all.

[MizTanks]

I'm thinking it was just the fish. Wouldn't do anything to your tank if everything tests out good. Iv got the 8g biocube with hydro flow and never had an issue with o2.

[adalius]

So, it's been awhile since I posted in this thread. Just to keep my thread up to date, I've since added a 4.36W light upgrade from nanotuners.com, a media basket & fuge basket from mediabaskets.com / InTank. Started running chaeto with a 10W submersible halogen light in the fuge basket. Started running purigen and phoslock in the media chambers. Setup a new RO/DI unit in the basement with a storage setup with a heater/airstone/powerhead for mixing my salt.

After losing one clown I bought another, did the usual dips and whatnot. Lost that one after 3 weeks as well. I think the other clown had gotten big enough that it was bullying it at night, but they acted like married couple during the day so I'm not really sure.

I've been pulling my hair out doing 50% water changes to try and get all the silicates out of the tank as I was fighting diatoms, they're finally now going away slowly and being replaced by dinos. I threw an emerald crab in today to start mowing the GHA and started a tank blackout to hopefully starve all the dinos out. The only light in the tank anywhere is in the fuge for the chaeto for the next 3 days. I'll continue the blackout for longer if need be.

So yea, there's your monthly update!

[cg5071]

I didnt think about the other clown. I have had the same thing happen to me and decided that had to be it. One (a second) occy wasnt in terrific shape but was dead within a few days of getting it. The replacement one for that was really healthy and was interacting with the other and everything. Between 3pm when I fed it lunch and 5pm when I happened to check the tank again, It was dead. I felt so bad,lol for putting the last one in there afterwords.

Now that she is bigger, I am looking for a tiny bf for her and hope for the best.

[ReeferRob]

So, it's been awhile since I posted in this thread.

No kidding, what's up with that? Let's see some tank!

[adalius]

*wipes dust off things* I'll try and post some pics this weekend if things settle down. Goby & clownfish are doing really well, hair algae is still present but not growing at an alarming rate, chaeto is growing like a weed, zoas & palys are spreading like wildfire, unidentified coral that was too small to ID is now a good 3" round clump and getting big, the other kenya tree looking corals are getting big but not spreading anywhere, trumpet coral almost died, it shrunk down to two pinhead sized pieces but now is one pinhead sized and one quarter sized piece.

Also, the diatom/dinos are completely gone after doing the blackout period several months ago. They haven't returned once.

So, yea that's about the gist of it. Like I said, pics to follow.

[Sir Patrick]

Looking forward to pics!