Chapter 1 The start of an addiction

[TanksEveryWhere]

I have been having some issues w/ my system for a little while now, and have decided that starting at the beginning might be better than starting in the middle of this tanks life. So we start w/ where this tank came from.

Back some time ago when I live in central Oregon I had a fresh water set up, but was not satisfied or challenged by it. While in Petco one day I asked the guy running the fish department what it would take for saltwater fish to be happy in my 55gal. He assured me that it wasn't possible, because saltwater fish were highly territorial and needed a much bigger tank. He said I would only be able to keep 1 or 2fish in my current tank. So I decided to wait on that idea.

A few years later and a move I took the plunge and found myself another 55gal figuring 1 or 2 fish would be a start. So I picked up my new tank and went to my local petco for fish. Greeted w/ a very small selection of fish to choose from google and I went searching for a specialized saltwater store. What we found was mind blowing as I had never seen corals outside my public aquarium. In that moment if you had asked me what a fish was I wouldn't have known.

So I went about the proses of gathering reef equipment, skimmers and proper lighting and everything else needed.
My first tank


My very first coral


And later today chapter 2

[MizTanks]

Welcome to CR @TanksEveryWhere !! Thank you for choosing CR to share your new found addiction with Your in good company that's for sure. Looking forward to reading more about your system and hopefully we can help with those issues that you mentioned.

[TanksEveryWhere]

Welcome to CR @TanksEveryWhere !! Thank you for choosing CR to share your new found addiction with Your in good company that's for sure. Looking forward to reading more about your system and hopefully we can help with those issues that you mentioned.

Thank you, my tank is completely different than the one in the picture now, but we'll get there in a bit.

[TanksEveryWhere]

Armed w/ a new skimmer and some T-5 lighting, I proceeded to gather info on my new found passion. Little did I know that petco and my LFS did not have my tanks best interest at heart. Petco was clueless and the LFS said nothing about the cycle taking close to a month and made it sound as though I could add many fish right away, which they than sold me .

A tribute to the fallen!


This guy died due to old age




As this thread progresses you will see the improved camera skills happen before your very eyes.

Not far into this I get fed up w/ fish dieing, oddly enough the corals that I had been collecting were doing great.
Because I like pics, here is some of that first stock list

Yes I paid for GPS




And 1 I still have today


W/ 4 year update


I stopped buying fish and got on my pc to start reading. Now as we all know, when you google anything reef tank related more forums pop up than anything else. Even the forums were some what tiresome to read (a lot of off topic stuff in between), they were a big improvement to info obtained from the store. After a few months I joined one and than found a local club.
My knowledge increased as did my coral selection and my tank improved as did the mortality rate of my fish.

The perfect clowns next.

[TanksEveryWhere]

Now with no excuse due to unlimited information and help through google and the forums, my tank started very slowly to resemble a reef. I went to local meetings where the local club gave me more suitable corals for my reef. I learned to work my way up to the challenging corals and fish.








I decided clowns were part of the hobby and I should have a nice pair, w/ a nem to host. After some time looking at different clowns as there are many to choose from, and doing a lot of reading on different nems, I decided on a pair of onyx pers and a BTA. I added another pair of T-5's and excepted an offered up GBTA to host my future clowns. Still have the BTA, which I love, though not very green is always healthy it seems and has never gone walking around my tank.



W/ my new nem happy in the tank I kept an ear out for my clowns, and soon enough the ones I had pictured came a long. I found a pair of captive bred onyx that had laid perfect fry and waited for the offspring to be old enough to ship.





I am happy to report that these 2 as intended laid their first clutch a couple months ago and are currently awaiting their breeding tank to be finished.

[TanksEveryWhere]

After an extended stay in QT, due to size concerns the clowns finally moved into the big tank. It was soon after that the decision was made to move. As no one likes moving a tank, less so the bigger the tank gets, I thought it best to put my live stock in a smaller set up for the move. I down sized a month in advance and sold off my 55, keeping the equipment that would be needed later to up grade again. I have to say, that I was much happier w/ the 20long I moved things into. It was much fuller looking than the big tank had been.

This is what I ended up w/, and out grew way to quickly.


And some close ups, as the tank was doing great despite the lack of room and water volume





But like everything else, this systems life had to end as it just was not big enough to hold the picture in my head, so a few months after the move I started thinking bigger tank.

And here's what happened



And guess what I did the plumbing this time (so proud of myself)....hope there's no leaks.


The finished home


Which will bring us to the next entry....where did I go wrong?

[TanksEveryWhere]

So if I have learned anything in the 3 1/2 years I have been at this, it's that there is always an exception to the rule and nothing is guaranteed. I would love to say that in the time I've been at this I know everything, or that I at least know more than the rest of you, ha ha ha. Just when I thought I knew something, the rules changed. I have chalked up any success I have had to dumb luck and enough knowledge to spot a problem. As a 40B set up this tank has been running for a year and a half. As a system it has been doing well for over 3 years. I have gone from T-5 lighting to T-5 + halide and than just halide. I have up graded the skimmer, and added more LR. For quite some time I could throw a dying coral in this system only to watch it recover and thrive in record breaking time. I had some success w/ sps coral, watching them grow week to week and color up in colors that blew my mind.

It has felt lately like there is one problem after another, and I have become leary of making any changes big or small.

All problems seem to have started about the time I moved my hippo tang to the bigger system. He moved and the algae moved in, than summer hit. Summer and the change to halides happened about the same time, leaving temps hitting 85 on a daily bases. I blame the tang for getting bigger and high temps for the algae explosion. So I start dosing MB7 and am still doing so w/ results as small as those results are. About to start w/ the carbon.

So due to some inpatients I get a sea hare, hopping it will make manual remove go a little quicker. It died in my tank, creating mass amounts of cycno.

I have been doing 40% wc weekly, and did 2 the first week after the hare had died. Siphoned the sand bed, and this seems to have handled the cycno, but things still aren't right.

Help me get to chapter 6, my perfect reef!!