70+ Gallon Mixed Reef

[xBakerx]

Ready to finally start a thread for my 70+ gallon reef tank that I've had up for about 8 months now at the new location. I am the second owner of the tank that was originally built by a LFS. The first owner had it up for about 6 months and had the LFS doing maintenance on it but the had little to no coral in it when we picked it up. I set it up and had it running for about 5 months with some of the same rock plus a few dry pieces and sand that I added to run its course. We had a move so I transferred the tank by removing all the rock and water down to the sand bed and reset it at the new location. Its gone through algae, cyano, and dinos up to this point. I've gotten it to the point were the parameters are pretty stable except for the new addition of iodine dosing and testing. Iodine is at the level I wanted it at after testing today and my Alk and CA is stabilized by Kalkwasser. Most corals added are doing well except for some older SPS frags that didn't pull though. I believe that this thread will be helpful in figuring out any future issues I may run into and give others a baseline of the tank. I recently did an ICP test, which I will post up in a day or so, that I would like feedback on to figure out why I am having trouble with Hard Corals in the tank. I appreciate everyone who took the time out to read this. The following is everything that is in the tank at this moment that I can think of.

Fish:
-Tominni Tang
-Blue Hippo Tang
-Mocha Storm Clownfish
-Six Line Wrasse
-Bangi Cardinals (x2)
-Sunburst Anthia

Inverts/CUC:
-Emerald Crab
-Small Hermit crabs (4)
-Nissarias Snails (10)
-Turbo Snails (6)
-Nerite Snails (2)
-Astrea Snails (3)
-Sand Sifting Star
-Yellow Sea Cucumber
-Pin Cushion Urchin

Corals:
-Frogspawn
-Pink Hammer Coral
-Blue Goniopora
-Branching Green Star Polyp
-Firework Clove Polyp
-Devil's Hand Leather Coral
-Nirvana Zoanthid
-Punk Rocker Zoanthid
-Sunny D Zoanthid
-Red People Eater Zoathid
-Jason Fox butt Krak Zoanthid (Grow Out Frag)
-Forest Fire Digi
-Bonsi Acro Frag (Added 1/24/22)
-Shortcake Tenuis Frag (Added 1/24/22)
-Unknown Acro Frag (Added 1/24/22)

Tank:
-28 1/2" x 22 1/2" x 23" Rimmed Cube Tank
-Rear internal overflow
-Custom made stand and canopy

Sump: 20 Gallon High tank converted to sump.

Filtration:
-Filter Pad in Overflow Section on Drilled PVC Pipe
-Filter Floss in Sump
-Bubble Mag C6 Skimmer

Other Equipment:
-Apex CORE Return Pump (set to ~30%)
-Small Sicce Powerhead For sump water flow
-Older style MP40 Powerheads (x2 set to ~20%)
-AI Hydra 26 LED Lights (x2)
-Inkbird Temp controller for Eheim Heater
-Tunze ATO (Kalwasser added to fresh water)
-Spectra Pure 90 GPD 4 Stage Spectra Pure RODI Unit
-Computer fan built in to move air from canopy

Maintenance:
-10-15% W.C. Weekly **** RED SEA Blue Bucket Salt ****
- Light syphon through sand every other W.C
- Change Filter Floss/Pad Weekly
- Skimmer cleaned weekly
- Flipper Scraper for Film Algae on glass

Current Parameters tested today:
SG- 1.026
ALK- 9.0 dkH
PO4- 0.08
No3- 14ppm
CA- 450ppm
MG- 1380ppm
Iodine- 0.06

Pictures and ICP test results to come...
Happy Reefing!

 

[blaxsun]

Looking forward to pictures!

 

[xBakerx]

Well the tank was doing great until I got busy with work. Within the last time I posted I lost a few fish and a couple of corals but I'm ready to get back into it. My approach within the last year has really been hands off and the tank was doing decent. I think I did a water change every 4 months or so for about the last year. Specific acros were never happy, but on the other side I also seen some growth out of coral that I've never seen before. Despite the few corals that dis grow I had a bad hair algae issue and an issue with blue plops taking over the tank. I decided to do some maintenance a few weeks back and decided to syphon out the sand bed in one section of my tank, and also add some RoaPhos. Hair algae was manually removed but I could see cyanobacteria building up in certain parts of the tank. No worries though It no longer bugs me to see It as long as the tank is moving alone in the right direction. Today I did a 23 gallon water change and syphoning of about 35% of the sand. It looks the cleanest I've seen it in a long time but I know the uglies are coming. Im logging all this today because I would really like a spot to keep all of my information going forward. 2.12.23

The tanks Alkalinity & Calcium is being kept stable with kalkwasser being added through my ATO.

Fish:
-Mocha Storm Clownfish
-Six Line Wrasse
-Bangi Cardinals (x2)

Inverts/CUC:
-Emerald Crab
-Small Hermit Crabs (x4)
-Turbo Snails (4)
-Nerite Snails (1)
-Astrea Snails (3)
-Nassarius Snails (5)
-Sand Sifting Star
-Pin Cushion Urchin

Lighting:
-24" T5 Aquatic Life Fixture. 2 Coral Blue Plus & 2 Atinic bulbs
-360w-e Kessel

Tank Parameters:
SG- 1.026
ALK- 8.6 dkH (2/9/23)
PO4- 0.07
No3- 16.8 ppm
CA- 460 ppm
MG- 1280 ppm

Tank Evaporates about 4.2 gallons every 1 week.
Replenish with 5 gallons mixed with 3 spoons or kalkwasser.