Blaxsun's Abyss: Red Sea 750XXL

[Daniel@R2R]

June 9. Once More Unto The Breech
It's long overdue for "fishing". Added three new additions to the tank (all happy as three peas in a pod). From left to right: green mandarin dragonet (female), sunrise dottyback and talbot damselfish. This officially brings me to 51 (current) fish. Still have no idea where my sixline and canary coris wrasse ended up or how a 3" racoon butterflyfish just disappears... I don't have any predators and there are much smaller fish present...

Update: Naturally, the sunshine dottyback (Sunny) found one of the elaborate cave systems one of the sapphire damsels had meticulously tunnelled out. The female (Ryuna) and male (Ryuu) dragonets of course found each other and the male has decided that "yes, you'll do" (so they're now inseparable). No sign of the talbot damsel but a few of the smaller fish (not damsels, ironically) were chasing him around - so he's probably found a spot to hole up in. Hopefully tomorrow he'll be accepted into the fold!


Have you ever seen three fish this happy?

Cool!!

 

[blaxsun]

June 23. The Last Ride of Bonnie and Clyde
Well, it had to happen at some point. After amassing something like 25+ kills (mostly other clownfish), Bonnie (an ocelaris clownfish) finally picked a fight with a bigger (tougher) fish. I don't know which one specifically, but I suspect it was the foxface (as he had a slight injury on his side). At the very least, it doesn't look as though she went down without a fight!



I acquired "Bonnie and Clyde" about 2.5 years ago from a friend who "had enough of them" after they killed off all the other clownfish in his system. So they came with the full disclaimer/reputation of bonafide killers. They started out with a third clownfish ("Dillinger"), but killed him off within 6 months after all three moved into the new Abyss tank. In addition to the one ocellaris clownfish they also killed off a black bar chromis that decided to take up residence (and refused to move) near their anemone. So those are the two "official" kills I know of (plus the aforementioned 2 dozen or so other clownfish).

About 6 months ago Bonnie somehow injured her eye and despite our best (albeit limited) medicinal efforts, lost it. Though this didn't really seem to slow her down or deter her in the least. A few days ago we noticed that she was no longer hanging out in her anemone and refusing to eat. Closer examination showed that someone had ripped/shredded her dorsal fin, so she was struggling a bit. A day later she was having trouble swimming and the next morning we found her remains floating on the bottom.

So long Bonnie - and thanks for the memories! Addendum: I don't know if we'll try and replace her with another female (it would have to be a larger one). Clyde was always the 'follower' in her escapades anyway.


Bonnie and Clyde in happier times (never straying far from their anemone).

 

[blaxsun]

June 27. Do Two Roys Make a Right?
We've been missing our Royal Gramma considerably, so when our LFS got some new fat ones in we decided to add another "Roy" (this one we're calling "Trigger").


Here's Trigger acclimating behind another ubiquitous obstacle (another plug for the green colander!)

 

[blaxsun]

June 28. Christmas In June
Every now and then my LFS gets in some Christmas rock replete with feather dusters and other marine denizens. I've had this one on hold for the past few weeks and finally decided to 'pull the plug' on it (little frag humor attempt). This medium-sized rock came with about two dozen blue, green, yellow and reddish feathers. I've placed it between the acro (left) and the condy anemone (so hopefully this place it in an odd spot that stifles any curiosity and potential nipping).


Apologies for the 'less than stellar' image (the lamarck's angelfish was photobombing me). After only a few minutes you can see a half dozen feathers that have come out already. So far so good - no "explorers"!

 

[blaxsun]

July 1. Custom "TheAbyss" Radion Template
I've now made my custom EcoTech Radion G5 Blue template available. Scroll to the end of the post and follow the instructions to save/import into Mobius. Enjoy!

 

[blaxsun]

July 2. "They Mostly Come at Night... Mostly"

Why is it all the really interesting tank activity happens at night... when the lights are out?


The fleet of nassarius snails emerges from their slumber... (3 of around 100+ pictured here). Notice one leg of the bristle banded starfish creeping out from a rock upper right corner.


That's where all my cool feather dusters are! Guess there are too many fish spooking them during the day... (neon tube anemone in the background)

 

[blaxsun]

July 7. Working in a Coal Mine...
Time to add some fish that work for a living...! Snagged a nice cleaner wrasse with a yellow band that runs down the top, a really nice sixline wrasse for pest control, another black banded starfish (this makes five with Inky, Winky, Dinky, Pinky and Slinky) and a nearly naked clownfish to keep "Clyde" happy (although Clyde will probably regress to a female (or so I'm told), so we've decided to name this new pair "Hansel" and "Gretel"). Assuming Clyde's violent past is behind him...

Addendum: "Squeaky" the cleaner wrasse found an unoccupied barnacle, curled up and went to sleep; "Nikki" the sixline wrasse immediately went on patrol somewhere; "Hansel" is sticking to the corner of the tank for now (I don't think he even realizes there's another clownfish); "Slinky"the black banded starfish is slowly circumnavigating the rocks for an ideal haunt.

Tip: Easy way to tell the difference between ocellaris and percula clownfish is that percula clownfish have an orange eye with a smaller black pupil whereas ocellaris have an all-black eye.


No one wants to cuddle up with the "Slinky" the starfish, lol.

 

[Mschmidt]

Love the names.

 

[blaxsun]

July 8. Fish. Love. Barnacles
Just over 3 years ago I invested in a pair of these barnacle clusters you can pickup at your LFS or on Amazon (~$25). I placed one in each of my (at the time) IM Fusion 25-gallon tanks. They were an immediate hit and have been since. At any given time I have between 3-5 fish occupying the individual barnacles. Some of the more flexible ones curl up inside; the larger ones will actually dive in and then quickly twist around so that their head is poking out.


Dollar for dollar, the best investment for your blenny, dottyback, etc.

In barnacle #1, my midas blenny and two of my lyretail chromis each occupy three of the open barnacles (roughly 40% vacancy). In barnacle #2, another one of my lyretail chromis and the new cleaner wrasse each occupy an open barnacle (roughly 60% vacancy). At any given time one or more "renters" will also briefly occupy one or more spots - although many of the permanent "tenants" enjoy having multiple residences (since some of them are interconnected or accessible through more than one opening).

 

[blaxsun]

July 9. Poor Beaker
Ah, my poor quoy's parrotfish Beaker. I'd forgotten how much cleaner wrasses took a liking to him. He has *not* been a fan of cleaner wrasses in the past - although this one seems less aggressive than the last one. Squeaky (the cleaner wrasse) has really taken a fondness to him - so there must be something he finds interesting. Beaker is actually (for the most part) letting Squeaky clean his sides - he's just about as patient as our Australian cattle dog when it comes to 'grooming'.

Parrotfish can move fast when properly motivated! lol

We wanted another cleaner wrasse to provide exfoliation for the fish and it never ceases to amaze me how quickly these fish resort to their basic instincts even when transferred to an entirely new tank.

Addendum: While I was writing this we observed Beaker hovering in place (standing on his tail near the surface) and letting Squeaky clean all over his sides. This is the first time we've actually seen Beaker do this for any cleaner wrasse, so it's encouraging!

 

[blaxsun]

July 10. Reef Achievements
Just a bit of tongue-in-cheek humour... These were my reef achievements this weekend (almost got bonus points for actually catching the christmass wrasse before he hit the floor).

Feel free to share your own suggestions!

 

[saltienewb]

Jan 13. The Abyss: Waving With ReefWaves


Addendum Mar 2/23: The maximum flow rate of each ReefWave45 is 3,960Gph, so this works out to the following flow multipliers based on the display size of 160 gallons. 60% is just too much and whips the corals around way too much, so this is in line with the 10-20x tank volume for supplemental flow I stick with.
• 20% = 1,584 Gph (10x flow rate) .......... • 30% = 2,376 Gph (15x flow rate)
• 40% = 3,168 Gph (20x flow rate) .......... • 50% = 3,960 Gph (25 flow rate)

So finally picked up a second 25.
Display tank is 65 gallon, 3 ft wide.
3960 gph total.
20% would be 792 gph, or around 12.2x flow
25% would be 990 gph or 15.2x flow.
Should I start with those?
Thanks for the schedule. Very helpful.

 

[blaxsun]

So finally picked up a second 25.
Display tank is 65 gallon, 3 ft wide.
3960 gph total.
20% would be 792 gph, or around 12.2x flow
25% would be 990 gph or 15.2x flow.
Should I start with those?
Thanks for the schedule. Very helpful.

Yes, I'd start with 10-20% on both and see how the flow is. I like to slowly ramp the flow up during the day until peaking at midday - so you can probably even run 20-30% at the high point (since it will only be for a few hours).

 

[Jhillreef]

Jan 13. The Abyss: Radiating With Radions
I see this question come up often enough that I thought I'd post my EcoTech Radion G5 XR15/XR30 schedule here. This is based off the default "radiance" template included in Mobius with the addition of an actual functional moonlight schedule (which for whatever reason still hasn't been corrected).

These settings have not been touched/adjusted in well over a year - and my corals seem to like them. Using either the RMS arm or rail mounts, with a similar light configuration you can reasonably expect PAR ranges similar to mine (more if you don't use diffusers; about the same if you run straight G6 Radions and slightly less if you run G6 Radions with diffusers). Note that the pair of XR30s provide quite a bit more "kick" than the pair of XR15s (as noted with the PAR reading at the water surface).

July 1. Addendum: Importing TheAbyss Template
If you'd like to import this template, click on the following link and rename the .txt file with an .mob extension. To import into Mobius, select Lighting » Templates » User Tab » (+) Icon - and then choose the "TheAbyss" file. Enjoy!

Do you have a picture of the schedule in Mobius ?

 

[Jhillreef]

Jan 13. The Abyss: Radiating With Radions
I see this question come up often enough that I thought I'd post my EcoTech Radion G5 XR15/XR30 schedule here. This is based off the default "radiance" template included in Mobius with the addition of an actual functional moonlight schedule (which for whatever reason still hasn't been corrected).

These settings have not been touched/adjusted in well over a year - and my corals seem to like them. Using either the RMS arm or rail mounts, with a similar light configuration you can reasonably expect PAR ranges similar to mine (more if you don't use diffusers; about the same if you run straight G6 Radions and slightly less if you run G6 Radions with diffusers). Note that the pair of XR30s provide quite a bit more "kick" than the pair of XR15s (as noted with the PAR reading at the water surface).

July 1. Addendum: Importing TheAbyss Template
If you'd like to import this template, click on the following link and rename the .txt file with an .mob extension. To import into Mobius, select Lighting » Templates » User Tab » (+) Icon - and then choose the "TheAbyss" file. Enjoy!

Do you have a picture of the schedule in Mobius you can upload ?

 

[blaxsun]

Do you have a picture of the schedule in Mobius you can upload ?

Yes, if you jump to the first page of my build thread you'll find a link to my Radion schedule details.

 

[blaxsun]

July 11. PSA: Clean Your Gate Valve
Red Sea recommends cleaning this every few months; I left it 2+ years (oops)... Be forewarned - clicking on the following thumbnails increases the icky factor significantly!


This is the inside of the gate valve after the cover was removed. Props to Red Sea for designing the cover such that it can only go back on one way (ensuring you can return it to your prior settings). There was so much buildup that I ended up having to adjust it anyway.


And this is the backside of the gate valve cover. And yes, it really did look like an omlet when I took it out. I ended up using a disposable electric toothbrush to scrape off all the detritus, buildup, etc. There was also a tremendous amount of crap that blew back into the tank as well (most likely from everything in the pipes draining back into the pump chamber and then being blasted back out again). I rarely turn the pumps off (instead preferring to throttle them down) so this is probably something I need to do more frequently.

 

[blaxsun]

July 12. No F's to Give
I've been having a bad run with fish this week. We found the sixline dead under some rocks (no damage whatsoever) and both the royal gramma and nearly naked clownfish have disappeared. An exhaustive search both inside the tank and out turned up nothing. Par for the course... The only survivor from the last batch is our cleaner wrasse who's decided that my arms need some 'defoliation' whenever I'm doing tank maintenance.

So having really missed our flame hawkfish (but finding none available), we opted for the next best choice - a falco hawkfish (which has been getting along with his tank mates at my LFS). The wild caught ones that my LFS has been bringing in all seem to have a really great temperament, so here's hoping. And we don't have any shrimp or small fish for him to harass, and the crabs can hold their own. At the very least, this is a fish that won't be hard to find and has basically zero F's to give.


We're calling him James. James Falco. James has decided that this particular rock structure is now his domain. <60 seconds, which has to be a new tank record in terms of establishing territory...

 

[blaxsun]

July 17. Reef Achievements (weekly)
A somewhat uneventful week. James the falco hawkfish has been a welcome addition to the tank. It's really cool how the back of their eyelids are bright orange - so when you're looking down from on top it looks like this ominous pair of orange eyes are staring right back at you...

I've stopped dosing NOPOX on a daily basis as I found I was just getting far too much algae growth on the glass. Eliminating it from my daily regiment allowed me to stay on top of my glass scraping (and other tasks) for the first time in months. Work smarter - not harder, I always say (more time to enjoy the fish!)

 

[blaxsun]

July 21. Thar Be Snails!... (again) And an Angelfish
Another day, another reef addition. Restocking some cleaning crew (1" trochus snails) and adding another dwarf angelfish (my LFS got another Eibli in that had really nice markings). Here's hoping he gets along with the rest of the "pack"...

Addendum: Well, that was quick! The new dwarf angelfish already mapped out the tank and found the other two dwarf angelfish. The three of them were all 'fluttering' happily together in the main cave where the coral beauty hangs out most of the time. And now the Eibli is hanging out with the Midnight together. Guess we'll see what day brings, but they all seem to be getting along swimmingly...


Trochus seem to do the best in my tank with the ability to self-right. Even still, I need to find the largest ones I can...


This is "King Kong", our massive trochus snail measuring 3" across. That's one big slug! (just compare to the regular-sized one in the foreground that's a foot closer)


We're calling the new dwarf angelfish "Idris" ("Idris Eibli"). This one has a lot of energy! He's been circling around while acclimating blowing bubbles and spitting water...