Blaxsun's Abyss: Red Sea 750XXL

[i cant think]

June 7. Back to the Future
I was taking pictures today with the new camera and thought I'd post an updated shot of the tank. For comparison I'm also including the previous FTS, which was taken a bit later in the day as opposed to the new one (so more of the blues are in-play on the older image). I've had a bit of a recession with the bright red zoanthid colony just to the left. There are three other zoanthids taking hold and a bubbletip anemone that's decided to roost in a few different spots, so it will be interesting to look back again in 6-12 months and see what else has changed.

View attachment 2700542

This is the new lighting configuration I went with. I was going to tweak it further but the corals are actually doing really, really well - especially the SPS and LPS - so I'm probably going to leave it. GSP has been going nuts, so if you compare the colonies between shots there's been incredible growth on some.

View attachment 2700541

You can see 32 out of 42 fish in this image. Our marine betta ("Beta") actually came out for a cameo (just sticking out along the back right behind the zoanthid covered rock). We even have a name for the rock - "Mount Doom", because two hermit crabs we named "Frodo" and "Sam" would routinely climb atop it when we had it in the other tank. "Midas" our blenny is of course in his barnacle and the others are off on patrol within the rock structure. Feeding time is a guaranteed head count!

That lubbocki looks like it’s a nice size, gotta try get some close ups of him!

 

[blaxsun]

I love the look of Spiny Sea Cucumbers but man their care scares me. How “easy” is he to keep?

Honestly, Absalom was been super easy to keep. After acclimating him I placed in the upper center rock formation and then he slithered over to his new permanent home within a few days. He's been there every since (about 6 months now). He just filters scraps so he's probably on par with the tube anemones in terms of upkeep (ie: essentially none).

 

[i cant think]

Honestly, Absalom was been super easy to keep. After acclimating him I placed in the upper center rock formation and then he slithered over to his new permanent home within a few days. He's been there every since (about 6 months now). He just filters scraps so he's probably on par with the tube anemones in terms of upkeep (ie: essentially none).

I’d love to attempt one but with my luck I’d end up nuking my tank somehow

 

[blaxsun]

That lubbocki looks like it’s a nice size, gotta try get some close ups of him!

I've maybe had him for just over a month now I think? He was a good size when I first snagged him but I think he's grown about 25% since then. He's one of my wife's favorite wrasses now along with the blue star leopard wrasse we added a few weeks ago.

 

[blaxsun]

I’d love to attempt one but with my luck I’d end up nuking my tank somehow

I think the whole "nuke" aspect is overblown. I've had tiger tails just wither away and die in a 25-gallon with no ill effects, so the whole "toxic" aspect seems to be a really rare occurence.

Absalom and the other black sea cucumbers that reside in my tank (including "Turdeau", "No.2" and "Mini Me") generally do their own thing and keep to themselves (and are pretty much left alone by the other reef inhabitants).

One of my black sea cucumbers was grazing on my large trochus snail while still attached to a rock, and when the snail decided to ascend up the rock face he stretched the poor cumber out until he finally let go - so they're fairly resilient in that sense.

Both types of sea cucumbers are an invaluable part of my cleanup crew (the black sea cucumbers literally keep the sand surface sparkly white 24/7).

 

[Susan Edwards]

I think the whole "nuke" aspect is overblown. I've had tiger tails just wither away and die in a 25-gallon with no ill effects, so the whole "toxic" aspect seems to be a really rare occurence.

Absalom and the other black sea cucumbers that reside in my tank (including "Turdeau", "No.2" and "Mini Me") generally do their own thing and keep to themselves (and are pretty much left alone by the other reef inhabitants).

One of my black sea cucumbers was grazing on my large trochus snail while still attached to a rock, and when the snail decided to ascend up the rock face he stretched the poor cumber out until he finally let go - so they're fairly resilient in that sense.

Both types of sea cucumbers are an invaluable part of my cleanup crew (the black sea cucumbers literally keep the sand surface sparkly white 24/7).

How did you acclimate your cucumbers

 

[blaxsun]

How did you acclimate your cucumbers

I use the IM drip acclimation tool with a small white container and let them acclimate for approximately 40-45min.

 

[blaxsun]

June 9. PAR...fect?
As part of my Neptune setup I'm running the PMK PAR kit. In one of the conversations with @Sean Clark he mentioned that his PMK sensor was not returning results close to what they should be, so it naturally perked my curiosity. And having handy access to a Apogee MQ-210 PAR meter, I thought - why not see... So I took some PAR measurements at 3pm which is approximately 10% from the peak lighting during the day (somewhere between 1-2pm).

Yikes! Well, on the plus side - I'm actually getting a lot more PAR than I realized - which is actually a good thing. On the downside, my Neptune PAR sensor is under-reporting by probably 50% or more - so I need to take that into consideration in the future (and the sensor cover was just cleaned a few days ago so these are pretty much optimal test conditions). I'll have to put a support ticket into Neptune to see what my options are as there's no option in Fusion to tweak the calibration.

Red = taken just below the surface, directly under each light
White = taken primarily in the middle of the tank
Black = taken around the front edges of the tank
Blue = taken at specific locations in the tank, typically towards the back
Orange = the Neptune PAR sensor (hidden in a rock)

Note that the Neptune sensor does test higher than 100 - towards the water surface it actually reports numbers between 450-500 PAR (which is fairly close), so I'm not sure why there's more discrepancy the lower it's placed in the tank. During the day my Neptune PAR sensor reports a high of 125, so I estimated that based on height and location most of my LPS were in the 125 to 150-ish range with the SPS at least 175 and up. So I was probably off 25-50 PAR based on my estimates, which isn't too terribly bad.

 

[Sean Clark]

June 9. PAR...fect?
As part of my Neptune setup I'm running the PMK PAR kit. In one of the conversations with @Sean Clark he mentioned that his PMK sensor was not returning results close to what they should be, so it naturally perked my curiosity. And having handy access to a Apogee MQ-210 PAR meter, I thought - why not see... So I took some PAR measurements at 3pm which is approximately 10% from the peak lighting during the day (somewhere between 1-2pm).

View attachment 2701797

Yikes! Well, on the plus side - I'm actually getting a lot more PAR than I realized - which is actually a good thing. On the downside, my Neptune PAR sensor is under-reporting by probably 50% or more - so I need to take that into consideration in the future (and the sensor cover was just cleaned a few days ago so these are pretty much optimal test conditions). I'll have to put a support ticket into Neptune to see what my options are as there's no option in Fusion to tweak the calibration.

Red = taken just below the surface, directly under each light
White = taken primarily in the middle of the tank
Black = taken around the front edges of the tank
Blue = taken at specific locations in the tank, typically towards the back
Orange = the Neptune PAR sensor (hidden in a rock)

Note that the Neptune sensor does test higher than 100 - towards the water surface it actually reports numbers between 450-500 PAR (which is fairly close), so I'm not sure why there's more discrepancy the lower it's placed in the tank. During the day my Neptune PAR sensor reports a high of 125, so I estimated that based on height and location most of my LPS were in the 125 to 150-ish range with the SPS at least 175 and up. So I was probably off 25-50 PAR based on my estimates, which isn't too terribly bad.

This doesn't sound like yours is off like mine is. My PMK is reporting 50 where the MQ-510 shows 150 and that is pretty consistent. PMK shows 150 and the MQ-510 shows 450.

 

[Susan Edwards]

I use the IM drip acclimation tool with a small white container and let them acclimate for approximately 40-45min.

cool. I did about an hour. Was reading people dripped for 2-6 hrs or more!

 

[Susan Edwards]

Wow on the par comparisons. I didn't use the rock as I can't get it to stay in the rock. I'll try again after I buy or build a base with a stick/handle. Maybe I can glue plastic to the algae scraper to hold it at a 45 degree angle. Interesting!

 

[N1tew0lf1212]

This tank is seriously goals man for myself. Everything is looking amazing....

 

[blaxsun]

This doesn't sound like yours is off like mine is. My PMK is reporting 50 where the MQ-510 shows 150 and that is pretty consistent. PMK shows 150 and the MQ-510 shows 450.

It's weird - at the surface the Neptune sensor PAR readings are really close. Everywhere else the sensor readings are probably off between 25-75 PAR. I'm going to inquire if there's a hidden dev menu with some additional settings for the probe.

 

[blaxsun]

Wow on the par comparisons. I didn't use the rock as I can't get it to stay in the rock. I'll try again after I buy or build a base with a stick/handle. Maybe I can glue plastic to the algae scraper to hold it at a 45 degree angle. Interesting!

The sensor fits into the hole in the rock and there's a notch for the cord to slot into. If you can't place it on a relatively flat surface the sensor tends to fall out. And for whatever reason snails and crabs love eyeballing this thing - so all those "spikes" are critter transits...

 

[blaxsun]

This tank is seriously goals man for myself. Everything is looking amazing....

Thanks! I think the addition of another half dozen to dozen corals and I'll be really happy to just let nature take its course...

 

[Susan Edwards]

The sensor fits into the hole in the rock and there's a notch for the cord to slot into. If you can't place it on a relatively flat surface the sensor tends to fall out. And for whatever reason snails and crabs love eyeballing this thing - so all those "spikes" are critter transits...

Yeah, there is a screw there but I can't figure out how to make it tight to even use it on a flat surface. I think if I can add a piece to this so the par eye faces upward it might work better

 

[blaxsun]

Yeah, there is a screw there but I can't figure out how to make it tight to even use it on a flat surface. I think if I can add a piece to this so the par eye faces upward it might work better

This is the Neptune probe, yes? There should be an artificial rock with a hole that accompanied it? You just take the screw off, remove the cover from the probe and insert it into the rock like this.

 

[Susan Edwards]

This is the Neptune probe, yes? There should be a rock a hole that accompanied it?

There is but I don't use it. I can't get it to stay and a lot of my rockscape are spires with coral on them so no place to set the rock. Maybe if I was putting it on the sand and leaving it for a couple hours. I'll play with it again. I don't plan to just leave it in the tank so I thought a handle where I could just take readings would work better.

 

[Sean Clark]

It's weird - at the surface the Neptune sensor PAR readings are really close. Everywhere else the sensor readings are probably off between 25-75 PAR. I'm going to inquire if there's a hidden dev menu with some additional settings for the probe.

There is the ability to adjust the range but I would not attempt it without a solid reference to compare to.

 

[blaxsun]

There is but I don't use it. I can't get it to stay and a lot of my rockscape are spires with coral on them so no place to set the rock. Maybe if I was putting it on the sand and leaving it for a couple hours. I'll play with it again. I don't plan to just leave it in the tank so I thought a handle where I could just take readings would work better.

Apogee has a want that comes with their probes (that's where the screw comes in). I suspect you can probably source it separately.