phillyko
New Member
Evo 13.5 Mixed Reef - My first saltwater experience
Hi everyone! I'm new to this forum and wanted to share my first saltwater
aquarium. I will try to make this detailed so other beginners can follow along on the journey.
The first 5 photos are of the aquarium as it stands in Feb 2024!
Current Equipment
- Nicrew Hyperreef 50W (100% Blues, 33% white. 10h photoperiod)
- No-name brand heater
- Fluval CP1 Powerhead
- Stock pump with dual outlet (Filter floss, carbon, purigen, bio gems)
- Digiten ATO
- Kamoer Single Doser (3mL AFR daily)
- Azure Damsel
- Bangaii Cardinal
- Lawnmower Blenny (I think?)
- Wyoming White Clownfish
- Trochus and astrea snails
- Blue legged hermits
Coral
- Torch (Dragon soul, indo gold, indo joker, green)
- Hammer (Gold, orange, pink, bicolor splatter)
- Florida Riccordea
- Brown bounce mushroom (?)
- Trachy
- Pulsing xenia
- Raja Rampage
- Blue goni
- Kryptonite candy cane
- Red Bowerbanki
- Assorted acans
- Toadstool
- Kenya tree
- Neon Green Duncan
- Green cup coral
- Red monti
- Starburst monti
- Monti digitata (Forest fire and blue)
- Hellfire milli
- Rainbow loom
- Milka stylo
- Green staghorn
Start-up (Aug/23)
After keeping freshwater aquariums for 10 years-ish, with a big interest in high tech planted aquariums, I found myself very intrigued by the prospect of maintaining coral. When I started this hobby, I was maybe 12 or 13 years old and saltwater always seemed like a very daunting task, especially with the budget that comes with being that young. Now that I've built up the husbandry skills and have an expanded budget (very important), I decided I wanted to try my hand at reef-keeping. I don't have a photo of the tank when I first bought it but I ended up finding an Evo 13.5 off facebook marketplace for 100 CAD so I picked it up and it was all set up the same day.
I set up the tank with all the gravel and live rock the previous owner had used which did not stay completely wet since he had taken the tank down. This was my first mistake. All the detritus and dying bacteria got kicked up and now I was in another cycle. I definitely would have gone with completely new substrate at least if I restarted lol.
At this point I was running all stock equipment and a jebao powerhead the previous owner gave me.
First Corals (Aug/23)
So I let the tank cycle again and after
about a month the ammonia and nitrites were back down and I thought I was ready to try some coral. So I went to a local hobbyist and got the kryptonite candycane and the pink hammer (he gave me the monti cap for free). I put them in the tank and to my knowledge all the parameters were good. The corals didn't open immediately but that is to be expected so I left to go camping the next day without much thought. Two days after placing them in the tank, I got a picture from my brother and the pink hammer was extremely retracted and in the end died off completely.When I got back home, I tested my water and everything seemed fine until I got to the salinity. I had calibrated my refractometer wrong so what I thought was 35 ppt was actually 25 ppt. The second photo shows my dead hammer and monti. It was actually taken quite a while after I corrected the salinity so you can see how puffy the candycane is at that point.
I spent about 2 weeks slowly correcting the salinity by doing 10% PWCs every day which honestly I'm not sure had much benefit over just doing a massive water change. This debacle frustrated me quite a bit as it was my own mistake but I was still determined to continue with this project.
First Fish(es) (Sept/23)
After I got the salinity back in order I was slightly thrown off the coral still so I went with a pair of clowns from a local hobbyist! I got one mocha misbar clown and a black clown. They acclimated to the environment well but annoyingly started hosting my powerhead. Honestly nothing really happened at this point and I was happy with where they were at. They were eating pellets and frozen.
Finally...more coral and the ugly stage (Sept/23)
A month after my first coral incident, I finally decided to get more coral. I didn't take many photos but I bought three "waves" of corals. You can also see the tank was going through an ugly stage for sure. I just stayed diligent with water changes and clearing the algae. Eventually, it disappeared. I also added a CUC of trochus snails and blue legged hermits which helped out a lot.
At this point I exchanged the powerhead for the fluval CP1 as I found the jebao was making far too much flow.
All the coral in this photo have stayed with me to now
New Light (October/23)
I started wondering what the corals would look like in more blue lighting so I decided to upgrade the light to the Nicrew here. I was a big fan of how illuminated the corals were and it wasn't too expensive either. I would say it was a very worthwhile upgrade.
All the corals were doing quite well (in my eyes) and the fish were really happy too! Algae was starting to clear up at this point.
RIP Clowns
A couple weeks after this photo, both the clowns started developing a really thick slime coat and died shortly after. I suspected brooks but I didn't have access to any sort of medication. Sad moment.
New Rockwork (November/23)
I wasn't a fan of how the rock layout was and now that the clowns weren't there anymore, I decided to make new rockwork. I used epoxy and superglue to construct the structures out of marco rock and went with a dual island layout.
You can also see at this point I added a lot of new coral from candy corals! Including my first more expensive coral (the indo gold torch).
I also tried a really janky temporary lid which I eventually replaced with egg crate.
New fish and corals! (Dec/23)
At this point, I was feeling more confident with the coral and started slowly adding a bunch of new stuff including my first easier SPS (monti digi). I waited a couple months after the death of my last clown and added a new clown. After that one showed good signs for a couple weeks, I slowly added the other fish over the next month.
Further SPS Ventures (Jan/24)
At this point I was feeling a lot more comfortable in with reef-keeping and started dosing all-for-reef to maintain mineral levels as they were dropping quite a bit through the week. I also wanted to try more SPS so I grabbed some new stuff during boxing day
...and that brings us to current day!
Takeaways for fellow beginners:- Be ready to learn a lot
- You can take this journey fast or slow but there is a minimum amount of patience you need
- If you are an experienced freshwater hobbyist, be ready to be humbled
- Reefs can take as much or as little money as you want
- Be diligent and consistent with your husbandry
- Online resources are your best friend (forums, FB groups etc.)
- Do it right the first time! I regret not changing the substrate to sand earlier.
- When something looks wrong, TEST THE WATER
- You will make mistakes. Learn from them and become a better hobbyist.
I hope this short writeup helps some beginners or provides some entertainment for people. Let me know if you have questions in the comments! Also why is formatting on here so hard lol.
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