Fjord Reef's Waterbox Cube 20

[FjordReef]

3 MONTH UPDATE

Chemistry:
Temp 78F / 25.5C
pH 8.0
Ammonia 0
Nitrite 0
Nitrate 0
Phosphate 0
Calcium 360
Alkalinity 7.5

Not too much has changed. I lost the teal candy cane and the other one still doesn't look great. I'm finding myself slightly bored with the aquascape so I think I'll be changing it up soon, but it will definitely have to wait since I'm planning a cross-country move right now and I'll have to tear everything down anyways. I love the clowns but they hide all the time because they're so shy. I feel like I have a Cleaner Shrimp and coral tank for the most part.

I'm getting great growth out of the Cespitularia, Waving Hand and GSP (of course). The toadstool is very moody; sometimes standing straight up, sometimes laying flat all closed up, sometimes in between. The Gorgonian seems good minus some tissue loss due to shading.

I've switched to the Saxby light schedule with reduced white. I was running the BRS AB+ before and it seemed to be upsetting my Toadstool and Sinularia.

Here are 3 month update pics:

Top-down

Gorg

Spaghetti Sponge under this shroom?

Moody Toadstool but getting better polyp extension with the switch from AB+ to Saxby

Beautiful Violet Cespitularia - one of my all time faves. Always has new polyps growing.

FTS

Have a good one

 

[Gedxin]

Tank is looking nice and healthy! Amazing the zero diatoms. Are you siphoning the sand?

Also no concerns with the zero nitrate and zero phosphate? My corals seemed to get angry when I bottomed out.

 

[FjordReef]

Tank is looking nice and healthy! Amazing the zero diatoms. Are you siphoning the sand?

Also no concerns with the zero nitrate and zero phosphate? My corals seemed to get angry when I bottomed out.

I siphoned the sand yesterday. I've settled into an about 2 week water change cycle, and by the end of the two weeks, there is definitely accumulation of algae on the sand and rocks. But nothing out of the norm for a newer tank. And yes, I'm concerned with the nutrient situation because I've seen what I believe to be the beginnings of dinos. I took out the skimmer and have been feeding extremely heavily. The numbers haven't moved at all, so not sure. I'm not really wanting to start dosing anything lol

 

[FjordReef]

Tank is looking nice and healthy! Amazing the zero diatoms. Are you siphoning the sand?

Also no concerns with the zero nitrate and zero phosphate? My corals seemed to get angry when I bottomed out.

That being said, the corals don't seem to care too much about the zeros haha

 

[mudjawd]

Hey. Nice tank. Interesting to see that you are doing water change once in 2 weeks. I was doing weekly changes and trying now to move to a once in two week schedule.

hiw do you get zero nitrates and phosphates?

 

[FjordReef]

Hey. Nice tank. Interesting to see that you are doing water change once in 2 weeks. I was doing weekly changes and trying now to move to a once in two week schedule.

hiw do you get zero nitrates and phosphates?

I can only guess that the small bioload as well as the corals and algae are using those nutrients before they show on a test? I don't really know too much about how all that really works so I could be wrong. I'm not running any GFO or any sort of nutrient export at all. In the rear sump area it's just a filter sock, carbon and bioballs. That's it lol

 

[FjordReef]

4 MONTH UPDATE

Chemistry:
Temp 75.6F / 24.2C (big temperature swing because temperature probe was out of water - )
pH 8.0
Ammonia 0
Nitrite 0
Nitrate 0
Phosphate 0
Calcium 410
Alkalinity 9.5

Slightly late with my 4 month update, but here it is nonetheless! Some big changes. I sent the Skunk Clowns to a local breeder, which was sad for me to do but they were just hiding all the time and I needed to consolidate down to one aquarium since I'll be travelling for work constantly. So I moved everything from the 10g JBJ I had to this tank. The updated stock list for the Waterbox are as follows:

2x Standard Captive Bred Ocellaris Clownfish
2x Skunk Cleaner Shrimp
Ultra Green Sinularia
Kenya Tree
Candy Cane
Tiger Acans
White Polyp Toadstool Leather
Red Sea Pom Pom Xenia (multiple frags throughout aquarium)
Blue Centre Green Star Polyps (1 frag on upper arch)
Green Star Polyps (back wall)
3 different types of Zoanthids (can't remember names and can't find receipt lol)
Green Tip Torch
Frogspawn
Orange Branching Hammer (recently split into two heads from one)
Many assorted mushrooms (disco and other, most hiding under shadowed part of rocks; lost the red disco)
Yellow Tip Clove Polyps
Mandarin Clove Polyps
Orange Spiny Gorgonian
Grube's Gorgonian
Purple Ribbon Gorgonian
Waving Hand Anthelia
Violet Cespitularia

I really like having the standard clowns in this tank now, they are so lively and have amazing personality and great colouration against everything else.

I've also changed my lighting schedule (again, yes tsk tsk lol) and things look so great now with excellent polyp extension for more of the day.

I'm going to perform a water change today and see how the parameters are when I get back from my next trip. I'm considering starting Kalkwasser dosing via ATO to avoid the Calcium and Alkalinity swings I've been seeing between water changes.

Enjoy some updated photos!

One of the two Skunk Cleaner Shrimp. It's fun watching them interact.

I loved this super close view of the GSP on the back wall. One of my absolute favourite corals.

Loving the colour on these zoas. And they came with a clam haha!

Full tank shot. I pushed the rock scape back closer to the wall and elevated it with another rock underneath.

Happy reefing!

 

[FjordReef]

5 MONTH UPDATE

October certainly flew by since I've been back to work. It was also the first month my reef basically had to coast on its own since I was gone for work so much. The 5 gallon ATO and Eheim autofeeder were lifesavers! Yay for automation. I performed a water change yesterday. Nutrients still not showing on tests, but I changed a bucket of water because my calcium and alkalinity dropped a bit over the course of the month. I tested before I left for a nearly 2 week work trip, right before water change and 12 hours after water change. The numbers are slightly surprising to me.

Before work trip parameters:
TEMP 78.2F / 25.7C
SALINITY 34.3
PH 8.0
AMMONIA 0
NITRITE 0
NITRATE 0
PHOSPHATE 0
CALCIUM 430
DKH 9.5

Immediately before water change parameters (after several weeks without water change)
TEMP 77.7F / 25.4C
SALINITY 34.7
PH 8.0
AMMONIA 0
NITRITE 0
NITRATE 0
PHOSPHATE 0
CALCIUM 360
DKH 7.5

12 hours after water change
TEMP 78.0F / 25.5C
SALINITY 34.6
PH 8.0
AMMONIA 0
NITRITE 0
NITRATE 0
PHOSPHATE 0
CALCIUM 360 (why no change in calcium? it's always returned almost to normal for me after water change)
DKH 8.0 (very slight increase in DKH, usually gets back up to 9.0)

I will see how the numbers change after my next work trip of two weeks. Most likely will start dosing kalkwasser in ATO.

Fish and shrimp are happy. Most corals are happy. 1 zoa frag isn't too happy. Some Xenia frags thriving, others not so much. Overall a sweet little reef. I brought back the wave maker to clear out the dead spot behind the rock. Nothing wrong with having a lot more flow. Have a couple spots of cyano forming but nothing too bad. Letting it ride. Reduced feeding schedule slightly.

Just a few pics for this update! Happy reefing!