Hello Reef, nice to meet ya

[IceNein]

Hello everyone. This here is going to be my build thread. I received my Hello Reef kit on Wednesday the 21st, and I have everything set up and the cycle has begun.

Standard Hello Reef equipment
12” AI Blade Grow (using the Hello Reef settings)
Sicce Voyager nano wave maker
50 Watt eheim heater.

The rocks are not currently in the “final rockscape” because I ordered the Pico package from TBS. My thoughts are that this will be enough live rock and sand to get this party started. But I have the rocks in there anyway so I can get the tank cycling. The current estimate for the shipment from TBS is 9/11. I’m very excited!

After I get the TBS shipment, I plan to buy some pods and some phyto to kick the diversity up a notch.

I’m not sure what my “stocking list” is quite yet, but I do know it involves a tailspot blenny. I was maybe thinking a purple firefish, tailspot blenny and clown goby. At any rate I plan on adding fish slowly, maybe a fish a month, with the shyest members first.

I had originally thought to go the BTA/clownfish route, but I’ve seen how big those BTA can get, and I think one large one would take over the whole tank.

For corals I will start with maybe some shrooms, leathers and zoas and go from there, see what works.

Any advice is welcome.

 

[Flameback Pair]

@IceNein great plans you have!!! You will cut your cycle time in half by using the ocean seasoned rock. Good luck.

- Mitchell.

 

[Gumbies R Us]

Following along! I can't wait to see what it will look like once you get livestock in there!

 

[IceNein]

A couple of updates, for cataloging purposes. I ended up getting an ATO because having to fill the return section every morning got old real quick. You could probably go two days without topping off, probably. I wasn’t too going to push my luck.

I bought the Reef Breeders 2023 model ATO. Works great. I have it connected to a 7 gallon Wally World jug that sits under the desk. Currently I appear to be evaporating around a gallon and a half a week. I am running my AC, so that’s probably pulling water out of the air.

I broke down some of the purple fake rock, because the pieces they gave me were too big for what I envisioned my scape to end up being.

This is what my tank looked like afterwards.

 

[IceNein]

I received my @LiverockRocks ”Pico Package” treasure chest yesterday. Unfortunately I was working so the box was put inside and I had to wait until I got back from work.

The Pico Package includes 3 lbs live sand, 3 lbs base rock, 3 lbs premium rock, 2 hermits, ane 2 astrea snails.

Well, the ladies must’ve felt nice because they threw in an extra hermit. Thanks!

I was a little concerned because I didn’t see the snails, but they were included in one of the rock bags.

I removed my fake live rock and removed about a third to half of the Fiji pink sand. I felt I had too much in addition to the live sand. I put the fake rock in, unpacked the base rock, put that in, unpacked the premium rock, put that in, and then I acclimated the animals and put them in.

The rocks are still in a pile on the bottom. Don’t worry, that’s not my idea of a scape. I’m just going to let everything cook for a little bit before I pick the right pieces and make a “real” scape.

The tank was cloudy as heck, and it was getting late, so I went to bed, but here’s the situation after the dust settled this afternoon.

 

[IceNein]

I’ve been having a lot of fun today finding all the neat hitchhikers, like this coral and very active barnacle.

There’s about three colonies of that coral that I’ve found so far. A yellow one, pictured, a red one with four or five polyps and a bright green one with one or two.

When I was rearranging the rocks to put their best sides up, a little brittle star crawled under one of the coral colonies.

There was also some sort of snail that was in the sand. I fear he may be predatory, but let’s just pretend he’s a nassarius for now, because I have no idea where he is.

There’s also some caulerpa that I’m trying to decide whether or not to destroy. It’s living for now, maybe I’ll come to regret that.

 

[IceNein]

Oh, I did some water tests with the API test kit I got for cycling, and total Ammonia appeared to be between 0.5 ppm ish, Nitrite was 0.25 ppm, and Nitrate was in the vicinity of 10 ppm, so I did a 2 gallon water change.

I bought some crab pellets for my little dudes, and I have some sinking seaweed Hikari pellets that I was imagining the snails might want. Honestly, there's enough detritus on the rocks to feed the two snails and three crabs, so everyone seems to be doing fine. I'll still probably throw in a pellet or two every day or so just in case.

I really like my little crabs, I've watched them for way way longer than I would have imagined. Must be getting addled in my old age.

 

[parclife]

Cool set up!

 

[LiverockRocks]

I’ve been having a lot of fun today finding all the neat hitchhikers, like this coral and very active barnacle.

There’s about three colonies of that coral that I’ve found so far. A yellow one, pictured, a red one with four or five polyps and a bright green one with one or two.

When I was rearranging the rocks to put their best sides up, a little brittle star crawled under one of the coral colonies.

There was also some sort of snail that was in the sand. I fear he may be predatory, but let’s just pretend he’s a nassarius for now, because I have no idea where he is.

There’s also some caulerpa that I’m trying to decide whether or not to destroy. It’s living for now, maybe I’ll come to regret that.

Howdy,

Glad everything arrived safely.

If it's on the glass, most likely a predatory whelk, get it out.

Love Caulerpa. It looks great, aids water quality, provides nutrition and is easily manageable. Regarding our macros, Hurricane Debby did her best to blow them off the farm. However, the rock is seeded with multiple types of lovely macro (I see some red on your nano) that will sprout given there are no herbivores (fish/crabs) yumming it up first.

Regarding the small corals, we are thrilled to see how quickly Florida corals start growing on planted live rock. To date, every coral on the farm (that we have seen) are non-endangered native corals. That being said, Mote Marine reached out to us looking for corals that grow on the TBS farm to be included in their International Coral Gene Bank operation. We were ecstatic to contribute 16 corals that will be well cared for and studied.
Starlet Coral
Star Coral - brown
Star Coral - green
Oculina Coral
Tube Coral

Thanks for purchasing a Treasure Chest.

 

[IceNein]

Yesterday I received some pods and some phyto. I introduced the pods and dosed the phyto.

Craziest thing. Sounds incredible, but I think I have a fish hiker. The rock is still hanging out in a disorganized pile, and a couple of times I have seen what appears to be a fry come out of the pile, swim around for a bit and then go back to its little hide. The thing is small, maybe the size of a grain of rice, I can't really get a good look at it, except that it appears whitish. I thought it might be a pod, but it is swimming around in a pretty fish like way.

I know very young fish need constant food, so I'm doubting myself about this, but I am going to keep my eye out and see what I can see.

 

[IceNein]

Well, lots of action in the old reef, and I have been bad about updating.

I finally set up a rockscape and let it sit for a couple of weeks, went out to the LFS and bought two more hermits, two trochus snails, and five nassarius snails. I was just following the Hello Reef guide, but honestly I feel like the nassarius that I got were just too much. They're probably an inch and a half long each, and frankly I feel like my sand bed is a little crowded down there.

Since I don't have much in the way of fish (I'll get to that later), I have been dumping in maybe a small marble size bit of shrimp from the supermarket in their for them and the hermits to chow on when I go to bed, and then I have been pulling it out when I wake up, if any is left. The nutrients in the tank don't seem to be getting out of hand, nitrates approximately 10ppm by API.

After letting that sit for a couple of weeks, I decided that it was time to get some coral, so I went back to the LFS and picked up a frag of blue hornets, and they had a tailspot blenny that I couldn't say no to, so now I got a fish too.

I had originally thought to add a couple of clowns later, but I've grown so fond of the tailspot that I don't want to buy any fish that's gonna bully him. So maybe a firefish or something and then call it a day.

I did go out to get more corals from the other LFS, and I got this nice neon green toadstool, but their prices seemed too high for me, and their tanks were kinda rough, so I doubt I will be going back to them. They did have several pretty good looking BTAs though, better than the nicer cheaper store, so if I choose to get one, I probably will go back to them.