Andy Macro
Community Member
- Joined
- Apr 6, 2020
- Messages
- 71
- Reaction score
- 270
I've always been fascinated about planted tanks and it took me some years to get serious about it, get all the right equipment until I managed to get my nano tank looking great. Somewhere along the lines I discovered some posts about marine planted tanks which was a total surprise. The weird colors and shapes of the macroalgea gave an otherworldly look that fed my sci-fi nerd self.
Anyway I finally decided in the beginning of the year to buy the materials and start the tank. I live in the mountains of Panama (over 2000 meters/ 6,500 feet above sea level) so I am really far from the ocean. When I got everything ready I decided to try my luck visiting a friend's house in the Caribbean I told my friends it was to relax on the beach but in reality it was to see if there was any macros. I has already talked to all the LFS and they made it clear that they didnt have any Macros and that they weren't planning on importing any. So that day there were strong ocean currents and we couldn't go swimming but luckily for me the waves brought dozens of macroalgea cuttings to the shore. I just grabbed all I could and hoped for the best.
All in all, all the cuttings are still alive and growing. I counted over 23 species of macros. I am still trying to figure out how to balance the system so that they can grow without promoting dinoflagellates. (any suggestions are welcomed). I got a couple of soft coral to support the LFS and add some texture.
My setup is:
Anyway I finally decided in the beginning of the year to buy the materials and start the tank. I live in the mountains of Panama (over 2000 meters/ 6,500 feet above sea level) so I am really far from the ocean. When I got everything ready I decided to try my luck visiting a friend's house in the Caribbean I told my friends it was to relax on the beach but in reality it was to see if there was any macros. I has already talked to all the LFS and they made it clear that they didnt have any Macros and that they weren't planning on importing any. So that day there were strong ocean currents and we couldn't go swimming but luckily for me the waves brought dozens of macroalgea cuttings to the shore. I just grabbed all I could and hoped for the best.
All in all, all the cuttings are still alive and growing. I counted over 23 species of macros. I am still trying to figure out how to balance the system so that they can grow without promoting dinoflagellates. (any suggestions are welcomed). I got a couple of soft coral to support the LFS and add some texture.
My setup is:
- Twinstar lamp for both tanks (just made it more distant to decrease the intensity, had 12 hours of light, decreased it to 8 and it seems to be working)
- Coralife marine filter with skimmer (run the skimmer at night only)
- OSMOLATOR NANO AUTO TOP OFF
- Temperature at 78F
- Small Wavemaker constant
- 7 Gallon Tank
- Dosing .07 ppm Nitrate, .04 ppm ammonia, .01 ppm phosphate and some fish food every other day.
