Reefer 200XL No More: Maddie's Lagoon Transformation

design.maddie · Feb 26, 2023

Let's close out February with a plus. It has been fun messing with all the testing constantly and monitoring everything so closely. The slight stresses of having a tank can be good sometimes. I am glad it seems to be back to smooth sailing again.

I bought a new Duncan not too long ago. Fella seems to be doing nicely. It makes me want two more variants of Duncans.

This is one of my family favorites. We call it a scroll coral but I honestly never really looked into what it was because I put it here as a tiny tiny triangle cut and now it is the size of my palm a couple years in. Very difficult coral to get a photo of. You can also see at the very front of the rim underneath there is a pup coral growing. Really interesting to watch it grow.

This was my first coral in this tank. This colony will be 3 years old next month or next couple months? Is that correct? Dang! That is correct. Larger than most apples.

This acan (micromussa?) is still looking this coloration. Might have shifted colors a bit after a move a couple months ago. Oh well, if this is it's new color then I will be okay.

All my parameters are in check. Phosphates still running undetectable most days. Alk/Cal/Mag are all back in check and sitting right in the golden zones. I have started dosing Acropower with each feeding. Not much, about 1.5-2.5 ml. I had to make a new batch of All-for-Reef this week. That was the last bit of the powder. After using the product nearly 3 years, I will be ordering more. I need to purchase a scraper or some blades to give the inside of the glass a good once over.

I want to touch briefly on the scooter blenny/flatworms. The scooter blenny is chunky and happy. The flatworms have become a chore to find one. The scooter is a voracious eater during feeding.

design.maddie · Feb 27, 2023

Night time shot, this is only lunar LEDs, I pulled away as much of the blue as I could.

design.maddie · Mar 8, 2023

It a BABY coral! I bought some Prime Reef Frozen and nothing would touch it. It was such a fine particle most of the fish didn't even look at it. The Blue Chromis nipped at it some. I have been told that the end goal is to have all your fish to feed on Mysis shrimp. I figured I would give it another try. The last time I bought some the shrimp were big enough for me to consider throwing it in a gumbo. It took a few feedings but they are all now readily eating that and seemed upset when they get anything else now. The Cardinalfish is the most snooty about it and won't come to the front of the tank if it isn't Mysis.

design.maddie · Mar 22, 2023

I have swapped over to a 20k light spectrum. I am going to try it out for the summer. I adjusted the flow a bit, I wanted to try and achieve a more dispersed flow up top so I moved one pump up a few inches and moved it to the overflow wall.

Time to relearn how to edit photos taken in 20k. 4 species of Coral, 1 invert and 2 fish.

Morning feeding.

design.maddie · Apr 6, 2023

Sometimes when your tank seems to be struggling there is always that one coral that thrives. Here they are, in no particular order.

Do you ever move a coral 1-2cm and it just blossoms?

The lights have been running at that 23k and making it difficult to capture video and photos. I do my best to present to you the most accurate pictures that I can to what my eyes see.

I want to tear my tank down and rebuild the rock work and start from frags of the encrusting corals and replug the others. Order all new dry rock and start fresh.

design.maddie · Apr 24, 2023

I have been having some issues with my ReefLED 90. Some days, it wouldn't turn on. Other days it wouldn't turn off. Then the days it did turn on, the dusk/dawn cycles would be strobe lights. It was driving me bonkers. I had reset the light every way that I could think of. Holding the button, unplugging a certain amount of time, leaving it unplugged for a certain amount of time. Everything. I had enough.

I recall reading months back that if you really REALLY need to reset one of these babies you have to remove a battery from inside.

Turns out there isn't much to look at, but if you ask me everything looks really rad.

As you could imagine, the amount of joy that overwhelmed me when I saw that little battery inside.

This is the way.

design.maddie · Apr 25, 2023

FYI Removing the Battery did not help. Last night during Dusk it started strobing again. This is very upsetting, I have epilepsy so strobing lights are a no-go. Get this will cost me ~$600+.

design.maddie · May 1, 2023

I am back to removing NP-Bacto from my setup. I stopped using it again about 2 weeks back now and my algae "Problem" went away almost over night. The same thing that happened last time. I don't really understand what is causing this, I can't feed any less. Or could I? I am feeding the tiniest of pinches twice a day.

Tank is started to snap back into a better place now though and waiting for everything to clear up/settle down. I want to do a water change now, would be my first major water change since I moved into this apartment about 8 months ago. I feel ashamed of the lack of water changes but at the same time, I am kinda proud that I am still running fine without it. I will say that NOT doing the water changes has kept me and the tank on edge way more than me just changing the water out ever few weeks. Mix some saltwater ever 14-21 days or stress over the balancing act of not.

The fish have been doing great.

I thought this cutie was a female when I bought them. Ha! Showed me.

design.maddie · Jun 9, 2023

I have swapped back to old school ways of water changes. Stopped worrying about NP-Bacto for now and trying to flush the system over the next few months. 20% water changes every week. I will still be running All-for-Reef but at a very low dosage. That is the plan at least. I'm about 3 weeks in now and everything seems to be doing great. As you would expect, I had a few large bacteria blooms after pulling NP-Bacto off the system. There are actually still some blooms, but I don't mind them much. When they are gone, I know that the system is refreshed.

I ended up pulling 85% of the algae from the Refuge (over the course of two weeks). I couldn't tell what was dying from lack of Nutes and what was still alive. As I started pulling it out the better the display began to look. I just wish I could figure out what is going on with my scroll coral. The polyps have been sucked in for weeks now. It is my favorite corals, and I am dreading to see tissue decay. It does look close to that line of starting to die.

I do want to add one bit of info about the Scooter Blenny, they are now eating pellet food. New Life Spectrum 'Marine Fish' to be exact.

design.maddie · Jun 15, 2023

I have been waiting weeks to tell you all about this. I had something printed for the tank!! OMG I can't tell you how excited I was to even send the request in. I have a close friend opening a "Maker Shop" and I sent him a request not knowing if or when they would be able to get around to it. They had my order done so fast and shipped out to me before I knew it.

I ended up ordering 4 of them because I like backups. Simple as that.

The quality is up to my needs, and I am enjoying looking at how the printer works just through looking at the parts.

Was a perfect fit for the OG parts.

I am so excited about attempting to make a type of Kcup for carbon (GFO rarely). I have all the carbon I need. I think my main thought process is super glue and fleece batting.

design.maddie · Jun 18, 2023

I have been trying to capture some good footage of my clownfish for what seems like months. I noticed it doing this little dance in the front of my Tunze Rock. Grabbed the camera and started filming. Hope you enjoy this little fella.

design.maddie · Jun 20, 2023

I don't have an update. All I have is this morning stretches of my coral. You should react to this post since it is just this coral alone holding your attention.

design.maddie · Jun 24, 2023

So my ReefLED died today. There are no longer functioning blue LEDs. I woke up this morning to the LEDs registered as "Out of Service". I went through and soft reset everything. Nothing. I went and removed from app, took 3 attempts. Nothing. I went and hard reset and then ran into issues getting it to reconnect. FINALLLY I was able to log everything back into the app and start setting everything back up. The app is really great at getting you up and running quickly. That is when I noticed the real issue. I have no blue spectrum. I went in the app and put it to just the blues. Nothing. F#$%!

I figure it is time to finally contact Red Sea and start discussing what needs to be done to get the lights back and running again. I really want to stop worrying about if my lights will turn on every day. Whatever the part they suggest I will most likely purchase on the spot and get it heading this way.

Expect a walkthrough on how to replace either a circuit board or LED array soon.

FINGERS CROSSED I won't have to buy a new light fixture.

design.maddie · Jul 2, 2023

Let me get the update on the lights out of the way. I contacted Red Sea and explained everything as thoroughly as I could. I even was open about the steps I had previously taken. They responded very quickly and informed me that my light fixtures were now 3 years old and beyond their warranty. Within 24 hours I was contacted again by Red Sea and was explained what the most likely culprit was. A battery power brick has gone bad. They were extremely helpful and sent a replacement free of charge. While I am still waiting on the parts to arrive the tank is still doing, meh. The corals look unhappy but not exactly melting yet. I cannot have that part in fast enough. I have been debating on the acclimation mode I will need to set after this event.

NOW! To the fun stuff.

Let me try and figure this DIY stuff out.

I went ahead and cut the "Bio filter" in half. I left them square for a purpose other than just laziness. (I had a hunch and it paid off.)

My thoughts are to reuse these sections repeatedly.

Time to cut out the polishing filter parts. I left these square too. I was really betting on my hunch by this point. I left it oversized for a reason. I do expect these to be disposable.

This is how I have the two layers lined up to insert into the printed part. We are getting so close I can almost taste the finished product.

Here we go, I used the angled corners as a means to hold the two filter materials together.

This is a rough stuff. lol I wanted to really show how I got it to stay in. I ended up smoothing it out to help eliminated any dead spots in the filter.

Here is the finished product. I am in LUV!!!

For those of you who are into see pictures of the bottom of things, I have one more photo just for you.

I will be testing these suckers out over the next 3 months.

Do you have any predictions?

design.maddie · Jul 3, 2023

These are just what I found on the glass. I left all the ones (equal amounts) [28 pictured] on the rocks.

I don't mind these fellas, I'm just tired of seeing them so abundant.

design.maddie · Jul 21, 2023

I wrote up a 2-3 page report on all the stuff that went down with the lights. Somewhere it got lost, then delete, the removed...I honestly don't know. So I will break it down very quick and simple.

1.) dropped the ball and never sent the part.
2.) Ordered new AI Primes while I waited on parts from Red Sea.
3.) AI Primes (x2) would not allow me to sign in and required Tech (resolved in 24 hours)

Corals were without lights for 10 days.

I ended up using one of the Signature Series spectrums to start with.

cearp3323 · Aug 3, 2023

Just read through the whole setup. Very thorough. Sorry for the downs you've had. Unfortuante part of the hobby. How did the coral do without lights for that long?

design.maddie · Aug 3, 2023

cearp3323 said:
Just read through the whole setup. Very thorough... How did the coral do without lights for that long?

Thanks! It has turned into one heck of a read through by now. The corals have responded very well to the new lights. There was a bit of bleaching in some of the corals. I noticed it mostly with the green pigments. The red/purples seem to thrive instantly under the new lighting setup. When I think back to the beginning of all the trouble and add up that whole time the corals probably not getting the full 90watts from the ReefLED90 it doesn't surprise me that the corals are displaying such vigorous growth.

This afternoon I was cleaning off the sand and rockwork a bit so that I can take some photos and videos tonight. I'll be sure to post something if I get some good shots.

design.maddie · Aug 13, 2023

Some corals have been getting moved around due to the new lights. I am enjoying the AI Primes. All of the corals have responded well, and some have even gone into a spurt of growth that I wasn't expecting. The SPS are thriving the most, including that dang Leptoseris. It has become almost a nuisance because of its aggression and rate of growth. All the Micromussa type corals have tripled in volume.

I have swapped my refugium lights to a reverse schedule to the display lights. I had them set to 24/7 before this past week. Is it odd that my home automation (Google Home) is dominated by tank IFTTTs?

I wonder if my photo skills are good enough to compete with POTM.