Custom Aquariums

New Next-reef sump and Coralife Protein Skimmer

2013-07-13T16:14:00.000-07:00

It’s been a long time since I have updated my blog and there have been some changes that I need to tell you guys about. This is a little video I put together for you along with an audio commentary. Hope you all enjoy.

Moving My Aquarium

2013-04-28T17:10:00.000-07:00

Moving My Aquarium

So I recently moved about 10 hours from where i was previously living with my family and my difficult to move aquarium. I figured I would take the time to explain how I moved everything and ill go into what to do and what not to do when moving a tank. Since i already moved and set the tank back up i don't have any pictures of the progress, but I will try to explain in detail the best I can.

My tank in a nutshell;

125 gal tank

55 gal tank as a refugium

150 lbs of live rock

Coral

I decided to move the tank and set it back up as fast as possible so the tank was the last thing that went into the moving truck and the first thing out. when taking down the tank I filled up a 55 gallon drum with the salt water then filled up a few 5 gallon buckets about half way so that i could put the rocks with the corals into those buckets. then put the rest of the rocks into empty 5 gallon buckets with just a little bit of water then capped them off. All of the fish i put into individual bags just like they come from the fish store.

- I got the bags from a website that sells just fish transport supplies.

I then put the sand into buckets then moved the tank and stand into the moving truck then put all the buckets into my car so that the water, rocks, corals, and fish would stay at a good temp. As soon as it was all loaded up i started my 10 hour drive. Once i arrived at my new house i immediately started to set the tank back up.

I started by putting the tank into place with some help of course. I then put all the sand and rock in first then poured the water from the 55 gallon tub into the tank. i had to make a lot of salt water to replace the water i didn't bring with me. so once it was almost full I was able to start the pumps and heaters to get the filter working and heat up the water to a good temp. At this point i started putting all the fish into one big bin with a slow drip to acclimate the fish to the new water. while i was waiting on that i put al the rocks with corals into the tank.I then put all the fish into the tank.

Problems:

the only problems i had were with one fish. once i put them all together to acclimate them i started to notice that blue tang was getting picked on a little. it wasn't until the fish was put into the tank that i realized the extent of it. He was beaten up pretty bad and only lasted a few more days before he died, but on the upside i didn't loose anything else.

Things to do:

Make sure to add the rock first then the sand then the water in that order. this will ensure a few different things. it will ensure the rocks are stably stacked with a solid surface. then putting the sand in before the water will make the water less cloudy when doing the last step of pouring water in the tank.

when moving i would recommend that you put the livestock in a car or suv with you so that you may keep it all at a good temp.

Things not to do:

I wouldn't recommend putting all the fish into a single bin when moving them. they will become very stressed and may become hostile towards each other. Best bet is to keep them separate while acclimating them back into the tank.

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Tags: Corals, Fragging, Xenia coral, mushroom corals, aquarium, 125 gallon, gal, Reef tank, huge aquarium, large, live rock, salt water, ocean, Fiji mud, Refugium, metal halides, 175w, 250w, 300w, calcium, iodine, blue tang, shrimp, yellow tang, clown fish, angel fish, foxface rabbitfish,Trigger, fish, Niger Trigger, Clown, Clown fish, Percula Clownfish, Tang, Yellow Tang, Custom Aquarium, Custom aquatics, living reef, reef, reef aquarium, 125 gallon aquarium, refugium, mud, live rock, live sand, deep sandbed, sand bed, corals, sps, over flow, blue regal tang, hippo tang, green chromis, foxface, foxface rabbitfish, one spot, anthias, mushroom corals, duncan corals, algae, LFS, Extreme aquarium, ultimate aquarium, coral beauty angel fish, lunar wrasse, DIY aquarium, Custom stand, LED Lights, 120 watt LED's, reef lighting, lights, salt water, deep sea, amazing aquatics, ocean,

Happy Thanksgiving

2012-11-24T04:52:00.001-08:00

I hope all had an amazing Thanksgiving,

I have recently had to move my 125 gallon reef aquarium. Not a task I wish upon anyone. I used many many 5 gallon buckets that I bought from Lows for just a couple bucks each, but these buckets just weren't enough. There were more buckets than I had room. All the rock had to go into them, the fish, and corals, and even the sand. Mind you, a 5 gallon bucket full of wet sand is very heavy. But once it was moved I decided to go with a shallow sand bed instead of the deep sand bed that I had. This is partially due to not wanting to carry all of the sand from one place to another and partially due to wanting to reduce the nutrients that my aquarium continues to hold. The shallow sand bed helps so that more of the nutrients will be picked up by my filtration so that I can then remove it when I change out my filter foam, protein skimmer, and water changes.

Stay tuned, in the end of March I will be moving my entire 125 gallon reef tank 8 hours away. That time I will take plenty of pictures along the way for all to see how that progress went.

New Fishies

2012-10-13T13:25:00.000-07:00

I bought a couple new fish, one large Niger Trigger fish and one large blue regal tang. I baught the trigger because he was so big and beautiful and yet only 45.00 at the local fish store. I believe a customer had bought it in a a trade is why it was so cheap. then I bought the blue regal tang because the huge trigger looked so good in my tank i needed another big fish. So I went online and baught the blue regal tang from liveaquaria.com. great website to buy live fish from. They have unmatched descriptions of all there fish and live stock.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b4mZsR5ES5Q&feature=g-upl

Trigger, fish, Niger Trigger, Clown, Clown fish, Percula Clownfish, Tang, Yellow Tang, Custom Aquarium, Custom aquatics, living reef, reef, reef aquarium, 125 gallon aquarium, refugium, mud, live rock, live sand, deep sandbed, sand bed, corals, sps, over flow, blue regal tang, hippo tang, green chromis, foxface, foxface rabbitfish, one spot, anthias, mushroom corals, duncan corals, algae, LFS, Extreme aquarium, ultimate aquarium, coral beauty angel fish, lunar wrasse, DIY aquarium, Custom stand, LED Lights, 120 watt LED's, reef lighting, lights, salt water, deep sea, amazing aquatics, ocean,

LED's and Fiji Reef Mud update

2012-09-29T19:12:00.002-07:00

Random Updates:

I have now completely replaced the lighting in the tank from the 175 watt metal halides to the new LED’s. All my corals have adapted well and now are fuller than ever before. In the Refugium I replaced the T5 to a 175 metal halide I had in the tank before.

Fiji Reef Mud:

I recently tried out a product called Fiji Reef Mud to see if it would make a significant difference in the health of my corals. They have a starter kit that has about 12 lbs of the reef mud and they have a booster that has about 12 oz. since I didn’t feel that I needed 12 lbs of this product in my Refugium I decided to get 2 orders of the booster, and since there was a significant price difference between the two sizes I saved some money.

I will be showing another new video of progress of my 125 gallon reef aquarium soon so be sure to check back soon…

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Aquarium Logging

2012-09-29T18:55:00.001-07:00

Aquarium Logs:

I have found that logging everything related to your aquarium in a book only dedicated to that purpose has helped me out in many ways. Sometimes I forget when I last dosed certain chemicals for the corals or when the last time I added water and how much I added. By logging all of your information in a log you can now track spending habits, prevent over dosing chemicals like calcium and iodine. Now I track everything from what I bought, and how much I have spent, to when I last cleaned out the protein skimmer.

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LED's For Coral Reef Aquariums

2012-08-28T14:43:00.001-07:00

I have decided to switch my lighting on my reef tank to LED’s that I was able to find on the internet that were very reasonable in price compared to all the crazy expensive lighting that I have seen everywhere. These LEDs are replacing my 175 watt Metal Halides that I originally had.

These LEDs that I have now are brighter and stronger than my Metal Halides so I find that some of my slightly sensitive corals I had to put to the bottom of the tank so that they could adjust to the new brighter lighting. That wasn’t until I lost a few of my small polyps.

This video is a little example of the difference between the new LEDs and the old 175 watt Metal Halides. then i will add pictures of some of the corals under the new LEDs so you can see some of the groth.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FFqzMULZboA&feature=plcp

These last two corals have been fragged and have really grown and healed up great since I put them under the new lighting.

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Fragging corals

2012-07-25T10:36:00.001-07:00

I have been reading a lot about fragging corals and from what i concluded it didn't seem tp very hard for a first timer to so it. So i went at it with a small frag of xenia coral i recently bought and it went very well.. I used a razor blade to cut between 2 stalks i then used a zip tie to loosely tie it on to another rock after about a day i was already able to cut the zip tie away and now its doing great.. The pics below are from day 1-3

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Sand Bed Change

2012-07-23T17:43:00.000-07:00

I changed out my crushed coral sand bed with a finer grade sand this past week. I changed out the sand bed for the benefits of the new sand and to alleviate the hassle of the crushed coral sand bed.

I like a deep sand bed and with a crushed coral sand bed its very loose and can't hold the proper bacteria used in a deep sand bed that breaks down the nitrites and nitrates in the aquarium. Because of this you need to shake up the crushed coral sand bed to sturr up the bacteria so that the filter can then pick it up and remove it from your tank.

Now there's many ways to replace your sand in your sand bed but there is a more prefered method which is.

first remove all live rock fish and 90% of your water
i normally put them all into a bunch of 5 gallon buckets

then remove the sand bed that you dont want..

then add new sand bed and add the same water back in..

put live rock and run the filter/sump/pump again for a few hours before putting corals and fish back into the tank. this in my opinion is the best way to do a sand bed change. This time i made the change to my sand bed i didnt do all these steps due to lack of buckets and lack of time to complete this project so i was in a little rush and this pic shows how cloudy the water is. if you do the steps correctly then your water will clear up a lot easier than it will take me to get rid of this cloud.

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Aquarium Update live stock

2012-07-02T17:18:00.000-07:00

I just thought I would do a post just on everything new thats going on with my aquarium

My chaeto has more than doubled in size in probably about 2 weeks. Here is the progress of that..

June 5

june 20

It is hard to see in the first pic but you can see the growth. As for the other pieces of live stock i have added to my refugium I havent seen much growth. the Red Gracilaria kind of fell apart but it still looks like it might come back to life so im not going to take it out quite yet. The Ulva has holes all through it i believe from the copepods maybe are eating it. Again no growth from thoes or the mangroves.

Aquarium Update

2012-06-24T18:19:00.001-07:00

Just a new video of how my aquarium is looking now. I knowticed that a lot of hobbyiest have dirty aquariums. Its not exactly a bad thing because they leave all of the benifical algae and bacteria that grow all over everything. Well though I always want the best for my fish and corals, I also want my aquarium to be as beautiful as I can. So one new measure I took with my aquarium is stacking all of my Live Rock in such a way that none of them are touching the glass. This makes it easier to clean and also helps preventing scratches on the slide and back glass.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ETEynymtwNE&feature=plcp

My aquarium Temp

2012-06-24T15:35:00.002-07:00

I thought i would share this little bit of information about the temp in my aquarium.

I realized that I was going to start having a tempature problem when I bought my 3 175w metal halides for my 125 gal aquarium so I started to look at chillers but then I was even more shocked at how much they cost. especially for something that I was hoping to not even need. But then I built a 55 gal refugium to replace the very tiny 29 gal refugium I made before. Ever since I made this switch I have knowticed that I no longer have a problem with my water temp. I guess for the large amount of water under the aquarium where it actually has time to cool off before it runs back into my tank actually keeps the water where it needs to be. right around 78.5 durring the day (AC stays at 75) so it actually works out great and saves me a few dollars. im not sure how well this will work for people with higher wats on there metal halides but its food for thought if your trying to save a little money.

Filling my Refugium

2012-06-20T16:33:00.001-07:00

I ordered some plants and macro algae for my refugium and they came in today. It cost me right around $20.00 for everything plus shipping. This is what I got.

5 Red Mangroves

Chaeto

Ulva

And Red Gracilaria

I already had some spaghetti Algae with a little Grape Caulerpa so I have quite a few different plants in there now. At the moment my Nitrites are at .5ppm and my Nitrates are at 20ppm. Its not very accurate since I'm using only the test strips and they can be off a little. . I will be posting on the progress and the growth of these plants and the affects it has on my water.

New, New Refugium.

2012-06-15T19:47:00.002-07:00

I have Made Many changes to my 125gallon aquarium. If you watched my video that I posted in my last blog then you would have seen my 29 gallon tank that I turned into my Wet dry/ Refugium. well I have recently invested in a 55 gallon tank that I bought used so that I could turn that into my refugium because the 29 gallon tank just wasn't big enough to fit my protein skimmer and my UV Sterilizer in it. Though this process wasn't as easy as I had hoped. I will walk you through the process and explain it the best I can.

This is the 55 gallon tank after I added the glass dividers. I accidentally got white silicone instead of clear. Its not a problem. Its just kind of an eye sore.
The first 2 pieces of glass weren't cut right for some reason so they ended up not being level.

Once all the dividers were dry I went to the next step of installing it. That was a problem also since the tank didn't fit under the stand. Something i wasn't prepared for. So i adapted to my new problem and I had to empty the tank to slide it away from the wall and cut one of the beems off the back so that I could slide the tank in.

this is the board I had to cut off.. once the rafugium was in place i put some brackets on this board to put in back into place. I don't have pics of that part of the process though.

This Dry portion with the Bio-Balls isn't accurate. I just didn't want to throw the Bio-Balls away so I just threw them into this chamber.

I was considering adding filter socks but until i figure out how I want that set up I just added foam inserts to stop free flowing junk in the water.

The last chamber has my UV Sterilizer and my protein skimmer. I have heard of people not using a protein skimmer when they have a refugium but I have been running a refugium since I started this tank and it does great but when i added the protein skimmer to the tank it started pulling out a lot of junk so i decided to keep it.

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New Build

2012-06-03T09:10:00.002-07:00

So I have some what completed my new project and I have made a little video of it to show everyone the new item.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=spIwAfal5bg

UV lights and ICK

2012-05-30T09:43:00.001-07:00

So ever since i got rid of my powder blue tang i have had an out break with ICK. It started out only on my powder blue tang for a while but when I traded it out for 2 regal blue tangs the ICK covered those two along with some spots on my black and white clown fish. I have added vitamins and garlic extract into their food diet about a week ago but hasn't had any positive affect yet so o decided to get a UV sterilized in hopes that it will kill off one stage of the ICK there for eliminating ICK all together. I have already lost one blue regal tang as of this point and will keep posting on my progress with this problem of mine.

Completed Stand

2012-05-28T16:20:00.002-07:00

I have finnished the stand I have been building and have attached a photo of the finnished product. I haven't worked on making a new canopy for the aquarium, but that will come very soon so dont mind the color differences. =)

2012-05-12T16:42:00.002-07:00

Here is the progress I have made on the production of my aquarium stand for my 125 gallon salt water tank. The frame is completed, and the only thing left is to use plywood for the sides and cut out 3 quares in the front for doors.

New aquarium stand.

2012-05-12T08:43:00.001-07:00

So today u have decided to build a new stand for my 125 gallon salt water aquarium. I don't have a lot of experience in wood building so i am taking this as a learning experience. The reason i want to build a new stand is because the one that i have sits very low to the ground making myself and other people have to Benson over when looking at it. I think by raising the tank just 1 foot will make the world a difference. I will post pictures and progress along with pics of the finished product.

Powder Blue Tang Trouble

2012-05-06T09:52:00.000-07:00

I have recently had to get rid of my Powder Blue Tang. He looked great in my aquarium but he was becoming way to much of a problem, with the constant problem with ick on him then to his aggression. The Powder Blue Tang would attack anything that I put into the tank. About a week ago I put in a new FoxFace Rabbit Fish and for 2 days straight the Powder Blue wouldn’t leave him alone. Since the Foxface has poisons spines on him I wasn’t too worried. The Powder Blue eventually let off of him but then I added a Corral Beauty Angel Fish and the Powder Blue tore him up so bad I had to take him out so that he wouldn’t kill the Coral Beauty Angel Fish. I figured that I needed to bring him to a local fish store to trade him out because he just wouldn’t chill out. Even rearranging the rocks in the tank didn’t help.

Now I have two beautiful Regal Blue Tangs to replace the one Powder Blue Tang and I am happy with the decision. Check it out. =)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=btXP2CdEjq8

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amazing design

2012-04-27T16:23:00.000-07:00

this company does some amazing work. very big
and extravagant but defiantly looks worth it. check it out!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_-n2U1mJIWQ&feature=g-vrec

Controversy over bio balls and refugiums.

2012-04-27T16:08:00.000-07:00

I have been doing a lot of research on the benefits and the negatives of having bio-balls in a salt water aquarium and what I am finding isnt what I expected. 　From what I am finding is that the bio-balls are good and even essential in a fish only aquarium. But when adding the benefits of live rock and live sand then the bio-balls serve only as another element contaminating the water with nitrates. 　When having a lot of live rock and live sand that add to the naturally accruing beneficial bacteria you should lean more towards a refugium with a deep sand bed for a filter component.

For my aquarium, sence I have only about 50 lbs of live rock in a 125 gal aquarium i made a refugium that utilizes both bio-balls and a live refiguim. so far so good. no problems with it and all of my fish are thriving perfectly.

Protein Skimmers VS Refugiums

2012-04-25T18:52:00.002-07:00

This Video I found on YouTube Helped me out A LOT for my ideas for my salt water aquarium.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ccyJXNkRVQc&feature=related

Powder blue Tangs and Ick

2012-04-24T18:50:00.001-07:00

Powder blue Tangs and Ick

So when I bought this nice 3 inch Powder Blue Tang the guy told me that they were sucseptibal to Ick. As with a lot of stories in the trade, I like to see for myself the ones that are true and which ones are fiction.

Now I have had this tang for a few months and it has caught ick a few times but none of my other fish in my aquarium have gotten it. I don’t have a UV sterolizer and I have not treated the water since i don’t like putting chemicals in my salt water aquarium that could potentially have a bad affect on other organisiums in my aquarium.

There was a few articles that I have read that said by placing a salt water fish in fresh water for about 5 to 10 minutes will cause the ick to die off. Now If you know about ick then you will know that it is a fungis that grows on fish when they get stressed and have losed their protective coating. So by putting salt water fish in fresh water I thought wouldn’t be such a good idea since that is one of the most stressfull things for a fish. But I figured I should give it a shot anyway. This did work, and I started to see the ick redeuce in size after a day or so. Now its been 3 or 4 days since I have diped my Powder Blue Tang in fresh water to get rid of the ick and it is completely back all over the tang. So in my opinion this fresh water dip to get rid of the ick is a bad Idea. It will kill off the ick but since it doesn’t fix the reason it started in the first place it is not a good solution.

Fast Algae growth

2012-04-23T18:36:00.001-07:00

About a month ago I went to this aquarium store called Matts Coral Connection ( http://www.mattscoralconnection.com/ ) to get algae for my refugium. I picked up

Spaghetti Algae mixed with Caulerpa, only about a hand full but it was very cheap. The algae help to keep your water conditions where you need them by removing harmfull bacteria from the water that the fish put into it. The handfull they gave me had a few copepods in it as free bees. Since then the ball of algae has more than doubled in size along with a lot more copepods all over the place which are good for some types of fish to feed off of. This was deffinatly a great investment.

In my photo of my refugium you can sort of see the algae at right about a month in the refugium. It’s helped so much that my 125 gallon salt water aquarium has yet to need a water change.