Hi guys. My name Is Troy and I have just signed up for the MASC forums. Seems pretty promising. I am currently a member of both reef central and reefbuilders but it seems they are too big of networks to get any real attention.
A little about me I am a 25 yr. old familee man. I just started keeping a tank about a year ago. I started off with a 3 gallon tank with a mature maroon clownfish and some old brown polyp corals that were given to me by someone who was moving and getting out of the hobby. Well all kinds of problems occured within that system and we lost everything that we were given but Id have to say that is when I was hooked. Shortly thereafter I moved up to a 55 gallon system which was under filtered and under lit for some time. I then got an Aquamedic Hqi/Actinic lightig fixture and began stocking my tank. I have kept and lost a variety of fish and coral over the time I have been involved with the hobby. About a month ago my 55 gallon suddenly sprung a leak and I was forced to switch tanks again. This time I purchased an almost new 125.
My current set-up on the 125 is as follows.
Lighting- I have a 4 ft. Aquamedic fixture with 2 Hqi 150 watt and 4 54 watt actinic bulbs. This is not directly centered over the tank due to the upgrade so I also added one 24" HO Coral Life fixture running a 10000 K and an actinic bulb as well as a 24" VHO Coral Life fixture running a 10000 K and an actinic bulb.
Filtration- Currently running a Penguin Emperor 350 Bio-wheel filter as well as an Eshoppes PF1000 dual overflow that feeds an Eshoppes wet-dry returned by a 360 gph water pump. I also have a cascade 1000 canister that I purchased media for and hooked it up it was just blowing bubbles on occasion with very little water coming out of the return so I just unplugged it. Wish it would work though. I also have about 60-80 lbs of live rock.
Flow- I am running a cheap powerhead that rotates on the backwall of the tank, However it no longer rotates and is returning from the middle of the back wall towards the right wall of the tank. I have no idea what its rated for GPH but it could not possibly be enough. I also have one other small powerhead blowing right to left from the right hand side of the tank. I have the return from the wetdry placed directly above the rotating powerhead returning against the front wall middle of the tank. I have tons of dead spots in the tank and I will eventually purchase a Hydor Koralia wavemaker and two or four high powered circulation pumps.
Fish & Inverts- Fuzzy Dwarf Lion
Yellow Tang (not doing so well)
Green Mandarin
Mature Maroon Clown & hosting Rose Bubble Tip Anemone
Lg. black Longspine Sea Urchin (PAIN IN THE REAR)
5 Blue/Green Chromis
Scarlet Skunk Cleaner Shrimp
A few Turbos, Nassarius, Hermits but not near enough for the tank.
I have also kept several other species but they did not make it up to this point.
Corals- Kenya Tree- I have a few large branches of this and have even succesfully propagated frags.
Neon Green Trumpet- Started out with two heads and now have four
Neon Green Star Polyp- Has always grown well 2 colonies on different rocks.
Small rock of mixed Zoa polyps. I am not sure what color morphs they are one green base and one orange.
3 heads of Dendrophillia similar to sun coral- having a hard time getting them to open.
Purple Gonipora - Slow to grow small frag disc.
again I have kept other species that have not survived to this point
Some things I need to address in my tank are to increase the flow using the Hydor wavemaker system. I also would like to set up a 55 gallon refugium/sump utilizing more live rock more macro and a dsb. I know my tank lacks proper filtration because I have various algae problems. Cyano bacteria and small patches of GHA are throughout the tank and hard to keep up with. I have cut back my feedings to 3x a week as well as cut my hqi lighting schedule from 12 hrs to 6 hrs. trying to get rid of the algae problems.
If there is anything else you would like to know about my tank feel free to ask. I am hoping to meet some fellow enthusiasts and getting some wonderful insight to help make my tank even more breath-taking. I hope this community is more personable then those other big sites that I had mentioned. Hope to make some new friends around my town! later guys. -T
A little about me I am a 25 yr. old familee man. I just started keeping a tank about a year ago. I started off with a 3 gallon tank with a mature maroon clownfish and some old brown polyp corals that were given to me by someone who was moving and getting out of the hobby. Well all kinds of problems occured within that system and we lost everything that we were given but Id have to say that is when I was hooked. Shortly thereafter I moved up to a 55 gallon system which was under filtered and under lit for some time. I then got an Aquamedic Hqi/Actinic lightig fixture and began stocking my tank. I have kept and lost a variety of fish and coral over the time I have been involved with the hobby. About a month ago my 55 gallon suddenly sprung a leak and I was forced to switch tanks again. This time I purchased an almost new 125.
My current set-up on the 125 is as follows.
Lighting- I have a 4 ft. Aquamedic fixture with 2 Hqi 150 watt and 4 54 watt actinic bulbs. This is not directly centered over the tank due to the upgrade so I also added one 24" HO Coral Life fixture running a 10000 K and an actinic bulb as well as a 24" VHO Coral Life fixture running a 10000 K and an actinic bulb.
Filtration- Currently running a Penguin Emperor 350 Bio-wheel filter as well as an Eshoppes PF1000 dual overflow that feeds an Eshoppes wet-dry returned by a 360 gph water pump. I also have a cascade 1000 canister that I purchased media for and hooked it up it was just blowing bubbles on occasion with very little water coming out of the return so I just unplugged it. Wish it would work though. I also have about 60-80 lbs of live rock.
Flow- I am running a cheap powerhead that rotates on the backwall of the tank, However it no longer rotates and is returning from the middle of the back wall towards the right wall of the tank. I have no idea what its rated for GPH but it could not possibly be enough. I also have one other small powerhead blowing right to left from the right hand side of the tank. I have the return from the wetdry placed directly above the rotating powerhead returning against the front wall middle of the tank. I have tons of dead spots in the tank and I will eventually purchase a Hydor Koralia wavemaker and two or four high powered circulation pumps.
Fish & Inverts- Fuzzy Dwarf Lion
Yellow Tang (not doing so well)
Green Mandarin
Mature Maroon Clown & hosting Rose Bubble Tip Anemone
Lg. black Longspine Sea Urchin (PAIN IN THE REAR)
5 Blue/Green Chromis
Scarlet Skunk Cleaner Shrimp
A few Turbos, Nassarius, Hermits but not near enough for the tank.
I have also kept several other species but they did not make it up to this point.
Corals- Kenya Tree- I have a few large branches of this and have even succesfully propagated frags.
Neon Green Trumpet- Started out with two heads and now have four
Neon Green Star Polyp- Has always grown well 2 colonies on different rocks.
Small rock of mixed Zoa polyps. I am not sure what color morphs they are one green base and one orange.
3 heads of Dendrophillia similar to sun coral- having a hard time getting them to open.
Purple Gonipora - Slow to grow small frag disc.
again I have kept other species that have not survived to this point
Some things I need to address in my tank are to increase the flow using the Hydor wavemaker system. I also would like to set up a 55 gallon refugium/sump utilizing more live rock more macro and a dsb. I know my tank lacks proper filtration because I have various algae problems. Cyano bacteria and small patches of GHA are throughout the tank and hard to keep up with. I have cut back my feedings to 3x a week as well as cut my hqi lighting schedule from 12 hrs to 6 hrs. trying to get rid of the algae problems.
If there is anything else you would like to know about my tank feel free to ask. I am hoping to meet some fellow enthusiasts and getting some wonderful insight to help make my tank even more breath-taking. I hope this community is more personable then those other big sites that I had mentioned. Hope to make some new friends around my town! later guys. -T
