No wonder I found it almost impossible to maintain a 40 gallon tank!
The knowledge base in the hobby has grown massively since then and thankfully continues to grow at a great pace.
I was looking through my books over the weekend and picked one up I had not looked at for quite a while, the book was published in 1989 but was first written a few years earlier I believe. It took me back to my first attempt at keeping marines in the early 1980's It was advocating the use of reverse flow under gravel filtration as the prime biological filtration. "The bacteria develop on the gravel surfaces and turn nitrite into harmless nitrate." It goes on to say an efficient pump will circulate the whole contents of the aquarium in 15 minutes! It also goes on to say that some aquarists advocate the use of external power filters with activated carbon and protein skimmers, but these are not strictly necessary! No wonder I found it almost impossible to maintain a 40 gallon tank! The knowledge base in the hobby has grown massively since then and thankfully continues to grow at a great pace.
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I bought a tiny toadstool frag when first setting up my tank 8 years ago. It has since wandered around a bit and found a favourite place where it has grown into a veritable giant. It looks superb, very beautiful, with long flowery polyps but it is overshadowing a lot of the tank. It is probably too big but I'm not sure what to do about it. Do I remove it, if so I'm not sure how or if I really want to? A lot has happened on my little reef since January. I came back after a month away to find a tank plagued by GHA and Bryopsis. I lost a couple of my leopard wrasse after several years and had an unsuccessful attempt to introduce Anampses wrasse into my reef. After slowly but successfully overcoming the algae and Bryopsis problem and having what appears to be a peaceful little community of wrasse I have decided to try and give the tank a rest. Corals are doing pretty well so I think just maintaining my cuc and inverts will suffice for a while (he says!) Perhaps a starfish if one comes along that I like and... Amazing watching the feeding frenzy that takes place when I put a dozen or so live feeder shrimp onto my little reef. The wrasse get so excited, the two Halichoeres in particular. They can catch and hold one full shrimp. The Macropharyngadon (leopard) wrasse have to pull them apart or feed on the bits left by the bigger fish. It certainly doesn't take long for them to be hunted down and dispatched. The wrasse are obviously excellent hunters on the reef. Sad news. lost my Anampses twistii. I feel that the acclimatisation process worked well. There was no aggression between the new fish and the existing population but I think she could just not get enough to eat and became stressed as a result. The two Halichoeres wrasse in particular are too boisterous and I don't think the Anampses are able to compete for food. Although this genus is beautiful I don't think they are suitable for a setup like mine with six other wrasse all feeding much more quickly than they can.
A lesson learned but not a good way to learn it. At last all of my wrasse are accepting any food I put into the tank. My Macropharyngodon bipariitus has at last begun eating everything. For weeks she would only eat frozen mysis and brine shrimp but now she will eat flake and pellets. Got the message at last. My concern is that my Anampses twistii seems to not be getting enough to eat. She eats very slowly and is struggling to compete with the other wrasse. She is feeding on everything but is just a very slow eater. Whilst doing a search for the aforementioned Paraferdina plakos I came across what I thought was a very interesting little article on a site called Echinoblog. Amazing what you can find when you are not trying.
I spotted this little beauty when browsing in my LFS. I have always fancied a starfish. I love my serpent star and have often thought about one of the Fromia or possibly Linkia starfish. At first I thought this was one of the Fromia genus possibly Fromia monilis, but when I asked and looked at the label it was a Deep Sea starfish, Paraferdina plakos. The was a basically red coloured one and a second more violet in colour. I know nothing about these and cannot find anything on the old interweb thing. Think I will need to try and find out more as I like it. Step 5My little A. twistii settled nicely when first placed into the reef and none of the other fish gave her any attention at all. Well done acclimatisation box! She swam around exploring the rock scape and hunting. When feeding time came, frozen mysis shrimp, she fed well.
Day two she was up out of the sand and swimming with the other wrasse. I was really pleased with this turn of events as it suggests the fish was not stressed in any way. When feeding time came, this time brine shrimp, she was again fine with the food but is a very slow eater compared to my other wrasse. I will need to watch this. Step 4After three days of careful observation the little twistii is ready to go. There has been very little if any aggression shown from the other fish. They have been nosing around satisfying their curiosity but no more. The A twistii has been feeding on frozen mysis and brine shrimp whilst in the box and has shown no signs of being stressed. After feeding using brine shrimp I took the lid off the box and tilted it over allowing the new fish to come out of her own accord. No other fish took any notice and the A. twistii swam out after about 10 mins. The box was left in the tank for about an hour incase she wanted to go back. This also allowed her to settle in the tank without any further disturbance. |
AuthorI have always enjoyed keeping fish and began this website when doing the research before setting up my own modest reef. I couldn't find this type of site so decided to make my own. Archives
December 2020
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