Waterbox 16 Reef

Macro-algae

Aquarium Upgrade

Zoa Frags

Amphiprion ocellaris

My current system and the new system build-out

Nano-reef Aquarium with my iPhone

April 5, 2015 - Pics and video of my 10 gallon nano-reef tank using my iPhone and the Olloclip macro lenses. I assembled all of this iMovie, and posted it to Youtube.

My nano-reef aquarium build plans

Fast-forward to 2014 through today, and I have started building out a new reef aquarium, this time going with a “nano” or very small aquarium. And this time I’m planning carefully–I mean every step. I also have some pretty strict requirements.

Requirements:
1. Self-contained (no sump, AIO) system
2. As much automation as I can build or buy
3. Backup power (at least a couple hours for the pumps)
4. Easy to maintain (rollable cabinet, small form factor)
5. Fairly realtime view into the system’s chemistry from anywhere (e.g., web, phone).

Here’s my cabinet, a “Luxor Mobile Steel Adjustable Height AV Cart with Storage Cabinet” I bought at Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B002C5QBA4. I upgraded the bolts to something hefty and stainless steel. The whole cart is made of 20 gauge steel, and should easily be able to handle a 70+ pound load. I’ve also cut a nice piece of 3/4 inch birch plywood for the top, varnished, sealed, and drilled for power cables to run down into the cabinet below.

I originally planned for the very small (and cool) 4.3g tank, but I have changed my mind and now I’m going with the Micro-Reefs 7.2 gallon AIO Acrylic Temperate (Rimless design) https://micro-reefs.com/temperate-systems.html (I had toyed with the idea of going with a temperate tank, but I’m back to the tropics–still I love the micro-reefs tanks, and the 1/2 inch acrylic is sturdy as hell).

Maintenance: I want the ability to roll the aquarium onto a plastic sheet to do maintenance, water changes, etc. The UPS also gives me the ability to unplug from the wall and roll the whole thing into the kitchen–right up to the sink if I need to.

Water: I have an RO unit built into the house, but I’m a fan of real seawater, so I will probably go with that as the primary source (the Atlantic is only six or seven miles away). For supplemental changes I use Instant Ocean Reef Crystals
https://www.instantocean.com/Products/Sea-Salt-Mixes/reef-crystals-sea-salt.aspx
APC BR1000G Back-UPS Pro 1000 Uninterruptible Power Supply
https://www.apc.com/resource/include/techspec_index.cfm?base_sku=br1000g

January 16, 2016

Shot of the aquarium this morning. Zoanthids (left side), and a group of palythoans:

January 18, 2016

Four more shots of my aquarium, a few different zoanthid species, and the lower-left is a cousin of the Cladocora sp. tube colony I have growing in the tank. Pretty sure this is a Cladocora, but these are larger, squatter, less branching--possibly Cladocora muellerae or debilis.

June 5, 2016 - More inhabitants of my tank

Beautiful orange sponge and a big bivalve covered in coralline algae (the pink and purple stuff)--one of the center-pieces of my tank. So much of this reefkeeping hobby/obsession is about personal taste, especially when it comes down to how things look in your tank. I have pretty strong opinions about what I like to see when starting a reef aquarium: if you ask me live rock is the only way to go--maricultured live rock that's been seeded for years in an ocean somewhere, with encrusting sponge, coralline algae, clusters of mollusks, worms, various coral growths--including a bunch of hitchhikers you may or may not want. (I'll take them, because the alternative doesn't appeal to me at all). I'm not a fan of sterile rock with frag-plugs of LPS and SPS corals glued here and there. These look unnatural to me. Sure, it may be colorful, and even stunningly beautiful when it all grows out, but there's something missing--a thousand things missing if you count every creature that comes in with live rock. I like a natural looking reef, with invertebrates of all kinds jumbled on the rocks. My favorite tanks on the planet are at the Monterey Bay Aquarium, the lower light tanks, with strawberry corallimorphs (Corynactis californica) covering the rocks, fronds of algae swaying in the currents, and hundreds of creatures of all sizes living, moving, hiding and darting in the shadows.

UPDATE: April 14, 2017 - New tank on the way from Acrylic Creations

I started this aquarium downsizing and automation project a couple months ago, and it’s going to take at least another four to five months to complete--maybe longer. Even if all the equipment is ready, there’s no hurrying the life behind the glass--you never want to rush the beginning of a new habitat. You have to let it come to life first, let it settle down, find its balance--and that can take anywhere from a couple months to a year. This may actually be the most difficult part of this hobby--the waiting, the patience required to just let things calm down on their own. You provide the stability, the nutrients for coral growth and the spread of that beautiful red and purple coralline algae (Lithothamnion sp. and the like). But you can’t rush the process and be successful. You can buy all the frags you want, but it’s going to be hell without a mature system.

Okay, back to what I’m working on: You might laugh at the idea of downsizing a 30g/113l tank, which is on the small side in this hobby. (I consider it a “Nano reef” aquarium, as would many of my fellow aquarists). I have had 40, 60, 160, 200 gallon reef systems in the past, but for the foreseeable future I’m going to stick to a nano-sized system, anywhere from 15 - 20 gallons of total water volume, and I’m starting with the foundation, building out a better, higher-tech moveable base for the aquarium, lighting, dosing system, electronics (battery backup), and the automation infrastructure (timers, temperature control, pH, ORP, monitoring). I have all of this running smoothly right now on the 30g, and transitioning it at some point will be a fairly big task. But back to basics: this weekend I have completed most of what I wanted for the base, the tank stand, with the lighting structure. (I run four Kessil LEDs, an A160EW Tuna Blue (all-day blue, color: 20,000K), A160WE Tuna Sun (Daylight, color: 9,000k), A150W Tuna Blue (Mid-day intensity, color: 15,000K), and an H150 Red (2 hours per day at dusk and dawn, wavelength: 620 - 710nm). I know, a lot for light for a smallish aquarium, but they’re not all on at the same time, and they’re on for varying lengths of time.

UPDATE: April 23, 2017 - More pics of the tank with my iPhone

A few more shots of my 30g reef aquarium with the iPhone 7+. Here's a batch of palythoans (the greenish-blue guys) trying to elbow their way into some rocky space controlled by a couple different varieties of discosoma (the reddish "mushroom" corallimorphs). Some reefers use "protopalythoa" to describe some of these, but it's far from certain in which genus to place a lot of these zoa/paly corals—and there's some dispute over "protopalythoa" being a legitimate label for defining the group.

May 2, 2017 - Some new Rhodactis sp. and Ricordea sp.

These are both from Indonesia. I love the irregular, almost brickwork pattern, in the Rhodactis. This morph fluoresces with a nice vivid orange. The Ricordea on the other hand is sort of a dull purple, which blends with the color of the rocks under actinic/20,000K lighting. With the daylight and 10 - 15,000K lights, these guys are a range of reddish violets to deep purple.

May 5, 2017 - Rhodactis sp.

Another shot of my beautiful Rhodactis sp. corallimorphs. (Camera: iPhone 7 Plus and Yellow No 8 filter; 30g/113l mixed reef, but heavy corallimorphs, zoanthids, and palythoans).

May 6, 2017 - The Coral Formerly Known as Acan Lord

Micromussa lordhowensis is a stony coral in the family Lobophylliidae. They're often called "Acan Lords" because they used fall under the Acanthastrea genus, and now that marine biologists have moved them into the Micromussa genus, you sometimes see them called "Micro Lords"--Lord is from the species name, lordhowensis, which refers to their original sourcing, Lord Howe island. Like almost all of the corals in my aquarium it is a zooxanthellate, which means it hosts zooxanthellae (zo-ozanth-elly), the colorful, photosynthetic symbiotic dinoflagellates that live in the soft tissues of the coral. It's the zooxanthellae that produce so much of the energy needs for these animals--essentially feeding on the strong lighting over the tank, but many, like these Micromussas still need to be fed mixtures of phyto- and zooplankton, as well as other meaty foods. And these guys are greedy. I just gave these an initial dusting of food, and they went into hungry mode, sticking out their tentacles, trying to grab anything coming by in the water column.

May 7, 2017 - More inhabitants of my tank

A mix of different corals in the tank, a scattering of zoanthids (upper left), with acans/micromussa on the right. The leptoseris (bottom left) is doing beautifully, oozing over the rocks, and bottom right is one stalk of two from a little Caulastrea sp. or "Candy Cane coral" frag I got recently.

Shots of some of the zoanthids in my tank. I love these red guys with the dark blue-black centers. In the trade, it's normal to come up with fanciful names for most corals, like Fruit Loops and Purple People Eaters. I always want to call these reds "deadpool zoas" because of the similarity with his mask.