Chris
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Everything posted by Chris
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I think I've got it ID'd as a Florida Sea Cucumber.
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So uh... I just got home, and was looking in the tank. Noticed some diatoms growing, which makes sense because I dosed the tank. Then, I look down and see THIS: It's got feet tubes like starfish and sea urchins do - is it a cucumber, perhaps? I guess it had to hitchhike in on that rock!
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This fella keeps on stealing the Pleco's food overnight... gonna have to stop feeding him so much of his own food! He's getting THICC.
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Trio safe for snails, plants, and whole tank treatment?
Chris replied to CarlitoFTW's topic in General Discussion
As stated on the Co-Op's website (as well as in practically every live stream they've ever done, and in several videos): "These medicines can all be used at the same time and are completely safe for all freshwater fish, shrimp, snails, and other invertebrates." https://www.aquariumcoop.com/blogs/faqs/how-to-use-quaratine-med-trio Almost all meds are plant-safe 🙂 -
I've always heard that a lot of aquarists avoid them because they're not always conductive to the "normal" reef tank set up - not all of them like that nasty Tuna Blue lighting, and some of them can smother corals if left unchecked, or go sexual. Meh. From what I've read, most species of true seagrasses would require a very specific setup, anyway. I've looked into Stargrass and Oargrass (both of which can be had cheap, when it's in season), but collection laws are iffy at best and you tend to need an insanely deep, nutrient-rich substrate (I.E. Miracle Mud) with small sand-stirrers (to keep things oxygenated, but nothing big enough to uproot the grass), and some high-powered lighting. I've seen people do everything "right" and have their tanks still fail. I'm a little afraid, lol! I'd love to go diving! We have a couple river beaches around here, and I always like going and watching the darters in the shallows. I've considered looking into Kentucky collection laws (I know they're strict-ish on fish, but I'm not sure on plants), and doing a KY Biotope. I'm pretty sure we have some pretty "classic" species here - Rainbow Darters, Tennessee Darters, Creek Chubs, Paddlefins, stuff like that. One day!
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I added in a trio of blue-legged hermit crabs from my saltwater order yesterday. These guys are brackish-tolerant down to about 1.004 (due to being tide-pool inhabitants), so this tank is on the knife-edge of survivable. However, before you hate me and accuse me of animal cruelty, they're serving an important purpose in this tank. Puffer dentistry! The Figure 8's beak has continued to grow, despite my best efforts. Any snails I add are either immediately eaten, are killed by the salt, or, in the case of nerite snails, only move at night, so the puffer never attacks them. MTS simply burrow into the substrate, never to be pecked at again. These guys have very little way of getting away from the puffer, and have extremely thick shells when compared to freshwater snails. He nipped at them a ton last night, and has been nipping at them on sight today. Just at the outer shell - he hasn't managed to get to the actual crab yet. I'm hoping this will keep me from having to trim his teeth, and that I'll be able to remove these crabs into a more suitable environment once the issue is fixed. Until then, this shall be an interesting experiment.
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Here's a video on the tank, detailing from Day 4 up until today 🙂
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Finally read all the way through this thread. I'm now convinced I not only want a temperate tank - I need a temperate tank.
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There certainly is more variety available for marine tanks than there is freshwater. Freshwater variety is out there, you just don't see it commonly, unfortunately. I'd love to keep some of the freshwater macros, freshwater gobies, freshwater blennies (!), stuff like that. Thank you! I love macros, so, so much. They really are gorgeous. Don't tell anybody, but I've been researching for a seagrass tank for years, if I only had the insane funds to do it properly!
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Alrighty, prepare your browsers for a mountain of pics! The box arrived looking like it had gone three rounds with an MMA fighter. As usual, thank you to USPS for their incredible service 🙄 Inside was a cooling pack and an insulated bag: Cactus Caulerpa: Caulerpa Mexicana: Pencil Cap: Brown Button Polyps: Hermit Crabs: Dwarf Ceriths (I ordered 10 and got 30): Nerites: Zig-Zag Periwinkles: No DOA's, as far as I can tell. Time will tell - all the snails and crabs made it, but the macros can melt away in the days after being shipped. That said, everything was still solid and had minimal melt, so I'm hopeful! Brown Button Polyps are coming around: Here's the Pencil Cap, which propagates a lot like Vallisneria, interestingly enough: Here's the Caulerpa Mexicana, which will probably take over the tank (note the melt on some of the fronds): And, finally, the Cactus Caulerpa. This is just the nicest looking fragment. Most of it looked kinda spindly, so I put it behind the rockwork to grow out for now: Expect a video on the tank tonight or tomorrow!
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Got my Reef Cleaner's order in today. I'm very tired from work, so enjoy this sneak peak:
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Yeah, unfortunately it's not too easy to tell. Since you're doing a brackish tank (right? that's still a thing?), I'd say just to order "plain" BBGs. It seems as if the true freshwater BBGs are much more uncommon than the brackish species are, at least in your average fish store. Most of the freshwater species have a slightly different pattern, I think - everytime I've seen a "true" freshwater BBG it's looked significantly different than the brackish varieties. I could be very wrong, but I'm fairly certain the three fish in the back of that photo (and the one in the close-up above) are B. Doriae, which are the most commonly traded. The guy in front (and another one in the tank) could be B. Xanthozonus, which is a very similar fish but with more scales and an elongated body. Both are tolerant of fresh and brackish, but prefer brackish (or very hard freshwater, at the very least). You can see two of what I believe to be the B. Doriae and one B. Xanthozonus in the frame of this video around a minute in. It is possible they're simply male and female of the same species, but the things that easily distinguish the two species also distinguish B. Doriae males from females, unless you have a microscope.
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They were special-ordered by my (now defunct 😞) LFS, but only because I wanted a large group. You can find smaller numbers pretty commonly around here! The only reason I'd order them from a specific vendor is if I wanted a specific species. Much like ghost shrimp (and I'm sure others), "Bumblebee Goby" is a common name for several species of gobies that look almost exactly the same, but come from slightly differing environments. Some prefer lightly brackish water and some prefer freshwater. In the pic above, you can see that the fish in the front (out of focus) is actually a different fish than the three behind him. I believe that they're two different species, but I'd have to get a macro photo and count their dorsal/ventral spines to know for sure.
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Added an airline to break up some of the surface scum. I'm wondering if that may have been part of the reason the nems are looking so angry. Also feeding a tiny amount of reef-roids for the feather dusters tonight!
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So I'm trying a plant in this tank again - a Crypt Wendtii. I'm going to try and keep the tank right on the knife-edge of 1.003-1.004. We'll see how things go! In the meantime, here's more pictures. Cause who doesn't like those? 😝
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The Aiptasia are looking a bit unhappy tonight - the guy in the back is open, but not as open as he has been. Water tests fine, and I mean, they're aiptasia, so what would they care anyway? I did find this tiny guy on the sandbed, and he looks like a tiny aiptasia: I know aiptasia can reproduce as hermaphrodites, but can they also reproduce sexually with eachother? If so, that might make sense as to why they're all closed up.
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Got some more pics tonight: This next photo was cropped out of a larger one (taken from about 6" from the front glass at max zoom): I then cropped it down to this close-up, and managed to retain quite a bit of detail: I love it when things work out this well!
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I really need to catch up on your tank journal! Temperate marine tanks are so cool. I'd love to do a UK Biotope - lots of Beadlet anemones and native macros.
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Maybe I should re-name the thread "Tank of Terrors!" for Halloween, lol! Noticed a few things in the tank today. For one, I'm starting to get the lightest patches of diatoms around the tank. To be expected, for sure. Another pest, I guess? 🤔 For two, the red slime has spread overnight. I'm now seeing long strands of it coating things in the tank. You can see it in between these feather dusters: For three, I'm seeing more and more pods in here. At any one time, I can look into the tank and find one within seconds. A great sign! They look to be of the non-coral eating variety, so that's good. I'm also seeing some other hitchhikers - namely, little tiny white worms that have appeared all over the tank. They're not flatworms, but are more like white spaghetti worms. Strange! I haven't been able to get a pic yet - they're teeny. And, finally, the Aiptasia are getting bigger and are gaining a tiny bit of yellow around their mouths. This guy in the back in particular has gotten huge: That was with the pump off - when it's on, his arms stretch a good 4" across that rock. I'm glad I got a species with at least a little color and long, flowy tentacles! Some of them are short, stubby, and brown/translucent. Not as fun to look at. Oh, and I fed one a piece of mysis shrimp. I recorded it, but I think I'm going to gather footage throughout the week and post it all together on the weekends, to avoid unnecessary links. Here he is with his tentacles in his mouth, though!
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This little guy is always hungry!
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We were talking more about the difference in the make up of freshwater and saltwater critters - I'm not sure where "vegetarian food" comes into it 😅 I'm confused! Glass and ghost shrimp are two common names that are given to a bunch of species of freshwater, brackish, and saltwater shrimp who all happen to be clear. Grass shrimp is another synonym. Pods are good, too, if you have a place to culture them!
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Looking better every day!
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Got all my water changes done! Now, for some pizza 🙂
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Today was water change day for all the tanks. I did a 50% on this one, cleaned the silk plants, and decided to show off my super high-tech pothos set-up. Ready? Yup. High-tech. Photo-dump:
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I love the top-down view on figure 8's! You can see the spines pretty clearly in this pic.
