20 Gal Reef Tank

3/18/08
One of the local fish stores finally got in another 20 Long aquarium. I think it's going to make a fine refugium sump for this tank. A Refugium is simply a place to cultivate macro algae (Seaweed) to absorb the waste from the tanks inhabitants and provide a safe place for micro critters called Pods to thrive. Of course the purpose of the pods is to occasionally get sucked back up to the main tank as fresh food for the fish and corals.

3/3/08 I Finally finished the new lighting hood a couple weeks ago! The old lights were just strip lights on a glass top. The new hood is built from 3/4" plywood and houses an AH Supply 2x55W Power Compact kit. I'm using 2 50/50 10,000K/Actinic lamps and like the appearance they give. Also, the lights are high enough, with the great AHsupply reflectors so I actually get some shimmer effect. Second photo shows the hood open. I painted the inside white to try and get as much light as possible into the tank. This setup gives plenty of room to work in the tank and still have half the light to work by. And to give credit where due, the hood was copied from Marc's 29gal setup at Melev's Reef but his looks a lot nicer. Now I just have to do something about the cheesy looking commercial stand. :)

And I need to get back on track with my maintenance, especially since the new hood isn't compatible with my Tunze skimmer's mounting system. A sump set up is the next planned upgrade so I can get it back on line. In the mean time I need to treat for flat worms again, guess a couple survived the last time because they're back in force. I also lost the monti. Not sure what happened there, my water quality never took a dive so I'm wondering if my temporary lighting while I was getting the hood together just wasn't enough. Either way I'm pretty bummed about it. The turf algae is coming back strong too, but I have an order of snails arriving tomorrow that will hopefully take care of that.

This encrusting monti came as a little quarter sized hitch hiker on the green zoo colony. It's now slowly covering the zoos! Not sure how to separate them, but I was surprised that the monti seems to actually be growing faster than the zoos. And my Rainford's Goby stands guard.

My star polyp, which has more than doubled in size since I got it a year ago.

Mushrooms anyone? Started as 2 mushrooms, as you can see, they like it here.

Now that's what I call a live rock! How many types of algae can you count?

Below are Photos from October 10, 2007

Here's how the tank looks after a couple weeks of good maintenance, also rearranged things a bit.

I moved the rock with my zoanthids and monti so they'll both have someplace to spread too. But now my zoos are looking pale. To much light maybe? I really need to find a good book on coral care.

My moni was pretty upset after I moved it, and didn't extend it's polyps for a few days. But seems to be doing well again now. Note the featherduster worm in the foreground. I've also recently discovered some tiny bright red dusters, but haven't had much luck getting a good photo yet.

Just a different view showing my best live rock. The water's a bit cloudy since I'd just finished flat worm vacuuming and removing excess macro algae.

Just a cool shot of my Rainford's Goby with my Open Brain in the foreground and Zoos in the background.

Below are Photos from Jan 15, 2007

Six months old, was dealing with a hair algae outbreak. Worst part about the stuff is how it clogs up the filters and skimmer.

Where it all started
Photos from June 2006

The bare tank with glass top, Tahiti Black Moon Sand, and 18lbs of live rock. You can also see the intake and outlet of the Prizm Skimmer I started with. If I had it to do over, I'd have broken up the live rock some to give me more landscaping options.