Taking it slow.

Taking it slow!



 

 

I suppose one could argue I am too busy boating and such. I prefer to think of it as being cautious or purposeful. Any how, I have chosen to add corals rather than fish for now. The fish seem to have difficulty acclimating to the new environment. I guess they get stressed, then diseased. After doing some research, I found it is wise to set up a quarantine tank to help acclimate the fish and treat for disease before introducing to the main tank. YIKES! OK. Settle down. No big tank investment required. Keep it simple. A small 10 gallon tank will due.

 

 

So I added a few corals recently. A few came from Wet Pets, and a a few more from a private enthusiast I found selling corals on Craigs list. The private seller showed me his set up and tank. I have a long ways to go. He sold me some great pieces. They need to grow a lot, but they are different from the stuff I found at the fish store. He helped me with proper element ranges for fast coral growth. So now I am playing chemist. Testing and adding Calcium, Magnesium, and Sodium Carbonate. All necessary for the corals to build their stony skeletons.

 

Take a look.

 

Blue Polyp.Sorry for the color rendition.(This coral is a little more purple than blue) I'm still working on getting good quality pictures.

Birds nest coral. This one should grow to a crazy looking mess. Small Polyp Stony coral (SPS)

Hammer coral. This is a large polyp stony coral (LPS)

I moved the Duncan coral back into the display tank. I now has 4 heads. I feed it small pieces of shrimp. You can see the white mouth in the middle of the head.

The tall flat coral in the back is a stony coral and the red and green one in the front is a LPS. sorry no names. I was thinking of Pete or Fred. We will see.
 

Hawaiian Feather Duster. It is a tube worm. The worm extends the "feathers" to capture Plankton to feed.

If you compare to prior posts you will notice the growth of this coral. It is doing better with brighter lights and the increased calcium. the square mount it came on is now covered with new growth. I am hoping it will get the finger like growth to hide the square shape. I know from my diving experience that coral will cover objects and make them unrecognizable.

This is my favorite picture.
I hope you enjoyed looking.
More to come as I add to my tank.

 

Tank Water  Chemistry.

 

Salinity 1.024ppm

Ammonia 0.00 ppm

Nitrate 0.00ppm

Nitrite 0.00ppm

Phosphate 0.01 ppm

Alkalinity CaCo3 149ppm

Ph 8.27

Temperature 77.9F

Calcium Ca 400ppm

Magnesium 1200ppm

 

Yes I measure all of these. It takes about an hour to do all the testing. It looks like I am running a chemistry lab.