Hogie's 180 Gallon Mixed Reef

Wow that's going to be a great setup I'm jealous. I like the stand and canopy antique/Barnwood kinda look. Very cool!

I may have missed it... But it's there an update on the clown tang? I thought there was a thread on it.

Adam

I'll try to take and get up some new pics later today, but here's the update.

The return pump suddenly got more power during the night (I think it has some glue that has run down into it that came loose because there was some blue glue strings in the tank) and so it threw off the herbie drain. I found out my emergency overflow pipe was too tall so it didn't get a full syphon befor the water was flowing over the side of the tank. Luckily, I didn't have the sump full of water, so it pushed over about 5 gallons before it was out of water and started sucking air. The bad news is I had the power supply, controller for the lights, and the controller for 1 of the wp40s sitting on the tile next to the tank and they got fried by the water. So, Jeff helped out (again) with a getting me set up with replacement equipment and now the lights are back up running and a new controller for the pump should be here this week.

I had a diatom outbreak that lasted about a week and a half. I got a pack of snails from reefcleaners.org and they're going to town. I'm debating if I want to do hermits or not. They're great scavengers and all the nieces and nephews love looking at the crab (hundred dollar fish right in their face and they get excited about a $0.50 hermit crab...go figure), but it seems like they always end up going after snails and like don't like the look of the empty, spare shells all over the sand bed. Thoughts on yes or no on hermits?

I've made a few adjustments to the fish list, and I've been adding them with a week in between adding each kind. The current stock in the tank is:
1 Watchman Goby
2 Bangaii Cardinals
1 PJ Cardinal
1 Tailspot Blenny
2 Neon Gobies
1 Purple Firefish
2 Red Firefish
2 Scissortail Gobies

Next on the fish list is to add the anthias (2 lyretails from 45 tank and 1 blotched)

Then the black and white clown pair will more down from the 45 tank.

Then it's on to Wrasses, then tangs, then angels.

Edited by Hogie - December 28 2015 at 11:44am

nice!

Looking good!

Time to add some pictures!


This is first adding water to the tank. I ran a hose from the garage to the tank (about 50 ft) and siphoned the water down to the tank so I didn't have to haul all the water by hand. It surprising worked really well with no leaking water!


After we got some water in the tank, time to do some aquascaping which is Kenzy's department. She set it all up outside the tank and then I was going to put it together with rods, but that stuff was a pain to drill through. After going through 3 masonry hammer drill bits, I gave up. Unfortunately I had destroyed her aquscapig in the process. Here's what it look liked when I was done.


So, she had to free stack it and redo it in the tank, but she was a trooper and I really like how it turned out. Everything is sitting on the bottom and it's surprisingly stable.



Next came the sand


Then more water. The water stayed pretty even with the sand.


I threw in a couple temporary heaters and a powerhead and the cycling began!


With the heaters I had, it got the water temp up to about 70 degrees which I figured was good enough for the cycling and I phantom fed really heavy about every other day.

I then go the lights from Jeff and mounted them to a board to go across the top of the canopy. But I left them turned off during the cycling.


After about 8 weeks of cycling, I tested the water and had 0 ammonia and around 20 ppm nitrates. So, I got the permanent heaters, go the temp up to 77-78 degrees and left it for another couple of weeks while phantom feeding extra heavy. I then retest and the parameters were the same.

For tangs I would recommend sail fin tang, purple tang.

Bring it, I have been waiting long enough :)

<=== Watching...

Fish List:
1 Yellow watchman goby/shrimp pair
2 Neon Gobies
1 Rainford Goby
1 Scooter Blenny
2 Bangaii Cardinals
3 Firefish (2 red and 1 purple)
3 or 4 Anthias
2 Black and White Clownfish (from 45 gallon tank)
1 Ruby Red Dragnette
1 Pearly Jawfish
1 Yellow Coris Wrasse
1 Either a McCosty's Wrasse or a Carpenter's Wrasse
On the fence about a Leopard Wrasse
1 Potter's Angelfish
2 Swallow Tail Angelfish (male and female)
On the fence about a Koran Angelfish
1 Sailfin Tang
1 Powder Blue Tang or Brown Tang
1 Hippo Tang (coming from my 45 tank)

Inverts:
Snails
Sandsifting starfish (eventually after the sand bed get's going)
Rainbow Anemone
3 or 4 Rock Anemones
Sexy Shrimp for the Rock Anemones
Fire shrimp

On the fence about hermit crabs

Corals:
Mainly SPS and LPS with some High End Mushrooms
No Zoas or Palys

What do you think about the order to add them, time frame between additions? Compatibility? Balance between where the fish will be in the tank (water column, in the rocks, on rocks, and the sand?) Too many? Not enough?!


Edited by Hogie - December 07 2015 at 5:47pm