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July Tank of the Month
Check out the PowerPoint presentation on Jason's tank by clicking here! Jason and his wife have been keeping exotic pets for many years. They have even owned and operated their own local pet store (Reptile Gardens). Their 55 gallon aquarium is positioned in the corner of the living room, leaving a large area behind the tank for equipment. Jason is an avid DIYer. His handiwork is clearly visible from the canopy to the sump. His decorative stand cover allows incredible access to his sump! Although the tank houses many different varieties of hard and soft corals, SPS frags dominate the rock work. Several fish swim throughout the tank. A beautiful rose bubble tip anemone hosts a pair of gold banded maroon clowns on one side of the tank while a bi-color blenny peaks from his hole on the other side. If you ever find yourself “up north” you should stop by and take a look at this aquarium. Jason is happy to chat about fish and corals. If you’re really lucky, you might get to meet his cute little daughter too! Many thanks to the Granges for letting us showcase their tank this month.
1) Your name, location and occupation. Include how long you have been an aquarist, how long you have been a WMAS member and how you heard of our club.
Name: Jason Grange 2) Describe your tank. Acrylic or glass? Size in dimensions and gallons. How long has it been set up?
Acrylic / Glass: Standard 55 gallon AllGlass, 30 gallon sump,
55 gallon refugium 3) Describe your lighting system, including your photo-period. Add what you would change if you could. I am using 4 x 55 watt pc (2 actinic/2 10,000k) and 2 x 175 watt 12,000k Metal Halides. I also have a dimmable lunar cycle moon light system. PC Actinics come on at 8 am, 10k’s come on at 9am, MHs come on at 11am. MH off at 7 pm, the 10k’s off at 9pm, and the actinics off at 10 pm. I don’t think I would change a thing. 4) Describe your filtration system. Include: How deep is your sand bed, plenum, your skimmer size and model and how long you run it, your circulation pumps (how many and their size in gallons per hour), your sump/refugium including Reverse Daylight, biowheels and skilters, HOT systems, clean up crew. I have 2 sump/refugiums: a 30 gallon kept unlit with LR and my DIY 750 gph venturi skimmer. The other is a custom 55 gallon with 3 chambers. Chamber #1 is a 6” DSB w/chaeto, Chamber #2 is a plenum w/caulerpa, and Chamber #3 is the return area for the submersible 900 GPH return pump. I run the skimmer 24/7 and run the 2 Rio 600 and MaxiJet 600 in the display tank on timers (moving to wave-maker soon). I have a 5 gallon auto top off for evaporation make-up. 5) What are your maintenance techniques? Include water change schedule. I do a 20-25% water change at the beginning of each month. Each week, I blow off the reef with a spare Rio 600 to suspend trapped detritus back into the water column. I scrape the glass as needed and empty/clean the skimmer collection cup and jug when needed. 6) What additives do you use? Kalkwasser, Strontium, Molybdenum, Iodine, Magnesium, Other I use Kent CoralVite each Saturday (except water change weekend). Other than that, I have a calcium reactor that is controlled by a Milwaukee SMS 122 that covers the Ca and Alkalinity levels. 7) Describe your feeding philosophy. Include your schedule, and what you prefer to feed your system? I only feed 3 times per week (M, TH, Sat). I feed 2 tsps of homemade fish-mush w/cyclop-eez. I also put a small leaf of dried green algae for the tang daily. 8) DIY ie, Calcium reactor, stand / hood, skimmer, sump, ect. Any Do-it-yourself items of interest? Web-sites that you may have referenced? Everything other than the tank(s), power equipment, and Ca reactor are DIY. I tried to get as close as possible to the highest quality, recommended brands/models for the job needed. 9) Stand and Canopy
Wood: pine 10) Items of interest: Favorite or unusual fish, coral, or invertebrate
Favorite Fish: Moorish idol… maybe, someday. Currently in the
tank, my bi-color blenny - aka Benny. 11) Can you include a table showing your elemental levels of Ca+, alkalinity, S.G., temperature, pH and other interesting parameters?
Ca: 430 12) What experiences and challenges have you had with the tank? Any lessons learned? Is there anything you do differently than others (or differently than previously)? If so, why?
My worst experience had to do with losing about 20 gallons of water
on the floor from my skimmer over skimming and overflowing the reserve collection
bucket. Well, I made up for all the lost water within about ½ hour. Man, but
I couldn’t figure out why all of my inverts where beginning to look like crap
(corals retracted and shriveled, snails and stars began falling off the rock
and glass). I tested the SG and couldn’t believe that my SG was off the chart.
I added double the salt needed to make up for 20 gallons. That was a mess!!!
Other lessons where that patience is definitely the golden rule in reefing
and don’t ever believe what you read about the next “cure-all” or advertised
as “quick”.
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