Finally got my tank started up

[FishEggs]

that really is nice rock. some day i'll have some of that.

 

[Ratrik13]

I went hog wild when it came to LR. I live in Alaska so choices are limited due to shipping options. If you look at the first pic, all the white rock in that photo is Key Largo dry rock from Marco Rocks the small darker rocks is just cherry picked rubble from my LFS. I bought two 50lb boxes because I was worried about getting just broken rubble after shipping. The rock actually arrived in great shape, each piece was bubble wrapped. After doing that first scape, i think i probably had about 20-30lbs left over that i actually made a centerpiece for my living room with. I think the total price on it came out to about $300-350ish after shipping costs (nothing that heavy is cheap to ship up here). Sadly its mostly been religated to base rock. One last note about the dry rock, it attacts hair algae like you wouldn't believe.

The extra rock that is in the newer photos is just a straight up 50lb box of Fiji Standard from Quality Marine that I got my LFS to order for me. They ordered two boxes and let me pick and offered to let me cherry pick from each. I found one box was mostly solid shelf like pieces while the other was a better assortment with a little more holes and texture. I made one swap out for a cool piece made of a bunch of large bivalve shells that had become cemented together to form an odd little rock formation and took that box. From what the LFS tells me i got lucky with the quality of this rock though. Even though it's directly shipped same day air to Alaska from their facilities in LA my LFS says it normally shows up almost dry. One trick I tried was to take the bag that the rock came in and pour some tank water in it, then flush all the little grit and gravel into a cup that i then sprinkled over the dry rock as a way to try and seed it.

I love how my tank looks now, but I still think that if i had it all to do over again, i would have just used all dry rock and seeded it with something like GARF grunge cause i LOVE how holely and lacy the dry stuff is. I was a little disappointed with just standard Fiji, but i didn't want to wait for the planetary alignment of my LFS not ordering for another 2+ months and hoping QM will have what i want at that time. I have to admit too that the last time I saw "fresh" live rock it was uncured wild Florida back way back in the day. Oh, and from what I've heard, Tonga and Marshall Island rocks have pretty much been off the market for about a year or so now.

Thanks again for all the kind words of encouragement!

 

[stratmaster]

It looks great! How is it that people get there live rock positioned so nicely like that? I just can't get the caveness like you have and nice stacks. Any pointers? rofl.

Steve

 

[Ratrik13]

I could make up some long winded post about perspective and proportions etc, but it would just be me talking out my blowhole. Keep in mind, this is MY first SW tank ever, so in all likelihood, I got lucky. =P

The best pointer I could give is to play with your rock. I had my dry rock for probably a month before I got it wet. Pick up the pieces, turn 'em over, flip 'em around, get an idea of each rocks personality. Got an ugly rock? Try breaking it, worst case, you end up with some rubble to spread around the base of your rockface which makes it look a little more natural. Got a solid hunk of rock thats just plain boring? Use masonry drill bits and think like a mantis shrimp (minus all the carnage and bloodlust ). As for caves, think of them more like tables. Use smaller less attractive pieces to support large flat pieces, or there's always PVC scaffolding. Then take some of the nice looking pieces and place around the sides to form walls, just make sure there's plenty of water flow through the cave and more than one entrance so fish can't get trapped inside by a bully.

For arches... i got lucky, I dropped a nice large rock by mistake and it broke into an almost perfect arch. If i hadn't gotten so lucky, my plan was to use alot of the smaller rocks and rubble I had and some of the aquarium safe epoxies to make a single arching rock. The few times I've done things like for freshwater the trick was to think like an artist first and an engineer second. Sculpt it how you want it, then use some epoxy to make it stable on at least one end. I say one end because you'd generally want to anchor an arch off a large stable rock to help it fight the tendency to fall forward or backward. I wouldn't recommend epoxying both ends because that would probably make it a pain to get back out of the tank if you have to take the system down.

Just remember, an aquarium is its own little world and you are it's god. Try to work with your building blocks to make the world in your image, but if all else fails, your only human, so break stuff till it works!

/close blowhole

 

[thominil]

Many people scape and rescape over and over until they get it to the point where thy like it. It is best to do the scaping when there are no fish/inverts in the tank.

 

[Sharkbait430]

Many people scape and rescape over and over until they get it to the point where thy like it. It is best to do the scaping when there are no fish/inverts in the tank.

Its so true. I scaped and rescaped and rescaped and rescaped. You just have to do it, look at it, and change things around if you dont like them. Thom also makes a good point - make sure you scape while you dont have any fish or inverts!!

 

[Ratrik13]

Figured i'd post a few pics before work, trimmed the macro a bit and finally added some livestock to the tank. 2 Feather dusters and 3 turban snails, think they are Astraeas.

 

[spikey]

Give us a pic of you artwork "centcenterpiece for my living room"

 

[Boulder]

Figured i'd post a few pics before work, trimmed the macro a bit and finally added some livestock to the tank. 2 Feather dusters and 3 turban snails, think they are Astraeas.

Nicely done ... kinda has a 'lagoon' feel to the aquascaping!

 

[Sharkbait430]

Looking good, that coralline will make it look spectacular!

 

[thominil]

Looks great!

 

[thincat]

Very nice, I would find a shell or something like that to anchar your tubeworm down to. You might even stick it in the sand. My duster is wedged into a shell and it grew straight up from there.
Here you see my Clarkii clown hosting with the Hawaiian duster and the duster coming straight out of the seashell/

 

[Ratrik13]

Funny thing about my dusters is that when i finally plunked 'em down in the tank... i couldn't remember which end was which. I figured the end with the lighter color to the tube was the "head", but one of them had two ends like that (I think it's actually two worms that are either in the same tube or who's tubes grew together at some point). I figured they wouldn't come out for a day or two because of how much they'd been disturbed so I decided to take a shower. Sure enough, when i get out of the shower, all three worms are peeking out, but I didn't want to put my hands back in the tank for fear of still having soap on me. After work today I gently wedged the dusters under some small rocks at diff points in the tank. One seems happy, but i haven't seen one since this morning and the other since yesterday.

My snails seem a little odd too, two of them don't seem like they've moved, but i don't think they are sick or dead cause they are in some of the highest flow areas of the tank (my wife says they can't move cause their hanging on for dear life).

My package finally came with my bulkheads and other parts for my refugium, but I'm probably not gonna get the plumbing finished till my days off. Here's a pic to give an idea of where it is in relation to my tank.

Figure I'd show a pic of my extra LR tank. It's just a standard 10g. It's pretty boring stuff though.

Spikey asked to see my "centerpeice" in my living room... woundn't it figure that as soon as I pull some of the rock out to use in my fuge someone wants to see it. =P Well, here's what's left of it. Oh, excuse the mess... my "living room" also doubles as my workshop due to lack of other space.

Finally... figured i would show off two pics of my freshwater tank too while i'm at it... if you look close, you can see my pride and joy (my vampire shrimp) in the lower left hand corner.

Sorry about the off topic nature of some of this post, but I was bored and playing with the camera. =P

 

[Mitchell0605]

Nice thincat. I wish my Black Ocellaris would get in my freakin' BTA. My previous one did (before it's sad demise from ich) and the black and white looked great against the purple tips and white and pink of the anenome.
ratrik: That aquascape looks AWESOME!!! I played around with mine as well. (Wanted a ledge for shadow effect). It's fun too lol. I was having arguements with my Mum over every little movement.

 

[Sharkbait430]

TC, thats an awesome shot and a really cool worm (never thought I'd be so excited about a worm before)!

Ratrik, the tank looks great as I said before but I was laughing because you were afraid to put your hand in the tank and thats happened to me so many times because I had washed my hands or something, but with me, I put my hand in the tank and then freaked out, lol, I dont think it is that bad though =)

 

[thincat]

A little bit on safety.Be aware that lots of saltwater animals are very poisonest. Zoanthus polyps are some of the deadliest of them. Be careful and wash your hands after any work in your tank. Just make it a good habit and you will avoid problems. If you have pets be sure they don't eat anything you may drop on the floor..same goes for children...

 

[Ratrik13]

So a funny thing happened while I was at work. I went to bed on Thursday night with a small crop of what I've been assuming was hair algae in the lower right hand corner of my tank. By the time i get home from work late Friday night I glance in the tank and just happen to notice... the hair algae is GONE. I don't mean mowed down, I mean GONE, like it wasn't ever there. Now truthfully, I'm not sure this stuff "was" hair algae, it was green tufts with kind of soft feathery looking strands that were about an inch in length and all came from a single point on the rock. I'm not sure it was "hair" algae though cause I had another patch of it in the lower right hand corner that i had tried to pluck to take to my LFS as a sample and they hadn't seen anything like it. The funny thing is that I had actually been "saving" that patch of algae with the intent of letting it grow in my fuge. I was of the opinion that if it would grow in the main tank it would grow in the fuge where it would be easier to harvest for nutrient export and if it did turn into a big stringy mess it wouldn't matter cause it's not in the focal point of the tank, and since it had been there since about a week after i set up the tank i figured it wasn't gonna go away on it's own. For the record, I think I know what did it, since the "snails" still haven't moved far, as i was scanning the tank looking for any signs that the algae has just "come loose" I noticed chitons and/or stomatella snails (think there are few of each) in a few places around the tank. I think the funniest part of the whole thing was the ghost voice of the forums in the back of my head wispering "Nothing good happens quickly..."

 

[Etunes]

Good job so far, i like the tank.

 

[thincat]

Oh my God, you're in for it.XD...not...How wide were the "leaves" on that algae?

 

[Ratrik13]

my guess... less than 1/8th of an inch wide, very feathery looking, just wish my camera would take nice close up pics.