55 Gallon reef build

[Justin1989]

The colors unfortunately are a lot duller then they actually are in person. The Zoanthids are a lot brighter green, the coral beauty is also very vivid. The different colors is what I liked most about him and a lot of the Polyps.

 

[melosu58]

The coral beauty looks nice. Just keep a close eye on him. Mine was a perfect tankmate for 4 yrs but then he went coral munching and almost wrecked my reef. Use caution on them in the reef.

 

[Justin1989]

Thanks melosu. Doing a little thinking I just realized, my stand will be 48"x18"x32".

This fits a 90gallon tank

I do believe I will be looking into a 90 gallon tank with a built in overflow. My question is now, how do these overflows work? and what would you do if your pump failed or the power went out? I have noticed that the intakes on some overflows are at the bottom, middle and top inlets.

EDIT: Well, first fish death. My gold headed sleeper Goby, he must not of liked me; he committed suicide Apparently my dad saw him this morning in the tank, I went to work and my mom found him behind the tank. Time to go get the egg crate from lowes.

Think I am going to hold off for a few days. Possibly looking at another goby. Theres a dragon goby at the pet store here in town. Will look at him for a bit.

 

[Justin1989]

So a few updates. I added another coral, and I didn't get the name of it. Go figure, I seem to have this problem lol.

After watching it for a while, my emerald crab went over towards it and sure enough grabbed little pieces off the corals. Calming myself down I simply tossed him in a bag with salt water and took him to the LFS. Traded him out. I'm trying to keep a close eye on the new one I got. He seems smaller so he may be better. He has already been on the coral eating around it but I haven't seen him actually munch on the coral. If he does I will take him back and just forget about the emerald crab.

Another update is I had a teacher in the local area shutting down her tanks for the summer. She talked me into taking an anemone, I wasn't to sure considering the immaturity of my tank. I may have made a mistake by accepting this anemone. He seems to be alright. He has let go twice, twice getting sucked up into my power head. Luckily no damage was down. I moved him far away from the Koralia #4 towards the tall rock I have. He has stuck he for around a day now, moving towards the back of the rock. Hopefully he finds a spot he likes soon.

Due to receiving the anemone I also later purchased a maroon clown. My mom was a big influence on this, due to her asking if she could buy it and if it would be ok to put him in the tank. So I went and looked at him, gorgeous fish and I didn't see why not but I told her that is was no guarantee the clown would host in it and also no guarantee the anemone is going to do well in my tank. So we added the maroon clown, and so far things look good. The clown is playing around the anemone, and eating well.

Hopefully it comes back out to the front of the tank.

New picture of the polyps

New pic of the mushroom

And a tank shot.

I have still yet to fix the background. I can't do much just yet with it until I get the new stand. Hmm.

I also picked up a firefish from the lfs. I was supposed to get a purple firefish however that didn't happen. Oh well still happy with him. He hid for about 3 days.

 

[melosu58]

Looks pretty good.

 

[pat8you]

I could be wrong but that looks like an unhappy goniopora. If it is it will get long wavy arms with flower looking heads on the end. Another picture once it has settled in will help. Very difficult coral to keep if that is what it is.

 

[Justin1989]

Now that you have mentioned that I looked it up online and can see that it is hard to keep. Unfortunately that is

 

[pat8you]

Is that the correct ID? If so i would see if you can take it back to your LFS. It aggravates me that LFS's even continue to buy these corals because their track record is so dismal. Then not informing people of the challenge is just shady. Sore spot for me.

If you must keep it send me a PM i have a coral book that is very helpful, i will give you what they believe is required to keep it health.

 

[mtnhomedude]

Looks great!! Im considering setting up another 55 with sw! and I must say this thread has been inspirational!! Thanks and keep on with the updates!!

 

[Justin1989]

I have no must to keep this coral. It is very beautiful however I do not want to keep a coral which has a 90% chance to die after 12 months. Doesn't seem right to me. It is a metallic green goniopora. I just found the bag for it.

 

[AMDPhenomX4]

Thats beautiful. I have a pink color one with many heads. Doing well for 3months.

 

[Justin1989]

Well sad news. Was downstairs for a while (hour maybe) come up and I find my anemone inside my power head. Not the tentacles though, the actual bottom but sucked up pretty well. I feel horrible for the little guy. Looks like I won't be attempting one of these guys for a long time. Possibly when I get my sump hooked up and can lower my power head down to a smaller one.

I appreciate everyone's replies, you are all very helpful. I love the comments, especially when they end up helping me out.

 

[pat8you]

Sorry about the anemone. I wouldn't worry about the power head though. I doubt it is the problem. Anemones will detach and free float when they are stressed or unhappy. Don't take that as a shot at you. It could be for a whole lot of reasons. It may be that the tank it came out of had less the perfect water conditions and when it hit your water just the difference can be enough to stress it out. Not necessarily your fault. I would how ever wait till the tank is a bit more established just to be on the safe side. I would also run some carbon to help clean up the mess of it going through the blender though.

 

[Justin1989]

No worries, any advice is always welcome. I never planned on getting an anemone so soon. Definitely one of those things I was iffy about. The anemone never got chopped up actually. His jelly bottom got sucked into the grill of the intake (koralia) and never actually touched the rotor itself. Im not sure what lighting conditions it was under, however it stuck towards the far bottom of the tank under rocks and so forth. I believe it may not have been used to that strong of lighting. I dunno though. I have a phosban reactor, quite a bit of stuff simply sitting here waiting for a new stand.