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jlanger's 120gal Arts and Crafts Inspired Reef Build (1 Viewer)

Now... I could use a nap!

I just completed the transfer of the 75gal back into the 120gal!

I started Friday morning with stacking the base rock for the island on the right side.
I selected pieces that made for study bases and had no visual appeal; flat, ugly rocks. I took the nicer looking, big rocks and created an open U-shaped grotto for the fish to use as cover. I tried to keep the rocks positioned so that not only did they lock together well, but the rocks offered great places for corals to be attached. It was somewhat of a guessing game as I knew that a couple of the pieces had encrusting corals on them and I wouldn't be able to use those until the tank was filled. After the main structure was set, I added the first batch of water into tank.
Since the island on the left side is epoxied and has some encrusting corals, that would also have to wait until the tank was filled.
So at the end of the day on Friday, I had the right side built, the tank almost filled to capacity with new and some old water and the pair of MP10's running along the back.

I started Saturday morning early; the rest of the family would just have to deal with it.
To begin acclimating the fish and corals to the new water conditions, I removed about 15 gallons of water from the 75gal and added new water. That old water was added to the 120gal to help fill it. I did this procedure twice more (after an hour wait each time) to fill the 120gal and sump so I could start up the rest of the system.
As I was waiting between the water exchanges, I constructed the left side island and finished the right side. The left side went easier than I thought. It wasn't the terrible balancing act I had before. The island doesn't seem as tall as before, but with many of the larger corals being removed from the rocks it may just seem that way.
I deviated from the original placement of corals to some extent. I removed more of the green montipora colonies. I also spread out the brain corals; just to see how they'll look in new places. And I placed the Red ORA Goniopra up off the sanded, just to add some motion to the mid-level of the aquascaping. Most of the larger pieces of coral have made it back into the display, but most of the smaller frags are residing in the sump; for now. The anemone is isolated in the acclimation box in the sump also and is doing well; eating again.

The last step was to get the fish transferred back to the 120gal.
Once the water level was lowered to about four inches, it wasn't too bad of an effort to catch them all. The pair of clownfish went back into the 120gal; family consensus. For some reason, the anthias are having the toughest time re-acclimating to the new tank; very shy and staying tucked into the rock work. Hopefully after a couple of light feedings, they'll be back out and swimming along. The pistol shrimps are already making burrows and do not seem to mind the lack of rubble in the sand bed.

So after about 16 hours of "work" and mixing up about 120 gallons of saltwater this weekend, my tank is back where it belongs. And sitting on nice new carpet.
And my wife was giving me the stink eye any time a drop of water fell onto the towels or floor.
I still have plenty to do; placing and attaching corals mostly.
But all of that will have to wait for now. I need to sit down, eat and get cleaned up; my son has hockey tonight and tomorrow; and the Wild play tonight also.

I'll post pics tomorrow.
 
HOORAY!! Congrats on getting to this point! I think you are still on track with your original timeline right?
 
Just about...
I was hoping to have the move accomplished by last weekend, but apparently having a bed for my son to sleep in was more important. So, his room took top priority.
I definitely needed to get the corals moved this weekend. Many of them have turned drab and some have become casualties to getting moved, shaded or burned.
I really wanted to have all the corals placed and glued by this weekend. So if I find time tomorrow I could stay on track. But as long as I'm ready for new corals from the Expo, I'll be fine.

And thanks again , Jeremy, for the use of the 75gal. It really helped out with this whole process.
I should be able to bring it back to you during the Expo; if you're available.
If you want some free frags in compensation, let me know and I can find some for you.
 
Black Friday... I'm not going anywhere!

I spent most of the morning placing/glueing corals and frags into potential locations. Lots of glue and lots of wet towels!
I did end up removing a couple of older pieces that just didn't belong anymore.
Some pieces are just resting in place (no glue), as I want to see how it looks for a while before I glue them in place.
And there are still about a dozen frags that I haven't even touched yet!
And I finally got around to taking some photos of the system after the temporary move.

Here's the new FTS.

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The left island didn't really change too much.
Many of the corals that composed the slope remained intact. I lost a couple of important ones; my Oregon Tort and the Chip's Acro.
I removed a large chunk of purple digitata from the backside that really didn't do much. This made room for the Miyagi Tort that was moved back onto the slope now that the anemone has been re-homed.
I'm going to mount all of the frags of birds nest corals onto the uppermost rock to create a nesting site. It should be interesting to see how they all grow into one another. They're still not glued into place, but it should look nice.
I've actually collected quite a few zoanthid frags lately. I'm still unsure about keeping them all in the 120gal system or adding them to the M60 when that is ready.
Here's the left side.

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The right island is mostly different than the last aquascape after I removed the XL montipora colony.
The brain corals have been dispersed to various locations. Although the ricordeas still inhabit the bottom right corner.
The way that the rock is stacked, it creates a very large open cave; one could fit a football inside. There is a lot of vertical faces to the rock work, so I plan on placing many of the tabling acropora pieces on this side.
I kept the large flat table rock at the very top. Since many of the corals on this rock had encrusted, it made sense to keep it in about the same location. My Strawberry Shortcake frag has spent almost a year encrusting, but it is now starting to grow many new branches. And the Blue Hawkins is still growing very well.
Here's the right side.

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With the new aquascape, I was able to open up the chasm between the two islands.
I moved the two Duncan colonies into the chasm; one on each side. They create a nice "bridge" between the two islands to tie everything together. I moved the ORA Red Goniopora to the right side; up onto the rock work. And I just added a Aussie Neon Torch coral that I placed on the sanded in front of the other LPS. The branching hammer corals were removed from the old chasm and placed just to the left.
I plan on having a few of my staghorn frags placed so that they grow out into the opening. The black background allows the corals to really stand out when they're isolated.
Here's the center view. (It's hard to believe with all of the fish that are in this tank, that only the clowns made the picture.)

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And I think the clownfish pair are content without having their anemone.
I placed many alternative hosts in the same location and they frequent each one of them. The male prefers the duncans, while the female prefers the goniopora. But they bounce into each one of them all day long.
Both of them will sweep the sand in between the corals, keeping their "courtyard" nice and clean.

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And the last piece of news, is I have clams again!
Since I tore down the tank and completely rinsed the sand bed, I hoped that I was able to remove any last remnants from my GFO mishap. So far, so good.
I added a T. squamosa and a T. derasa that I purchased from Jay at the expo. The derasa is doing great; wide open and taking in the light all day. The squamosa is also doing well, but for some reason one hermit likes to climb on the shell and clean out the scutes; which irritates the clam.

So...
I'm almost done with this whole new carpet adventure.
Glue the last corals in place.
Hook up my dosing system.
And then start on my next build!
 
Last edited:
marty9876 said:
Glass is way, way too clean.
Click to expand...

One of the benefits from tearing it down completely.
The back glass was wiped clean! Even the algae that had grown in the caulking is gone! So now the corners are clear again; for now.
 
Last night I finally got around to setting up my dosing pumps; well two of them.

With having the master unit's control buttons on the top of the unit, I had a hard time trying to find a place to install the units.
I ended up just cutting a piece of 3/8" thick polycarbonate to create a lid/shelf that fit the sump.
The two units are stacked and placed on the right end of the sump.



Since I know that I need to dose calcium and alkalinity on a daily basis, I started with those two supplements.
To prime the pumps, I entered the manual dosing mode and held the "set" button until the liquids began to flow out of the tubing.
Programming the pumps was very easy.
In the auto dosing mode, I entered in how much of the liquid I wanted to dose in a 24 hour period, how many times I wanted to dose in that period, what days I wanted to dose on and how much of a lag time between pumps I wanted to set up.
So every hour, the pump will dose 1/24th of my total daily dose of each supplement; and the pumps are staggered 10 minutes apart.
I really wish I would've set this up at the very beginning of this build. So easy!

I will be monitoring my Ca/Alk levels daily over the next couple of weeks just to make sure that the pumps are working properly.

Tonight, I may try hooking up a third pump to dose the Red Sea NO/POX additive.
I'm really bad at not being strict on dosing this one, so maybe having it done automatically will yield some results.
I only have room enough for two of the dosing containers in my sump, but I will try to dose straight from the bottle.
I need to pick up some more plumbing parts for when I hook up the Red Sea Colors Program supplements.
 
The tank looks great! How long have you had the Goniopora? I tried once and it lasted for 9 months. Any secrets you have learned to keeping them happy?
 
esbowman said:
The tank looks great! How long have you had the Goniopora? I tried once and it lasted for 9 months. Any secrets you have learned to keeping them happy?
Click to expand...

I've had the goniopora for almost two years.
It is the ORA Red Goniopora.
It was a small frag from LA-DD. The skeleton was about the size of a quarter; and when extended, it was about the size of a golf ball. Now the skeleton covers the entire 2-½" mount and extends over 5" in diameter.
I have not had any health issues with this coral. I haven't ever spot fed the coral as I have always fed a frozen reef blend to the tank. Maybe having the clownfish hosting in the coral has done something beneficial.
I have tried other goniopora corals (not aquacultured) and they do well for about six months before they decline.

If you're thinking of trying one again, get the ORA Red Goniopora; or any other aquacultured piece for sure.
I know that a couple people on here have fragged this coral and have them available from time to time (DG).
 
Wow, just wow! Absolutely gorgeous tank. I love month as well and your tank has the look I'm going for! Really like how the colors mesh and it looks very artistic, beautiful, and healthy!

any tips for a beginner? :agree:
 
Wags90 said:
Wow, just wow! Absolutely gorgeous tank. I love month as well and your tank has the look I'm going for! Really like how the colors mesh and it looks very artistic, beautiful, and healthy!

any tips for a beginner? :agree:
Click to expand...

Thanks!

Tips for monti's?
Montipora spp. corals are one of the easier SPS corals to keep.
Every species of monti that I keep started as a frag 3" or smaller. They grow extremely fast when your water parameters are stable. Keeping the alkalinity at desired levels was the toughest to manage due to the montipora pulling it out of the water so quickly. Required lighting for the montipora corals can vary. I kept them under T5 and LEDs with success. The green M. hodgsoni was my eye test for where I needed to set my light levels. The higher up the corals were the bolder the colors, but then you create plenty of shadowed areas beneath the coral. As I ramped up the intensity of the LED lights, I let the corals tell me when I was getting too bright.
I also tried to keep the coral frags from growing onto the main rock structure. Once the coral begins to encrust on the rock, it is near impossible to eradicate any coral that remains on the rock. I had a colony of a Lilac Montipora that I lost many months ago due to me moving it around too much. But over the last two months, a small remnant that encrusted the base rock has began to grow into a new colony. A very tough coral!
But once in a while, they do just crash. A phenomenon that happens and no one knows why; I've discussed this with a few experts that have experienced it.

Tips for color meshing/art (design)?
Since I was able to re-aquascape my reef, I used a lot of the knowledge I gained while in school for Art/Design.
Having a black background let's the reef dominate your field of vision. I placed many of the bigger and brightly colored corals towards the back of the rock work to play off the background. I also use the foreground for the smaller brightly colored corals to add punches of light. The darker colored corals fill in the middle ground. I tried to create the different levels of light to create a dynamic appearance. You don't want to put all of the bright corals in one spot and the darker in another; layer them.
I also use the good ol' Color Wheel we learned in elementary school. I try to keep corals of complimentary colors close together to keep that visual dynamic. I placed my orange colored M. setosa amongst the blues of the Tort Acropora corals. The brightly colored Neon Green Birds Nest Coral play off the deep purple of the Staghorn Corals. The ORA Red Goniopora is grouped with the Green Duncan Corals.
I also consider the texture of the corals when I planning the aquascape. Having a staghorn coral sticking out from a bushy/plating coral adds visual interest (movement); placing the Birds of Paradise Birds Nest amongst the ricordea polyps for example. I do like keeping the LPS/zoas/rics in groups away from the bulk of the SPS corals, but that's just because they do not get along nicely.
It does take me some time before I decide on what coral is going where. But I always say that proper planning prevents a lot of issues down the road.

Tips for a beginner?
Take it slow. (Don't rush. Minimize impulse purchases. Plan, plan, plan.)
Keep it steady. (Regular water changes, maintain water parameters, etc.)
Let it grow and enjoy. (The reef tank is a community. And you're the observer.)

And if you have any questions, just ask.
The membership here is very willing to help newcomers out; all of us have been there at some point in time.
 
I'm five days into using my dosing pump and I'm loving it.
I was dosing the soda ash at 120ml/24hrs and the levels have slowly increased to where I want them to be; 9.8dKH.
I've dropped the dose a bit to see if the levels will rise/lower/maintain until i have it dialed in perfectly.

My calciums levels are still somewhat high at 490ppm, so I will monitor those levels before I begin to dose the calcium; if needed.
Since I use Reef Crystals for a salt mix, I have never had trouble keeping calcium levels over 450ppm due to weekly water changes.

Since the dosing pump is working so well, I decided to try dosing the Red Sea NO-POX.
Since I don't have room for another dosing container, I just took the plumbing from the container and put it through the cap on the bottle. It worked out perfect as the bottle is about the same height as the containers; no cutting necessary.
Now, I just need to find four more of the adapters and hard tubes to set up the Red Sea Colors Program bottles.



I should get my vinyl cutter out and make decals for labelling the dosing containers.
I wouldn't want to make a mistake and dose the wrong supplement.
 
David! What did you do that for?!
Bringing Marty and Angie's (nka: Margie's :kackle:) drama into my build thread.
Not cool... ;)

I keep a sand bed because I enjoy keeping shrimp gobies and pistol shrimp.
The shrimp were not very happy during the three week stay in a bare bottomed tank. They tried creating dens by dragging smaller rocks and frags to their area of choice; which did cause the loss of a couple of frags. So, the sand bed stays.

#SandBedYes
 
jlanger said:
David! What did you do that for?!
Bringing Marty and Angie's (nka: Margie's :kackle:) drama into my build thread.
Not cool... ;)
Click to expand...

I'm like a fish STD, parts of me just ooze to other threads. They should issue mops and latex gloves to mods around here.
 
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