BlindSwordsman's 55 Gallon Thrifty Tank (1 Viewer)

[BlindSwordsman]

Things are still doing fine. No algae. No red stuff. I don't need to clean it much at all with small number of fish. I wiped the glass a bit once or twice but left everything including the sand alone. No strategy there, just being lazy and left it to the snails and other critters to do their job. ... From the start, I wanted to go thrifty on this tank and used whatever I had on hands instead of spending more money on 'corals and fish'. Well, I ended up spending some money on wood to build the canopy and additional things like the ATO system, and bought a few green torch, Indo Gold torch, 24 Tails Gold torch, ... But I got my money back from selling extra frags so I think I was still able to keep my initial goal there . Some new pictures ...

New 24 Tails Gold torch



Don't know what this torch is ...



No major progress so I just changed the angle and did a side shot instead.

 

[fanyeezy]

Looks amazing

 

[Reefer Oz]

I love the side shots. You can get really great depth of field and focus with these angles.

The Zoa island and Pectinia are great focal points in that tank. Nice way to highlight them!

 

[BlindSwordsman]

Looks amazing

Thanks!

I love the side shots. You can get really great depth of field and focus with these angles.

The Zoa island and Pectinia are great focal points in that tank. Nice way to highlight them!

Mmmm ... Thanks!?! ... I think the blind swordsman has swung his sword bravely (and blindly) and struck something!??!!

 

[Livestuff]

I use only the blue spectrum for my tanks so I only use about half the maximum wattage of the black boxes. I also use the blue spectrum of the Radions only, and that is set to be about 30% of the max capacity, and it is also about 60W or so. Turning the Radions higher or with more spectrums, I start to bleach out my lobos and other stuff, and grow algae (which I normally don't) .

So do change this to take the Pictures or u have filters on the camera?
FYI Sweat. Please come visit me

 

[BlindSwordsman]

So do change this to take the Pictures or u have filters on the camera?
FYI Sweat. Please come visit me

... I have a rather cheap Nikon D3100. I don't change the light setting when I take pictures (too much work). I usually leave the light as it is (in blue) and I use a yellow or light green filter. I'm sure there are members on this forum who do a better job than I do. I'm just an average amateur. But here it is ...

Camera and filter.



Here how it is, taken under the normal, automatic setting.



Here is how it is, taken with manual setting, and yellow filter. Photo not adjusted.



... And I might use some basic photoshop software to tweak the photo a bit to my liking. (I think if there's some misrepresentation here, it is 100% OK because I'm not doing this to make a sale or such .)



.. And no, I was not in art major. My art prof advised me to, but I thought I would starve myself faster going that route!

 

[BlindSwordsman]

2.5 - 3 Month Update: Beside the bad luck with the new fish online orders from Liveaquaria for this tank in recent weeks, nothing much has changed. Added some stuff that was rescued from being overgrown in the 75 gallon tank. Things are growing okay in this tank. Still no red stuff or algae outbreak and such. Except 1 red goni colony has been unhappy and closed up while the others are fine. I don't know why. It doesn't tell me!

 

[Livestuff]

2.5 - 3 Month Update: Beside the bad luck with the new fish online orders from Liveaquaria for this tank in recent weeks, nothing much has changed. Added some stuff that was rescued from being overgrown in the 75 gallon tank. Things are growing okay in this tank. Still no red stuff or algae outbreak and such. Except 1 red goni colony has been unhappy and closed up while the others are fine. I don't know why. It doesn't tell me!


View attachment 56220

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You NEED to come to my meeting and whisper in my ear your little tank secrets PLEASE

 

[BlindSwordsman]

You NEED to come to my meeting and whisper in my ear your little tank secrets PLEASE

Heeheehee ... There is no secret really. Ask @Reefer Oz. He saw my tanks. He came and left, and I think he learned absolutely nothing new or useful . My setups are very low tech and low budget. Nothing is near to yours. I use cheap $4 timers, empty cat litter buckets, etc. There is no dosing regimen or Miracle-Gro addition . I use cheap Instant Ocean salt. I do a 10% water change about once a week. I run my stuff under blue lights of the cheap black boxes. ... If you are really curious about how my stuff really is, you are welcome to come and check them out just for the heck of it if you have the time . I don't really mind having someone coming over.

 

[Livestuff]

Heeheehee ... There is no secret really. Ask @Reefer Oz. He saw my tanks. He came and left, and I think he learned absolutely nothing new or useful . My setups are very low tech and low budget. Nothing is near to yours. I use cheap $4 timers, empty cat litter buckets, etc. There is no dosing regimen or Miracle-Gro addition . I use cheap Instant Ocean salt. I do a 10% water change about once a week. I run my stuff under blue lights of the cheap black boxes. ... If you are really curious about how my stuff really is, you are welcome to come and check them out just for the heck of it if you have the time . I don't really mind having someone coming over.

Alright time to start selling stuffJk I love all my worthless stuff.
Deal on the invite sometime

 

[H2OHOH]

Makes me want to do more lps. Zoa garden looks cool

 

[Reefer Oz]

There is no secret really. Ask @Reefer Oz. He saw my tanks. He came and left, and I think he learned absolutely nothing new or useful .

I have indeed witnessed your ability to harness chaos in a glass box! And I approve!

Though you may claim to stab blindly at the craft of reef keeping, the proof is in the pudding. Your attitude and your method have brought success in a couple of gorgeous tanks. The best take away for me from our visit was showing just how effective a KISS approach can be. No chasing numbers, fancy controllers, slews of additives or expensive gear. Cover the basics, be observant, don’t make it a contest and Keep It Simple Simian!

Thanks Ken for sharing frequently! I hope more people get to see your setups firsthand. When you gonna host a meeting dude!?

 

[BlindSwordsman]

I have indeed witnessed your ability to harness chaos in a glass box! And I approve!

Though you may claim to stab blindly at the craft of reef keeping, the proof is in the pudding. Your attitude and your method have brought success in a couple of gorgeous tanks. The best take away for me from our visit was showing just how effective a KISS approach can be. No chasing numbers, fancy controllers, slews of additives or expensive gear. Cover the basics, be observant, don’t make it a contest and Keep It Simple Simian!

Mmmmm ... Thanks! I didn't know my approach even had a name. I thought it was called I.G.N.O.R.A.N.C.E. or S.T.U.B.B.O.R.N.N.E.S.S. .

I hope more people get to see your setups firsthand. When you gonna host a meeting dude!?

Well ... I think there are a few hoops I have to jump through to host a meeting (e.g. attending someone's meeting, etc, etc)?

 

[BlindSwordsman]

No new stuff. Well, except the Midas Blenny I got from Petco (I wanted a yellow coris actually). Some gonis were unhappy in this tank so I swapped them out and moved them back to the 75 gallon tank ... And blah, blah, blah ... Without further ado, here's my new ugly full tank shot!

 

[Reefer Oz]

Dude! I really love this tank! Such a good visual balance with the all the colors and textures in the scape.

People have ill regard for 55gal tanks for various reasons, many of which I agree with. So I kinda fall into the camp of 55s being less than ideal saltwater tanks. But you my friend run a testament to the contrary. Even the side view of this tank is appealing. Way to break reef keeping convention. Your avant-garde style is fun to experience!

 

[BlindSwordsman]

Dude! I really love this tank! Such a good visual balance with the all the colors and textures in the scape.

People have ill regard for 55gal tanks for various reasons, many of which I agree with. So I kinda fall into the camp of 55s being less than ideal saltwater tanks. But you my friend run a testament to the contrary. Even the side view of this tank is appealing. Way to break reef keeping convention. Your avant-garde style is fun to experience!

Thanks for the encouragement! ...Well, you know? They say 'if you have a lemon, make a lemonade' ... (I think I might have been drinking too much lemonade ... But, that's beside the point .)

 

[BlindSwordsman]

Same old stuff with some minor changes. Moved the rest of the gonies over to the 75 gallon tank. Just logging a new picture in for the record here.

 

[BlindSwordsman]

This tank was doing moderately okay. No red stuff. No algae. But, I decided to take it down to reduce my work load. As of now, most of the corals have been transferred over to the 75 gallon tank. There are a few frags left that I will post up in the public FIF section if anyone would be interested. Once I have those cleared out, I will move the fish from this tank over to the 75 gallon tank and put this one away. This is the end of this tank for now! So long, and thanks for all the fish!

 

[Mason1310]

This tank was doing moderately okay. No red stuff. No algae. But, I decided to take it down to reduce my work load. As of now, most of the corals have been transferred over to the 75 gallon tank. There are a few frags left that I will post up in the public FIF section if anyone would be interested. Once I have those cleared out, I will move the fish from this tank over to the 75 gallon tank and put this one away. This is the end of this tank for now! So long, and thanks for all the fish!

What corals are left?

 

[BlindSwordsman]

What corals are left?

Everything from this tank has been transferred out to my other tanks. Some extra, miscellaneous frags and stuff were given away last week. This system has been taken apart and put away already .