Today it was announced that my 280g diary was chosen as
in Reefkeeping Online, an excellent online magazine for anyone caring for saltwater tanks.
A 50g water change was done tonight. During the water change, I made it a point to use a pump to stir up all the detritus in the sump and cause the water to be murky in the refugium to keep it in suspension. I pumped out this filthy water, cleaned the sump, skimmer & Mag 12 pump for a fresh start for 2005.
The fish room, once I was done. The skimmer is already bubbling nicely.
I documented my 280g 14-day Upgrade Project. It is a 5.6meg webpage, so dial-up will probably not be able to download this page (browser error for sure) with all 111 images.
The mandarins are doing fine so far. The female Blue Mandarin will chase either or both Target Mandarins. The male and the female target get along, but lately their doing their chase again (with the female always running away). I'm continuing to feed newly hatched baby brine shrimp every other day, so I know all the mandarins are getting some food for sure that way. The larger fish don't know what to do with the tiny jittery food.
Here is a picture of the 280g reef as of yesterday.
The new tank is maintaining well. Temperatures range between 79 and 81F from day to day. pH tends to run rather low, around 7.9 to 8.1 but I recently started dripping Kalkwasser to see if that will elevate the levels to 8.3.
I added additional locline to the existing returns, to the point that I could flex them upward like the hump of a camel's back. I drilled several anti-siphon holes in the underside of the hump, and no longer is there a risk of the sump overflowing.
Tonight I was feeding my son's tank, and the Golden Eel came up to look for food. So I got him some thawed squid. However, he seemed more interested in my fingers than the meaty food! Looks like I'll be able to hand feed this interesting creature provided I get some silversides instead. I really do like all of my fingers where they are!
Tucker looks like he's going to be just fine. He was eating tonight, and swimming in the tank like normal. :)
I woke up just in time today. My first job was to check the 280g and make sure the fish were swimming right side up. Current pH is 7.8 (but that could be 7.89 because the pH Controller doesn't show the number in hundredths). Then as I was heading back toward my room, something blue caught my eye. My little Hippo Tang was lying on the carpet!
I picked up Tucker, and he was still soft but dry. I quickly immersed him in the 55g's sump and held him as he started breathing again. I didn't know if he'd pull through, especially since I didn't know how long he was out of the water.
Sadly, I have to report that the beautiful Copperband Butterfly died today. It looked rather thin last night, which was the first time I noticed it. Since I saw it eat frozen food at the LFS, I wasn't worried about it. Plus it eats featerdusters and aiptasia, right? Well, my son's tank has both of those!
I feel badly, because she was a beauty. *sigh*
To find out the latest on the new tank project, you can read all the details on Reef Central where a (discussion) thread has been started.
Pictures are included. :)
