Volcano tank, biopellet timeline

My tank is a bit cloudy because I just cleaned it up.


It's a series of two tanks, one reef safe (150) and one predator (250) tank with mangroves and volcano rock work. There's also a 200 gallon sump and a 40 gallon fuge.


I have been gone almost 8 months in my bid to make it to the olympics for swimming and filming a TV show. I did water changes whenever I could but mostly my fish were fed daily and top off water was added.


Yes, I know my tank has an extremely large bioload. The inhabitants have been living in there happily for over a year and some of them up to four years. My rockwork in the 150 gallon tank is over 10 years old and the rocks from the volcano tank are mostly around four.


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The 300 gallon has; a large spiny puffer, lion fish, file fish, red sea sailfin, blond naso, purple tang, large hippo, various other tangs, 10 clowns, file fish, dragon wrasp, mandarin, snowflake eel, clown trigger, niger trigger, picasso trigger, a large rabbit fish, a 4 line damsil I cant catch and various others.


The 150 only has a few shrimp, stars, a giant clam, and some basic tangs in it. I plan on redoing the rock work and blacking it out for awhile when my tank stabilizes. I have a bad problem with majo anenomes. too many to fight. at this point I only have some leather coral and the clam. I will find a place for the clam and hopefully bring this tank back to its former glory (heavily dominated SPS coral tank)


Currently there was little flow in my tanks. I have the returns and a MP 60 on the 250. This was probably a big issue with nitrates.


My filters include the 40 gallon fuge filled with macro, sock filters, SRO 5000 reef octopus, a SRO 5000 Calcium reactor now filled with Biopellets, two canisters with GFO and carbon.


I know I will get plenty of criticism but please back it up with personal experience or references.


I will update the pictures hopefully weekly so you can see how the biopellets do. Currently theres only 1 liter of NPX pellets in the reactor. I will add the other half in two weeks time.

http://imgur.com/a/RUqdd

Pictures

I know that others will probably disagree with me and that is fine. But for mujano anemones, I highly recommend Aiptasia Away produced by one of our sponsors: - Sea Life Aquarium Services & Supplies, 174 Semoran Commerce Pl. Apopka, FL 32703 (407)889-9887. I had a tank that was overtaken by them and I pulled all the rock and gave it a 2 week hydrochloric acid bath. I also had some problems at school in the 300 gallon tank. I used Aiptasia Away and the mujanos were gone with one application, even though, I was told that it might take two applications. They have not come back.

There is honestly hundreds of them. I need to re do the rockwork anyway. I'm sure a few weeks of no light and they'll be gone. I wish there was an animal that ate them.

If water quality has gotten a bit off, do water changes its the cheapest way to get things back in line. if you have sensitive corals do smaller changes. for example

my 500 gallon system had 50 ppm n03, other wise was perfect. I did two 50% water changes with new SW "REEF CRYSTALS " water that matched my parameters at this time, expect the n03 of course. I'll add that i had a horrible cloudy issue with both batches. but that mix was closest to my current tank parameters ALK n CA wise. id have chosen Red sea mix if i had to do it over again. and my corals tank was isolated for several hours while everything mixed and then i slowly mixed the new system water into he over all system. this is because enthuse system i have an attack d 60 gallon frag tank I'm growing out in. the main display doesnt have any sensitive corals so any parameters shock, which was only less n03 all of a sudden anyway, wasn't an issue. i am seeing a influx of new algae in the coral tank two weeks later due to stability and red field ratio ill not get into that. its nothing my tang can't manage. just something i noted. maybe due to something in the reef crystals mix.

SOOOOO were back in line at 10 ppm n03 which is where i want mine. bio pellets can take months so stabiles and do there job. there more of a long term maintenance product IMO. start with good water quality and choose your method to maintain it.

Be it water changes.. or bio pellets or carbon dosing with vodka. back to the point, when things get off, do extra water changes because it works. its not a guess or a partial fix its bring s everything back inline.

ill second the aptaisa X stuff. it works well and does little damage to other things in the process. other wise it can be a complete tear down some times to get them gone gone. they don't need light to survive.

I do water changes but it just isn't feasible to do as often as I need to. At a minimum I would need to change 200 gallons a month. I have a water changing station set up in my garage but our hot summers here usually bring the water temperature up into the mid 80's. There's also a cost factor, that's at least 60 dollars a month if I go with the cheapest reef crystals.

Hmm I had no idea they did not need light to survive. I have "cooked" rocks in the past and had them all wither away in a matter of weeks.

Thank you for the input!

I will agree on the no light. They will still come back. My 70 had 100s of them also, that is why i treated with HCl. If I had known about Aiptasia Away before, and if I had the time, I would have used it.

I'm not here to criticize or try n bully my way of thinking but ill try n speak from my experiences in the hobby and the results of conversation on this topic with other reefers.

I dont wanna argue about water changes and there cost effectiveness or convenience.. but ill say this, by my math the cheapest way to have a successful reef tank is water changes method. The non WC method is possible, but far more costly to implement.

I follow a 10% a month from the day i set up the tank. And I do so automatically now for sheer convenience and to stay on the schedule that i know will reward my efforts and $$$.. The money I spent on automating the WC far out weights the cost of trying to get around water changes and affords me alot of stability and end results of success.

For 90% of the hobbyist, there route to success begins with a water change schedule. Above skimmers, and dosing, and bio pellets, and all that.. Wc will do more for less.

Consider that a good quality salt mix and good rodi has everything but light n flow that you need to be above average successful in the hobby.

more and more now days i believe the rocks, sand and so forth only complicate the issues that can n will arise in normal reef tanks.

most tanks, aside from system malfunctions, end up failing due to the build up of unwanted stuff in the system. Be it in the rocks, the water column, in the sand bed, or by eventually the over stocking from growth or new additions.

Wow, your FO tank sounds amazing. :) For the the reef, just re-home the leathers and the clam and nuke the rock. I can't wait to see it all re-done and stocked with coral.