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Bobcat's 75gal First Reef Build


BobcatReefer

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  • 4 months later...

Gonna be doing some work and updating this thread a bit, but this is a super sad update....my oldest critter looks to be on it's last legs...errr, tentacles...  I've had this starfish for maybe 15yrs now?  He was out and about yesterday and I noticed that his body is almost entirely gone - to the point where you can see holes right through him.  He had scurried back across the tank not 30min later, so he's still functional today, but that can't be good...

 

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Just finished up (another) fluconazole treatment, and this one did absolutely nothing.  Sump is fixed (fingers crossed) and getting water tested today, so next step is getting that put back in, then using the 40gal as a holding tank for the fish while I pull all the live rock, separate the corals I want to keep and see what I can do w/ the rest of the rock.  Debating on whether to put in a separate bin w/ no light to let everything die off, or go full nuke and treat w/ acid and start over.

Biggest issue is this red, sheet like algae:

 

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Why is that?

 

edit to add:  The reason I was thinking of acid is to truly get anything growing on the rock, vaporized.  I feel like bleach will kill everything, but it isn't going to eat it away and leave clean rock.  Am I off on that assumption?

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I guess to me the acid is more dangerous to work with and also reduces the size of the rock considerably.   I saw a video some time back by BRS comparing the two methods and my recollection is that if I ever needed to do it bleach would be the way to go.

 

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I know this is horrible to think about, but if you have to start over I'd recommend new rock, re-seeding and the whole ball of wax. That way you are sure to remove anything related to the rock. I would get rid of the sand as well. (replace rock, sand, water, thorough clean out of the sump - start over).  If you are nuking the rock you are pretty much starting over anyway, it would cost more $, but be more certain if you start with new/cycled dry rock. Just an opinion. 

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Unless you have some absolutely awesome rock that you can't bear to part with, then in that case I would bleach the **** out of it, clean it really good with a pressure washer, and then leave it out in this heat/sun for a few days and it should be pretty clean. No guarantee that everything in the deep crevices is gone, but I would think most everything should be at least dead. 

Then I would  put it in a tub of salt water for a while to leach out any remaining bad stuff, test the water for nitrate/phosphate, water changes, when those are mostly undetectable start the curing process again. You pretty much need to to the same process with dry Pukani, but I personally would feel safer with the new dry rock, then rock that I know had some issue. 

 

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I've thought of that, and I debate what good doing anything less than completely starting over does overall.  Still a bit conflicted.

Right now, I have 2 issues: 

1)  The algae, which I think I can really knock down w/ the bleach/acid, especially if I can do a large % of my overall rock.

2)  Whatever is killing all my corals, which I **think** may have been some kind of metal leeching into my tank through one of my jerry-rigged setups.  But that is also a WAG.

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  • 5 months later...

If you are worried about the acid ( which will eat rock) you can use a stronger bleach than the 3% you find in stores. I have 12.5% here at work and 35% Hydrochloric acid here. But honestly i wouldnt use either, Id use 25% caustic soda (sodium Hydroxide) it kills anything organic. If you need some let me know i have several totes of 50% you can dilute. i honestly wouldn't use the chlorine products. 

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  • 1 month later...
On 2/23/2016 at 8:57 PM, FarmerTy said:

Wow, have you identified what worms they are?

Someone posted on #AskBRStv about a worm they caught, and then the trap used to catch it, and the description matches 100%.  Specifically, the mucous around dead critters the worm was eating.

http://www.coralreefmagazine.com/how-to-build-yourself-a-trap-for-the-infamous-oenone-fulgida

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  • 1 month later...

Well sportsfans, all good things must come to an end.  At a crossroads in terms of time and money vs desired results and made the tough decision to shut it down.  Once I get everything sold off and broken down, it will be the 1st time in over 20 years that I don't have an aquarium running.  

Keep an eye out in the classifieds for frags, live rock, dry rock, live sand, dry sand, salt, hardware, etc.   

Thanks for all your help along the way - I certainly couldn't have done any of this without y'all sharing the knowledge and love of this hobby.  

 

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25 minutes ago, BobcatReefer said:

Well sportsfans, all good things must come to an end.  At a crossroads in terms of time and money vs desired results and made the tough decision to shut it down.  Once I get everything sold off and broken down, it will be the 1st time in over 20 years that I don't have an aquarium running.  

Keep an eye out in the classifieds for frags, live rock, dry rock, live sand, dry sand, salt, hardware, etc.   

Thanks for all your help along the way - I certainly couldn't have done any of this without y'all sharing the knowledge and love of this hobby.  

 

Sorry to hear that bud. I’ll keep my eyes open for stuff for sale. I would like to have your lone star leather as soon on as you want to sell it.

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