SPS nano?

[DerrickH]

I have a 16g AIO tank set up in my living room. It had some low powered LED lights on it but the color tone just didnt look good. I started the tank with true coraline covered live rock and live sand. Full of brittle stars and some bristle worms. Set it up and let it run on its own for about 5 weeks. I added some duncans that were just about history, some dragon eye zoas, and some palys. All of them are thriving and the duncans have just about recovered. There is also a massive pod population in the tank as well. Some huge pods. The only filtration is the rock, sand, and some sponges in the overflows. There is room in the overflows for carbon bags and gfo bags. Return is built in as well. I have no powerheads in there since there is only about 3/4" from water line to top of glass (rimless) and I dont want water splashing out.

There are ZERO fish in this tank so bio load is slim to none. Other than the small corals and pods put out there isnt a lot to create nitrates.

My question is, since I ditched the LED and put a 150w HQI pendant with a 20k bulb over it, would sps be out of the question since the water volume is so low and there is no means for nutrient export? All I want is acros and milli's for sps and only fish that will eventually go in there will be a mandarin goby. For the sps guru's out there, whats your thoughts.

Also, I have yet to do a water change on it and the tank has been up nearly 3 months....

[jestep]

If you get well established acros you should be fine. Stay away from anything that came directly from the ocean. Some of the ORA or Tyree and other branded corals are good because their lineage is well established and in many cases they were only cultivated because of their hardiness. You should be able to grow almost any monti, digi's, or birdsnest without any worry as well.

You may need to increase water changes only for mineral replenishment as long as your NO3 and PO4 stay relatively low. The mandarin will eradicate all the pods in the tank fairly quickly, so you would want to get one eating pellets or prepared food.

[mFrame]

Talk to rchavez as well, I know that he was running SPS in all shapes and sizes of tanks.

[RUSH]

I run a 20g nano at 2 years and going. I run Brs rox carbon and gfo via a converted AC70 refugium. Also have a Reef Octopus bh1000, ato and rkl. I do 2 five gallon water changes a week and sps do great. I had a couple colonies get rtn for unknown reasons. Roland is definitely the sps guru to talk as he grows sps like weeds.

-Chris

[FarmerTy]

The easy SPS should be no problem (birdsnest, stylos, and pocciloporas) and they have pretty good growth rates too so they should be able to fill out your tank quite quickly. I say for sure frequent water changes (every week or a minimum every 2 weeks) to supplement alk/calcium levels and to keep nitrates/phosphates at lower levels. If you have the ability, GFO or a small refugium would be beneficial. It is definitely possible.

Mandarin + 14 gallon = bad idea. Unless you train it to eat pellets. The green spotted one's are supposedly more open to eating prepared foods instead of live foods.

-Ty

[ckyuv]

ull be fine with many sps but they may not look as good as they would with a powerhead. ive read the flow contributes to size and health of sps. with 20k bulb they will grow slower but will have awesome colors. I tried keeping a mandarin in my 14g biocube and would feed it tigger pods every week but it wasnt enough. I would not recomend a dragonet in such a small tank

[DerrickH]

Thanks for the advise. Yeah I kinda thought the goby may be a bad idea as well. Was trying to figure out how to replenish the pod population. Maybe an HOB fuge full of cheato...

I litterally put this thing on cruise control from day one. Only thing Ive done is top off and add the halide lol. Looks like testing and a WC this weekend will be in the mix. Maybe a bangai cardinal or two.