Planeden Posted March 16, 2014 Share Posted March 16, 2014 So turning my 10 gallon QT type tank has gone from simple to not. After seeing ceastman putting rock from floridaliverock.com in his tank it reminded my how much I liked the look of the diver collected rock from the gulf of Mexico (GOM). So, here is the plan. The idea of this tank will be to actually get a sliver of the gulf encased in glass and let it do what it wants to do. It will have diver collected sand, all diver collected rock, and only inhabitants from the florida coast. Well, best I can on that last bit, anyway. It's hard to narrow down from "western Atlantic reef" to the gulf of Mexico. I want the rock to come with tons of life - CUC, macro, corals, etc. I will do minimum cleaning to get rid of true pests and invasive species. Then just do minor pruning as everything grows. I have no intention of adding corals to the tank. I think this will make a very interesting look. Equipment list: 15g tall from marineland. Aquaclear AC70 HOB filter with canister media and maybe chaeto. BML lights (Patrick has suggested 12K). Heater Nano powerhead or two. Since this will have minimal filtration, no sump, etc, setting up the biological filtration will be key. After talking to Dale at floridaliverock.com his concern with such a small volume of water being stable, especially at the beginning. He's afraid that any die of will nuke the tank and kill all the life on the rock. His recommendation was to set up the 15g with sand and a small amount of rock. Then as it cycles and stabilizes, slowly add other pieces of rock. So, I have a 30g tank that is sitting around with nothing to do. I'm going to use this as a holding tank for a home for the slow addition process. I'm going to take this a little further, and cycle this tank before ordering rock. I will use some substrate and a few pieces of rock rubble from my sump with a power filter. When the time comes, some of this media will be added to the filter for the GOM Box. This may all be over cautious, but we're talking about an extra month (or so) of my life to make sure everything goes well. Nothing exciting to take pictures of now. But they'll come eventually. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Planeden Posted March 16, 2014 Author Share Posted March 16, 2014 15g Marineland Tank - Aquaclear 70 HOB Filter 20" 12K BML Light Hydor Korella Nano - 240 GPH 30 lbs. of GOM Live Sand 25 lbs. of GOM Live Rock Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sherita Posted March 16, 2014 Share Posted March 16, 2014 Can't wait to see livestock, or something. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RobR Posted March 16, 2014 Share Posted March 16, 2014 Nice sounds like a cool little project... Taking things slow sounds like a good plan to get it started right!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Planeden Posted March 16, 2014 Author Share Posted March 16, 2014 Nice sounds like a cool little project... Taking things slow sounds like a good plan to get it started right!! Yeah, I like taking it slow just to get it all in line. Plus, it adds to the excitement when the countdown reaches zero . But, I did just salt the water in the 30g, so a little more work tonight and it'll be churning out the bacteria. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Veni Vidi Vici Posted March 16, 2014 Share Posted March 16, 2014 Sounds pretty cool Planden.Why Florida coast and not Texas? I like than gnarly nasty rock your talking about,with all the surprises. I have to see if I can find some of that local. I wonder whats is the state law on removing rock and sand from the Texas coast if any? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
subsea Posted March 17, 2014 Share Posted March 17, 2014 The shallow Texas waters are not very clear, plus the temperature is much colder in the winter and does not support the abundance of colorful diversity found in Florida coastal waters. This is reflected by numerous commercial collectors of live rock in Florida. To my knowledge, there are no commercial live rock collectors in Louisiana or Texas. I know of one small time macro algae collector out of Corpus Christie. Dennis, What are your thoughts for using Chaeto in your HOB? You will have plenty of macro sprouting from your live rock. Just this past week, after moving some of same type rock into a different tank, I noted emerging Dragons Breath. It had been dormant for over a year in captivity. In the GOM, during this time of year, the green macros will be subsided with predominate red macros, which should include Red Grapes. Patrick Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Veni Vidi Vici Posted March 17, 2014 Share Posted March 17, 2014 The shallow Texas waters are not very clear, plus the temperature is much colder in the winter and does not support the abundance of colorful diversity found in Florida coastal waters. This is reflected by numerous commercial collectors of live rock in Florida. To my knowledge, there are no commercial live rock collectors in Louisiana or Texas. I know of one small time macro algae collector out of Corpus Christie. Thank you for the info Patrick. You wouldnt happen to know if there are laws in Texas preventing removal of sand or rock from her coastal waters? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
subsea Posted March 17, 2014 Share Posted March 17, 2014 I think there are no restrictions on sand and rock. Livestock like Peppermint Shrimp requires a fishing license only. These would have to be private collection and not for commercial resale. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ceastman Posted March 17, 2014 Share Posted March 17, 2014 I love the diversity of life that came on the live rock from Dale. Ever other week or so I trim back another section of the watercress (I don't have a fish that likes it) and I find something new growing underneath it. I have started finding more limpets running around the main tank as well, I thought I only had them in the refugium. I just dropped off one of the hitchhikers I got from the live rock from Dale, it was a rock boring urchin, he was pretty cool but he was eating the coralline algae off my rocks. I also have a small one of these I am keeping for now. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Planeden Posted March 17, 2014 Author Share Posted March 17, 2014 @VVV - glad Patrick answered your question with inelegance and stuff. My answer was going to be that I couldn't find texasliverock.com. @patrick - my thought on chaeto is if I want/need pods to grow in the filter as a fuge, they may want some chaeto to live in. depending on how the tank is laid out and the eventual inhabitants, I doubt I'll need it. I also do not know if he chaeto would be any benefit or if just the filter media works. Edit-I'm considering adding a layer of carbon in a filter sock on top of my filter media, which may or my not inhibit pod accommodations. @ceastman - yeah, I seriously think I missed out on the hitchhiker watch on my first build (all dry rck). This time I should get it on steroids, though. I'm getting a combination of his premium coralline rock and the deco rock. But he wants to avoid some of the larger bivalves and sea squirts for ths size tank. But you are getting some really neat stuff coming out of yours. Hopefully I won't be jealous much longer . Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
subsea Posted March 17, 2014 Share Posted March 17, 2014 I do not think the Chaeto will help your biofiltration, as your tank will be its own biofilter. With repect to pods and a refugium, small rock rubble in your HOB would grow pods and not require a light source. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Planeden Posted March 17, 2014 Author Share Posted March 17, 2014 I do not think the Chaeto will help your biofiltration, as your tank will be its own biofilter. With repect to pods and a refugium, small rock rubble in your HOB would grow pods and not require a light source. Yeah, I agree bio filtration wise it won't do anything. So maybe adding a little rock rubble will be better. Or I may not need anything with 20-30 lbs of rock in the tank. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
subsea Posted March 17, 2014 Share Posted March 17, 2014 Are you sure that you can get 20-30 lbs in a 15G tank? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Planeden Posted March 17, 2014 Author Share Posted March 17, 2014 Are you sure that you can get 20-30 lbs in a 15G tank? No . But dale thought I could. But I would rather have a little extra and sell it than not have quite enough. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gonzo59 Posted March 17, 2014 Share Posted March 17, 2014 Let me know if you have too much! I wouldn't mind a small piece of this awesome rock myself... And it would be a lot cheaper than starting a new tank just so I can order enough to make it worth while (but not nearly as fun) Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Planeden Posted March 17, 2014 Author Share Posted March 17, 2014 Let me know if you have too much! I wouldn't mind a small piece of this awesome rock myself... And it would be a lot cheaper than starting a new tank just so I can order enough to make it worth while (but not nearly as fun) Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk Ha true, it would be cheaper. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Planeden Posted March 17, 2014 Author Share Posted March 17, 2014 Shhh, it's a secret. I have put 30 lbs. of aragonite in my holding tank. I will seed this with some of the diver collected sand. I'm hoping that while the tank is doing its holding job, the 30 lbs. of sand will be grabbing up the worms, stars, and whatevers that I hope come in my sand. Then, when I break the tank down after it has finished its job, I can provide some to interested club members to add to their tanks for added diversity. But, we will see how it goes. The stuff my not reproduce fast enough, or there may not be enough interest, to make it worth while. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ceastman Posted March 18, 2014 Share Posted March 18, 2014 Hitchhiker update - I just caught a pistol shrimp yesterday (Niko's reef has him now), pretty cool specimen it has blue legs, blue antennae and a red body. So current total from 90lbs is 2 mantis shrimp and 1 pistol shrimp. And I think I heard another click in the tank last night, maybe I am just hearing things but I will be watching/listening. If my kids wouldn't keep picking slow moving peaceful fish I might have kept these hitchhikers but..... but on the plus side I found 2 more rock boring urchins (black with a bit of purple), a small starfish and more limpets. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Planeden Posted March 18, 2014 Author Share Posted March 18, 2014 Hitchhiker update - I just caught a pistol shrimp yesterday (Niko's reef has him now), pretty cool specimen it has blue legs, blue antennae and a red body. So current total from 90lbs is 2 mantis shrimp and 1 pistol shrimp. And I think I heard another click in the tank last night, maybe I am just hearing things but I will be watching/listening. If my kids wouldn't keep picking slow moving peaceful fish I might have kept these hitchhikers but..... but on the plus side I found 2 more rock boring urchins (black with a bit of purple), a small starfish and more limpets. awesome. i'm sure niko is happy with your rock . i plan on getting a pistol shrimp, so if he came in on one that'd be great. i absentmindedly stick my hand in my tank too much to want a mantis shrimp stay. but i do have a list of disappointed eastman customers who didn't get their hands on one, so i know who will pay top dollar . otherwise, i need to work something out with Cstang to get things to niko's reef since he's a bit far from me. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Planeden Posted March 31, 2014 Author Share Posted March 31, 2014 i got my lights ordered today with the help of cara at Build My LED. it'll be a 12,000K spectrum, 18" long, with a 60 degree beam angle hanging about 6" above the tank. it'll get here next week sometime. i am still waiting for my 30g haolding tank to cycle. it is taking a while, though. doesn't seem to have really started yet. ammonia is off the scale and nitrites/ates are 0 after a week or so. it may have been my single piece of reef rubble, so i added a second yesterday. not that there is really a rush. it's probably an unnecessary step anyway. dennis Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Veni Vidi Vici Posted March 31, 2014 Share Posted March 31, 2014 Looking forward to the photos Dennis. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
subsea Posted April 1, 2014 Share Posted April 1, 2014 Dennis, The ten pounds of reef rubble which I got from you for biociltration study initially contributed ammonia to the ten gallon tank. Patrick Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Planeden Posted April 1, 2014 Author Share Posted April 1, 2014 Looking forward to the photos Dennis. not much to photograph right now. an empty glass box and a glass box with mostly nothing but water in it. but i'm working on it. Dennis, The ten pounds of reef rubble which I got from you for biociltration study initially contributed ammonia to the ten gallon tank. Patrick true, but this stuff has been in my sump a while. but who knows, there could be die off. but i did dump a bunch of stuff in it, too. so, adding ammonia clearly is not a concern . Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Veni Vidi Vici Posted April 2, 2014 Share Posted April 2, 2014 I been checking out Floridaliverock.... I think im going to place an order.Have you had any previous experience with them Dennis? ~Todd Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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