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Mike's 315 Gallon Build

It's coming up on three weeks since I switched over to metal halides. One of my montis started to bleach but it seems to be fine since I moved it to a lower light area. A red dragon frag RTN'd on me. It had been in my tank for two months but didn't really seem to be growing.

On a positive note I had a SSC frag that had turned white during one of my dino battles. It had found its way to the frag graveyard at the back of my tank but to my surprise is has started to color back up and I'm seeing some sings of branching. Last spring when I still had my 120 I lost a blue milli colony. A month or two ago I noticed a brown growth that I thought was a sponge. Last week it started to branch and turn blue. It's looking like that blue milli is back from the dead!

The lights are definitely adding heat to the tank. It's driving the temperature of the tank up to around 79 by the end of the light cycle. The tank is in our basement which is cool year round. I'm thinking that it shouldn't be a problem but I'll need to keep an eye on that over the next few weeks until it's time for the central air to come on. The immediate benefit is that my heaters are running less. I've been watching my average electrical usage on my apex and it's actually gone down slightly.

I also picked up two new fish from ASR, an orange back fairy wrasse and a richmond's wrasse. They are both in my QT and seem to be doing fine. I still have some work to do to get the richmond to take prepared foods.
 
Well it has been a while since I've done an update. The switch over to metal halides has gone very well. Temperature really hasn't been too much of an issue especially when we have our AC on. I had been questioning if I was getting enough turnover with the Laguna 2400 pump that I was using for my return. I ran a few tests and discovered that I was only turning over 1x my system volume per hour. I ended up replacing it with a Laguna 4200 and bumping up my return line from 1 to 1.5 inch and that did the trick. I have been battling some cyano recently so I'm hoping this help. Ive also cut back on feeding some homemade frozen food that had recently made. It is just way too messy. There is a reason that I don't cook. :)

Now for not so fun news. For the past two years I had been pretty religious about quarantining all new fish for 4 to 6 weeks. Last month i got three fish from someone who was breaking down their tank. I put them in my QT but with a lot of work travel the past few weeks I decided to move them over to my display after only 2 or 3 weeks.

I was primarily concerned with the introduction of the rhomboid to my lineatus but that went fine. However the basslet disappeared about a week after it was introduced. I got home from a week long trip last night right before lights out and checked on the tank. My potters angels, bimac anthias and rhomboid wrasse were nowhere to be seen and the bellus angel, exquisite wrasse and solenaris wrasse appear to have ich. I'm kicking myself for not being more cautious. My qt routine was really just observation and treating with prazi pro so I guess it is possible that has been in my tank for a while. Ironically enough I have debating about getting a sterilizer the past few weeks. Not that it would have prevented this but I wonder if it might have helped to keep it in check.

Everything is eating and none of the other fish are showing sings, yet... I've seen the discussions about whether all our tanks have it and if it is more stressful to remove the fish and treat and let the display go fallow. I'm not sure if I can sit by and keep my fingers crossed that the rest of the fish will be fine or worry about new outbreaks anytime that I introduce a new fish. I had been thinking about going bare bottom and putting in a starboard which would require pulling out most of the rock anyway. I'm leaning towards pulling the fish and doing hypo or treating with chloroquine phosphate if I can find it.
 
I have a powder blue tang that showed signs of ich. Added a uv sterilizer and it did not rid the ich but decreased infective part of life cycle. This in turn allowed fishes immunity to catch up and keep it at a level that's not noticeable.
 
I put a few fealers out last week on a few used ones. One way or another im going to get one. If need to go new it might be a few weeks before I scrape up the cash. Id rather hold off and buy a larger one (80 or 120 watt) when I can afford it.

Lights came on this morning and the three missing fishes are dead. The solenaris and linespot flasher have a lot of spots. My bellus, midas blenny and 8 line flasher are also infected. The lineatus, diamond tail, pintail orange back wrasses, regal angel, clown, and desjardini tang arent showing symptoms yet.
 
Mike....foster and smith is running 10% off this weekend on the entire site. The 80w emperor aquatic would be good on your system and you can get it for about $650.

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Thanks Steve. I had been looking at that one but am a little unsure if I can make it fit. Gonna do some measuring tonight. Didn't see any footnotes as to when that sale ends.

Lost my Midas blenny and bellus angel today. :( I'm wondering if this is velvet not ich or a combo of the two. Does ich normally take out fish this quickly? The pace of my losses pushed me to pull the rest of the fish this afternoon. It wasn't fun pulling all of the corals and rock but I got all the fish out and into another tank without too much problem.

I also took the opportunity to go bare bottom and removed the sand. I think that I'm going to pickup some black starboard tomorrow. Funny enough I just placed to rock back in the tank without any thought and when I was done I liked how it looked better than my original scape lol.

I'm going to leave my tank fallow for two or three months. Its gonna be tough road. Gotta do some more reading on the treatment options. I was going to do hypo, but I'm not sure if it will be effective if in fact I do have velvet. Copper isn't and option with the wrasses. I have chloroquine phosphate coming by mid week. I'm hoping everything else holds on until then.
 

dnov99

FRAG SWAP VENDOR
If the fish are dying so quickly I would lean towards velvet. Ich really takes a major infestation and long term to kill a fish. Sorry to hear about this mike...
 

kschweer

Administrator
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If the fish are dying so quickly I would lean towards velvet. Ich really takes a major infestation and long term to kill a fish. Sorry to hear about this mike...

+1. Hope things start to turn around for you.
 
Good luck mike. This always sucks when stuff like this happens.
I really need to look into adding a uv as well. Especially since QT is just not something I do.
 

TanksNStuff

Officer Emeritus
Officer Emeritus
Ugh, it's really sad to hear about all the losses Mike. Hopefully you can figure out what it is and save the rest of them soon!
 
It seems that this is certainly something more than ich. Lost an exquisite and solorensis wrasse yesterday. Everything was still alive today when I got home. My 8 line flasher has had spots for several days but is still hanging in there and eating. Everything else is symptom free at the moment. Gonna start treating with CP tonight and keep my fingers crossed that things will stabilize and start to improve.

I also broke down and ordered an 80 watt emperor aquatics UV sterilizer. Now I just have to figure out how to plumb the beast.
 
Im hoping that ive turned the corner. I lost the 8 line a day after my last post. The desjardini tang was looking rough late last week but appears to be doing better. I ended up losing about 50% of my fish in the span of a week but the CP seems to be doing its job as the remaining fish seem to be doing fine.

My plan is to continue to treat with CP for a total of 30 days and then observe for another 4 to 6 weeks after that.

Im guessing that I should be ghost feeding the display while the fish are out?
 
Its coming up on a month since I pulled the fish and started treatment with CP. Im happy to report that the remaining fish are doing great. Even the desjardini tang that was looking really rough is completely healed. Im going to treat another two weeks CP just to play it safe.

Its definitely tough not having fish in the display but im going to stick it out for another 6 to 8 weeks. I wasnt sure how Id like going bare bottom but I added blank starboard to the bottom and I really like it. Between that and adding the UV the water finally has that floating in air clarity that I nevered seemed to be able to get with sand in the tank. I also changed the rock scape up and am very happy how it came out.
 

ecam

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Pics of tank. Interested in the look of black starboard
 
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