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Restarting a 40 pillar reef.

Any updates? Did you get to epoxy the stuff?

Yeah I got the epoxy, but have yet to do it as I wanted to tackle the dino problem I have first.

I think an RBT in a nano would be great, ours loved our 45g cube.
Your tester stick looks great :)

Yeah right now I'm at the convince the wife stage of another tank. LOL.
As far as the stick goes, I wish I remembered the names of them so I knew what they would turn into.
 
Yeah I got the epoxy, but have yet to do it as I wanted to tackle the dino problem I have first.



Yeah right now I'm at the convince the wife stage of another tank. LOL.
As far as the stick goes, I wish I remembered the names of them so I knew what they would turn into.

Dinos can be a pain man lol. Best bet is to siphon it out bit by bit, it'll keep coming back but at least it wont look like crap lol.
 
kifwehaveacunundrum_zpsb205cc6b.jpg



For some reason I can't keep my alk up. My cal is always above 440 but my alk drops to 6 on the regular. What could be sucking all the alk out of my water and not so much of the cal? I've even gone weeks where I don't dose cal and just does alk just to see if the cal will come down. Even right now(haven't done a water change in almost 3 weeks to help fight the dinos) cal is at 450 and alk "was" 6. Cant figure this out.

Also I got my pH up. Figured with all the talk about "gas exchange" I've been shooting water into the tank via syringe creating lots of micro bubbles(heard running the skimmer wet helps so why not this). I do this about every other day and my pH has now risen up to 8.2 on a constant. Cowinkidink. I think not. LOL
 

redfishbluefish

Officer Emeritus
Officer Emeritus
For some reason I can't keep my alk up.

There are medications for this….but if it lasts longer than four hours…..Dance



In all seriousness, this is a common problem….because of the salt you are using. There was a time I wasn’t dosing calc because the salt (Reef Crystals), was overdosing my tank with calc. I’ve now changed my salt mix to 2/3 Reef Crystals to 1/3 Instant Ocean, and I’m now back to dosing calc.


Continue testing for ALK and CALC and MAG, and dose accordingly. There is a balance with ALK and CALC….if one is high, it will drive the other down.
 
And I quit.

Serpent Star Got The Pipefish. WTF. I'm so ******* FURIOUS Right Now I Don't Know What To Think.

I'm Just so frustrated when I comes to livestock and this tank. It seems that I can only have one other fish outside of the 2 ywg. I'm half thinking of breaking the damn thing down. What's the point of a fishless fish tank.

I'd understand if I half heartedly jumped in, but I researched the best type for a High flow tank, set up a mini fuge so there would be a little pod factory, took a hour to acclimate him. I just don't know. All I can do is shake my head.
 
Serpent stars eat fish. They are very opportunistic and will grab when they can. Get rid of the star, get a sand sifter or something, and you should be fine to get the pipefish
 
Don't quit. You have come way too far to quit.
Next time, look for the blue stripe pipe fish. I know it is far, but Trop can order them in (they had them recently but I believe they are currently sold out). We have one in our reef and he is really lovely. That looked like a dragonfaced, the blue stripe is much smaller, and I found it easy to acclimate to both our frag tank (his initial home) and our reef.
I know that ORAs assessor basslets are back on the market, have you thought of one of those?
Hang in there.
 
Don't quit. You have come way too far to quit.
Next time, look for the blue stripe pipe fish. I know it is far, but Trop can order them in (they had them recently but I believe they are currently sold out). We have one in our reef and he is really lovely. That looked like a dragonfaced, the blue stripe is much smaller, and I found it easy to acclimate to both our frag tank (his initial home) and our reef.
I know that ORAs assessor basslets are back on the market, have you thought of one of those?
Hang in there.

AC down here has a pair of Blue Stripes but I really liked the Dragonface. At this point I don't know if I'm going to get any other fish.
 
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