27 MONTHS 26 DAYS

I made an impulse buy on 1 Apr and bought the Hailea HS-28A (1/10 hp) chiller from Aquamarin.

I was supposed to post the following photos earlier but was too tired and lazy and procrastinated till now to do so because the end of the month is coming soon. I have decided to forego SPS for the time being since I am not doing a good job and to focus on LPS and soft corals etc. 

Strangely, my Maxspect Razor Nano blue lights for my Aquarium 1 were burnt out yesterday. I was here when the lights flickered on and off until the blue lights were no longer on. I was playing with all the lights that I have yesterday and cut my left thumb with a pair of scissors and there was blood everywhere. The pain lasted me through the night. I replaced the lights with a simple 18W Green Element lights but it was flickering just now too. I wonder what is the problem?

my yellow Banded Coral Shrimp in my office aquarium

I guess this Bubble Coral is recovering?

one of the two Royal Gramma has disappeared

the Supersun in my home aquarium

close-up of the Supersun

one of three green-purple Gonioporas that I have

photo taken under more white light

another Goniopora

fan worms and Zoas

Elegance and Zoas

FTS with white Aquazonic lights on the left

Aquazonic white lights on the right

one of two Bubble Corals

one of the last SPS that I have

too much blue in the photos

too much white makes it too warm

EIGHT MONTHS

I think this is quite an uneventful month, considering that there weren't much additions or changes.

After getting the AI Nano and switching the Maxspect to tank 1, I find that the collective colourful Zoas garden is unbelievably amazing. The 7 fishes (4 Fire Gobies, 1 Purple Fire Goby, 1 Royal Gramma and 1 Flameback Angel) add a lot of colour to the tank. Interestingly, there is a purple clump of algae growing on the red Zoas rock at the bottom right hand corner of the tank. The purplish blue Actinodiscus and orange Ricordea yuma mushrooms are also getting bigger.

As for tank 2, I am still highly unhappy with the colour. Frankly, the Flame Angel is the one with the most vibrant colour in the tank. Other members add a colour here and there, but the entire display does not quite stand out. The Pocci sps appears to be dead now while the Millepora, yellow Bird Nest, green Digitata and Stylophora appears to be fine. There are a few Zoas that I place here temporarily until I transfer them gradually to my office tank. Some of the colourful premium Zoas e.g. Red Eagles Eyes, Sunflower, Purple Death and Nuclear Death, are multiplying rather quickly. I am still cracking my head thinking of how I can add more colours to the system.

Tank 1 (1 ft cube - 27 litres)
The list of livestock is as follows: 

• Fishes 
• 4 Fire Gobies
• 1 Purple Fire Gobies
• 1 Royal Gramma 
• 1 Flameback Angel
• Invertebrates 
• 1 Cleaner Skunk Shrimp 
• 3 Pom Pom Crabs 
• 1 big red Hermit Crab & 3 small red Hermit Crabs 
• 2 Turbo Snails 
• 1 Nassarius Snail 
• 1 red Coco-worm 
• 1 big (brown) Feather Duster Worms 
• Corals 
• LPS 
• 1 pink Sun Coral 
• 1 cream Elegance Coral
• Mushrooms 
• 1 plate of blue Actinodiscus mushrooms 
• 1 orange Ricordea yuma mushroom 
• Soft Corals 
• 1 Rose Tip Bubble Anemone 
• 2 Chili Corals
• Polyps 
• 1 plate or pink and 1 frag of green Palm Tree Coral 
• 1 rock of brown Daisy (Clove) Polyps 
• 1 green and 1 red Palythoa 
• mixture of Zoas 
• 1 Rasta (6) & Sunflower (1) Zoas 
• Macroalgae 
• many clumps of green Caulerpa 

The technical information is as follows:

• 1 Ocean Free Hang-on-Back filter 2 
• 1 Easy Aqua Ex500 External Filter with wave deflector 
• 1 Maxspect Razor Nano 60W (10,000 K)
• 1 Tunze Osmolator Nano 
• 1 Dymax Cooling Fan 

Tank 2 (1.5 feet cube - 56 litres)
The updated list of livestock is:

• Fishes
• 1 Yellow Tang
• 1 Flame Angel
• 1 Yellow Wrasse
• 1 Six Line Wrasse
• 3 Clown Fish
• Invertebrates
• 1 Fire Shrimp
• 1 Cleaner Skunk Shrimp
• 7 Turbo snails
• 2 Nassarius snails
• 2 Bumble Bee snails
• 1 electric blue Hermit Crab
• 2 Coco-worms (1 red and 1 yellow)
• 2 brown and 1 grey Feather Duster Worms
• 1 blue Clam
• Corals
• SPS
• 1 green digitata
• 1 purple millepora
• 1 pink birdnest
• 1 yellow birdnest
• 1 cream green Stylophora
• 1 1 blue-tipped and 1 green-tipped Acropora
• 1 brown Pocci
• 1 brown Monti cap, 1 brown Monti cap with SPS, 4 frags of Monti caps (pink, brown, royal purple, mixed)
• LPS
• 1 rock of fluorescent green and blue Goniopora
• 1 plate of mixed Goniopora
• 1 fluorescent Octo Coral
• 1 orange green Acan
• Mushrooms
• 5 orange Ricordea yuma mushrooms
• 12 Ricordea florida mushrooms
• 1 plate of purple Actinodiscus mushrooms
• 1 St Thomas anemone mushroom
• Soft Corals
• 1 Xenia
• 1 flower anemone
• 1 rock of Finger Mushroom Coral
• Polyps
• 1 brown Palythoa
• 1 green and purple Zoanthus
• plugs of Zoanthus (Incredible/KO 9, Fruit Loops 6, Pink Panther 3, Eagle Eye 9, Sunflower 10, Red Eagle Eye 13, Fire and Ice 6, Nuclear Green 2, Nuclear Death 8, Purple Death 7, Pink unknown 6) 
• 2 mats of Green Star Polyps, 2 frags of GSP
• 1 Organ Pipe Coral
• Macroalgae
• 1 red Ulva macroalgae
• 1 red branched macroalgae
• Halimeda

The technical details are:

• Eheim 2213 external canister filter
• Dolphin H-200 hang-on-back filter
• Bubble Magus Q3 skimmer
• AI Nano 35W LED lights
• 1 Two Little Fishes Phosban Reactors running Phosban
• 1 Dymax fan
• 2 Hydor Nano wavemakers
• 1 Tunze Nano Osmolator

DAY 46

Much has happened since the last post and it is a long story. To cut things short, my old Fujitsu laptop was dying, so I got myself a new Sony Vaio laptop yesterday and I am now posting from it.

Anyway, much has changed to my aquarium and the photos shown here are no longer updated. Just looking at these photos, I have to say that I replaced the OF 3 HOB filter with a Atman HF-0600 filter because  it has a surface skimmer when drawing in water through the inlet tube and the compartment is more spacious. However, I hate it now that the inlet tube is sticking too far out into my tank and obstructs the view. I also added the Tunze Nano Osmolator as an auto-top up for water so that when I go for my upcoming trip for 7 days, it will refill the water for me without me having to worry too much. I was running out of real estate area in my tank, so I took out the Boyu wavemaker since the currents appear too strong and blew everything in a haphazard manner. These are the only equipment addition and changes.

In terms of lifestock, I have to admit that I added a cute Clownfish Chloe and a Six-Line Wrasse Sally but both fishes perished. I have decided not to add any fish for the time being until I am back from the trip.

As for corals etc, I added the following which I will post on another day:

• Stick/Tree Polyp
• branching whitish Goniopora
• frag of luminous green and pink Ricordea mushrooms
• plate of mixed Zoas
• piece of brown Candy Cane which somehow broke into 2 and I brought 1 to the office
• rock of luminous Green Star Polyps which has not opened since day 1 on 19 Feb 13. I didn't know it has been 7 days until now.

Looking at these photos, somehow I must say I find the actual tank display looks better in person than on camera but I will strive to post better photos next time.