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Unread 07/21/2017, 07:21 AM   #177
BigDave
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Join Date: Jul 2002
Location: Wylie, TX
Posts: 473
The starfish ended up not being 'nothing'. My green birdsnest is gone. We went on vacation for a few days and when we got back, there was nothing left but the skeleton.

The other SPS don't look much better. They still have color, but that's about it.

The LPS and mushrooms in the tank seem to be ok.

I'm not sure what to do about the starfish. There's too many to try and hand pick. I thought about a Harlequin shrimp, but I don't think I'd be up to the care and feeding it would require after the Asterina's were wiped out.

I also don't think it's all the Asterina's. The white ones seem to leave everything alone, it's just the dark colored ones I've caught on the bird's nest.

I haven't seen any on the new SPS.

Right now the tank is kinda just sitting there. I haven't had much extra money, so I haven't added any new livestock to the tank since early June.

I did see a nice looking tank that was mostly softies and LPS. My understanding is those can be easier to maintain. I was thinking about starting to head down that path. The T5's on the tank might do better with those types of corals to begin with.

I'm not completely set on doing SPS and acros, I just want something with movement that will grow and be healthy.

I also need to get some more fish into the tank. All my fish tend to swim around and then sit somewhere. I think my next purchase will be a Kole Tang and my Flame angel. Those will be my two larger fish in the tank. Maybe even add a yellow tang.

My skimmer also seems to be a bit underpowered for the tank. I was looking at larger skimmers. I'd have to redo part of my sump... mostly moving my macro algae somewhere else so I can put the skimmer where it currently sits.

The fans I added to the tank are doing very well. For the most part my chiller is only having to run once a week or so. My wife is home for summer break, so the house has been kept a little cooler. That's probably helped too.

I have the fans kick on half a degree cooler than the chiller does. Both cooling devices lower the temp by 1 degree before turning off. So if the fans kick on at 80.5 degrees, then the chiller kicks on at 81. The chiller then kicks off at 80 and the fans kick off at 79.5 .

Between the two, the tank has been a lot more stable on the temperature side. My evaporation rate has pretty much doubled. I went from burning 10 gallons a week to closer to 20 gallons.


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