Guits' Caribbean Rose Coral Tank

[guits]

Hi everyone! I wanted to share with everyone my reefing "interest" since my return to the saltwater hobby over a year ago. I wanted to establish a Florida biotope nano tank (Fluval Spec V) and after doing lots of research I thought it would be a neat project to start a tank with solely corals that live naturally in the areas where our aquacultured live rock comes from. I also loved the idea of getting live rock from our own USA "backyard" and letting the hitchhikers grow naturally. Specifically, I thought the Caribbean Rose Coral (Manicina areolata) would be a great coral to focus on after looking at online forums and pictures of specimens that fellow reefers have obtained as hitchhikers on aquacultured Florida live rock. The challenge for my biotope tank would be obtaining specimens, since hard corals from Florida can only be obtained as hitchhikers from aquacultured live rock. After a lot of aquacultured live rock orders from a Florida and a lot of patience (with a good bit of quality live rock that didn't have any coral hitchhikers being given away) I have established a tank I really enjoy and that has matured quite nicely. Additional coral hitchhikers I have been able to obtain include a gorgonia and 2 varieties of oculina. The fish (various gobies from the Florida area) and cleanup crew are the only additions to the tank that did not hitchhike on the live rock. Anyways, I hope that you LPS lovers enjoy the pictures!

Start of tank February 2014



Photo of tank July 2014 before move from Boston to NYC



Photo of tank November 2014 (unfortunately the Cladocora did not do well after the move)



Various shots of corals and fish









Rusty Goby



Tiger Goby



Masked goby guarding eggs (recently my pair spawned after I increased frequency of feedings)

[stagcrazy]

very beautiful tank

[guits]

Originally Posted by stagcrazy

very beautiful tank

Thanks!

[chinchalice]

nice! how did you do the move? imma have to do one soon!

[guits]

Originally Posted by chinchalice

nice! how did you do the move? imma have to do one soon!

Moving was a real pain, but luckily the corals in this tank are very hardy. On the morning of my move, I packed every specimen in individual bags with enough water to cover the entire specimen. I stacked the bags into aquarium buckets that I had. There was a day between when I could pack and unpack, and during that day the buckets were put in a shady spot at room temperature at my in-laws' place. I unpacked quickly once we got to NYC and made fresh saltwater. Most of the corals did ok. The things that did not make it were the shrimp in my other tank, and the molly miller blenny was weak and never recovered.

[joshky]

Originally Posted by guits

Do you know the name of this coral? Some kind of favia sp.?

Nice tank.

[Mussin]

Awesome brains...

[guits]

Originally Posted by joshky

Do you know the name of this coral? Some kind of favia sp.?

Nice tank.

Thanks! The "y" shaped coral is an Oculina sp. I believe. The fleshy corals are Manicina areolata, also referred to as Caribbean rose corals.

Originally Posted by Mussin

Awesome brains...

Thanks!

[guits]

I was able to observe the masked gobies spawning again earlier in the week and posted a video on YouTube. Enjoy! They spawned on Wednesday and today is Saturday and I can see tiny eggs inside the eggs, so I suspect they will hatch soon.



Picture of female guarding eggs

[TheSaltySnailer]

Originally Posted by guits

i was able to observe the masked gobies spawning again earlier in the week and posted a video on youtube. Enjoy! They spawned on wednesday and today is saturday and i can see tiny eggs inside the eggs, so i suspect they will hatch soon.



picture of female guarding eggs

awsome picture!

[Mussin]

Do you have any power heads in that tank?

[guits]

Originally Posted by TheSaltySnailer

awsome picture!

Thanks!

Originally Posted by Mussin

Do you have any power heads in that tank?

Nope, I actually just use the stock pump that comes with the Fluval Spec V. The flow is probably lower than ideal, but it seems like the inhabitants don't need especially high flow.

[Dekon70]

Great looking tank.

[guits]

Originally Posted by Dekon70

Great looking tank.

Thanks!

[JoelA7]

Very impressive.

[guits]

Originally Posted by JoelA7

Very impressive.

Thanks! I'm out of town for 2 weeks I hope the tank does ok under the care of my significant other!

[griss]

Guits, very beautiful tank, I'm envious. I'm digging this thread back up because it's an awesome tank and you share my passion for Caribbean livestock. My tank looks nothing like your's at this point. It's just some Reef Rocks base rock with Haitian live rock on top. I also have a Caribbean Gorgonian, several R. Florida, Caribbean Zoas, 3 Rock Anems, 2 Condys, and a Porites that popped up out of nowhere.

That said, your success with obtaining Caribbean LPS and SPS has inspired me to purchase some aquacultured rock from Florida. As soon as the weather gets better, I plan to purchase small amounts (10-20 lbs) of aquacultured rock at a time from various vendors. Hopefully, over time, I'll have a tank that looks as nice as your tank does.

[tah532]

Where did you purchase your Caribbean corals? Or were they all hitchhikers?

[stinkyreef]

nice piece of the ocean there. Everything looks happy and healthy

[guits]

Originally Posted by griss

Guits, very beautiful tank, I'm envious. I'm digging this thread back up because it's an awesome tank and you share my passion for Caribbean livestock. My tank looks nothing like your's at this point. It's just some Reef Rocks base rock with Haitian live rock on top. I also have a Caribbean Gorgonian, several R. Florida, Caribbean Zoas, 3 Rock Anems, 2 Condys, and a Porites that popped up out of nowhere.

That said, your success with obtaining Caribbean LPS and SPS has inspired me to purchase some aquacultured rock from Florida. As soon as the weather gets better, I plan to purchase small amounts (10-20 lbs) of aquacultured rock at a time from various vendors. Hopefully, over time, I'll have a tank that looks as nice as your tank does.

Thanks! All 3 of my tanks are Florida based. This tank only contains corals from live rock, and my other 2 have almost all their specimens from KP Aquatics. I highly recommend KP Aquatics for stock from the Florida Keys.

It took a lot of single-minded dedication and many orders of live rock to stock the tank in this thread - as you can imagine it's really hit or miss, and aquascaping can be quite difficult since the hitchhikers are already attached. Good luck!

Originally Posted by tah532

Where did you purchase your Caribbean corals? Or were they all hitchhikers?

For this tank, none of the corals were purchased. I don't believe any of the stony corals can be purchased as specimens, they can only be obtained as hitchhikers. It took many orders of live rock, and each time I asked the vendor know I was specifically looking for hitchhikers.

Originally Posted by stinkyreef

nice piece of the ocean there. Everything looks happy and healthy

Thanks! Unfortunately, after my 2 week vacation to Asia, I returned to my tiger goby covered with ich. The large one has sadly passed, and the other ones have ich as well. I live in a small apartment and logistically am unable to have a separate quarantine tank. I'm trying "Ick Shield" pellet food from New Life Spectrum since I can't medicate the entire tank. I'm not very optimistic but we shall see!

[griss]

Guits, I believe you purchased all your live rock from Gulf Live Rock, if I remember correctly. Did you use their free shipping or did you pick up at the airport? If you used their free shipping, how did the rock look when it arrived?

According to their shipping chart, you and I are both in their 3 day delivery zone. I'm trying to determine if I should spring the extra $$$ for air freight or just get more rock by sticking to free shipping.

[guits]

Originally Posted by griss

Guits, I believe you purchased all your live rock from Gulf Live Rock, if I remember correctly. Did you use their free shipping or did you pick up at the airport? If you used their free shipping, how did the rock look when it arrived?

According to their shipping chart, you and I are both in their 3 day delivery zone. I'm trying to determine if I should spring the extra $$$ for air freight or just get more rock by sticking to free shipping.

Yup, the rock was from Gulf Live Rock. I lived in Boston at the time, and the free shipping actually arrived on the 2nd day for me (not the 3rd day). I don't remember all the details, but I think my first order was during winter so I paid for overnight and it arrived in decent shape, one order I paid for overnight but due to a mistake from the shipper I didn't get it until the 2nd day and there was very significant die off (I was extremely upset because I paid the $$$ and gave very specific directions for delivery, and almost everything on the rock was DOA), and the other orders in the spring time when temperatures weren't too cold or hot I did the free shipping . Frankly, regardless of whether overnight or 2 day shipping was used, there was a good bit die off and areas of tissue on the coral that arrived dead and required months to really bounce back. The overnight shipment, as expected, arrived with less tissue death and recovered faster. The worst shipper was the gorgonian, with significant die off and it took a while for it to really recover. I believe gorgonians ship poorly in general.

After having ordered several times using both overnight and priority mail, I've come to accept that it's unreasonable to expect the hitchhikers to arrive alive all the time, and some DOA hitchhikers are the norm.

[griss]

Originally Posted by guits

Yup, the rock was from Gulf Live Rock. I lived in Boston at the time, and the free shipping actually arrived on the 2nd day for me (not the 3rd day). I don't remember all the details, but I think my first order was during winter so I paid for overnight and it arrived in decent shape, one order I paid for overnight but due to a mistake from the shipper I didn't get it until the 2nd day and there was very significant die off (I was extremely upset because I paid the $$$ and gave very specific directions for delivery, and almost everything on the rock was DOA), and the other orders in the spring time when temperatures weren't too cold or hot I did the free shipping . Frankly, regardless of whether overnight or 2 day shipping was used, there was a good bit die off and areas of tissue on the coral that arrived dead and required months to really bounce back. The overnight shipment, as expected, arrived with less tissue death and recovered faster. The worst shipper was the gorgonian, with significant die off and it took a while for it to really recover. I believe gorgonians ship poorly in general.

After having ordered several times using both overnight and priority mail, I've come to accept that it's unreasonable to expect the hitchhikers to arrive alive all the time, and some DOA hitchhikers are the norm.

Thank you

[guits]

I've acquired some additional rock with hitchhikers and also upgraded my lighting to a Nanobox mini. With the new light, it's really difficult to take pictures with my iPhone that represent how how it actually looks in real life, but this picture it pretty close:



The tank photographed a lot better with my old Chinese eBay lights, but the tank actually looks a bit nicer in real life with the new lights.

[elegance coral]

Awesome, awesome, awesome tank man!!!!