My 65G Shallow Reef Tank

[DiscusHeckel]

My red A. carduus (aka red dragon) arrived earlier this afternoon in good condition and is now in my tank after acclimatisation. I have chosen exactly the same spot that I used for my A. speciosa (low flow and low PAR- ~150-200 mmol/m2/sec) as per Matt's suggestion.

[reefmutt]

Very nice Bulent!
Good luck with it.

[mhucasey]

Originally Posted by DiscusHeckel

My red A. carduus (aka red dragon) arrived earlier this afternoon in good condition and is now in my tank after acclimatisation. I have chosen exactly the same spot that I used for my A. speciosa (low flow and low PAR- ~150-200 mmol/m2/sec) as per Matt's suggestion.

The dragons are so awesome! Congrats!

[Cam]

Hi Bulent,

I wish you had some of that Acropora digitifera available when I saw you the other day. I love table corals and would have happily had a piece off you. If you still have some and will post I'd still take a bit and cold even send you a box if you needed one.

Cheers,

Cam.

[DiscusHeckel]

Hi Cameron,

What a surprise. I had no idea you were on this forum. It is a sad sight isn't it? I am not sure this coral is necessarily a tabling acropora, but grew in this formation due to strong crushing currents it has been subjected to from above.

I will think about your proposal and will let you know. Has my aspera settled yet?

[joshky]

Originally Posted by DiscusHeckel

Finally, I have just noticed how much this mystery Acropora (gemmifera???) has grown since 20th December 2015:





My corals are on a steroid .

Holy crap that is AMAZING!

Sorry about the A. digitifera, it was a very impressive colony but I think you made the right decision.

[biggles]

That red dragon looks so cool Bulent............. i'm very jealous now

That's the perfect piece and color variant to use as a dosing canary coral btw Bulent. Reds and pinks etc light up like xmas trees in my water

[DiscusHeckel]

Originally Posted by joshky

Holy crap that is AMAZING!

Sorry about the A. digitifera, it was a very impressive colony but I think you made the right decision.

Cheers Josh. I have begun dosing tiny amount of poly sugars as a carbon source (Tropic Marin Elimi-NP). Corals may grow even faster now.

Originally Posted by biggles

That red dragon looks so cool Bulent............. i'm very jealous now

That's the perfect piece and color variant to use as a dosing canary coral btw Bulent. Reds and pinks etc light up like xmas trees in my water

Thanks for the compliment Andrew. This is why I am concentrating on reds and pinks lately.

I bought this coral yesterday. It came with two resident acro crabs. It has creamy/green body with pink tips. It is a wild-collected piece from Fiji and was much more colourful in dealer's tank. What do you think it is Andrew?

Cheers

Bulent

PS. I am running out of space in photo bucket. What are the alternatives?

[maxxII]

That looks like A.sarmentosa to me....

But I'm not Andrew...

[biggles]

I didn't alter the colors whatsoever Bulent, all i did was max out the gamma and saturation of those in the pic and brightened the pic - it's a little trick i use to check out what potential pigments might be washed out when a new piece is added. I also use it to check out the crap acros the rebels routinely add to their filthy little puddle tanks......... just to monitor the potential future pigment threat level

Acro crabs are awesome

I think you can see the obvious potential locked away in that colony now mate



I pay $5- a month for my account so i never have to worry about it. Considering the cash we throw at this hobby i think it's a bit silly to worry about running out of bandwidth and storage space.

You are sounding suspiciously like a rebel now Bulent.........

I agree with Max

[DiscusHeckel]

Originally Posted by maxxII

That looks like A.sarmentosa to me....
But I'm not Andrew...

Thank you Max. I appreciate it.

Originally Posted by biggles

I didn't alter the colors whatsoever Bulent, all i did was max out the gamma and saturation of those in the pic and brightened the pic - it's a little trick i use to check out what potential pigments might be washed out when a new piece is added. I also use it to check out the crap acros the rebels routinely add to their filthy little puddle tanks......... just to monitor the potential future pigment threat level

Acro crabs are awesome

I think you can see the obvious potential locked away in that colony now mate



I pay $5- a month for my account so i never have to worry about it. Considering the cash we throw at this hobby i think it's a bit silly to worry about running out of bandwidth and storage space.

You are sounding suspiciously like a rebel now Bulent.........

I agree with Max

I think you are right about having an account for storing photos. I tried to save some space by deleting some old photos, but also removed recent ones by mistake

The coral looked like the one in this picture in my dealer's tank. I will take another picture when the lights come on later today. I had to trade eight of my A. copiosa frags for it. I am so happy after seeing your future prediction. Thanks for that.

[Cam]

Originally Posted by DiscusHeckel

Hi Cameron,

What a surprise. I had no idea you were on this forum. It is a sad sight isn't it? I am not sure this coral is necessarily a tabling acropora, but grew in this formation due to strong crushing currents it has been subjected to from above.

I will think about your proposal and will let you know. Has my aspera settled yet?

Hi Bulent,

It was my friend Graham (who had some of your frags) who said that you were on here, I hadn't noticed as hadn't been around on RC for a while. I'm also looking at Biggle's system with a view to trying it on my setup and have ordered in the necessary bottles.

The aspera is doing ok now although I had to break a branch off it to get it in the spot I wanted for it but both pieces are doing fine as are the rest of the frags. I just need to get some better growth now to get them filling out. I certainly think running T5 lights helps but I'm running a Radion G3 now on this tank which I am very pleased with.

Interesting about the digitifera growing like that due to flow. I have a nice blue prostrate that has done the same but I've just broke it off and moved it to get new stuff in and to prevent it causing too much shading as space is limited. If you want to do a swap I have a nice bit of the prostrata mounted you can have.

Cheers,

Cam.

[reefmutt]

Very interesting potential in that new piece, Bulent.
Looking forward to watching it.

[joshky]

Hey Bulent, my biggest issue with photobucket is the "viewing bandwidth", as in if X amount of people view your images, they replace your image with their own advertisement telling you that you need to upgrade your account. Because of this little tactic I decided not to use them anymore after doing so since 02/17/05, my account is pretty old considering it was founded in 03. I use Flickr now, it seems to be exactly what I want and I don't pay a penny for the service.

Nice new acro, it should be a stunner when it colors up.

Andrew is going to share all of his secrets soon and we'll no longer need him! Just kidding!

[Cam]

Hi Bulent,

Any more thoughts on the digitifera or a swap for the prostrate?

Thanks,

Cam.

[reefmutt]

Bulent, how's the dragon doing?

[DiscusHeckel]

Originally Posted by mhucasey

The dragons are so awesome! Congrats!

Sorry for the late reply Matt. I must have missed your post. Thank you.

Originally Posted by reefmutt

Bulent, how's the dragon doing?

It has not grown even a millimetre nor has it started to encrust its base. It is almost holding its colour though it looks very slightly off colour (i.e. slightly less red and a little more brown). This is probably because it did not receive enough lights due to overhanging copiosa colony. The mighty copiosa went to another home today and the dragon started to receive more lights. I will observe its progress in the coming weeks before considering moving it to a brighter spot.

[reefmutt]

Status quo is good. I wouldn't expect any change in the first week..

[DiscusHeckel]

Originally Posted by Cam

Hi Bulent,

Any more thoughts on the digitifera or a swap for the prostrate?

Thanks,

Cam.

Hi Cameron,

I planned to take a short break in your part of the world this Easter, so that I could bring the coral to you in person. As I told you before, I love your island, but sadly our trip did not materialise.

I considered your proposal carefully, but I feel unable to post such a huge piece in case it dies during transit. It took me so long to grow it. A gentleman is driving 65 miles from the south of the country to collect it next week. Really sorry about this Cameron. However, I have two small pieces, which I advertised on UR lately. I will be happy to challenge my inhibitions about posting corals and send them to you with my compliments if you can cover the postage. Where would I get heat packs? Please let me know if you are interested.

[DiscusHeckel]

I parted company with one of my oldest staghorns, A. copiosa, today. Although I fragged it many times over the years, the copiosa still looked mighty today (11.5" X 9" X 7"):



It went to a good home and I am sure the new owner will look after it well. After the colony was out of the water, this is how my tank looked:



I would say the tank looks a lot less mature without the copiosa.

I used the two large A. digitifera "frags" (5" X 5" each) to find out how my tank would look like in the future if I placed two plate forming corals in the space vacated by the copiosa. This was the result:





I will only keep one of the frags and the second one as I said in my previous post will be removed next week. I have not yet decided which piece to remove, but I am inclined to keep the one on the left hand side for two reasons: first, it has my trusted four-year-old acro crab living on it; second, it has a long trunk, which means that it will occupy less real estate.

I would welcome your views on the future look of the tank and which piece to keep.

Thanks in advance.

[reefmutt]

Nice choice on the reef makeover. A change is good..
Go with the Acro crab, no question!
New pieces, new interest and new colours.. All good!

[Cam]

Originally Posted by DiscusHeckel

Hi Cameron,

I planned to take a short break in your part of the world this Easter, so that I could bring the coral to you in person. As I told you before, I love your island, but sadly our trip did not materialise.

I considered your proposal carefully, but I feel unable to post such a huge piece in case it dies during transit. It took me so long to grow it. A gentleman is driving 65 miles from the south of the country to collect it next week. Really sorry about this Cameron. However, I have two small pieces, which I advertised on UR lately. I will be happy to challenge my inhibitions about posting corals and send them to you with my compliments if you can cover the postage. Where would I get heat packs? Please let me know if you are interested.

Hi, that is very kind of you and I'd love a smaller piece. A bit bit would probably be more than I need as my tank is only small and I like to let the smaller bits grow in. I think you can get heat packs from any fishing tackle shop. Did you want a piece of the prostrata in return?

I'll switch to PM on UR if you like so as not the fill your thread here with unnecessary posts.

Cheers,

Cam.

[biggles]

Looks very different Bulent, i agree with moose man Matt on keeping the crab piece but i'd place it on the lower spot if it will be happy there since you know it's going to table and shade again.

[reefmutt]

Originally Posted by biggles

Looks very different Bulent, i agree with moose man Matt on keeping the crab piece but i'd place it on the lower spot if it will be happy there since you know it's going to table and shade again.

Ya know I've been called worse things but it IS a bit rich coming from the Aussie who's best friend is a mischievous koala named Kevin..

[plyle02]

Love that FTS Bulent!
Looking so mature and colorful. I love the makeover, we have to all do this from time to time, I am always a big believer in evolving the tank. We learn every day, mostly through our reefing experience, taking the learned information and applying it to enhance your reef speaks volume Bulent. Colors, health, and the overall contrast of the colors and growth patterns makes the tank look so much larger, great job!!!
Cheers