My 29g Work-In-Progress

[ellebelle]

edited.

I'm actually not 100% sure on the species of blastos that I have - I think I've got it correct, but I'm not positive.

 

[KathyC]

Lissa - that Red Headed Fairy Wrasse is the prettiest fish I've ever seen. Now I know what my next fish will be! And your pics are awesome too!!

 

[ellebelle]

Thanks Kathy! And, he's got a great personality too. I could probably hand feed him if I wanted too.

 

[ellebelle]

Thanks to the diligent work of my roommater, my tank looked better when I got back from South Africa than when I left (minus the algae that needed to be scraped off of the sides).

New fish, courtesy of House of Fish! This little guys LOVES hanging out in front of my tank. These photos do absolutely no justice to the beautiful purple color he is - the actinics make him look waaaaaay bluer.

Also got one of these:

I realize that my tank is fairly young, but I did quite a bit of research before taking the plunge on this fish. I've got the copepods to feed it right now, and I am instituting a copepod breeding station in the back of my tank as well as getting a fuge set up as part of my sump. Right now, my copepod population is really high because of my extravagant use of phyto in the early days of my tank in the hopes of keeping my feather duster alive in a brand new tank, followed by several months of only one fish.

This fish acclimated faster than ANY fish I've put in the tank. It took him approximately 30 seconds to come out and start pulling little white bugs off of my rocks. He's also making his way through the snail eggs that some of my astreas laid.

My mandarin likes to hang out in the back because my copopods like to rest on the glass near the sand in the back. Sad.

I've got lots of coraline algae now!

A lot of is is building up on the sides and the back because that's where my best flow is. I also have anthelia that has taken root on the glass in the back.


Full Tank Shot:

The lobo and some of the zoos on the rocks in the front, one of the frogspawn pieces and the colt are Eric's, not mine, so my tank isn't QUITE as full as this photo would indicate. I'm just holding them until he's ready for them. The lobo was looking a bit deflated, but it's puffed up in recent time, but lost color. I'm going to try target feeding him every other day to see if I can't get him back to how he was before.

Oh, and a couple more mandarin photos because he's so photogenic. (My roommate has named him Princess, despite my pointing out that he's definitely a male).

 

[KathyC]

Tank looks great Lissa! Love the new Mandarin, I recently got the same type, very pretty.
I think you should hold those pieces from Eric indefinitely...:wink1:


Welcome home BTW!!

 

[ellebelle]

Well, there is obviously going to have to be a growth tax on some stuff.

 

[NYreefNoob]

29g

almost makes me not want to take my 29g down to replace with a 65. love the clown wrasse. was thinking of getting one myself. beautiful tank

 

[Vic8361]

Tank looks great Lissa.
Love that wrasse.

Vic

 

[jmh]

I have a 29g as well, i was wondering about your pod breeding station? What did u have in mind just a prototype hang on fuge or something less complicated.

 

[ellebelle]

I had grand plans for an acrylic box with some cheato and a slits that the mandarin couldn't get through that the pods could. But I couldn't make it work. So I just piled up a bunch of small pieces of rocks in the back corner of my tank and turkey basted some of my fuge water in there to try and "seed" it. It works pretty much like the acrylic box idea.

I have a proper fuge that I sort of ghetto-rigged (with the help of Brett). Basically, I have a tupperware container full of cheato and sand and some rock. Then there's a powerhead from the sump that pumps water up to the fuge (on a shelf above the sump) and then the fuge drains back into the sump where (hopefully) all of my little pods are pumped into the tank.

 

[jmh]

Sounds nice my mandarin is fat, but I worry about him depleting the population. I saw him eat mysis once. "once" so after I figured he would get the hang of eating it but never again. Tank looks great!! Nice work!!

 

[ellebelle]

How long have you had the mandarin? If he isn't eating prepared foods, he WILL deplete the pod population in your tank eventually if you don't have a fuge or you aren't culturing pods and adding them to your tank in some other way.

 

[drperetz]

...

Great choice of fish.. Good luck with the tank.

 

[jmh]

Ive had the mandarin since christmas. I see copepods in the morning when the lights go on on the glass but I dont see mysis or amphipods(i cant tell the difference) anymore. My fuge just has mangroves in it and LR. I need to pick up some chaeto and junk. I git the mandarin cause I saw a tremendous amount of pods after a short period of time, so I fugured I was ok. But like u said Im worried about my homeboy mandarin depleting the tank plus I want to add some smaller fish like clown gobies and prwan gobies so I need to have a pod factory

 

[PalmTree]

You take some awesome pics Lisa. Tank looks great BTW!!

 

[Awibrandy]

Very nice Lisa. Wish I could take pics half as nice as yours. The tank is coming along great.

 

[ellebelle]

Mike SWEARS to me this is going to keep its color in my tank as long as my water parameters are good because his tank had too much light for it. If he's wrong, HE IS DEAD TO ME. (Okay, maybe not. :hug

I'm trying to take a photo of my tank around the same time every month from the same place in my apartment.

Here is march.

(As a reminder, this was February)

 

[noodleman]

that lobo sure does stand out nice

 

[ellebelle]

Sadly, it's going back to live with Eric soon. Now my goal will have to find one that looks just like it.

 

[noodleman]

better yet break off that little piece at the top :sgrin: