Long time no update. Lots of pics and info to come.

Went to the LFS today and got some more live rock and some more pre mixed salt water as I was out. LOTS of life on one of the pieces. Ill get pics soon…. Been having low ph over the last few weeks. 7.8 Been doing water changes about a gallon each week and no change. Ive been putting in the seacrem ph buffer but it has not risen one point. Though about trying b-ionic but the owner of the lfs recomended kent supperbuffer. She gave me some for free to try out. Thats what she uses to buff her water and premixed saltwater. Going to add it to my top off water and add it that way see what happens. I dont really want to start having to does lots of different things trying to keep it natural.

Also one of my creith snails died last night…. No hermit near him till the lights came on in the morn. Since the temp in the house has risen caus of the warmer weather the tank has been around 80. I tweaked the heater today and keeped the lid open. Temp is back around 78.4.

Also added 4 nassarius snails yesterday. They have since vanished into the sandbed.

Will get pics of the new rock up soon. Ive been slacking on the blog shame on me.

Water Test: 5-6-08 16:34

Temp 79.1
Specific gravity 1.025
PH 7.8 Had to add some PH buffer today I have no clue why this droped. Possibly from the water change.
Ammonia 0.50 Looks like the CUC is having an effect on the water
Nitrite 0
Nitrate 0

First death!!!

One of the margarita snails was found MIA sunday may 4th. His shell was fliped over and all i saw was slime around it and noticed what I think is a fire worm crawling around in the shell. The other margarita snail has not really moved around all to much since I put him in the tank last wen.

Click for a high rez shot. You can see that worm in the shell.

First water change: 5-03-08

Did my first 1 gallon water change. 10% of 7.5 gallons is almost 1 gallon. 7.5 gallons is the ammount of water thats in the tank give or take. So i took out 16 cups and replaced it with the saltwater I got from the LFS.

SG droped to about 1.023 the next day. So ive been topping off with saltwater over the last few days and now its back at 1.025.

Sorry did not get any pics of this.

First members of my clean up crew

Since all the water testing is still show 0 and I got tons of algae growing I though it would be a good time to get a few carbs and snails in.

I added 2 scarlet hermit crabs, 2 blue legged hermit crabs, 2 cerith snails, and 2 margarita snails. So far there all doing there job except the margarita snails. They have cleaned up the tank really good so far. There will be a lot more CUC to come.

Floating the bag and acclimating them to my tank.

I timed this so the lights where in there sunset cycle. Had the tank lid still open here.

Closer look at em only moon lights on now.

Close up of one of the scarlets the next day. Click for a high rez shot.

Full Tank Shot: 4-30-08 21:42

Center

Left

Right

Few more feather dusters

Click for a high rez shot.

Found another Spionid worm

Click the images to get a high rez shot. He is dead center cant miss him.

Hydor Flo Adjustment

MY hydor flo recently keep blowing off. So I looked around the house to find some kind of tape to make it fit tighter in the hole. Here is what I came up with. Its been in there like this for a week and has not budged.

New aquascaping

I messed around with the tank for about 30 mins and got it looking pretty good. Still need more live rock. Im going for a U shape in the tank. Will get a FTS up tommorw after the tank clears.

From the top

Front

Left

Right

This is how much water I had to take out to keep the water level the same after placing in the new rock.