Into the Reef Crest

[Kronic Reefer]

To those who may be interested; here is the journal of my first adventure into reef keeping. I'm starting this log 5 month into my tank being filled with rock and water, I will try to summarize my experience so far.

July 2025: My planted freshwater tank is finally looking good. My itch for corals and saltwater fish has grown out of control, i cave.
The Design: Simulate a high energy mixed reef in a 35 gallon cube.
Experience: 0
After a couple of years of light research, I dug into as much literature as my inexperienced brain could process. Of all, the Berlin method seemed the most logical to me. I designed a sump that was simple, with a 30 gallon tall, pet-co tank. My initial thought was to stack foam in a chamber for mechanical/biological filtration and do water changes until i found the need for a skimmer.

 

[Kronic Reefer]

For the tank I got a 35 gallon cube from pet-co as well, its hard to beat half off glass. The stand is an amazon side table that i wrapped in plywood and painted with black epoxy paint.. I suck at taking pictures in the process but here's the tank and stand with my temporary HOB filtration. Spoiler i got my live rock.

 

[Kronic Reefer]

August 2025: my order of live rock from Tampa Bay Saltwater arrived. 30 pounds of rock and 20lbs of sand. The rock absolutely blew my mind, it was covered in micro/macro fauna! Sea squirt, tunicate, coraline, sponge, tubeastrea, the works. I picked up the cargo from SFO shipping was easy. I want to say it worked out to about 15 dollars a pound for the rock and sand together.

 

[Kronic Reefer]

It took about a week of staring at the rocks before i started to give the scape a go. Heres the first iteration. Super glue and epoxy only.

 

[Kronic Reefer]

From august first when i got the rock up until august 12th i did a buckets worth of tropic marin salt in water changes. There was alot of die off from the rock and ammonia and nitrite wwere showing up constantly. I had inverts and clams in the tank (hitch hikers) and was worried for their health. Now that i look back i was testing incorrectly and all my numbers were 10x less than i thought lol.

 

[Kronic Reefer]

August 12, 2025 Lets get some corals (left to Right) Red Micromussa, Green Digitata, Bill Murray, Green Slimmer, Purple Millepora, Green Indo Torch.
These weere the first corals i ever bought, I was so nervous i had no clue what the hell i was doing, So funny to think back on that now. I live about 10 minutes away from luke at Wine Country Corals so aquiring beautiful animals close by is all to easy.

 

[Kronic Reefer]

August 19th Moved my rodi into a cabinet i made closer to my tanks. Right outside the window actually. I feed my line in the window and fill my containers in the front room. My wife is amazing and doesnt give me to much slack for it.

 

[divewsharks]

Welcome to the addiction!

 

[Kronic Reefer]

August 20th I Have been waiting for my Hang On Back skimmer for a couple weeks. Here at last. Jeff at Life Reef Aquatics built the skimmer out of clear acrylic.
Love the HOB on the opposite side of the wave pump, Thats my idea of ideal flow right there

 

[Kronic Reefer]

Guess i should put some fish in there. My draw to the hobby was coral, second was the mandarin goby. So, like any responsible new hobbiest; i got a mandarin dragonet. At this point my tank was so full of pods they would snow storm the glass every 3/4 days. I also got a clown fish. The mandarin went straight into the display and she had the place to herself for quite some time. The clown fish on the other hand was not so easy. After a formalin bath i noticed a pod burrowing its way out of the clowns side. Small Black dot in the picture is where it came out of. Second is what i assume is the isopod that burrowed out. Off to Q.T mister

 

[Kronic Reefer]

The tank is a volatile mess at this point but i had no clue. Everything looked good to me salinity, temp, elements all in healthy range. So more corals why not.
Blue Acropora Striata, ny knicks torch, red millieopora. hci and chemi clean dip, effective but not my perferred method at the moment.

 

[Darkxerox]

Guess i should put some fish in there. My draw to the hobby was coral, second was the mandarin goby. So, like any responsible new hobbiest; i got a mandarin dragonet. At this point my tank was so full of pods they would snow storm the glass every 3/4 days. I also got a clown fish. The mandarin went straight into the display and she had the place to herself for quite some time. The clown fish on the other hand was not so easy. After a formalin bath i noticed a pod burrowing its way out of the clowns side. Small Black dot in the picture is where it came out of. Second is what i assume is the isopod that burrowed out. Off to Q.T mister

View attachment 76369View attachment 76370

Crazy I haven't seen an isopod on a captive bred clown ever! Heck I've only seen them on fish in books.

Are you using a float switch or anything on the RODI containers? I've had my fair share of spills without one.

 

[Kronic Reefer]

Crazy I haven't seen an isopod on a captive bred clown ever! Heck I've only seen them on fish in books.

Are you using a float switch or anything on the RODI containers? I've had my fair share of spills without one.

Call me lucky lol, hes lucky to be alive. On top of the isopod, he had some flesh infection. His bottom lip fuzzed up real bad, hemoraged a few times. Which is crazy to see a fish bleeding and still alive.
Heres a picture about mid way through the infection.

I fill everything by hand and i set timers on my phone. I do have a float switch on my HOB skimmer. The way its plumbed, if it over flows, my pump would keep pumping and overflow the display.

 

[Kronic Reefer]

Bet he ends up being a 50 year old clown

 

[Kensington Reefer]

That’s a very uncomfortable fish!
If it eats…there’s hope