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Kenaneu's Lost Reef In The Woods

kenaneu

Supporting Member
Alright folks, I'm trying to get the hang of all this BAR stuff, and tired of feeling discouraged from DBTC and other activities where folks are wanting tank journals, etc.

I'm not great at posting stuff about myself or my hobbies, or keeping things like social media updated. I'd rather be enjoying my tank and family than on the keyboard here. And honestly, I don't expect anyone to read any of this.

That said, I'll give this a go so folks know my reef and I are real. :)

This tank journal is starting about 9 months after the fact. I lost a 45g reef of almost 20 years during the CZU fire in 2020. So yeah, I live in the woods in the Santa Cruz mountains. Thankfully our home narrowly escaped demise during the fire, but we were evacuated for 6 weeks and the 45g tank was without power for over a month. The tear down of the dead reef broke my heart for the hobby for a few years and I took a long break.

When my wife and I bought our house in the woods, we shared a dream of upgrading the 45g reef to something that could be a more prominent part of our living room one day. So despite the loss in 2020, the dream of a hidden reef deep in the woods was still bouncing around in the back of my mind. I had an old second hand bow front tank tank I had intended to set up in this house, but it needed a complete tear down and re-seal. I don't know what brand it is/was, but it looked like an oceanic to me. I don't know the exact gallons, but it was sold to me as a 250g. I don't know or care if that's true, but it's about 80lx27wx30t at the fattest point of the bow. I don't think oceanic made that as a stock dimension so who knows?

Wedding, baby, remodeling projects, fire, life, fear of DIY silicone seal failure and all manner of other things pushed the un-fun tank rehab project to the back burner for almost seven years. Last year I got serious, and by the end of June, the tank was re-sealed, plumbed up and fresh water was in for leak testing. After a couple of weeks and a few minor setbacks, fresh water was out, pump was on and salt water was in... Many thanks to my wife for being patient with a big empty tank gracing our living room for so many years prior to that point. :)

I'll take some time to go back through old photos and events of the build out, and growth process, but I'm dubbing the tank "The Lost Reef In The Woods" in memory of the 45g and its inhabitants who were lost in the woods in 2020.

Tank Basics
  • 250g (?) glass bow front tank
  • Custom dual overflows and returns w/ funky bean animal setup via creative in-tank plumbing between the pre-existing drilled holes (it's weird, but works great and is silent)
  • Jebao DCP-20000 return pump
  • Trigger Triton 44 sump (not actually running Triton method, but liked the big fuge chamber)
  • Eshopps skimmer of some sort
  • Redsea ReefATO+
  • Redsea ReefDose
  • Dual titaniam heaters and controllers (inkbird and finnex) with redundant probes
  • Maxspect xf280 gyre (bought a looooong time ago and sat in the box, will likely replace with something more efficient/modern/quiet when it dies but it does move a lot of water)
  • 4x Kessil a360x's (so far)
Mixed reef, with mostly peaceful folks in it as well as some algae, some uglies, some stickers from the kiddo on the outside, and a variety of LPS/SPS and softies. Evolving all the time, getting better and more stable as time goes on. I'm not in a rush.

IMG_6222.jpg
 
Nice!!
Welcome to our place in space
And thank you for becoming a $upporting member

In your tank pic
On the right side, above the (?) fairy wrasse…
What’s the cord looking thing?
 
If you’re willing to share any details of the reseal project I know some people on here would like to learn more. Nice work! Way to overcome
 
Looks well established for 9 months. Very unique setup!
Thanks! I definitely have benefited from the kindness of local reefers, a few tank breakdown windfalls, and some nice sized coral colony re-homing opportunities that have sped along the filling in of the tank.

On the flip side, the rock I sentimentally decided to re-use from my prior reef fully dried out over my years of break and has been an absolute GHA nightmare. Established rock from others has been relatively spotless, thankfully.

I’ll take some more recent pics (the one in the post is about 6 weeks ago) but it’s finally turning the corner with some more time, the temporary help of a sea hare and some hardcore manual removal.
 
In your tank pic
On the right side, above the (?) fairy wrasse…
What’s the cord looking thing?
Oh, above the orangeback fairy? The knobby looking thing?

Just some loc line from the returns. :(

It’s pretty unsightly, and I am not sure I’m really benefitting much from the modest amount of flow redirection I’m achieving with it.

I’m contemplating some changes with that since the gyre is doing most of the in-tank heavy lifting for water movement and I’d like the returns to look less like alien tentacles in the tank :)
 
If you’re willing to share any details of the reseal project I know some people on here would like to learn more. Nice work! Way to overcome
Always willing to share whatever folks are curious about. Unfortunately I didn’t really take pics while doing the reseal. I wasn’t sure it would even work, honestly, and when it was go time to actually spread silicone I had to work super fast, sitting inside the tank to get it all applied, smoothed and the tape lines removed before any of it set up. If anyone really wants to chat more about it I can write something up but I’m sure others have done the same work, and probably more skillfully than me!
 
Love the tank and great tank journal so far! Sorry you lost your tank in the fire, but clearly reefing skills don't also whither away. There's definitely a few other 831 reefers here, hopefully you meet them.

Honestly I use my tank journal to track growth and changes, even posting a couple photos every month or so gives you a good idea of how things are progressing.

What's the plating thing on the left side? Sponge?
 
Love the tank and great tank journal so far! Sorry you lost your tank in the fire, but clearly reefing skills don't also whither away. There's definitely a few other 831 reefers here, hopefully you meet them.

Honestly I use my tank journal to track growth and changes, even posting a couple photos every month or so gives you a good idea of how things are progressing.

What's the plating thing on the left side? Sponge?
I've met a couple of 831 reefers through fb groups, so that's been great! Hope to meet more! We definitely have some challenges with the hobby up here, especially in the more rural areas where power can be out for weeks sometimes. Generators, UPS's etc. FTW. :)

The plating on the left... Lots of plating montipora caps. I'll have to give some away at some point when the shading gets out of control, but I'm enjoying them for now. I have a bit of red plating photosynthetic sponge from another reefer in Scotts valley, but one of the urchins decided it was a nice hat so it's been on an extended uber ride around the tank for about a month. :D

Your profile pic looks like where I live! Did you happen to be at a wedding in the Santa Cruz mountains? I live right next to a pretty popular venue up here.
 
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