New Pics of my 415

[npaden]

Well I took some new pics of my 415 gallon tank over the weekend. It's at about the 9 month mark so still a baby tank age wise.
The stuff on the left side is all transfers from my old 120 and the right side is mostly new stuff added in the last several months.
Lots of frags that are really seeming to take off but have a year or two before they will really look good.

It is really hard to see the size perspective in the pics. The fiji yellow leather on the left is about 12" X 18".
The derasa clam on the left is about 9".

Oh well, here are the pics:

Any comments or questions appreciated.

Thanks for looking, Nathan

 

[SteveP]

Wow, that tank looks great! I love the lighting. Very natrual and not overwhelmingly blue. What type is it?

Steve
8{I

 

[-JB]

Very nice pics Nathan, The tank is coming along great! How about some equipment shots?

 

[myreef]

Great looking pictures Nathan. What fish is the one in the next to last frame? Looks similar to a wantanabi angel, but not sure.

 

[SPC]

Beautiful Nathan! Are you having any algae problems with that many fish?
Steve

 

[BROKER]

Nice Tank Nathan. How much rock do you have in there? Do you have a refugium?

 

[npaden]

Thanks for the compliments guys. I really need to get my website updated sometime soon.

Steve - The lighting is 4 X 400W Iwasaki with 440W of VHO Actinic and 320W of VHO 50/50.

JB - I have some original plumbing shots on my site but I've changed it up some since then.
I'll try to take some equipment shots after I get my jerry rigged kalkwasser reactor up and running.

Andy - The anglefish is the same genus as the wanatabei - it's a melanopolis.

SPC - So far I've had pretty much what I would consider the typical new tank algae problems.
Nothing horrible but plenty to keep my clean up crew happy and healthy.
I just reached the current fish load in the last month or so and I would say I'm pretty much stocked up.
Really considering the overall volume of the system I think the fish load isn't too high,
but don't see myself adding more than one or two fish at this point.
If you compare the overall fish load to a average 120 or 180,
I would say that I have about double the amount of fish as most would keep in a 180,
so from a biological standpoint I'm actually better off,
and with the way I've set the tank up there are plenty of hiding spots and open swimming room
at the same time and so far the tank has been pretty peaceful.

Broker - there is about 325lbs of rock in there - I have 2 small refugiums right now - a 15 and a 50.

Thanks for the input everyone.
I love looking at the tank and thinking what it will hopefully look like a few years down the road!

FWIW, Nathan

 

[SPC]

Thanks for your response Nathan, I should have made my question clearer. My point was not that your tank was over stocked from the fishes perspective but more along the lines of exporting nutrients. I was wondering how you accomplish enough nutrient export to keep from having an algae problem.
Steve

 

[dsb1829]

Very nice. I was wondering when your site would show some more current images. Got a full tank shot for us? I know 10' is hard to get into a single frame :wink:

 

[Jeff Hood]

Looks AWSOME!

Any thoughts on your large leather? Is it causing any problems with your SPS that you can tell? I have a small one in my refugium with a colt coral and probably will get rid of it. Not sure if the whole chemical war thing is over rated. I have talked to several people that say their SPS polyps are out more when they removed there large softies. I don't have enough to be able to say but I like the SPS so much that I am willing to get rid of them. Maybe I should just set up a softie tank seperate of my large SPS reef.

Jeff

 

[npaden]

Thanks again for the comments guys.

SPC, I guess I'm reaching the point in my stocking levels that I'm starting to think that I'm not too far from being overstocked.
I feed 3 cubes of frozen food and 1/3rd sheet of nori each day and periodically throw in some shrimp pellets or flake food.
I've got 2 small refugiums (15 and 50) and a dual beckett skimmer that I got from Myreef.
The algae reached it's peak within the first couple months and has been on the decrease since then but it's still not gone.
For a while I was exporting about 1 gallon of macroalgae every couple weeks but that is down to 1 gallon or a month now.
The skimmer pulls out plenty of really nasty gunk and gets cleaned every other week.

dsb, I keep trying to get a decent shot of the full tank but it is tough.
The camera sees alot above and below the tank and adjusts it's exposure and then the inside of the tank ends up overexposed.
I'm going to try taking a few during the day with just the VHO's on and see if that comes out.

Jeff, That leather has grown tremendously for me over the last couple years.
It's the only leather in the tank and although it is pretty big doesn't seem to cause any problems.
Possibly due to the fact that it is a full 4' away from most of my sps or possibly due to the larger volume of water, I'm not sure.
I have really good polyp extension on my sps 24/7 but whether that is a good thing or a bad thing I'm not sure.

Thanks again for the comments, things seem to be doing well.

Nathan

 

[BCReefer]

Very nice. A full tank picture would be cool.

Cheers,
Patrick

 

[trigger0214]

What is the stripped fish in the center of first pic?? :lol: Very cool. It kinda looks like a Japanese Swallowtail....

Thanks

 

[trigger0214]

It also in the 5th pic (56k....oh humm)

 

[trigger0214]

It also in the 5th pic (56k....oh humm)