Finally some good things happening, although the mag cleaner seems to have clouded a couple of areas so not sure why yet. Here are some updated pics of the project and creatures. Sorry for some not being crisply in focus or the front of the tank being totally clean.
The bigger more well developed of the two islands:
The smaller of the two islands:
New glass cleaner which I also got the acrylic pads and put one on immediately:
New rock formation which is designed to hold tunze pump since 1" glass is thicker than most of their magnets:
Pump in formation:
Pump in tank:
Birdsnest seems to grow in my tanks like weeds. Its always a very happy coral:
Zoas starting to open up again:
Some of my many colonies of mushrooms which also seem to love it and have plumped back up now that they like the new tank (these guys are 4" each):
One of several plating corals:
Finally things are starting to look a little better.
Its getting there. Have re-routed the wires and moved the heaters so that wires are not visible from the front of the tank. Been working on wire management under the tank and have cleaned up some of that. Overall starting to see growth again on a number of the corals so thats looking good. Will be starting up the tunze pumps today to increase water circulation and eliminate some dead zones inside the tank.
Will try to get some new pics this weekend. Overall tank is looking great, except i have a new guest. On another thread I had posted that a fellow reefer contacted me when his tank failed and asked if I could help save his corals, so I immediately worked with him to get all the corals to my house and into the tank. Since my quarantine system could not handle a 100 gallon display with all the creatures, they went directly into the 450. Over this past weekend I saw this unusual creature rapidly dart across the tank and then appear to hide under one of my pagoda corals, wrapping his body underneath the coral and eyes staring out at me while I attempted to stare at him. It appears I had a hitchiking squilla mantis which I am now attempting to trap. He is so fascinating I went out and added another tank to my collection, an innov marine 16 to place him in once caught. For those that have not read up on them, they have the striking force of a .22 caliber bullet and are voracious hunters. So far my trap only appears to have caught 5 peppermint shrimp which have been temporarily relocated to another holding tank while I try to capture this guy. He is quite unusual to look at and can only hope that I can get a good photograph once he is isolated into his own tank.
While I was away from home traveling and had a local teen tank sitting for me, disaster struct when he accidentally added 5 lbs of sodium bicarbonate to the sump. Multiple steps were taken to try to save my precious creatures and preserve the tank, but a series of mishaps cascaded into total tank destruction. I was so devastated that upon getting home I simply couldn't bring myself to post the demise of my beloved BEAST. I am now in a much better place and have started the rebuild which I will post in another thread.
Thanks Empire. I am getting excited again now that I have made progress with the clearing out of the tank and cleaning the rocks and sand. I am looking forward to the new build and am over the grieving process (mostly)
The latest update is that I have had the BEAST up and running since August and have started restocking. All is going well and today just got some new acrylic covers for the tank, sump and fuge that are better made with handles than my old sheets of acrylic i used. Will try to get some new pics this weekend after Christmas.