So far so good with the emerald crabs.  They haven’t eaten any of my corals and have been nibbling on the nuisance algae in my tank.  The only downside that I’ve noticed is that they tend to hide a lot.  Other than that, these two little creatures are a great addition to my reef tank!

I would recommend keeping these in small numbers in case they do end up being problematic (a guy I know bought a ‘colony’ of emerald crabs only to find they nearly ate all of his mushrooms).  Plenty of people don’t encounter that problem when kept small in number.

Over the weekend, I purchased my first emerald crab.  In the same trip, I purchased two more cerith snails and one more nassarius snail, bringing the totals to five cerith and three nassarius snails.  Unfortunately, I found the emerald crab lifeless on the tank bottom yesterday, with a nassarius snail completely covering the carcass.  I decided to try again and went out and picked up two emerald crabs today.

I’m trying to combat a bubble and hair algae problem that was introduced to my tank after buying a mushroom-covered rock from a local fish store.  I’ll be measuring two things in the next few weeks:  (1) Emerald crabs’ effectiveness in removing bubble algae, and (2) Emerald crabs’ compatibility in a reef tank atmosphere.

Edit on 6/17/09:  After talking to a few respected members of ReefLounge.com, my mind has been put at ease (mostly).  I am told that this is most likely a macroalgae of some sort and should be harmless.  According to one member, my best bet would be finding a marine biologist who specializes in marine algae.  If anyone can point me in that direction (I would really like to know what I have), I would be very grateful. Thanks to the good folk over at ReefLounge.com.

Over the weekend, I put together my own hang-on-back siphon overflow.  I don’t have the U-tube or prefilter sponge for it yet, but I will soon.  The total amount spent so far is $20.  When purchased premade, this type of overflow starts at around $100 and can cost a few hundred dollars.  I estimate that I will have to spend roughly $20 dollars more to finish the project.

Parts/Equipment Needed:

• $10.99 – Lee’s Aquarium Specimen Box (Large)
• $9.99 – 1″ Bulkhead Kit (includes strainer and L-shaped PVC adapter)

According to my research, the 1″ bulkhead will give us a maximum of 600 GPH, which will be more than enough for my application.  Here’s a picture of what it looks like so far:

On Saturday, I visited Captain Nemo’s, a store in Southeastern Pennsylvania, and bought a green star polyps frag.  After drip acclimating it for a little over two hours, I put it in the tank and it opened up within 12 hours.  Green star polyps are a great addition to any reef tank, and relatively easy to maintain.

On a side note, I changed my activated carbon today. and yesterday I used a turkey baster to clear off the live rock and sand.  Who doesn’t love a little maintenance?

Everything is going great with my 20 gallon long aquarium. My ammonia and nitrites didn’t see any huge spikes and were only elevated for two days after switching. It made me nervous but I’m glad it didn’t last long. Through the use of my refugium, one saltwater plant, denitrator filter media, and biweekly water changes, I have managed to reduce my nitrates to below 5 ppm.

My mandarinfish and clarkii clownfish are both doing great. My current livestock is as follows:

• (1) Clarkii clownfish
• (1) Mandarinfish
• (2) Narcissus snails
• (3) Cerith snails
• (1) Turbo snail
• (4) to (6) Blue-legged hermit crabs

I also have some coral in the tank now:

• Pulsing xenia
• Blue/green mushrooms
• Clove polyps [grew off initial live rock]
• Brown button polyps (some with neon green center)

Using a DIY refugium tutorial I found, I crafted a homemade, hang-on refugium for my ten gallon nano reef tank using the AquaClear 70 power filter.  I decided to do this for two reasons: (1) to have refuge for copepods to breed with the final result being to feed a mandarin, and (2) filtration.

Parts & Supplies Needed: AquaClear 70 Power Filter, an appropriate fluorescent blub w/ clip-on fixture or similar, razor, scissors, macroalgae (chaetomorpha), piece of glass (optional)

To light the unit, I use a 50/50 10 watt compact fluorescent blub that plugs into a regular light socket.  I am considering getting a higher voltage grow lamp from Home Depot or Lowes to see if I can improve the current situation.  The light is mounted using a clip-on fixture I bought for $11 dollars.  Because I use reverse lighting (i.e. when my tank lights are off, the refugium light is on, and vice versa), I am able to point the light on my tank to add a little extra light for the anemone and coral.

I won’t go into great detail on exactly what I did to create this because there is a link to the actual tutorial at the bottom of this post.  Basically, you cut the basket into three parts (bottom + two sides).  The bottom is used to prevent the macroalgae and refugium inhabitants from flowing into the tank.  One side of the basket is used to divide the macroalgae from the biological filter or whatever else you decide to put in there, and the other side may be used to divide it further.

HOB refugium tutorial for pico and nano reef tanks

Some folks over at ReefLounge.com helped me identify the growth on my live rock pictured below as clove polyp coral.  What a nice surprise!  I suppose they like my tank conditions.

I am now officially the proud owner of a turbo snail.  This should help with the brown algae bloom I am currently experiencing.  In this entry, I want to touch on the fact that I have heard some mixed things about keeping these creatures in a reef tank environment.

From what I gather, it seems that a lot of people have trouble keeping turbo snails alive.  Apparently, a lot of these folks end up overpopulating their tanks with clean-up crews so everything looks “nice and pretty,” but in such large numbers they end up starving to death when owners neglect to give them supplemental food as needed.

The second article I read shared about how a lot of turbo snails come from Mexico, and originally lived in a subtropical environment.  This makes the 78-80 degree temperature of a reef tank stressful for this type of turbo snail.  In this theory, it ends up being impossible for the snails to become properly acclimated to the tank.

I don’t know what will happen, but for every person that can’t successfully keep a turbo snail in captivity, I am able to find someone who can.  Here’s a picture:

I am still having trouble with the ammonia levels, but levels have certainly improved since yesterday.  Today ammonia clocked in between 0.25 and 0.35 ppm, which is still high, but is to be expected at this point in time.  I didn’t treat the water with anything, but I did skipped the fish feeding and attempted to feed the anemone.

This was the first time I have successfully fed the anemone.  Every single day, I have been trying to get it to eat frozen silverside that I purchased from Captain Nemo’s, but always end up throwing it out.  It was pretty cool watching the anemone slowly wrap its tentacles around its food.  I was worried the the clownfish might end up pulling the silverside away, but the clown tried to no avail!

In other news, I have been trying to track this starfish I saw on the first day I got the Fiji live rock, and I finally found it again.  If anyone has any ideas on what it may be, please let me know!