This is my 90 Gallon Reef Aquarium.  I will be posting updates and new pictures about this reef tank periodically as things change or additions are made.  The date of each entry is posted at the beginning, and the newest entries are displayed first.

July 16th | December 3rd

[12-03-02]  

Well, I've not been too inspired to do much of any updating for so long, mainly because I've been fighting off hair algae since about August. I found out it was from the sea salt mix I had been using, Crystal Sea. I could never kick this diatom problem the tank had, and I had always just assumed it was something I couldn't get out of my water source. Well, I came to find that Crystal Sea was just about one of the worst salt mixes available, and was the likely culprit for the hair algae - after 2 years of using it.

So, I switched to AquaCraft's BioSea mix. Diatoms have nearly stopped, and the hair algae has been slowly decreasing since I started using it in late October.

The corals have still been growing a whole lot, especially after the salt change. Both GSP patches are HUGE now, the two toadstool leathers are quite large now as well. The beautiful torch was the only coral that fell victim to the hair algae. I was one large head and some baby ones have survived though and are now growing again. The purple gorgonian is growing a lot as usual, and the red colt coral has been relatively closed up since the hair algae started. Xenia still grows like a weed, even on top of the hair algae.

Since my new camera is coming, and I've just done a large hair algae removal, I'll get an updated photo soon. But be prepared, it's quite drab compared to it's previous days shown below :(

[07-16-02]  

A current photo from July 9th, 2002:

The current inhabitants of this tank are:

Fish:

  • A 6" hippo tang (6 months old)

  • An ocellaris clown fish (2 years old)

  • A male bangaii cardinal (~1 year old)

  • Two blue chromis (3 weeks old)

Corals:

  • A Pink Colt Coral

  • Two types of green star polyps

  • Too many atlantic blue and red mushrooms to count

  • A tan/orange cabbage leather

  • A metallic green candycane coral with two heads

  • A neon green torch coral with 5 large heads and many new ones growing

  • Two toadstool "pin cushion" leathers

  • A mystery leather coral

  • A purple sea whip gorgonian

  • Lots of Pulsing Xenia "weed" coral

  • A white Fiji leather

Other Critters:

  • Assorted reef hermits

  • 10+ old, large astrea snails & lots of baby snails

[07-16-06] I will give you a bit of background on this tank.  It was started back in August of 1999.  The original tank had an internal filter built into it that went across the whole back.  It was a prototype test for the filter system that is now used in my nano reef aquariums, just larger scale.  Lighting was provided by four 55w CSL powercompacts.  The maintenance for the tank was just a partial water change every other week, of about 15%.  I have never used a protein skimmer.  The tank was started off with only about 25 pounds of live rock, that I had moved over from my 25 gallon tank; my first attempt at a reef.  Being 14 at the time, I didn't have much money to stock the tank, so I was slowly saving up my money to get enough liverock to get the tank going and add livestock.  After a few months, I had enough money and purchased 45 pounds of pre-cured Fiji liverock.  The tank was relatively successful, even in the beginning.  I slowly added corals to it, as I could find them and afford them.  After about 9 months, I didn't give as much attention to the tank, and it wasn't quite as nice.  About a month later my interest was rekindled when I had more time to spend maintaining it.

After cleaning it up some, I soon decided that I would like to have more room within the tank.  I moved everything in the tank to a 50 gallon rubbermaid container for 2 weeks, and removed the internal filter, which had taken up 4" of the back of the whole tank.  I then constructed a much smaller model of the internal filter, about the size of a typical internal overflow box, and that is what I use today.  This opened up most of the back of the tank, and allowed for me to keep more things.  The tank has progressed very well since then, and I have always been maintaining it well.

In March of 2002, a friend of mine who had a FOWLR tank had to move out west, and offered his 200+ pounds of LR to me for free.  I used it to finally complete a more full aquascape that you now see today, as well as completely aquascaping my 46 gallon tank.  A little before adding more rock, I upgraded the lighting to four 48" VHO lamps, which was quite an improvement.

I never had a digital camera until June of this year, so I have very few photo documentations of the growth of this tank.  From now on I will try to keep better track of the progress and changes within this reef tank.