WAMAS Tank of the Month
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Thank you all for this honor! My name is Bryce, or Llemonz. I have been in the hobby for almost 15 years now. Over the years I have kept many different tanks (120,150,300,120,135 and now a 330). This hobby and the community around it has been incredible to be part of. It has afforded me great opportunities to meet many friends, share knowledge and experience, and to forever be a student in keeping reef aquaria. If anyone is interested in more pictures of my tank, please find me on Instagraph @doclemonzreef My current tank is a custom built 330 gallon tank from glass cages. It is set up as a peninsula with the dimensions of 90x36x25". The tank has been established for 18 months as of this write up/ The tank serves as a room divider in our basement, allowing for 18 feet of viewing, from three sides. I am running a Neptune Cor-20 for the return pump. I am shooting for about five times tank turn-over through the sump. I have found it difficult to achieve good, even flow for an SPS dominate peninsula style reef. I currently run 4 Jabeo cross-flows and 6 Jabeo powerheads. The poweheads are all running on different pulsing frequencies. My goal is to provide as much random flow as possible. Currently the tank is lit by a combination of T'5s and LED's. The main fixture is an ATI power module (8 t5's and LED clusters). I have multiple T'5 retrofit kits in place along with LED supplement. I run primarily a combination of ATI blue + and ATI true actinic. I run approximately a 12 hour photocycle. The T'5 supplements (B+ and actinic) are on for 12 hours along w/ the LED supplement. The main lighting is ran for 6 hours each day. When I started this tank, I began w/ 3x 400w metal halides. The color was incredible, but as the SPS began to fill in, I quickly ran into shadowing issues. Due to the shadowing, and my goal of a packed SPS tank, I made the switch to T'5's as the primary light source. Filtration is rather simple. The tank is supported by an 86 gallon all acrylic sump. The first chamber of the sump is a refugium packed full of Chaeto. There are no filter socks on the tank. The detritus accumulates in the first chamber of the sump, where I clean it out periodically. The second chamber of the refugium holds the skimmer, a Deltec 2560, and two heaters. Separating the final stage of the sump is filter floss to help cut down on any micro-bubbles, before going to the Cor-20 return pump. I keep my water parameters steady using a combination of 2-part and a calcium reactor. I use the 2-part to be able to adjust the alkalinity manually from the comfort of the Apex Fusion app. The calcium reactor (Geo 818) does the bulk of the work maintaining calcium and alkalinity. Occasionally, I hand dose Acropower and Red Sea Coral Colors program, but not consistently. The tank is SPS dominated. Currently I have approximately 130 difference SPS pieces. I do have a few LPS. My favorite being a 10+ year old pagoda cup. There are approximately 30 fishes in my tank, including 6 different tangs, 3 different anthias species, and multiple anglefish. I try to have a lot of fish, to give me the excuse to feed a lot. I believe that frequent feeding is important for both coral and fish health. I have been using an automatic feeder that feeds the tank PE pellets 3x daily. I try to feed frozen at least 2x daily, but usually 3x. The last frozen feeding of the day contains a mixture of Benefeef, Reef Roids and BRS Coral Frenzy. The biggest challenge in the hobby for me is patience. I find myself struggling with it on a near daily basis. I think its the nature of us hobbiest, that we are always trying to change or tweak something, just because we can. Most of my difficulties in the hobby have been from "just because" changes I have made. I get myself in too much trouble when I make future plans in this hobby, so it's best to say I don't have any... But for now I need to finish staining the tank canopy and put doors on the tank stand. This is one of the coolest hobbies we can all be a part of! It has been great to share with you all some insight into how I care for my tank. If anyone has any questions or just wants to talk reef with me, please don't hesitate to reach out to me. Also, for anyone who wants to follow along in my reefing journey, please follow my tanks Instagram at @doclemonzreef |
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