Hi all and thanks for all you new followers that came along even in my long absence from blogging. A big fat sorry of shame for not updating for such a long time!

Without any more excuses for my laziness in writing here we go. I will make this very short.

• Basically moved house, tanks and critters back in March 2016 (had to take a good opportunity for a houserental for us on very short notice, its very hard to come by here in town!).
• Hence I wasnt finished with the planned DIY liverock backwall.
• Due to the move and all that comes with it I never really got into finishing the backwall.
• Summer came and so the Kayakfishing/sailing, was great! 🙂
• Other hobbies and stuff took over a bit…
• and here we are!

 

Backwall is 50% finished now since February but another big new hobby has taken over. Its Indoor Aquaponics checkout my other blog and at least it has also to do with fish and tanks but not the salty cold kind 😉 more on that later (for those who dont know, Aquaponics is basically growing Veg and Salads etc hydroponically but instead of fertilizer, using the Nitrates from the fishwaste as nutrition for the plants which in turn clean the water for the fish)

To this day I havent setup the 200L maintank that was featured here previously but I still have it. I have moved all the rare anemones and some of the critters in the 180L tank and that has been going ever since I moved. The Plan is to setup the 200L again with some technical redesigns mainly to do with the overflow plumbing and the actual overflow box itself. (more on that later)

So here some pictures from when I took down the 200L tank back in Feb 2016.

Some of the Rocks had some serious worm activity. Note that all the rocks where barren from higher shore when I added them in Nov 2013. You can also see some greyish Bryozoan on the mid right on first pic.

Totally overgrown pumps and overflow. The new design overflow will definitely have a plastic grid instead of “stainless”steel!

After I was nearly finished with emptying the tank I was wondering where the hell the two clingfish where. There was only one rock left to remove and there they where next to each other guarding their eggs behind that rock!

I kept them and their rock in a bucket with an airstone and pump but the next day all the eggs where gone… was really cool though to see that they where so happy in my tank that they started breeding.

So here some of the Critters I kept and are currently in the 180L tank.

• loads of Hindmanni Hermits
• Juvenile Spidercrab
• 2 huge black Brittlestars (have them since the beginnings)
• Couple of Hermits and various Snails
• Big Strawberry Anemone
• Bright Red Dhalia Anemone
• Various colored Beadlet Anemones

 

So here now some updates of the 180L tank which currently holds all my old stock. I havent been collecting anything really in over a year except a couple of Mysis for the couple of failed attempts of breeding them.

There isnt much going on but the Spider crab is doing well, here from a few months ago. Has shed about 3 times in the tank and taking fairly big leaps in growth everytime. Decorating itself with anything it can find!

This is him todayish…

To be honest the tank is a bit boring right now also visually but as usual with Rockpool tanks there is always that surprise WHAAAAT-moment. We spotted the two brittlestars breeding one day and then a few days after again and again. It happened right after feeding the tank, it was pretty cool to watch. I am not sure whether it was the new food that triggered it or the fact that there was lots of tiny particles of food in the watercolumn as it was frozen mixed seafood from the LFS. I used to just feed them whole clams and mussels etc before. I have some video footage of it will try and edit it together someday. It was amazing to see how one of them started spawning eggs and the other one releasing sperm simultaneously on opposite ends of the tank. This happened about three times over about two weeks. Havent seen any offspring though…

Another cool thing I accidentally caught with some mysis and completely overlooked for a good while. Some very unusual prawn that I never found in years of Rockpooling. I though it was a juvenile lobster or something much larger due to its claws, it was a mystery for a good while until I spotted the female carrrying eggs which obviously meant that these are fully grown. So I went through the books and it seems to be Athanas nitenscens but I am not 100% sure though the white line on the back is a bit of a giveaway and the fact that the book describes them to “resemble small lobsters”. Which explains our earlier theories 😉 They are very shy and really hard to get a clean straight shot done but really cool to watch the male and its little mini claws.

And here the female…

 

Thats it for now hopefully will keep posting more now and keep the momentum going! It definitely wont be as long again 😉

Next up should be an update on the live rocks…