all right guys i do this every once in a while new viewers this is the tom reefer studio here's
the 20 gallon cube mixed reef and here's the 3.5 gallon pico and over here is the five gallon tall
it's really closer to six gallons as i always say and down below is the 10 gallon
experimental tank but it will now become a peninsula reef and i'm going to put it right up
here
i'm trying to get into the tom reefer mode
when i open my eyes i'm gonna be tom reefer relax
hey guys my name is tom new viewers this is the tom reefer channel
everything looks good to go guys tanks and me today's video is going to be mega
on the 20 gallon i've gotten a lot of new viewers who probably haven't gone through all my videos
i mean they you could if you want to guys but they're asking me for an overview a deep overview
like whatever deep dive into the 20 gallon from the beginning and it goes all the way back to
april of 2016. so this tank is almost five years old now let's take a look at the tank now keep
in mind it's not going to be the 20 it'll be a 10 water box that i had five years ago eight in april
of 2016. so if we consider live rock and my original corals this is what i had five years ago
all right this is it guys april 1st 2016 i have the leather coral on the left which
is the one that you see in the center of my 20 gallon now the leather up by the clowns
is the leather that i have on the bottom right that's the australian leather
and there's the green star polyp it started from that size that's about the size of a
smaller tennis ball a lot of us new to the hobby don't realize that the most critical part in reef
keeping is really the first year you're really not going to see your reef tank probably the way
you would like to see it until after a year if you have this vision of things being perfect or
certain things to grow a certain way it's going to take at least one year that's been my experience
the only way you can really jump start a tank is if everything that you put in it
comes from an already previously aged tank so for example when i started this tank five years
ago i got all the live rock from fish guy mike which had been in his tank for 10 to 15 years
so what i'm trying to say here is don't get discouraged a lot happens in the first year
of the tank hair algae unwanted other types of algae diatoms dinos let's take a look at the tank
from where it came from and kind of compare it to where it is now
do
do i want to throw in a little opinion here guys
you don't really want exorbitant growth in a nano you'd like things to be healthy but you
don't want it to overgrow if you look at this now it's getting close to that i'm going to
keep cutting the leather coral so i welcome slow growth as long as things are healthy
there's a couple key times when i added things to the 20 gallon in the beginning
i added what i showed you already and then i got to i believe about the four year mark once i was
in the 20 gallon i thought let's take a try at some sps in there so this is when i put the sps in
all right so for you equipment guys let's start taking a look at the equipment i had
from the beginning so i didn't dose in the 10 gallon i believe at the very end i was
manually dosing a little bit with little milliliter cups and i would pour a little
bit in the evening hours so it wasn't until i started the 20 gallon that i
started my auto dosing with the pumps and let's take a look at them
water flow and circulation let's take a look at that
refugium let's take a look at that
skimmer of course did i say two-part dosing oh lighting of course lighting from the beginning
uh
ai prime not hd in the beginning ai prime then once i went 20 a little after that
kesley 80 to supplement the blue that's why we get that nice shimmer in here
ato smart ato i run three of them from the one container one goes into the 20.
what else guys
i think i got everything
oh fish
the clown sometimes reminds me of having a dog he'll sit inside that leather and just hang out
so
um
all right guys i think i covered it all so no more questions about the 20 gallon this covers it
you know i'm gonna have to start uh what could i do i'm getting a lot of repeat questions guys
so um look at my videos you know do a little research in there you'll find the answer to almost
ever almost every question you have in my videos look for keywords and search around a little
but i'd be glad to try to answer them in the description below but sometimes they're repeats
so um you know i don't know maybe i'll do a link to the video where i know the answer
is but i like to communicate with you guys a little you know i think that does it for sure
man this was a big one i hope i can edit it all in time so anyway have a great rest of the day
i'll see you on water change wednesday all right take care
you