Lasses Dream Build

[Lasse]

It looks looks like posts in the lounge forum not show up in latest post list. Do not miss this. Its pictures that few have seen before

The great Elk migration

The Eagle has landed. I saw it first (Sea Eagle) a lot of ravens too. https://www.svtplay.se/video/jN3XL2B/den-stora-algvandringen/idag-00-00?id=jN3XL2B&position=42665&highlight=havsorn-i-narbild-42665 Sincerely Lasse

www.reef2reef.com

Sincerely Lasse

 

[Lasse]

First swimmers pf the year - press "spela från...."

Den stora älgvandringen – Idag 00:00 – FÖRSTA SIMMARNA!

I flera tusen år har älgarna vandrat samma leder för att ta sig till sommarens rika betesmarker. Följ årets vandring, som är den sjätte säsongen då vi får se älgarna vandra i rutan och på SVT Play.

www.svtplay.se

See

The great Elk migration

This have nothing with reefing to do - but it have with the wonderful nature to do. Its slow TV and if you is stuck at home - be welcome to see one of the wonders in the world Since more than 2000 of years - some of the moose (elk) population in northern Sweden have done a migration walk in...

www.reef2reef.com

Sincerely Lasse

 

[ESABOE]

Thank you, appreciate the advice. I need simplicity but want to catch the wonderful coral colors!

Hopefully I can find it on sale.

Btw, your Tank is beautiful- and the videos are great!

Hi Lasse,
I purchased the Olympus TG-7; couldn’t find the older model that wasn’t used.

The manual is very extensive- I have never owned a real camera before.

It has all these Underwater features; but I want to take full photos of my display and that would be outside of the water.

What settings do you use when taking tank display photos vs. close-up or macro shots? Do you still use Underwater features?

Also, do you change your tank lights at all when you photograph? I have the AI Blades and can adjust as needed.

I really appreciate your help and it was because of your beautiful photos and staying simple that I purchased the camera. Very excited!

 

[Lasse]

The settings is the same if you use it under or over water. There is a learning curve. I will come back to you with some tips later on. I have to look at the tg7;s manual first - I´m not sure its the same as TG6

Sincerely Lasse

 

[ESABOE]

The settings is the same if you use it under or over water. There is a learning curve. I will come back to you with some tips later on. I have to look at the tg7;s manual first - I´m not sure its the same as TG6

Sincerely Lasse

All reviews said it barely changed from TG-6. Thank you for reviewing.

Ok, Underwater settings it is!

 

[Lasse]

I normally use one of the three first

They have a white balance inbuild in the program but normally - it does not work with our aquarium lights (to much blue in them). Therefore I use the White Balance adaption trick

Blue circle - your own white Balance

Chose one and press info in order to catch a new option Now you should aim your camera on something white I normally use the part of the sand that´s are most white. Press the trigger and say yes to the question. If you do not have white sand - use a white plastic sheet inside the aquarium but make the adjustment with the camera outside. I normally use all lighting at 100 % when I do a photo session (no flash)

After the picture is done - I use Photoshop and some of the automatic options in Picture - adjustment.

I normally use ISO between 100 and 200

Sincerely Lasse

 

[ESABOE]

I normally use one of the three first

They have a white balance inbuild in the program but normally - it does not work with our aquarium lights (to much blue in them). Therefore I use the White Balance adaption trick

Red circle - your own white Balance

Chose one and press info in order to catch a new option Now you should aim your camera on something white I normally use the part of the sand that´s are most white. Press the trigger and say yes to the question. If you do not have white sand - use a white plastic sheet inside the aquarium but make the adjustment with the camera outside. I normally use all lighting at 100 % when I do a photo session (no flash)

After the picture is done - I use Photoshop and some of the automatic options in Picture - adjustment.

Lasse, I can’t thank you enough! The fact that you took the time to read the new manual; give me the instructions with pictures (I am a visual learner so I needed these); and also gave me step by step on my lighting and How to take photo really humbles me with your kindness.

I won the TSA grand prize and they are flying me to their store/farm in Florida on Monday. I am taking photos of my current DT and also taking lots of photos while I’m there, I started a dedicated thread for this incredible gift I am receiving. Here is the link if you are interested in seeing my photos and my special reef I have created. I will be adding your inspiration and guidance in a post in there as well:

Thread 'The TSA Grand Prize Tour Experience!'
https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/the-tsa-grand-prize-tour-experience.1050770/

 

[Lasse]

@ESABOE I have edit my post - please read the new version

Sincerely Lasse

 

[ESABOE]

@ESABOE I have edit my post - please read the new version

Sincerely Lasse

Will do!

 

[Lasse]

Today - I did a couple of analyses of my water below my DSB.

There has been a lot of discussions lately if there can be any total ammonia "pockets" in an existing mature tank. My tank is constructed in a way that it is rather easy to investigate this. It has a DSB in the refugium that have a reversed flow. I pump water down to the plenum and further up through the DSB

The flow is around 1000 L/H through this compartment of my aquarium with water containing around 0.1 NH3/NH4 as I show below (from march).

My PO4 is rather high and on its rising - for the moment 0.89 in the display water. 1 week ago - I had to switch my pump that supplies the plenum with water from the display. The same type but it seems to give what is supposed to do (around 120 L/H) -> 2880 L/24 hour. The old gave maybe only half that amount as it was old and tired. I have gone down with flow now to around 58 L/H.

What did I find and am I surprised? I´m not surprised by myself - it was in line with what I had expected due to experiences in both anaerobic and aerobic environments I have been working with before but it maybe will surprise some others - like those that always claim that tanks with a lot of corals and surface never can produce high amounts of NH3/NH4 and therefore all measurements that shows the opposite is false.

In clear figures

NH3/NH4 (total ammonia) in the DT - around 0.07 mg/L
NH3/NH4 (total ammonia) in the bottom of the DSB - around 0.89
PO4 in DT - around 0.89 mg/L
PO4 in the bottom of the DSB - around 1.78 (read 0.89 too but it was diluted fifty/fifty with new fresh saltwater)
NO3 in the DT - around 6.4
NO3 in the bottom of the DSB - around 3,8 mg/L
NO2 in the DT - around 0.013 mg/L
NO2 in the bottom of the DSB - around 0.03

These figures shows that activity of heterotrophic bacteria produce a lot of both NH3/NH4 and PO4 when they are feeded with organic carbon. It also shows that for the moment - my DSB mostly act as a NO3 producer (its probably mostly aerobic) and I have slowing down the flow and increase the organic carbon dosing in order to favour denitrification. The nitrification will happens at other places in my tank.

Sincerely Lasse

 

[Lasse]

In this graph - you can see how the pH below the DSB decrease when the pumps stopped

Sincerely Lasse

 

[taricha]

It has a DSB in the refugium that have a reversed flow. I pump water down to the plenum and further up through the DSB

The flow is around 1000 L/H through this compartment of my aquarium with water containing around 0.1 NH3/NH4 as I show below (from march).

What did I find and am I surprised? I´m not surprised by myself - it was in line with what I had expected due to experiences in both anaerobic and aerobic environments I have been working with before

So what do you think is the source of organic nitrogen that is getting into the plenum and breaking down under anaerobic conditions to make ammonia?
are you visualizing particulates getting through the sand into that space, or like dissolved proteins and amino acids?

 

[Lasse]

So what do you think is the source of organic nitrogen that is getting into the plenum and breaking down under anaerobic conditions to make ammonia?
are you visualizing particulates getting through the sand into that space, or like dissolved proteins and amino acids?

Do not forget that it is a reversed flow DSB - its water from the refugium (that get water from the DT trough a coast to coast overflow) that are pumped down to the plenum. The plenum is aerobic - at least it has mostly a positive ORP

Before 14/5 - my flow through the plenum (and the sand bed) was around 107L/H and after that - around 57 L/H. ORP has decline as expected

I think that the processes in the plenum is aerobic and with help of etanol dosing (around 30 ml 8 %) a day is mostly aerobic heterotrophic bacteria that break down organic particles an leave a lot of both NH3/NH4 and PO4 in the plenum water. I know that I have claimed aerobic circumstance - but I´m not sure that it is that way in the plenum - but it is a lot of N disappearing from my system and I have earlier believed that it happens with help of classic denitrification. But in that case - there have to be a lot of nitrification taking place in the plenum and that´s IMO not possible with as high load of organic carbon. Below is the measurements yesterday compared with the 14/5

As you can see - for the moment - there is elevated NO2 in the plenum water - this can be due to an incomplete nitrification. This means that a water rich in total ammonia. nitrite and organic carbon is traveled up in the sand bed. It will be anaerobic rathe fast and therefore another possible process for direct ammonia oxidation can be possible. There is anaerobic environment, organic carbon, total ammonia and nitrite. This fact means that I can´t exclude the anammox process. Its clear that around 0.8 mg/L total ammonia disappear through the sand bed 14/5 and the 20/5 - around 0.59 mg/l total ammonia gets lost through the passage. 14/5

The step I will take now is to lower the flow to around 25 L/H. For the moment it runs for 2 minutes and stop for 2 minutes. I will run it for 1 minute and stop for 2 minutes - it means that I will have around 38 L/H

Sincerely Lasse

 

[taricha]

I think that the processes in the plenum is aerobic and with help of etanol dosing (around 30 ml 8 %) a day is mostly aerobic heterotrophic bacteria that break down organic particles an leave a lot of both NH3/NH4 and PO4 in the plenum water. I know that I have claimed aerobic circumstance - but I´m not sure that it is that way in the plenum - but it is a lot of N disappearing from my system and I have earlier believed that it happens with help of classic denitrification. But in that case - there have to be a lot of nitrification taking place in the plenum and that´s IMO not possible with as high load of organic carbon.

See, this is the thing that I feel unsure on.

Is the ammonia and nitrite a result of organics->ammonia->nitrite from heterotrophs fed by carbon in a sandbed?

Or is it denitrification from nitrate->nitrite with some ammonia produced from NO2 -> ammonia as a small part of the process.

You have really good quality and boatloads quantity of data that says that your sandbed when fed carbon is denitrifying NO3. The data seems like it could be read either way to me.

 

[Lasse]

See, this is the thing that I feel unsure on.

Is the ammonia and nitrite a result of organics->ammonia->nitrite from heterotrophs fed by carbon in a sandbed?

Or is it denitrification from nitrate->nitrite with some ammonia produced from NO2 -> ammonia as a small part of the process.

It also looks like it is a high PO4 production in the plenum that indicate the first statement. I also doubt that 0.6 mg/l total ammonia could be produced from DNRA because the plenum is aerobic, But never the less - its is 57 l water per hour with 0.6 mg/L ammonia and for the moment 0.9 mg/L NO2 that pass through the sand bed. The water after the sand bed has 0.02 mg NH3/NH4 and 0.007 mg/L. Of cause I could have a high nitrification rate in my refugium but in that case my 300 L DT should get around 187 mg NO3/hour -< rise of around 0.63 mg/L NO3 per hour. No - I am more and more sure that I can´t exclude anammox at least as a part of my nitrogen removal

You have really good quality and boatloads quantity of data that says that your sandbed when fed carbon is denitrifying NO3. The data seems like it could be read either way to me.

With these new tools (Hanna Marine Master) I hope I can do weekly analyses of the water in the DT and compare with values in the plenum. I will use the flow as an adjuster. Whats interesting for me for the moment is where the PO4 comes from.

Sincerely Lasse

 

[Lasse]

A small demonstration of how much organic matter there can be in a filter in my system during only 5 days. With organic matter in this case I mean both the original organic particles that occur in my water but also the bacteria grown in the filter.

I run a small GFO/Al filter in my sump - possible cleaner than the water that goes down to my plenum because it is both macroalgae and sedimentation areas between the two pumps. The size can been seen here - the coca cola can is with to give an idea of the size. Filtration material around 160 ml.

This is how the water looks like after 3 rinses

The flow through this filter is much lower than down to the plenum and no organic carbon adding at this point - it could be som that leak out from the bed but I do not feed any organic carbon in the sump or DT

This chart shows how ORP react at different flows, 107 L/H, 57 l/H and 38 L/H. The ORP probe is 2 cm from inlet into the plenum.

However - the pH graph show some confusing patterns. Denitrification should rise the pH but in this case - the high flow period (that should give lesser denitrification) result in a pH peak in the plenum higher than in the DT - low flow period shows a rathe lower pH overall in the plenum. However - its long time since last calibration for both electrodes but the pattern should not change because of that. The thin green line - pH in the sump - thicker pH in the plenum.

Sincerely Lasse

 

[Lasse]

A note according samples from the plenum. All is filetred by a 0.22 µ syringe filter pre analyse. Its so much particles (read bacteria film) that is only possible to force around 10 - 15 ml before the filter becomes clogged,

I did a PO4 analyse today - 0.94 mg/L and NO3 of 0.5 mg/L - this after 1 day with lower flow but the same amount of organic carbon.

I must say that I´m rather confused because in spite of high PO4 reading, measurable NH3/NH4 and NO3 and most of the ultra trace elements there they should be - my windows are rather clean. Before - with lower measured PO4 - they need scraping nearly every day - now maybe once every 4:th day.

I use Salifert Phosphate eliminator and they state that this product flocculate the PO4 into a form that is not useable for photosyntetic organisms but will be breakdown into PO4 and the flocculant when you analyze it. What´s contradict this is that I have not seen any lesser growth of my macroalgae. Never the less - there is much lesser microalgae growth on my windows now

Sincerely Lasse

​

 

[Lasse]

Does my corals grow in nearly 1 mg/L PO4 (Measured)? Lets see in the future

Sincerely Lasse

 

[Lasse]

A better photo

Sincerely Lasse

 

[Lasse]

I am adjusting the flow and ORP decrease. Need to decrease the ethanol too

I´m away from home but plan to take some tests tomorrow

Sincerely Lasse