Restarting my seagrass build

[Amphiprion]

An update and pics to come this weekend. So far, almost all the grasses have bounced back substantially. The only species that finally dwindled was the Syringodium. The delicate cylindrical leaves just broke off and never grew back. The Halodule and Halophila have exploded, especially the latter (which I thought was all but dead). Every square inch of the tank bottom is now covered. It is beginning to reach the point of being too thick, so I will be trimming it very soon, pulling up rhizomes as I go. I'll be sure to get before/after pics if I do that this weekend. The single Thalassia stalk has done really well, mostly with rhizome growth. What started out as a shoot with almost no rhizome at all has now become a single shoot with a 7" rhizome . It isn't much to look at, but it is doing well. Overall, I like how the tank looks now--at least enough to want to get pictures of it. I've got a few folks who are interested in the rhizomes I pull up. If I have some left over, they are up for grabs to whomever is interested. They are worth trying and a different challenge compared to typical reefkeeping, at least in my opinion.

[Amphiprion]

And the pics... Just took a couple, since the viewing angles are limited. For those wondering why I left the sides dirty, there's a reason for that . I have hundreds of dorvilleid worms that munch on it and I rather like them, so I keep the sides algae-covered for their benefit... and I'm a bit lazy as well.





Notice how the Halophila filled in incredibly fast. It went from almost nothing when I first restarted, then got choked out by the dinoflagellates. What you are seeing is roughly 2.5 months of sprouting only, which is incredible. This species' tendency toward ultra-fast vegetative growth is nothing short of astounding. The shoal grass has filled in quite well. It gradually dwindled like the rest and suddenly sent runners and shoots everywhere. There are about 30 individual shoots, ranging from about 1" to about 8". Last but not least, one of my favorites, the worm activity. I got a sandbed shot to show the amount of burrowing occurring in the bed. You can even see some of the dorvilleids nestled in their burrows next to grass roots. Very cool. There isn't a single square inch of sand that isn't packed with a worm of some sort, be it a cirratulid or run of the mill amphinomid. Exactly what I was going for!

[AuroraDrvr]

Very beautiful and healthy ecosystem.


I think you need a nice colony of some species of Staghorn Acropora right in the middle of the tank.

[Amphiprion]

Thanks for the kind words--I'm hoping I can keep it relatively healthy.

Wow, great picture. Definitely something I've been considering. I think with the right tools and experience, it is doable this time around. The Pocillopora I had before did really well until the Aiptasia explosion. I think I may be able to grow a hardier staghorn species once I get everything in order, like reconnecting my skimmer and getting calcium and alkalinity in check. The grass is getting thick and numerous enough that the decaying leaves/subsequent detritus would eventually become an issue. I think I can largely mediate that eventual outcome by keeping them in check a bit better, in addition to have the skimmer running.

[jt3069]

just my 2 cents but id wait longer and let your grass bed really take hold
from your pics its seems thin,but tall

after it takes hold you should be a able to handle the potental detritus break down (basically n and p)
cal and mag is a whole nother story

[Amphiprion]

just my 2 cents but id wait longer and let your grass bed really take hold
from your pics its seems thin,but tall

after it takes hold you should be a able to handle the potental detritus break down (basically n and p)
cal and mag is a whole nother story

It's not actually that thin--it's reached roughly the point where I don't want it getting any thicker. Also, keep in mind all the shorter stuff is seagrass, as well--just a different species. The problem with allowing it to get thick, contrary to what may look better aesthetically, is that it causes problems. This is true not only for the grasses themselves, which do best when they have lots of room and water circulation, but also for the animals that inhabit the sand bed. Once the grasses reach a certain density, sand bed fauna declines and eventually disappears altogether, followed shortly thereafter by the vigor of the grasses. The grasses eventually dwindle, get patchier, and disease sets in as rhizomes decay and encourage large amounts of bacteria in the substrate. It's a precarious balance for grass beds. In the wild, the healthiest beds are the ones with the most regular grazing. The thickest ones simply aren't sustainable. All of this goes doubly for species that grow incredibly fast. Unfortunately, Halophila johnsonii (the main species I have) may be one of the fastest (if not the fastest) growing species available. The same scenario here is true for plants in general.

The only reason I know this is because I've allowed the grasses to fill in as much as possible when the tank was set up before. As they filled in more, detritus increased substantially (soluble n and p never were issues and aren't even now) and the sand bed enriched to the point where the grasses were unhealthy and all sand bed fauna was limited to the absolute top of the sand, struggling to stay between the numerous rhizomes. It was a sad sight and one I'm working toward not allowing again. Toward that goal, I actually just thinned the leftmost, thickest portion today. It looks bare, but I'll gradually, over the course of the next few months, begin thinning the entire tank in sections. It should help preserve sand bed fauna and allow grasses time to fill and settle. In any case, it's all a work in progress. I've already experienced one way of doing it that doesn't work in the long run, so I'll see what happens when I try things a bit differently.

Edit: I didn't mean to sound like I'm going to immediately jump into putting corals like Acropora in the system. I want to see how sustainable this method is, first. It is an eventual goal, though, and a big step forward, I think. I know it works well for Pocillopora and pretty much any "LPS."

[jt3069]

never know till you try

and you have, experince goes along way
keep updating on this style tank, i like the natural grass look

i think a grass bed in a volcano tank
would look awesome and maybe a tang to manage the grass
lol

[Amphiprion]

Well, I found something odd. Not entirely sure what it is, since I can't see all of it and have no way to get a picture. I'm fairly certain, however, that it is some sort of large worm and it appears to have a big taste for sand. I can see tunnels along the glass that are about 2x the diameter of a pencil and it's got to be this big one doing it. It plasters its bright red mouth against the glass like a suction cup and pulls in a big mouthful of sand and repeats this. Pretty cool and apparently, whatever it is, it does a lot of "work," since I can see evidence of it moving around pretty much all throughout the tank. Wish I could get a picture of the whole thing, but it might just freak me out. The big guy only seems to be active at night, too...

[Amphiprion]

A mini-update and no pics at the moment:

I've had a lot more success as the tank aged and stabilized. The grasses have filled in almost too well and I've already started pulling large amounts of rhizomes from the substrate. I can tell when areas of substrate get too thick with them, because I start seeing less infauna in that area, plus the grasses start looking leggy. Fairly easy to spot once you know what you are looking for. It's a bit more extra work than I had intended, but it still is a far cry from what I would've been doing with a typical reef system. I think this is the only way you can sustainably keep these grasses growing at heavy rates--something FW planted folks are already quite familiar with and accustomed to. I guess with experience with corals (and zero experience with grasses before), I was initially a bit afraid of simply yanking the grasses out, worrying that they may not fill back in. Obviously now I know that such worries are completely[/] unfounded, at least with one species. I'm not quite as aggressive about pruning the other species I have in there, though, since their growth and coverage is much less. Anyway, new pics to come soon. I'll likely have some up before X-mas.

On another note, I did get a few quick shots of the worm I was talking about previously. After observing it long enough and seeing its feeding behavior, I am convinced it is a large capitellid worm. It is clearly targeting detritus in its foraging habits and has a protrusible mouth in which it feeds. Pretty interesting. Here are the pics (they are terribly blurry--I was in a mad rush to get a shot of it)--for reference this guy is a bit shy of 2x the diameter of a pencil:

[AuroraDrvr]

How is your Halodule holding up against the Halophila?

[Amphiprion]

Well, I'm not losing any, but gains are small and slow on that front. I can only imagine that the competition for nutrient sequestration from the Halophila is pretty fierce and that if left unchecked, it is fairly clear who the victor would be. I'm hoping the Halodule will attempt to fill in a bit better as I keep trimming/thinning the Halophila from the rhizome up.

[Amphiprion]

Small update, but no pics (tank looks pretty nasty from some neglect). Despite how it looks, I noticed tonight that my Thalassia (a.k.a turtle grass) has actually sprouted! I found a little daughter plantlet very close to the main stalk. It seems as though it is finally settling in and growing. Cool stuff, but it took it long enough.

[jt3069]

do you have any experience with maiden's hair
was thinkin of using this in my sump instead of cheato

[Amphiprion]

Unlike Chaetomorpha, maiden's hair is a bit more demanding, mostly in that it requires a lot of water motion (more light-hungry, as well)--as much or more than many corals. It won't work well in a sump and it isn't as fast growing as Chaetomorpha. It has also been implicated in secreting compounds that can potentially damage corals, though that seems like it is more a localized thing (i.e. the alga is in close proximity or contacting coral). There's a lot of algae that do that, anyway, like Caulerpa, but people use it without too many issues.

You should try seagrass instead !! Shameless plug, I know, lol.

[Amphiprion]

Quick update: I took some pics and even a really short video. The cyanobacteria from the last harvest is now subsiding. The muck causes it to pop up and hang around every time.

http://youtu.be/c51dNDItdZM





Drew, I bleached the crap out of that Montipora frag you gave me. I raised the fixture to about 14"from the water's surface, shortened the photoperiod before I added it and still bleached it. Hopefully it will pull through--it'd be nice.