It seems a little fishy!

Its time for a post about the tank, "Project Spongia" Be warned, this is going to be a long post. Originally this was going to be a tank devoted to specifically the growth of different sponge. So off of Craigs list, my friend found me a link to a tank for sale. It was $10, how could I go wrong. So off to this mans house I go. Ten bucks in hand. It was a good purchase. A little small but for the price it a deal. about 10 gallons of sponge growing real-estate. It was brand new never used. Perfect.

I took the tank home. The next day i visited the local hardware store. Purchased a sheet of 5/8" plywood. Some 2x3 lumber, a power bar, 2 timers, a 23 watt cfl, some 16ga power cord, a male household plug, and a lightbulb fixture. And I drove home. Next step: Setup a makeshift cut station and built a 30"x24" aquarium table with a large shelf underneath; for storage and phytoplankton growth. Having it made of rough wood lends the benefit that I can later cut/drill holes in it for sumps or algae scrubbers without worry about messing up nice furniture.

Next up was dealing with the tank. I washed it out, and promptly set to leak testing it in the bath tub. Everything checks out good. Throw down a towel on the new table. Set the tank on

top. Head out to the LFS and break out the bank card. A filter, air pump, air line, air junction

valve, airline tee's, crushed coral 'sand', a heater, and small power head, salt mix, and a 24" double light setup, hydrometer, and thermometer all came home with me. Some of thee bits were for the Algae-coloda project, and others for Spongia.

Putting all the pieces on my bed I started opening packages. Reading directions, and installing hardware. Fast-foreward about an hour and I am in the bathroom mixing and testing water for the tank. Somewhere along the way I had gone to Walmart and bought a rubbermaid bin for storage and water mixing. I found the water did not want to test repeatably. I attributed it to a few different things. 1: testing different areas in the bin resulted in different readings. Mixing was not even throughout. 2. mixing was introducing air bubbles into the water which would change the volume of water in the hydrometer giving false reading. 3. the actual act of filling the hydrometer could introduce bubbles that wanted to stick to the float needle, causing it to rise more than it should. and 4. allowing the water to sit for a short period of time allowed the salts to dissolve more evenly into the water. removing the 'grit' from the bottom of the tank. So I worked around all these little problems and have a method for making repeatable and accurate readings now. Also as a side note; I noticed that if you let the hydrometer sit after testing salt will stick it up when the water evaporates. This also introduces error in your next reading because you re-disolve this salt when taking your next reading. My solution is simple. rinse with fresh water when I am done using it for the day.

So, materials gathered. Table built. Tank setup, water mixed. Add the water. Done and done. I proceed to set the timers and plug everything in. Timers are set on the lights for 6am rise and 10pm set. I let the tank circulate for 2 days. The water cleared up and everything settled down. Another trip to a different LFS (my fav one so far) And I was coming home with some Prime, and a 10lb live rock. I added some prime hap-hazardly to the tank. And set the live rock in place. In hindsight; I realize that I put in a lot too much Prime. Oops. I calculated that I need to add .1ml of Prime per 4L of water. This again I let circulate for a day or two. Some long algae grew almost instantly. Not a lot of it, maybe 5 pieces.

Next I did something that I have read a bit about. I pee'd in the fish tank. Seriously. Ok maybe not exactly how it sounds. I have been doing a lot of reading on how to 'properly' cycle a tank. And it turns out, there are many ways. There are the die hard old school people who throw in some hardy fish to swim around, and probably die. Some people put in live rock, live sand etc. Let it sit for a month or 2 and then call it good after various 'milestones' are hit with water testing. Some people put in a few cocktail shrimp (yes the frozen food item) It rots/decomposes with the help of bacteria. Ammonia is produced and other bacteria eat it. Turn it into nitrites/nitrates. Other people have other methods. The key thing here is that ammonia is produced. Bacteria cultures multiply and start to break the ammonia down. When ammonia/nitrites/nitrates all read 0 again after this ammonia spike; then your 'cycle' is complete.

I read about people actually using human urine to cycle their tank. I thought why not. I did some research on urine. What it constitutes, what gets flushed out of your body with it. How much 'could' be added. How to collect it, etc. I made the decision to try it. I am a relatively healthy person. I eat pretty well, don't put too many toxins into my body, and I drink plenty of water. So I chugged a bunch of water, went to the bathroom. Drank a bunch more. I did this to ensure I was properly hydrated and that the urine would not be full of pollutants hat had been accumulating. I wanted fresh pee, so to speak. So next bathroom break I brought a small cup and dipped it in mid stream. Collected a table spoons worth of it and doused the tank with a bit of urine.

I let the tank sit for about a week. A few days after the pee was added my friend bought me a test kit and I set out to check the levels. They were lower than i expected, but still above what I would expect to see of a cycled tank. So I let it continue to work its magic. During this time I did no water changes. Various forms of algae grew. My live rock 'funked' over turning golden yellow to a browny color. Red slime started to form. I tested the water every few days and levels progressively dropped in all areas. Ammonia, nitrite, nitrates, phosphorous. My friend came over and was a little upset by how the rock an tank looked. She insisted on doing a partial water change. Another couple days later and everything read zeros. My cycle was seemingly complete. In under 2 weeks. To be sure, I added a little more urine. Brought my ammonia level up to 2.6ppm and let it circulate again. Testing the next day, levels dropped and nitrates/nitrites were forming. Everything was working properly.

Around this time I also discovered a hitch-hiker in my piece of live rock. A little blue crab. His name quickly became Joda. Joda likes to hide inside the rock. The core of the live rock seems pretty hollow, with tunnels running through it. Joda has a collection of small stones hidden in there which 'he' likes to stuff into the holes to the caves. Blocking himself in. I am not sure what kind of crab he is yet. Bluish grey with slightly hairy legs.

So today I decided would be a good time for some more live rock. I bought a nicely shaped 4 pound rock, and 2 sponge rocks. A blue one with a red sponge hitch-hiker (plus various other creatures). And yellow with what I thought was some odd black Coraline algae). The 'algae' turned out to be an animal. What I have identified as a Scutus. Otherwise known as an Elephant Slug. Why it has this name, I don't know. But it is a slow creature. And it exposes its internal shell which makes it look like a racing stripe. Neat creature. On the blue sponge rock was a large patch of deep purple Coraline algae. Really pretty. A medium sized tube worm.

A small mushroom (I think). A few black and

white brittle stars. And another crab. This crab was almost identical to the crab I found the other day; it quickly left the sponge rock and made a dash for the large live rock i had initially bought. I guess that this new crab (named Mu Shu) and Joda will meet. I expect one of 2 things to happen. Crab babies, or crab carnage. Time will tell.

So now I have a bunch of rocks in the small tank, 2 crabs, a few brittle stars, 3 sponge. A mushroom, A snail(Scutus), 3 tube worms and who knows what else in the tank. Room has disappeared quickly.

I cleaned all the glass surfaces today. And did a 30-40% water change. Once all the levels again return to zero its probably time for a fish. The real test to see if my tank has cycled well; or to see if my tank will suffer like so many with 'New Tank Syndrome' To be continued....