Up and running for 8 weeks

It's been a while coming this update. So what has happened:

Firstly and most drastically was the rescape that we did on Saturday. The old scape was fundamentally good, but we struggled to see the fish and inverts alot of the time. In addition, we were running out of space to place corals as well as allowing them place to grow. So a major rethink was in order (it is also a dry run for when we move house). We removed two pieces of live rock that formed the base of the structure, and tried to create a few more overhangs. This is to help with swimming space as well as it gives us more coral placing space, surprisingly so. One of the rocks was moved to the first filtration chamber, while the bio balls that were there have been placed between the combs of the 3rd chamber. I did this so as to not change the bio filtration to much. The hope is to replace the large rock with live rock rubble and then replace the bio balls with some form of mechanical filtration. One of the sad events from the rescape seems to be the loss of one of the gobies. We are not sure if he is a fatality of the rescape or a casualty before hand as we had not seen both simultaneously 2 days before hand. The positive though, the surviving goby has housed himself under a rock that is more visible. If he survives the move, we may pair him up with a shrimp. All seems well so far. The leather is sulking big time, but I am hoping its just a prelude to shedding.

A new addition: we have made our first venture into LPS corals. On Saturday, we purchased a hammer coral. It is considered a moderately difficult coral to keep, but it will be manageable in our tank. They have been known to be surrogate anemones for clowns, and we are really hoping that happens.

The phosphate scare: after battling with algae, I finally decided to test the phosphates and see how bad it is (all other parameters were in the norm). What I saw was shocking - the phosphates were off the charts. So in with phosphate remover. I did it in 2 stages as i didn't want to shock the tank. I am happy to report that a week and a bit later, the phosphates are a little more respectable, but still some way off. But it's moving in the right direction at least.

Bye bye Aiptasia: after 3 weeks, the peppermint shrimp didn't even nibble on the Aiptasia. Also, I failed in my attempts to cover the hole with putty. So I resorted to chemical means (Aipex) and blasted them. It seems to have worked, but I will need to wait a while to confirm a good kill.