Octo Tank - Going Larger

[Darth Kraken]

Good story........I think we all understand the wonderful chaos that occurs during major procedures The tank looks good as well, from the finished photo

 

[Nancy]

Nice tank. Nice mushrooms, too!

Nancy

 

[Darth Kraken]

Yes, I noticed there seemed to be a few cnidarians about in the picture. What species do you have in there?

 

[DWhatley]

Like most of my simple critters, the living things in this tank are from the Caribbean, most coming from Sea Life Inc. The ones on the left are inherited (source unknown) and problably in excess of 10 years old, the ones in the middle only a couple of years (maybe 3 now since this build out was almost a year ago and they came from the smaller tank it replaced). The zoes are commonly called giant sun polyps (not to be confused with the hard skeleton nocturnal coral of a similar common name):

Giant sun polyps are somewhat uncommon variety of palythoa zoanthid from the Caribbean. They have probably the largest polyps of any Caribbean zoanthid, with polyps that get easily as large a 1? in diameter and often larger. They are often called "Sun Polyps", and are most likely in the genus Palythoa, and probably the species "grandis", but there could be some debate over the exact species.

The red mushrooms are a Caribbean "corallimorph in the genus Discosoma", species unknown. These are a deeper water mushroom but they can get quite large in an aquarium and live for years. The one in my largest system lived over 5 years and was 8" across. They don't multiply much but this tank has had some propagation.

 

[Darth Kraken]

Well, I always think the cephalopod layouts with some corals are nice to look at Great progress so far, post pics when your cephalopod arrives!

 

[DWhatley]

Darth, the tank has been set up for almost a year now and has housed two octos into senescence. Not much has changed except I lost the sponge. This tank currently houses two briareus hatchlings (now a month old) in the main tank and one in the sump.

I keep my tanks pretty simple and most are species tanks with octopuses being the primary residence in 4 of the 8. Two are small mantis tanks, one is an anemone clown tank and the other (our largest) a forlorned generic that may one day consider cuttlefish.

 

[Darth Kraken]

Oh, ok......I didn't know you already had your cephalopod occupants.

 

[SolidNaza]

why do you have a smaller tank under the main one?

 

[CaptFish]

why do you have a smaller tank under the main one?

That is called a "sump" that is where the filters, skimmer, and heater go.

 

[DWhatley]

Sumps provide a way to add water volume to any tank. In the case of an octopus housing, it also makes octo-proofing, areation and cooling a lot easier. The water from the main tank is drained by gravity through a bulkhead and tubing on the right side of the tank to the sump (the location varies from tank to tank). I have a filter sock with charcoal under the flow to the lower tank for filtration in addition to the skimmer and heater (for winter only). A return pump sends the filtered and skimmed water back to the main tank. The return system includes a SCWD and is set up to alternate the flow between both a long and short path, adding to my water flow in the tank.