Nothing much's happening in the tank right now, except that on Thurs night, we discovered that the Caulerpa algae has sprouted vegetative structures and became all mottled - the start of sexual reproduction. Yanked the whole chunk out. Caulerpa going sexual in a reef tank is one of the stickiest problems speaking against its use as a nutrient export. This time, the event was triggered when I left the refugium light off for almost 24 hours. Think it got stressed out.

Also, there's been a positive BLOOM of micro-organisms in the refugium! HUNDREDS of tiny mysid shrimp swimming around, and I have no idea how they managed to evade the protein skimmer. I even found 5-6 of them swimming in the fluidised reactor, which means that they must have somehow survived the return pump's impeller blades. Extrapolate this a little, and I guess they actually do find their way to the display tank, providing at least some food for the fish, especially the picky mandarin fish. Also found more newly-hatched abalones in the refugium.

Dendrophyllia's growing steadily, and one of them has sprouted 4 new polyps. Shall see if I can upload pics later. Something in the tank's eating my zoanthids!! Arghhh I really REALLY hate this.