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WAMAS Fall Meeting - John Coppolino, Building an SPS Monster - extended discussion with Q&A


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Saturday, October 17, 2015

Time: 1:00 P.M. - 5:30 P.M.
Where: North Bethesda Middle School
8935 Bradmoor Dr
Bethesda, MD 20817
 
Speaker: John "Copps" Coppolino
Topic: Building an SPS Monster - extended discussion with Q&A

 

Agenda

1:00 - 2:40 Sign-in / socialize
2:40 - 3:00 Club business / MACNA 2015 Report / Speaker Introduction
3:00 - 4:30 Speaker: John Coppolino

4:30 - 4:50 Break
4:50 - 5:30 Raffle!

Miscellaneous
- food & drinks provided

 

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"Building an SPS Monster - Extended Discussion with Q&A"

Home display aquariums over 1,000 gallons are a rare sight, with reef displays of that size being rarer still. Home SPS displays in this realm are almost unheard of. This presentation shows my journey building my "Forever Tank" in the "Forever Home" my wife and I recently built, using my 25+ years of experience in the hobby. This system includes a 1300 gallon SPS display, 240 gallon anemone/soft coral display and two six foot frag/off display tanks and totals nearly 2,000 gallons. Also built into my home are a large fish only display, many fish QT systems, a separate coral QT system, and a water makeup system that includes vats to store makeup water plumbed throughout the ground level of our home. Live vicariously through me, and perhaps learn some pointers you could use on any size system you might be designing.

 

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About John Coppolino

John’s innate passion for aquariums was nurtured growing up on an island on a lake in Northern New Jersey with a fish loving father and a mother allergic to everything with fur and feathers!
 
A saltwater hobbyist now over twenty five years since age 11, John began working at a large regional aquarium store as soon as he obtained working papers in high school, resulting in a house full of tanks before going off to college. In college he went on to study reefs in Bermuda, the Galapagos Islands and Ecuador where he lived (and met his wife!) for about two years after obtaining his B.S. in biology.
 
John now lives in Northern Virginia with his wonderfully supportive wife and two young children, and keeps about 2500 gallons of saltwater aquariums, most being reefs. In addition to publishing articles and speaking at conferences, including three past MACNAs, John has spoken to reef clubs in over twenty states. His systems have been featured in publications in Asia, Europe, and the United States. These include the book “The Coral Reef Aquarium” by Tony Vargas, which profiles two of his systems, including a 10 gallon “kitchen nano” from over ten years ago, and his SPS system he recently moved. John is also one of just two people to have received the prestigious Reef Central Tank of the Month for two different systems (September ’04 and January ’11), where he is known by his username and childhood nickname, Copps. In the summer of 2013 John started building his largest system yet, with a 1300 gallon SPS display, a 240 gallon anemone display and two six foot frag tanks that are installed in the “forever home” he and his wife recently had built. In addition to his reefkeeping at home, John travels yearly with work to Hawaii and Guam, where most free time is spent underwater.
 

Directions to North Bethesda Middle School:
- NOTE: The school is just inside the north edge of the beltway near Old Georgetown Road.

Here's a map from Mapquest

http://mapq.st/1gpNq92


Special thanks to theses sponsors. Please support them & say thanks next time you shop with them. You can find their website address by visiting their forum or the sponsor page on the WAMAS website.

 

WAMAS Gold Sponsors 

Air, Water & Ice
Avast Marine
Blue Ribbon Koi
Exotic Reef Creations
- Pimped Out Aquariums
Reef eScape

- SaltwaterAquarium.com

WAMAS Silver Sponsors
Artfully Acrylic & Incredible Corals
Charm City Corals
Cobalt Aquatics

Dr. Mac's Pacific East Aquaculture

- Eshopps
FishnReef.com
LRS Reef Frenzy
The Marine Scene
Premium Aquatics
Reed Mariculture (Reef Nutrition)
Quantum Reefs
Reed Mariculture

Supreme Reefs
* Save your receipts from our sponsors and get raffle prize tickets

 

Vendors on site:

Dr. Mac's Pacific East Aquaculture

 

 

WAMAS Members selling/trading (table display)
Copps

DaveS

Paul

Mr. Chalice

 

 

 
Raffle Items include:

Premium Aquatics Gift Certificates

Charm City Corals Gift Certificates

Two (!) All-in-One tanks from Artfully Acrylic

Sump from Pimped Out Aquariums

Food assortment from Reef Nutrition

Corals from Dr. Mac's Pacific East Aquaculture

AquaFuge sump and refugium with light from The Marine Scene

Corals from Supreme Reefs

Supreme Reefs Gift Certificates

Flake food, a heater, and a prop pump from Cobalt Aquatics

Frozen food from LRS Reef Frenzy

SaltwaterAquarium.com Gift Certificates

16 GB (black) iPad (lightly used from MACNA)

 

More coming! Stay tuned!

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  • 3 weeks later...

Sponsors and members that will be setting up a tank: If you'd like to set up a tank at the meeting for frag sales and have not yet already coordinated with me, please do so by sending me a PM. 

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Details of the All-in-One tanks being built and donated by Artfully Acrylic for this Saturday's raffle can be found here.

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Many thanks to Larry's Reef Services (maker of LRS Reef Frenzy foods) for these donations to tomorrow's meeting!
 
Five 4-oz packages of LRS Reef Frenzy Nano
Three 8-oz packages of LRS Herbivore Frenzy

Three 8-oz packages of LRS Reef Frenzy

Three 8-oz packages of LRS Fish Frenzy
 
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I also have a few items left over from the MACNA raffle including: 

 

A bucket of reef crystals

2 V2O fine point coral feeders

Chemipure All in one filter media packs

 

 

And BRK (Blue Ribbon Koi) has donated a lot of different Thrive products! 

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From Cobalt Aquatics for the raffle!

Six 8-oz canisters of Cobalt Marine Omni flakes

One 150W Neo-Therm Heater

One Neo-Flow 10,000 adjustable flow DC prop pump


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Sent from my phone

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We have a lot of stuff in tomorrow's raffle. Thank our super-generous sponsors! See you tomorrow.

 

(From above)

  • Premium Aquatics Gift Certificates
  • Charm City Corals Gift Certificates
  • Two (!) All-in-One tanks from Artfully Acrylic
  • Sump from Pimped Out Aquariums
  • Food assortment from Reef Nutrition
  • Corals from Dr. Mac's Pacific East Aquaculture
  • AquaFuge sump and refugium with light from The Marine Scene
  • Corals from Supreme Reefs
  • Supreme Reefs Gift Certificates
  • Flake food, a heater, and a prop pump from Cobalt Aquatics
  • Frozen food from LRS Reef Frenzy
  • SaltwaterAquarium.com Gift Certificates
  • 16 GB (black) iPad (lightly used from MACNA)
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