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Jack, came in this morning and the basslet was out. Fourth time I've seen him in over two months. I keep thinking he's got to be dead for sure. My room is very quiet. We are a small program with small class sizes (for a multitude of reasons). And even when the students are in here they are quiet and stationary. I was able to swing by Isaac's place this weekend @YHSublime, and through his unbelievable generosity we have some more fragging to do. Won't be until after Thanksgiving break and we do jump into SOL season here in VA (yay standardized testing!), but we'll find time to get together at least once if not twice before winter break. I'll make sure to update with a complete account of what we are doing and what Isaac supplied us with. Thanks again, Isaac! And if Tiny (and Sandwiches) ever need a babysitter, I'm your guy.

Gatortailale, things are great. My tank is (I think) 54 years old and all is well. I eliminated a bunch of invasive, encrusting, photosynthetic sponge. Just had a back operation and need another minor one. I published another book, not about fish that is on Amazon. It's about my time in the army and Vietnam. My birthday is coming up Christmas day, and almost all is well.;

Thanks again to our great local vendor sponsors that helped make the party awesome! Few more video posts from Facebook: BRK: https://www.facebook.com/share/r/1BE7PpkVKo/ Coral Candy: https://www.facebook.com/share/r/14JLb35bKo/ BRK: https://www.facebook.com/share/r/1DBTKpJWTu/

Thanks to all the members and their family who came out to the Anniversary/Holiday party. Over 125 vendor provided coral frags, and another 100 or more member provided frags were gifted out to attendees. Everyone went home with several nice coral frags. In addition the potluck food everyone brought was fantastic. Thank you to all who brought a dish to share. Finally, thank you members, and a special thanks to the vendors, who helped make event awesome by providing coral frags: Blue Ribbon Koi & Marine Coral Candy Aquaculture Reef eScape and Top Shelf Aquatics & WAMAS members Few pics of attendees, food spread, vendor & member frags, & door prizes.

Glad it worked

Well, when I'm hot, I'm hot. And when I'm cold, I'm cold. I've been putting a ton of energy the past few weeks into getting the tank cleared up now that I've got my numbers rock solid. The biggest feat was getting the larger frag rack out, along with selling a few colonies of things that I adored, but simply didn't have the space for. The few fishes I have are enjoying the extra space, and it looks like the glass bottom is seeing a diatom bloom with the shuffling/removing of many a long sitting rock. There are also parts of the glass bottom that are getting light for maybe the first time since this tank has been up and running. Something that I rarely talk about that I'm very proud of, is aquascaping for 4 views in a peninsula. The front, the back, the point, and the top. I normally post photos from the end (tip) because that's where my office chair is, but there is a couch along the "back" and the room is framed when you walk in by the "front." Every viewing angle is intentionally curated, and there is something different to see from every side. I took these photos when my lights had only been on for about an hour, and I had done quite a bit of rearranging, so everything isn't at it's peak splendor and open wide, but it still looks pretty darn good if you ask me. I also didn't want to swap lenses, so these sub par shots will have to do! I'm least proud of this one (view from the couch) but it gives a rough idea of what's happening on the side I rarely show because of such a shallow depth of field.

Looks awesome, Issac!

thanks, Jeremy! already cleaned out from my first round, there will be more!

I pulled the skimmer top off of the fw hob filter and the little goby took his chances in the current. Poor thing. The filter impeller then went to work on him Ouch! So we just have the two female sexy shrimp. Going to add a male and call it a day. Shrimp were sourced from Christina's Coral Cabin. We've added quite a bit of stuff in the interim. Sourced some Sunkist bounce, a superman disco, Godzilla bounce, a nice orange ric...I'm forgetting something. I also picked up a nice new tank from Isaac, @YHSublime, for my son's beta. Going to try my hand at a simple fw planted take and then turn his little 2g tank into fw shrimp tank. That's the plan.

Welcome, Paige.

Welcome Paige. If you are available to attend the holiday part on the 14th in Fairfax, the club is giving out some free coral frags including some Zoas frags among other corals.

Welcome! Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Hello Paige, welcome to the club

Welcome!

So yesterday we took the Lady and her sister around because they have never been on Long Island and she wanted to see the "Famous" Hamptons. WE took them to a winery were we are members. There was a party going on so the place was crowded. As we walked in, most of the people recognized us from the TV appearance and all came over thanking me for my service and telling us what a nice story it is. I didn't know any of these people. Then a few minutes later, a guy came to our table and gave me a $30.00 bottle of wine saying his Dad was a Vietnam Vet. Then I took them to a farm stand here because she likes horseradish and they grow and produce it there. The woman who owns it saw us get out of the car and ran out to hug me. Long Island is about 150 miles long, there are about 7 million people and we only have one local news station so most people here see it and it loops about every 15 minutes for like 2 days. This morning everyone I ever knew in my life is calling to ask me if I knew I was on TV. It was a lot of fun. The reporter and camera Lady took a lot of video of my fish and steam punk stuff and all the innovations I built in my man cave. She said there is to much going on here and they may have to come back and do another story. This is Kathleen who wrote me the Christmas card in Nam in 1970. And in the winery

Yesterday My Nam Buddy and me placed flags on the graves of Patriots in Calverton National Cemetery.

This month my tank made it (barely) to 52 years old. A couple of weeks ago I removed everything from my tank except the gravel for a good cleaning of this invasive sponge that was covering everything. I also changed 100% of the NSW and used ASW just because my source of NSW is loaded with silicates and fueling the sponge. Eventually, if the sponge is 100% gone I will change back to NSW which I will first remove the silicates. It was a huge job. My tank after the thorough cleaning is coming along nicely. The rocks that were to covered in sponge I had to bleach and now they are covered in short hair algae which is normal. Many of them still have pieces of dead sponge on them that are really covered in algae as I assume it is a good fertilizer. There is a growth of algae growing on the back glass which I want and I didn't scrape it to clean when I removed the rock. The corals are starting to open up fully and the fish seem happy and many of them are spawning. I even think my hectors gobies are spawning. I have 4 of them and may get a couple more today. They are like eight bucks and very colorful so whats not to like. They are very small so don't hardly have any carbon footprint and you don't even have to feed them because they are pickers on algae and mulm. Since I gave away my big Koran angelfish I have more room to add quite a few small, interesting creatures which I prefer. Even this guy has found a home near the front of the tank so I can enjoy him I have 3 filefish so I am not sure if I can put in crabs and shrimp. I did add 4 small hermit crabs but haven't seen them so they may have been on their menu. I would like to try more coral not that I don't have all those sponge toxins so if I see something nice today, I will pick it up as I am going to a lfs. This was last week after I put all the stuff back. Much of the rock I had to wire brush and keep outside in the cold and dark for a week to eliminate the sponge.