SixtyFeetUnder

Very cool. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Making it out to see your stuff in person is on the list of places I need to spend my next disposable income... Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Talk about a cool bonus for the day!

Great picture!

Will plan on it. Seems like most of the reefers are out in VA so like meeting people local!

Being in Gaithersburg close to home I'll have to come check it out once it is in full swing.

Maybe I will stop feeding them for a bit. My banded coral does target them afterward if I don't guard them with a turkey baster

Do you have a link you would recommend for your DIY reactor? Feedback much appreciated.

I have a couple headed Duncan frag that has been seemingly doing great and feeding well. All parameters good and other corals showing no signs of stress. Then over the past week the Duncan has seemed to be mostly closed, most of the time. Do they by chance close up somewhat before the heads split? Any other suggestions?

Thanks Bruce!

I run a fairly small system (100g) and have always done manual supplementation. Of course it can be tedious but if it goes wrong I only have myself to blame. After all, going "Office Space" on a machine isn't going to bring your coral back. It's also a space issue for me now. But I'm planning a move up to a larger system when my wife and I move and realize the more i can automate the better (more stability) when my system grows 2 or 3 times in size. Maybe it would even make sense to add a dosing pump sooner rather than later. The question is what is benchmark best practice for using reactors and what is best done through dosing pumps? Magnesium for example i've seen people do both ways. Just wanted to get some thoughts on this; i'm not sure if technology is changing/improving or research has made innovations of late. I seem to hear more about dosing pumps and less about reactors. If anyone can help me see the smoke it would be appreciated.

Thank you for the links; helpful information sharing as always.

I've been in the hobby a little while and of late have been thinking about how long we run our lights vs a natural photocycle. Generally speaking I seem to see most people list running their full sprectum w whites for 8 hours and actinics for an hour on both ends. So essentially a 10 hour day of sunlight w peak of 8 and 14 off/moonlights. To me this jumps out as a mimic of the human 8-10 hours workday which seems odd. I have always run my lights on a similar program as it keeps algae to a minimum and seems "standard". But if I think about summer here we generally have 14 hours of light, in the winter quite a bit less. How does this compare to the tropical reef climates? Is there less fluctuation in those climates? Should we be altering on on/off times along with the seasons? And would it behoove me/us to run our lights on a longer schedule than seems standard (12-14 hours per day) or have our aquacultured corals adapted like poison arrow frogs loosing their toxicity after generations of captive breeding? Love to hear the thoughts and opinions of a lot of much more educated minds on the subject at hand, thanks!

Does anyone have a link to a good set of plans for turning a standard tank to a reef ready tank? Not sure how difficult setting up the plumbing/drilling is and if it really is advised to save money when thinking about a larger (200+) setup. Any thoughts and points in the right direction are appreciated.

I'm not sure if this is associated with the same set of issues discussed in a below thread but I have some concerns and wanted to see if anyone else dealt with these. Upon my sump filling I would assume the ASOV would actually shut off the waste water running to the drain. Instead the unit makes a muffled, grumbling noise and vibrate sending a bass sound through the wall it is attached to (note this can be heard from two rooms away). In addition waste water still runs down the drain when it should shut off. I was told that trapped air could create some sound for the first few days but it has now been running about a month without improvement. The vibration and noise is concerning enough that i shut off the saddle valve last night to sleep without worry. I've ordered a pressure gauge to put near the inisaddle valve from the line out to see if my lines are highly pressurized causing the problem but tend to think this might be a busted ASOV. Any similar experiences or guidance here? thanks!

I was thinking about having NAGA design a tank for me and i'm brain storming about a possible cube set up with overflows. Another individual i know is looking to potentially get some custom work done for his restaurant. I know he has done work for a number of people on here and i've heard nothing but glowing reviews. If anyone would be kind enough to post some photos of tanks/sumps he's done we would greatly appreciate it!

Wow, i just realized the shipping cost would be 175 for me from marine depot. That's crazy. After a leaking sump cause me a lot of headache, money, and a flooring, i've been thinking about downsizing from my 75. this looked like an interesting design and idea but i can't see myself spending that much unless i can see the system in advance and plan out how i would do my skimmer, fuge, etc. within a budget. I wish i even knew where one was set up at a local store or members house to view and sketch ideas in my head. In any case i appreciate the thoughts and welcome any more insight.

I've read a bit about this tank and think it looks like it may make an interesting nano for viewing but wanted to see if anyone owns or has seen one locally to get opinions. If so what skimmer was used, is the flow actually decent with the system, etc. Any thoughts appreciated. http://www.marinedepot.com/Deep_Sea_Aquatics_34_Gallon_NEO_Aquarium_Glass_Sump_Black_Cabinet_Stand_Saltwater_Aquariums_Complete_Kits_(Heavy)-Deep_Sea_Aquatics-UD001781-FIAQCKCH-vi.html

http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2002-02/hcj/feature/index.php

I've never used kalk but considered either calc or a calcium reactor recently. I've got a 75 with a lot of LPS and a Deresa clam that love to drain the calcium and Alkalinity levels. Does anyone have advice or a good thread i can read on Kalc and/or calcium reactors and their pros/cons? Currently calcium is a daily event (and may be twice daily soon at the rate the clam is growing) and KH buffer needs to be added twice per week. Any thoughts are appreciated.

Botryocladia can be beautiful - when contained. But in smaller tanks or under certain conditions it can spread like a wildfire. Controlling nutrient content and not overfeeding is the first step, efficient protein skimming to remove the spores is step two. Not sure of the tank size but certain Zebrasoma tangs are effective; I've had good luck with my yellow tang. A good one two combo of herbivores is a yellow tang and mexican turbo snails - the snails help clean up the left overs after tang has done it's damage to sea grapes. If thye really get out of hand you may need to remove manually. See this article for detailed ifo on the do's and dont's of manual removal. Good luck!

Recently (within the past week) i noticed two monitpora corals in my tank that have been acclimated and growing well begn to bleach. Within the past two days a few small pocillapora and Acros began to bleach as well and polyps hid. I've checked the tank params - everything seems rather on par - 75 gallon tank -alkalinity - 4.2 (may be a bit high?) -Calcium - 420 -Nitrate - 0 -temp - 74 - 76 night and day -SG- 1.024 -Lighting - 2 * 250 10K, 4 * 96 actinic. All the corals have loved the light to this point. I think my problem may be one of two things, or a combo of both. I used a cycle of "Chemi Clean" cyanobacteria remover which threw my protein skimmer way out of cycle. It is creating massive amounts of microbubbles so i haven't been able to run it properly. I am doing a third partial water change today (in the last week) to try to remove excess chemicals so i can get my skimmer running normally (not overflowing the colleciton cup constantly). There is also one leather coral in the tank. could the lack of chemical filatration for the past two weeks, or that in conjunction with the leather emitting toxins be killing these previosuly helathy corals? Any advice? thanks, bill

Do you plan to sell some of the frags in the future? If so what is your planned time frame like?