Lee Stearns

I can bring chaeto, if I have any requests: Seantadez I can cut for anyone who might need: Pink tipped frog spawn, DJCERNA (David),grav Green tipped frog spawn green speckled mushrooms, DANDY Purple mushrooms, DANDY Orange Cap Large mounted green hairry mushrooms, RAF Capanella Green kenya tree- Stevil tricolor acro- Jager,Stevil,Carla, Chip Devils hand leather -unmounted-Jager Looking for: Grape calurpa- Can not grow enough to keep up with my tangs- Jager, grav,madmax Tang Heaven- DANDY Orange mushrooms-Carla Almost any ricordia except green A little blue tort- Lost my colony-Dhoch I prefer not to sell- if you do not have anything on my want list, do no worry. Regards,

Ok I will bite- WHat kind of system do you have that you need this for?

VERY VERY Nice! The Triggers have not rearranged the land scape and bothering corals?

looks to me like hydroids. have you been feeding any newly hatched brine shrimp- did you get any rock with your sea horses- Sea horse tanks are notorious for Hydriods. They are not a good thing unfortunately.

I too am particular about my livestock and BRK came through after a long wait with an Achilles Surgeon, a very sensitive fish. I looked at it a couple of weeks while he kept it on hold for me and fattened up to make sure it was not cyanide caught, and had no parasites. I now have it acclimated with My PBT and Blue hippo and they are finally not only tolerating each other, but doing great! Many thanks to John!

Good catch. I thought nitrates as well would be pulled out by purigen- Maybe just taking out the amonia and nitrites is what has caused the drop in nitrates when I check nitrate levels after a few of days use.

Chris your pics are always awesome! and your corals seem to always be thriving. Great job.

I have used purigen in the bag pouches several times- It is very easy and I have not had the misfortune to have one break open. I like it because it is rechargeable- when it darkens just put it in bleach for a few minutes , rinse and let air dry- and back into the sump- Primarily it absorbs nitrogen varients, Nitrates ect. My experience is that it can be recharged about 5-6 times before it seems to turn brown very quickly after putting back into the fuge. If you are testing and find a nitrate issue even with macro algea in the sump growing well then I would just drop a bag in the sump and check my levels in a couple of weeks.

Nice steve- I vote for teh two island look as well

Baking soda unless you have a large well established SPS heavy reef. 1 teaspoon in a cup of water raises 50 gallons about .5 meq/L Slow- do not raise till you can measure and do not raise more than .5 per day till you get to 3.0 or 3.5 meq/L

Have not seen anyplace locally carry them- but I would be in for some as well- Sea horses will not allow the smaller or medium of these to last. I treid raising some of them from an order in a seperate 5 gallon but did not have much success.

Tagging What TDS number do you use for the point at which you change resin, and or filters?

some of the best at sea footage I have seen thanks for linking

do your stir it often with power heads or turkey baster to try and suspend it in the water column?

occasionally toad stools like most leathers will - slough off a waxy type coating, they kind of do not extend polyps and just sit there, then you will see the milky surface material stuff comming off in a few days- Finger leathers and Devils hand do this quite often- Toad stools less often-

Very difficult the first try- take rotifer cultures and a seperate raising tank. Get Joyce Wilkersons book on Clownfish- A guide to thier captive care and breeding. Bad news is you probably do not have the time to get up on step for these- Do your research and set up all the special rotifer and aqua culture things you will need for this batch, good news is if you are very dedicated to the idea, then you can be ready when she puts out her next batch about two weeks or so after these disappear. Regards, Lee

Yep definitely the goby with the lead pipe in the library.

OK, back in town and hope to bring: I have a large toad stool long polyped-phisigs79 I have fire and ice one large 15 polyped- Howard- your name is on these, the original came from Rocko, Garret some also one head green with pink tipped frog spawn-Fishwish(Ellen) one green with green tipped frog spawn- limited blue zoos for trade-Valeria red and green Candy cane-Raf For Free or trade: I have orange Cap montipora- Green Cap montipora-ChrisS,Asaleem91 Capanella-Kimmers yellow colony-Kimmers Some neat speckle zoas that have some yellow colony mixed in- try your hand at getting the yellow colony out-they do not seem to hurt each other- I just like my yellow colony in a seperate corner to keep them under control.--ChrisS Bright green center green skirt zoas-Garret,raf pink centered brown skirt-Fishwish pink centered green skirt-smarsh97 Galaxia will be cut at the meeting bv the professionals- should be several if wanted-phisigs79,Valeria,ChrisS purple mushrooms and green mushrooms-miachaelG,gsedlak,Dandy7200 green speckled mushrooms-Smarsh97,ChrisS large hairy mushroom Brown Zoas- Filter freak Want: Green bali slimer (Acropora) to restart in my tank from my original- Rocko?I gave out a bunch of these but mine took the nose dive late in the summer. ricordias- loisettae - many, many, many available- OUSnakeBite(thanks) red macro- Flowerseller/Chip if you can make it, bring the filters and one of your purple digis. For general info -I generally do not sell my frags- If you want one of the for free or trade- I generall just do that - trade or give- The first ones I listed I will trade for something in my want column- I will bring the others in in bagies and if I have your name listed it will be on the bagie and yours. I do not have much real estate left for other stuff that is not on my want list.

Good color!!- I would be a bit concerned that your zoos are so high up in the tank- They usually do not like that brigt MH up close- I have the 10K MH and have all my zoathids on the sand and they seem to be doing great- That being said I have noted that of the 12 or so types of zoanthids I have some like more lighht and some like less- Some definitely need to be under teh shade of another coral from MH lights. While others show more growth out in the open sand bed with more light. Beside that upper real estate is prime sps territory now with you MHs Rocko- Bob had a tank with MH and lots of T5 s and he could not even get mushrooms, or zoas to grow unless they were under a ledge or shade. Keep us posted Regards, Lee

Dvae you are definitely doing a lot right with that hairy milli! All the shots are great, but that one jumped out and said what am I doing wrong with my millis! Great pics, Regards, Lee

I have a tiger pistol and yellow watchman that I added to my sea horse tank and it is absolutely amazing the sand moving and cleaning that has taken place in that 54 corner tank- Very neat and helpful combo!

If you actinic supplement I would go with the 10Ks If MH is your only lighting I would go with 14K- That is for most of our standard type tanks. Lots of variables -

yep I answered once a day as well- which is a general assumption because i chnge what and how much I feed each day- I feed heavy only once a week, But I add nori soaked in selcon nearly every day, occasionally add dts and golden pearls, and cyclopese. It is kind of only one time when I get home in the evening - but the dts and pearls usually go in after lights have been out a while on the heavy feeding day- Cyclopese is good for everything in the aquarium at almost anytime, just a matter of whether I want to truck up to the freezer to cut off and thaw a peice.

NeOne, To answer your original question - I am not sure why you would want PH at 8.3. I think you are running a calcium reactor now- right? If so, your system will run a bit lower in the 8.0 - 8.1 range which is fine with your good stable alkalinity levels and calcium levels. The more important thing that everyone was saying is that you need stability rather than huge swings in PH over a day or even several day period. There is a bit of natural swing daily of .1-.15 from the lighting photosynthesis cycle, which is why a lot of folks fun their fuges on an off-lighting cycle from thier tank - this keeps the PH a bit more stable over a 24 hour period. If your alkalinity were low, like Eves, I would recommend arm and hammer washing soda- raises both PH and Alkalinity at the same time- If all you need is alkalinity and PH is normal- then just baking soda. If PH is low and alk is normal then Kalk or pickling lime. But with a clcium reactor Alk becomes very stable-and all one needs do is drip kalk like you are for maintaining a bit more calcium and keep PH up. Your numbers are fine- so I would not mess with it. Stability and slow changes are more important than the exact correct numbers- And the numbers are always suspect first rather than water chemistry being suddenly off- Another note is that in my experience the Pinpoint PH monitor seems to drift one way or the other over time-month or so , quicker as they age. most of the time it drifts upward- So cleaning and recalibration is necessary. Also the probe finally will not hold a reading after about 18 months- some folks say 12 months. Even with this pain- the pinpoint is better than trying to read PH with a test kit. Again the large densly sps packed aquariums that we drift towards require much more stability than the fish and softie only aquariums. I have kept Nano cubes that have remained stable with correct stocking- for six months without having to adjust PH with kalk at all during that time.

I am like Jake I occasionally add golden pearls, and DTs, maybe once a week. At least three times a week cyclopese mainly for the fish and other critters- Need to feed when the lights are off for many corals. Coral coloration is for my two cents 60 % water quality, 35% lighting and only about 5% food. Take care of the first two and your colors will come around slowly to be more vivid.