L8 2 RISE

Dave is correct. Absolutely a peppermint, never had issues with any of the species eating fish, but they can be monsters to corals that are eating and if the gobies were VERY small, I wouldn't be surprised.

I agree that itm's probably not a time saver. What would be, and where I thought you were going, would be to find a way to rig up a dry area for lights in the dishwasher, or use some of the new waterproof LED strips that are coming out, and leave all the algae trays in the dishwasher permanently. Drill two holes and run pipes through the wall into the trays. Test it to see how often and for how long you have to run to get the algae off, then program or put it on a timer to do that. You would only have to open the door to check on it every once in a while and no mess. Obviously that's ideal, not sure how feasible it would be, but it would be pretty cool!

Won't be a big deal if it rusts. Most people keep razor blades in their tanks on mag floats with no side effects. I agree with seth on using a magnet to try to find it though.

I was in the same situation almost 5 years ago although you're lucky because my parents didn't express interest in keeping a tank going. It was more from coercion on my part When I first went off to college, I broke down my 160 and put a few of my favorite frags/fish into an 11.4 gallon that would be easy for my mom to take care of. The thread for that is here: http://wamas.org/forums/topic/43617-sams-rimless-114-gallon-led-nano/. My mom ended up kind of liking the reef and so we upgraded to a 57 gallon seen here: http://wamas.org/forums/topic/57917-sam-and-his-moms-57g-rimless/. I put A LOT of work and thought into this build in order for it to be easy to maintain. Biggest thing MAKE WATER CHANGES EASY. You can read about how I did that in my build, but basically my mom just has to roll out a hose and flip a switch. Other suggestions: - Ditch the testing (aside from salinity). When I tried to have my mom do this it almost pushed her over the edge because there was "too much going on". It really isn't necessary and my mom has successfully kept two mostly sps reefs without it. - Ditch the reactors and dosing, it's not necessary (see above). Have Chemipure or ClearFX Pro on hand and teach them how to put it in for emergencies. - Get a DJ Board and label it so that turning things on and off is very easy. - Make friends with aquarists who live near to you before you head off to school. Have their number on hand in case your parents need help or something major goes wrong. - Spend a lot of time and thought designing your system so that nothing major will go wrong. I follow the method of spending a lot of time, thought, and effort up front on my systems so that they are very simple and easy to maintain later. - Have your parents send you pictures of the tank every once in a while. You will likely be able to see how everything is doing better than they will. Good luck! Read through my threads and others to see if they give you any ideas.

Lots of great advice in the thread already. Where did you get the fish from?

Also just got a new addition through qt from Reef eScape! I've been trying to get one of these in the tank for years and it's our last major fish addition! We're very worried about the white tail beating up on it, so it's going to stay in the box for about a week so they can get to know each other. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

It's just the efflo on the overflow. It was grown on a magnetic frag plug by the wamas member I bought it from, so I used an old mag float to hold it to the overflow while I decided where I wanted it to go. I decided I liked it a lot there so just left it and it's since encrusted onto the back!

So right before I came back down here to Tech I "trimmed" the right side of the tank. Actually I ripped out all the coral because I hated how it grew and that it was all the same color. Stuck in a bunch of frags of corals I like and here's how it looks now. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Filled the tank up Friday! I went gradually through the day, filling chamber by chamber. So far so good, no leaks! I'll give it another 24-48 hours in the basement before I bring it up and set it up. Thanks everyone for the advice! Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

You could try to use an air pump/pipe. Basically run air bubbles up a pipe which causes it to draw water. Never tried it myself, no idea how it would work, just throwing out ideas

lol, takin an off week for the sake of the fish to come! Half way through the wait! Getting excited to test this out!

Thanks for all the advice again everyone! Scraping all the old silicone took a solid 2 hours but the razor blades and especially sand paper were a great idea! Siliconed on the new glass last night. I really cached a bunch on there and it was much easier than expected. Since I didnt paint the glass yet, I could see into the back and work the silicone into where I needed it. Put a bunch of 2.5 lb weights on it so now I just have to wait a week. Fingers crossed please! Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Heading out to get supplies now! Will absolutely be testing it over a floor drain for at least a week. Thanks for the advice everyone, will keep this thread updated!

Great idea on the sand paper! And yes, it was a horrible horrible feeling! I will definitely get all of the old silicon off the glass, but what I'm worried about is the bottom left and bottom right corners. There is already a silicon seem there that wont be removed unless I break down the entire tank. Should I just cake silicon into those corners?

That's a good idea, was also thinking maybe I could smoosh in from the outside? I'll see how it goes. Also, does silicon bond to silicon ok? thinking about the already existing seams that already have dried silicon in them...

Doh! Was carrying my new IM 30 long and smashed the back on the corner of a dresser. The result is in the pic below. The back was completely shattered but it has a black plastic covering that held most of it together. I've decided I'm going to try to salvage the tank given that it is the back pane of glass, so the most supported and the least necessary to be clean. I found a glass store to make me a piece of 1/4 inch glass for only $14 and picked up this silicon: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00EZB2MDI?psc=1&redirect=true&ref_=oh_aui_detailpage_o00_s00 (figured I'd spend the money and go with something I know is good). So hopefully this will turn out to only be a $30 mistake. Tonight I scraped off the rest of the glass and ended up with this: Tomorrow I will pick up the glass and use some rubbing alcohol and new razor blades to get as much of the old silicon as possible. My plan is to spread silicon along the edges of the tank and the baffles shown in the pic above, then hopefully have a couple friends lower the glass straight onto the silicon. I wont be able to reach my hands into the back to smooth out the silicon so we will have to make sure it goes straight down. A few questions: 1) Does anyone have any tricks to get the old silicon off the glass? I don't feel that I will be able to get 100% of it with the blades. I have an adhesive remover meant more for walls, but would that work? 2) Does my plan for lowering the glass onto the silicon on the tank sound ok? Any suggestions? Please share any advice or experiences!

Harlequin wont eat brittle stars typically and they are fine with other shrimp

Thanks all! Yes, elegance on the right. Doesnt really fit in my tank anymore but I would hate to sell it. Not sure what to do. The green reef eacape birdsnest on the left was sold because I already had the large one on the right. The ponape birdsnest is now much bigger and on the right where the anemone was. Most of it is behind the rock though

Quick growth/picture update! Top picture is from January of this year, bottom is from today, both quick cell pics but the growth has been awesome! No dosing, no testing, just water changes every 3-4 weeks. I'm blown away that it's doing so well (though my monti caps haven't fared the best, penning it down to likely alkalinity issues, but I don't test so don't know!).

Really cool!

Losing spines is not a good sign. From the description you gave, the only thing I can think of is there may not be enough food in that size tank. Maybe try nori It could just be something you cant control though

Not normal in my experience unless they broke off... Do you have other inverts in the tank? More details about the tank/water chemistry? How big is the tank?

Cool! Good to hear, that's why I asked.

Cool tank! Do you notice any aggression between the flames? Can't really tell from the pics but looks like they're both males?

They absolutely dont handle fragging well/dont look good with fragging unless you have a huge one with multiple separate heads, but that's inherent with this type of coral. I have had one for 2-3 years now and it has probably increased in size six fold. The ones from australia do well. The indonesian ones dont. Get it from a good source and be confident it's australian and you'll be good. You can check out my build thread or TOTM page for pictures, but they do take up a lot of room so that's something to think about