Matt LeBaron

Welcome to the club. Are you down in Virginia or up in Maryland? Always on the lookout for more MD WAMAS members.

That is a stunning tank, I love it.

So it appears *knock on wood* that things may be back to normal. I took the skimmer apart last night cleaned it out and put it back together. I didn't notice any blockages or other issues, it's only been running for about 5 months or so but this morning when I checked the foam level was very low around where I might expect it to be with the gate opened all the way. I don't know if the cleaning did something or whatever may have gotten into the water finally go diluted enough that things are beginning to go back to normal. I'll slowly start closing the gate later tonight and get it back to a more normal running level and watch it carefully over the holidays. The tank doesn't get exposed to any cleaning chemicals, the tank is built into the wall and I keep my workshop/fish tank room closed off. The only thing I can think of at this point is that my tank reacts badly to the 2 part epoxy or there was some small blockage in the air intake that I just didn't see when cleaning it. I guess the next time I use two part I'll have to watch the tank carefully but a reaction that lasts almost two weeks and continues through a 25% water change is far more of a reaction to epoxy than I've heard of before. Problems that mysteriously fix themselves make me nervous because I don't know what I can do to avoid them in the future. Another big thanks to the Avast folks, your skimate locker saved my tank. This was an annoyance rather than the mass SPS death that I had this summer.

This skimmer is a recirculating one so the height of the water doesn't affect it.(Should have mentioned that earlier) Maybe flooddc is correct and there's some partial blockage in the air intake, I don't know but I'll try and find time to disassemble it tonight or tomorrow.

It's been almost two weeks, 11 days now so I don't think it's still the two part, or if it is there is something about my tank that makes the affect worse. Not sure if I'll have time to take the skimmer apart and clean it today but I'll try that tomorrow for lack of any better ideas at this point.

So the problem I am having is that my skimmer is overflowing. There are bubbles up to the top of the collection cup and it's producing a bunch of basically clear skimmate. (Filled a 5 gallon bucket in less than a day when it first started.) The skimmer is a Avast CS1 and has worked like a champ since I got it this summer. I have the gate all the way open, I can make a water fall easily by closing it. This is the same issue that caused a partial crash over the summer that prompted me to get the new CS1 and a skimmate locker. (which saved my tank this time, thanks Avast!) My old skimmer was really a crappy cheap one so I just replaced it when this problem happened before not thinking much on it beyond learning the lesson to buy quality equipment yet again.) My parameters have not changed since this started happening, the only thing that I can think of that is different in the slightest is that I used a fair bit of the two part putty a couple days before this started, which I know they warn can cause skimmer over production but I'm going on two weeks with this problem now so I can't imagine it causes an issue for that long. I did a 20-25% water change on Saturday and replaced the GFO and Carbon in my reactor since I was trying to resolve this issue and it was near the end of the month when I normally do that anyhow but the skimmer was still going in overdrive mode on Sunday. Anyone have any ideas or suggestions? Anyone experience something like this in the past? Luckily I have the skimmate locker so I'm not really in danger of crashing the tank but having to do what is amounting to a water change every day is getting old quickly and I'm not a fan of seeing what the long term effects will be on my tank of not having a working skimmer will be.

Those Aussie Acros are jaw dropping, really wish you had gotten them in after the Holidays. I'll be keeping an eye out in the future, if you get more in I don't think I'll be able to resist ordering.

Not sure what your cost limit may be but this is something you could do fairly easy with a controller. The process could be automated fairly easily with a Reef Angel system, two pumps, and their Reef Angel Multichannel Water level expansion. I'm envisioning something along the lines of once a day the controller suspends it's auto top off function (something else you'd need for a system like this) then pumps out the amount you would like to remove (this would need to be calibrated ahead of time) and then runs the pump in the new saltwater container for the same period of time or until it detects that the water level in the tank has reached the fill point that the auto top off monitors. Other controllers could likely be used but I have a Reef Angel so thinking more from the perspective of what I am familiar with.

Great thanks folks, put it in my DT last night. Bit sad that the other one was lost to dipping the corals now.

Bought two corals today, a Pipe Organ and an Orange/Peach colored maricultured acro. During acclimation and the dipping process two of these things came off. The one pictured below was during the acclimation process and I saved him in a little cup. He's very tiny, smaller than my pinky nail and in the picture it's a bit blurry but it's got little tentacles coming off it's back. Anyone able to ID this guy? If I know it's something harmless I'll just toss it in the tank, otherwise down the drain into the septic tank for it. Thanks,

This makes me nervous that LA/DD may go away entirely. What is Petcos incentive to keep a barely profitable portion of their business alive?

The response that Petco cares about animals the same way Foster and Smith do just makes me shake my head when I think about the sad state of the fish I see at every Petco I go to and the equipment they have to try and care for them. I just do not see a single upside for the consumer from this deal, especially for those of us that are focused on the aquatic side of things.

What kind of setup/feeding do you use the raise them? Couple of years ago I had a pair that were breeding every two weeks like clock work. I only managed to raise a very small handful to adulthood. I was using a 20G at the time to try and raise them but my largest issue was my mortality rate in the first 2-3 weeks. Any that I managed to get past a month generally lived but getting them there was a massive challenge. I often wonder if I was feeding enough as I there was a large portion of the day when my wife and I were at work that I was unable to feed. The male that was breeding unfortunately died in a freak rock fall incident after a few months of breeding and none of my others have shown true interest but I am fine with that since dealing with babies every two weeks began to get to be a bit much. Having said that though, it's a challenge and should my current seahorses start breeding again I think I'd give it another go.

The bacteria that the pellets grow and eventually falls off the pellets if you have proper movement of the pellets needs to be removed some how to truly be beneficial, you skimmer is how that happens so it helps if that bacteria finds it way directly into the skimmer.

I bought pellets twice over the two-ish years I've run pellets, the second type I bought were larger than the initial batch I bought but I don't remember the brands. My original pellets are mostly used up at this point but neither was small enough to make it through the mesh until they were mostly used up, I run my reactor right into my skimmer now.

What kind of pump are you using on your MR5? And did you put the plastic mesh in to catch the pellets? That mesh should have prevented any pellets from making it into the tank. I have a MR5 with bio-pellets running on my tank and have never had cloudy water or many of the pellets escape. (I have had a few sneak out after they were used up so much that they were about 1/4 their beginning size) I use a MJ900 on my MR5 with a bit of a modification in that I put a funnel open size up at the bottom of the reactor to encourage tumbling. The bio-pellet nozzle that I bought with it didn't really move the pellets much but with the funnel I get excellent movement.

Nice, it has really grown into an awesome colony.

I just replace my heaters yearly. I've had broken Jagers, Hydors, Marinelands, and Fluvals. Only brand of heater I've had that never broke (not once among the five I've had over the years) are Rena Smart Heaters, but they don't make them any longer. I still have a 7 year old smaller one that I use with my hospital tank when I have to set it up from time to time. I have a Colbalt heater that I may run for more than a year to see how it lasts but I'll be replacing my second heater like I do every year. Even now when I have a controller and a ground in my tank to help prevent the worst of disasters I still try and replace them yearly. They're the most likely piece of equipment to fail in my opinion and one that can do a fair bit of damage when it fail.

There's just something about seahorses that makes people like them, despite their "dumpiness". They just have a lot of personality but my wife and I both agree that they act like the stoners of the sea, they just hang out looking semi clueless eating all day. One day I'd like to setup a small tank for pygmy horses just so that I could have a bunch of them all in a single tank. I limit myself to 3-4 right now with the other fish I have so that I can keep my water parameters under control in my 90G.

Haha, I know. Came how with 13 frags and a box of salt. That place is as close to a willy wonka's candy factory as exists for reefers.

No issues at all and never with the connections coming undone. I don't know if they have changed them but the connectors that came with my kit are very snug, I've had to use needle nose pliers to pull them out on occasion when I had to move wiring. I can't imagine them just falling out. Very happy with the kit, best aquarium investment I've ever made honestly.

I'd recommend the Evergrows or a RapidLED DIY kit. I had the T5 fixture years ago and it was just expensive to replace the bulbs and the one time I forgot to replace them on time and was reminded when I began to have an algae outbreak. Was just a hassle all around, I got a RapidLED DIY kit and it was a built it and forget it situation, all I have to do is check the lenses on my UV lights every year or so to make sure they haven't started degrading but more than two years in and still no issue with that.

Cannot wait for this, going to be a long week until Saturday.

This is just crushingly disappointing to me. A truly terrible loss.

Welcome aboard, always glad to see more Marylanders.