Marc Weaver

Clownfish are goofy. He must be all jacked up on Mountain Dew.

I bought these and am very happy, and they're cheap. http://www.ebay.com/itm/100-CURED-REEF-LARGE-FRAG-PLUGS-LIVE-CORAL-PROPAGATION-/180555770908?pt=Coral_and_Live_Rock&hash=item2a09f66c1c

I used it for about a year. I have since dosed vodka and vinegar as well, and have honestly not seen an appreciable difference between the three. I have never used GFO, but always ran oversized skimmers. It most certainly can be overdosed and nutrient levels can go too low. I did it twice while following the numbers instead of observing and reacting to changes in the coral. It's just a learning curve that you have to get used to in your tank. Once nitrates get too low, phosphates will start to rise again. When you back off the dose, eventually phosphates will begin to plateau then lower again as nitrates slightly rise. The same exact things happened to me with vodka and with vinegar. Don't be afraid to try it, as it does work. I remember when I started it I followed the dosing directions verbatim and had nitrates of 44+ (the max of the test kit I was using) and NOPOX lowered them to under 1 within 6 weeks.

Nice job.

Awesome tank progress and beautiful coral coloration. Nice job.

Try using a tee fitting instead of the elbow and leave the top of the tee open but with an extension pipe so the height is above the water level in your skimmer, then extend your outlet pipe back underwater and try that.

Eggcrate is meant to keep the rocks from slipping on the tank's smooth bottom, not to distribute the weight. For that to work, you really have to use one piece, or at least several larger pieces. The glass can take the weight. If you were to put eggcrate under the rocks only where they contact the tank bottom, I think they would slide around worse than without it in a bare bottom tank. Plus, it will look like crap and collect detritus like crazy.

I have a spongodes and a red I'll give you a piece of - in Boonsboro. Also some pink pocillopora. I have about 50 mini-colonies from a spawning incident.

They're very forgiving coral. You have to really screw up badly to kill one. Go for it!!!

Every one I have ever had that size has done that. I think they get too big for their own good. Once the slightest thing happens, RTN follows quickly. Frag some while you still can. They are fast growers.

It is no longer being made. It was replaced with Sentinel, available from your vet by prescription only. Sentinel adds a flea killing agent, and some say it works fine, others say it does not work. You'll have to research it and decide for yourself. I've not tried it.

Looks great!!

I think you made a wise choice. I would worry that when the outlet is live, water would drip from the RO tubing if put into the same wall plate. Also, the connections at the back of the outlet would have to be enclosed and protected somehow Any other place would require a big hole.

Oh I see. I thought that may have been your kitchen because of the crock pot and you (or your fiancee more than likely ) would not like the cord to be visible at all times. The suggestion I had would just look like 2 outlets and the power strip would only be live when you wanted it to and no one would know any different. If you are still interested, I'll draw it for you. Otherwise, as long as you splice them back together correctly and insulate properly, there should be no problems. Just use wire nuts, then electrical tape around each individual nut, then electrical tape the whole thing. Or use heat-shrink tubing if it makes you feel better. Make sure the splice is not at the bottom of the "loop" of hanging wire in case the cord gets some water spray. The water will be less likely to penetrate the tape.

Thanks man. I have been following your build thread on RC and love your videos. The fish room looks about the same. I just added a countertop and reorganized it, but the tank area / sump looks the same. I'm going to build an electronics cabinet to hold all of the controllers and DJ switches because I accidentally sprayed water on my dosing pump and ruined it. The water also hit a GFCI receptacle and the power did shut off but the receptacle was smoking and I'm afraid next time it might start a fire.

Thanks. They do fine with little to no maintenance. I just spray the salt off of them with RODI water in a spray bottle every few days and that's about it. They seem to be tough. There is aiptasia, cyano, and algae growing all over their roots and they still grow. I have to get some flow in that little tank. Flow is virtually nonexistent and it accumulates junk quickly.

Looking great!! Love the exquisite wrasse. Idea on the outlet situation: You could wire the surge protector from in the closet to a blank outlet and mount it in the wall near your RO/DI passthrough (or even in the same wall plate.) Then, get a cheap extension cord, cut it, and attach a male plug end to the cut end, so you have 2 male plugs. When you need power to the power strip, connect the two outlets together with the cord. When you don't, stash it in the closet. That's assuming I understood your situation correctly. Hopefully the counter outlets are GFCI protected already (they should be) because of those water lines being so close.

Thanks everyone for the compliments!! That clownfish followed the female around which chose the duncans and never looked twice at the nem. She jumped a few weeks back so the male is alone now until I find another one. My wife likes to choose the fish for the tank and she has yet to find one she likes. Most of the neat ones we found were not for sale or sold in pairs only and I don't want any aggression. Hopefully the new one will pick the nem. I'll remove the duncans to coax them.

Just messing with the camera getting some updated photos..... I included a pic of the mangroves from 2 months ago, they are considerably bigger now.

I do, as I am on well water and have only 40 or 50 PSI in the house. Booster pump kicked it up to 80 and it makes water twice as fast (I change 80 gallons a week so I need as much as I can get.)

As far as I know (I have ran all three in the past, but not together) flow requirements from most to least are: Biopellets -> GFO -> Carbon. If it were me, I would definitely run the biopellets separately and output them near the skimmer input. The bacterial mulm may clog GFO and/or carbon. I never tried it, though, so I may be wrong. When I used a GFO reactor, I did output that through a carbon reactor and all seemed fine. I did not use a ball valve between the reactors, only before the GFO reactor. The decrease in flow to the carbon was perfect, because carbon should not be tumbled very much. It takes more flow to fluidize GFO than carbon. Now I don't use GFO and just use a zippered-mesh bag of carbon in the sump near the filter socks it seems fine. You build a manifold and run each independently as well.

My copperband tears them up!! I have aiptasia in my frag tank (plumbed to the main system) and all I have to do is put the frag in the main tank for a few minutes and any aiptasia on the plugs are gone. The copperband actually lurks waiting for my hand to move and immediately comes over to inspect the frags. Mine also ate all of the feather dusters in the tank. Hold out for a little while and it should come around. Destroy all of the large ones and the copperband should eat the smaller ones in time. I bought mine as a baby from Adam when Mr. Coral changed owners and now it is 4" long. I also had one before that ate aiptasia but I made the mistake of feeding it littleneck clams, which it loved. So, naturally, when I added a clam it constantly nipped at it. I sold that one to Cris on WAMAS a few years back. That one would eat right from my fingers. One thing I did is to only buy one that was eating frozen foods in the store. I passed over several that did not. I didn't want to watch a fish die from starvation. That drastically improved my odds. The only problem they had was lympho, which went away.

I wonder if the stress of being moved causes a coral to release slime or waste that makes the test results high?? I sometimes do the same and have always had high phos and nitrate readings in the bag water.

Might be some kind of sponge or something. I have all kinds of weird blob-like stuff like that in mine too, mostly on the underside of rocks where there is not too much light.

Yes, if you are talking about the 1/4" hose, Lowe's sells compression fittings for those. RO/DI systems use the same tubing as icemaker water lines for refrigerators, so hardware stores sell the fittings.