Omair

WOOOT! He found his PVC tunnel home!

Yeah. I need to find some rubble rock from a local place. Anyone have some they can sell? Or any advice on how to properly aquascape for a mantis? He's still a small guy, don't think he can do much damage. But if theres anything I've learned over the years - always respect mother nature. She can really surprise you.

20 Gallon Long with Custom Overflow Indonesian Tonga Rock with Carib Sea SeaFlor Special Grade Substrate - Need to get some frag rock for the Mantis to play with. Filteration: Avast Reactor (SeaChem Carbon/Phosguard), Avast Kraken (Bio Pellets), Avast CS-2 Captains Reserve Skimmer There he is! Wish he would go into the PVC tunnels I made ... My wife was highly upset at me due to this snail. Apparently it's vulgar and I should be concerned about the innocense of our 3 year old daughter. Frankly, my daughter is a little evil as it is; takes after her mother. I didn't mention that of course. She made a few more lewd annotations about this Snail and that I should get rid of it - she has a dirty mind. I smirked and informed her that this nice, plump, snail would be cracked open sooner or later. Once I explained just exactly what my new, percocious, mantis does for a living - she gasped and lectured me about the evils of torture. As she babbled on, I sat there and thought to myself - will I ever understand women? Honestly.

Got it setup last night. Went to bed at 3AM. UGH. Pics coming soon!

Particle board. Not good. You can see the bowing with just that small tank. Can you run two beams of 2x4 and screw them into the top board from the inside?

I had a midas in my last tank, peaceful as can be. Really surprising how some fish can have such different personality quirks. Now the Starry Blenny (Lawn Mower Blenny) was real pain! Absolutely territorial. He would "push" hermits off his rock!

Do you mean the coral? Or the mantis? PM sent.

I was worried about the same thing but Decadence assured me that the mantis will try to dig downward. Easily fixed; head to home depot or lowes and pickup a cut sheet of acrylic and seal it to the bottom of the tank with silicone.

Over the past few days I have been doing extensive research into NPS corals; but I still have questions on feeding cycle and coral food mix. Is there anyone local to Northern VA that keeps NPS corals?

Gorgeous and healthy looking fish! Grats!

COW FEEEESH!

Easiest way to avoid a cycle is plenty of Live Rock. If you can take some Live Sand / Live Rock from your Main Display and use it in your Bio Cube with fresh saltwater that would be ideal. Then replace the rock/sand in your main DT with new.

Is this possible? Has anyone gone this route? If so how much is the cost?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CrVCKq6H0kU&list=UU1pXg9TZsF98nTV-GeX32kw&index=2

I'm just curious to see if Avast will offer a ZeoVit/ZeoLite Reactor in their line up.

Rob, how big was the tank? Did each of the peacocks have their own caves or did they share?

They might last a week or two, but eventually they will try to kill each other. Even mated pairs aren't a safe bet. Natural born predators.

Marbles? What an awesome idea! Haha, I'm definitely going to try to see what my peacock can do with different colored marbles. Thank you for the above suggestion kjamaya; I'll definitely hold off on any coral placement for awhile until he's nice and comfortable in his new home.

Thanks for the heads up. I knew that they like to reaquascape quite a bit but I didn't realize that they are prone to destroying the coral as well. :(

I'm planning to downgrade to a small tank since my future looks pretty tansient with the recent government cut backs. As such, partly inspired by Rob, I would like to do a species specific tank. I've always been fascinated with inverts within our hobby. Urchins, Hermits, Shrimp - the list is endless. One species that I am particularilty interested in is the Peacock Mantis Shrimp. These little guys can grow up to 6"-7" (in captivity!). They have quite a bit of color to them as well as a quirky personality. Unfortunately, they are pretty hard to find. Most people consider them to be a pest in a full blown reef so many wholesalers do not try to stock them. Fortunately, a local WAMAS member needs to cut down on the number of tanks in his house - which leaves me in a good position to ****** up a beautiful Peacock Mantis Shrimp. My plan is to keep Non-Photosynthetic Corals with the Peacock Mantis Shrimp. These guys live in the deep dark. They rarely, if ever, have long periods of time under bright lights. As such, their carapace can develop complications if you keep these guys under coral growth LED/MH/T5's. Some corals from Divers Den that I plan to keep: .. and other fat head Dendros. I've tried researching what corals/livestock are associated with the environment that these creatures live in. So far I have found that certain mushrooms and NPS corals are appropriate. I do not know what other livestock these guys are associated with though. I was told mid range, active fish would be fine - any suggestions?

I'm really looking forward to see where you go with this.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=29pnojFp3RI

Sump setup, what do you think? Not sure if the Avast CS-2 is working that well; not much foaming action right now. I hope everything is ok. Sump looks a little cloudy because of the new Seachem media.

My new skimmer. Need a 20 gallon sump to pair this with.