Jennylynn9579

Ok well I will be going up there shortly after they open, like I said, just not sure which day. I'll let you know which day, and you can meet me there. I'll siphon a bunch of junk out right before I go so it's er, fresh for you.

I actually have to drive out to Frederick this coming weekend, not sure which day yet. Will be around lunchtime though. I have an order to pick up at Mr Coral. Does one day work better than the other? I'm indifferent.

Pants, You can have ALL of them!! I haven't noticed paralysis of anyone, 7 of my 8 fish are acting normally, not avoiding anything. In fact, my flame angel and clownfish pair hang out in an area where the gunk has proliferated, and it doesn't seem to bother them. There is one chromis who is acting oddly, hanging out near the back corner at the top. I don't think this is related though, as he has been bizarre for a couple months at least. There was an episode where his mouth looked strange, like it didn't close right and it looked like he had a covering over his mouth, similar to a knights helmet. Sounds nuts, but it's the best way to describe it. It resolved after a few days. He's been hanging out at the top intermittently for about 1.5 months but is still eating. Coral hind, Yes, I have a RO/DI. it's about 6-7 months old, I make about 40 gallons a month or so. It's a 5 stage and comes out at 0 TDS.

Oh, one other thing, about the kalk - I don't have a reactor or auto top off or delivery mechanism. I've read about the slurry, it could be an option, I suppose. Or could I make a weaker solution of it with RO water?

Ok, so I guess it's my turn to have some catastrophic mess... I have been battling with dinos for about 2-3 weeks now, I just came to the conclusion of what they were for sure about 4 days ago, and read what other people have done to fight them. Currently, my lights are off, the tank is covered for the 3rd day, and I've seen improvement. I've manually removed a million pounds of this junk with a turkey baster, I'm running GFO and carbon, and I'm skimming heavy. Since I'm relatively new to this, I had just started exploring kalk and all that, but haven't done anything yet. I know raising ph is helpful, mine is about 8.1, maybe a smidge under. I am looking to raise it to 8.5/8.6, as I've read in many places. I also ordered ultra algae x by fauna Marin, from England, as I cannot find it here. Anybody have experience with this? Opinions and ideas are welcome, I'm hating this stuff!

This is harder than one of those hidden picture puzzles!! I can't find the dang thing...

Hey guys, thanks for the warm welcomes! I've been a bit busy lately with life in general, making some slow progress on the 150, my husband reinforced the stand over the weekend, I think it could support a dancing herd of elephants at this point! I pulled the trigger and picked up 2 AI sols for my current 40 breeder, and I was using the mounting rails that came with them, but the supplied legs only keep the lights high enough to barely keep them dry, and the hubby isn't keen on hanging them over this tank for 3-4 months, as it's in our main living area and it already looks a bit cluttered with the tank shoved between a large desk and a large sideboard. I did some thinking outside the box and decided on this: I plan to take the sols off the mounting rails that have them perpendicular over the tank ( which I didn't like anyway), and use ONE of their rails to mount both sols longways, spreading the light along the length of the tank better. Then I'm picking up these shelving brackets from Lowes to support the rail along the center of the tank, allowing me to even mount a nice shelf over the tank, for pictures, pretty stuff, etc. I'm hoping this solves the spread problem! I sold my old T5 fixture, got a GORGEOUS Idaho grape monti cap with an attached green monti as a partial trade, but the thing is huge for my breeder, and I found my anemone took a stroll last night and cozyed up to it, so this morning, I set the monti on the sandbed until tonight when I can do a bit of rearranging. I have the space, it's just not laid out well, but in a few months, I won't have an problem :-). I can't wait!!! Steve175, what kind of doc? It's funny, in RN school, I always thought I'd do L&D or NICU, both of which I would still like to do, but I got into psych first because it was hard to find something fresh out of school. I started out at Springfield hosp center up in sykesville, but hated it, and when I found my current job, I jumped on it. It is crazy challenging, no pun intended, sometimes, I have days where I question if I can come back, but they are few and far between, and for the most part, I love the kids to death. My favorites are the Downs and more nonverbal autistic kids, there's just something fulfilling when you can get one to make eye contact or actually get a few real words out of them.

Haha, no I didn't cut it yet, I wasn't feeling well this weekend, and my daughter took over the basement with a sleepover, and that's where all my stuff is, so... Probably one evening this week. I should probably pick up a metal ruler thing, I've been muddling along with a plain wood wal-mart special for my plans, buses it's time to graduate. Thanks wvreef, I'm trying to get a good mix of colors, as of now, I've got a lot of frags jammed in the tank, trying to grow out before the move to the big tank, so looking good isn't a big priority, just keeping everything healthy and growing. Welcome Brewski, you'll like it here, I've been a member for a week or so, and everyone has been so helpful and friendly!

Chad, Thank you for so many suggestions! Everyone on here is so helpful! The refugium's pipe will have a ball valve on it, and good idea with the baffles, I don't want to cut more glass than I have to. I've looked at DIY LEDs for awhile now, I'm just too lazy, I'll buy all the bits and hijack the kitchen table with parts and my husband will inevitably get tired of looking at it all and screech at me while he does it himself lol. I'm settled on tunzes or vortechs for flow already, so I'm supposing I'll go for the mag 12, I don't want external, don't want to deal with plumbing anything more than necessary. Thanks again!! I'll start a build thread once I actually get somewhere, rather than just collecting parts!

Thanks for the input everyone! I had thought about one of those display risers, thought I would drill a few holes to allow flow through also. The overflows are already Dursos I believe, I saw these things called Maggie mufflers, they looked pretty cool, saw some good feedback on RC.

Yeah, my ocellaris host a frogspawn too, despite having about 5 other choices in the tank, lol, silly things. They've never hung out anywhere near the nem.

Hi all, I'm progressing through building a sump for my 150 upgrade, I bought a 55 to use, as I wanted LOTS of space for anything that might come up in the future. My plan looks like this: The red pipes are return lines and the line out for my gfo/carbon reactor, and the green lines are my overflows and line back from the reactor. I split the R overflow with a tee to a ball valve to feed my refugium. In the center compartment will be the return pump (which I haven't chosen yet), heaters, and pump for the reactor, along with room for probe holders, whatever else. My question is that my skimmer, reef octopus, prefers a water level around 8-9 inches, and I planned that section to be deeper than that to give me more water volume. I'd like to elevate the skimmer about 3-4 inches, and I am torn on what to use. I thought of 2 options, 1: eggcrate bound together with zip ties, obviously not the sturdiest thing, but easy and cheap; 2: either buy/build an acrylic platform. Anybody wanna weigh in on this, especially anyone with experience building acrylic stuff or anyone with an elevated skimmer. Next, I was thinking I'd like to change my lighting fixture for the refugium. Right now it's just a 13 inch power compact fixture that came with the setup. It's old and all salt creepy, and it obstructs my view of the fuge and I bump into it while working in the stand. Has anyone tried LED strips like stunners or similar? Lastly, I need advice on the return pump. The tank is 150 G, 6ft long with corner-flows. I plan to split the return from the pump with a Y, then I was toying with splitting each return at the top to do 4 loc-line flare nozzles. I looked at the old return pipes that came with the tank, they're 1 inch or 3/4, I think. The return pump would pump from the center of the stand, thru the Y, to an elbow on each end, then up through the tank to the return outlets, I estimate about 3 feet from pump to bottom of tank, then 2 1/4 feet to the loc line. I've heard I need at least a 10x turnover, but I always have trouble figuring out head loss, resistance, whatever we call it. I like the mag drive pumps, but would I need an 18 or a 24? I'll have a ball valve on the main return pipe so I could dial it down if need be, but I think with splitting it twice, I might not need to. Advice? Thanks for reading! Jen Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

Thanks! I'm picking up the frags today, soooo excited!!! I bought all the glass for the baffles, and silicone, and glass cutting tool yesterday, a little nervous about cutting glass for the first time, but I bought an extra 16x24 sheet in case I booboo. Gonna get to work today, while the ravens spank "pretty boy up north"! Go ravens! Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

My RBTA is a pain in the a$$, it walked around for 2-3 months trying to figure out a perfect spot under my T5's when I changed over from MH, then one morning I got up to do my daily roll call on the tank, and the darn thing was nowhere to be found! I figured he sucked himself down into the rock, and decided to give him 30-40 minutes to sort himself out. When I checked back, the stupid thing SPLIT! However, I have to say, since the split, both clones have settled themselves and only stroll around a 6-inch area of this one rock, which I have refrained from putting anything good on. So long story short, I like mine now, but they are obnoxious until they figure out where they want to be. I say that now and watch, they'll figure out how to scale the glass to perch on my frag rack (soon to be full of awesome frags from Graham!) I have a torch coral that could fool people as an anemone, plus I think it's prettier, here's pics of both: Excuse my camera hogs... Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

Snowing in ellicott city, md!

Thanks! It's hard not getting ahead of myself with the build, I'm in the sump building and stand reinforcing stage, but I find myself looking at corals, and lights and other stuff that shouldn't be looked at till spring! Also REALLY hard not to overload the 40 with frags, but I saw Graham's frags for sale and couldn't help buying a handful. I justify it by saying they'll have some grow out time before moving to the empty abyss!

Sweet, they came through! Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

Ask and you shall receive! I hope the pics come through, they're just junky iPad pics... FTS Left side Center Right side Current frag rack My favorite curmudgeonly fish, Fug Currently drawing out sump plans, plumbing diagrams, and aquascaping ideas for the 150! Summer can't come quick enough! Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

Thanks Chad, Ryan and Steve, Wish I could make the meeting, but it's my weekend to work at the hospital, gotta make that money to buy stuff for the tank! I was leaning towards the MP40s, I think for starters, Ill get one, put my 2 koralias opposite the vortech, and try to skate for 2-3 months to save for the other one. My husband is mostly supportive of the tank, he's great for manly tasks, like running the miter saw to cut wood for reinforcing the stand (I'm PETRIFIED of the whole thing shearing and collapsing), but he's a huge proponent of doing the most cost effective thing, vortechs are a bit frivolous in his eyes, but luckily, he never checks prices on stuff and he travels a lot, so I tend to accumulate goodies while he's gone LOL. Once it's in the tank, it's not returnable!!

Hello everyone! I got lucky enough to stumble across this reef club last night, couldn't resist joining, I currently am a member of CMAS also, but you all seem really active and more people equal more resources and support, right? So anyway, I'm relatively new to reefing, I bought a 40B setup from a lady on CL last summer, upgraded the lights from an old 150w MH pendant to a 6 bulb T5, which I really like, and I upgraded the old euro-reef skimmer to a 150G reef octopus. Picked up a couple dozen frags, lots of zoas at first, the moved into acans and other LPS, but about 3 months ago, I decided "what the heck" and grabbed an ORA screaming green birds nest for mrcoral (thank you Sonny for draining my wallet of cash, 10 bucks at a time, LOL, your 10 dollar section is totally tempting and browsing it has become an almost daily habit!). I've done great with the birdsnest and have picked up a few other SPS, which are also doing pretty well. Well, long story short, I've loved yellow tangs since the first time I saw one, and not knowing about their space needs, it didn't occur to me that one wouldn't fare well in the 40, so in order to get one, I'm now collecting all the goodies needed for a 150G that I will start up this summer. The plan is to spend the next 4-5 months buying all the components and cycling in June. So far, I've gotten an incredible deal on the tank, a 150G with corner flows and a cherry stand and matching canopy. Also I have picked up about 70 lbs of BRS reef saver dry rock, 35 lbs of dry Marco rock, most of which is smaller chunks that I am contemplating using as a rock wall against the corner flow covers ( not covering the openings, of course). Last week, I grabbed a 55g at petco during the $1 gallon sale, which I will be using as a sump, with plans to get the supplies this weekend and build over the next couple weeks. Looking at AI sol blues for lighting, and plan to use an AI controller for them while I save up for an Apex. Also have a BRS dual reactor for GFO and carbon, but with the 40, it doesn't fit under the stand, and servicing it has been REALLY inconvenient, as it is wedged behind the stand, against the wall, so I stopped running it about 6 weeks ago. Still up in the air for powerheads, I'm open to all suggestions, I like the vortechs, but I know some people think they are a little loud, and expensive, but worth the money for most of those who have them. I'll be starting a build thread for the new tank, I welcome all suggestions and ideas, I've digested a LOT of information over the last 6 months, but I'm still such a noob and can use all the knowledge I can get! When I'm not messing with the current tank or obsessively planning the new one, I'm raising my almost 13 year old daughter with my husband of 6 years, and keeping up the non aquatic part of my zoo, which consists of a 3 yr old great Dane, a 2 year old chihuahua, 3 tabby cats, and a very grouchy Quaker parrot. I'm a full time RN, I work with developmentally disabled children and adolescents, and they are both a joy to work with on good days and a cause for midday drinking on bad days, lol! Looking forward to getting to know you all better and to showing off a rockin tank in about a year! Jen