jamesbuf

Crap. I just noticed the wattage. BRK it is.

I'm looking into buying new bulbs. I found these on bigalsonline. http://www.bigalsonline.com/catalog/produc...id1=1843;pcid2= http://www.bigalsonline.com/catalog/produc...id1=1843;pcid2= and http://www.bigalsonline.com/catalog/produc...id1=1843;pcid2= Are these bulbs any good??? I know the price is good, and I've definitly heard of coralife. If anyone has every tried then, please let me know if they're any good. Thanks again everyone.

I agree with not adding in anything that might mess up water parameters. It claims to have just calcium, iodine, and a couple other trace elements. I only have a couple mushrooms and some polys, remember I have a FOWLR. I just want my rock to look better. It is the actinic light that makes the coraline grow right?? Also, I have a 6 bulb T5 strip on my 125. Its almost time to buy some new bulbs. What would be a good bulb combination?? I have 2 plugs by the way that turn on 2 or 4 or all six, so what I usually do now if have my 2 actinic bulbs turn on around 90minutes before the 4 white bulbs kick in and 45 minutes after the whites cut off. I think my fixture originally came with 2 6500K and 2 10K bulbs. Should I forgo the 6500K and just stick to 10K. Or maybe add another actinic that would come on with the whites??? Any help is always appreciated. I've read alot about kalk, but wouldn't it be overkill when I'm really just wanting more coraline? I'll probably never get into the harder to keep corals anyways. Too expensive, and again I'm in it for the fish.

I figure it wouldn't hurt to try a bottle of it. I do already have some coraline growing in certain places, but I was curious to know if coraline will grow under/over areas where there is nusaince algae already growing?? Also, I was curious to know if that social thing this weekend only applies to people who have corals to trade? I'm gonna be over in VA picking up some liverock on Saturday and I was hoping to stop by and check the place out.

Has anyone ever used the product called PurpleUp? It claims to help promote coraline growth better than just calcium alone. Congressional aquarium tried to sell me some for $24, but i found the same thing online for just 11.99. Its about the same price as the Kent liquid calcium so I guess its worth a shot, unless somebody on here had a bad experience with it. Thanks everyone. James

Has anyone ever used the product called PurpleUp? It claims to help promote coraline growth better than just calcium alone. Congressional aquarium tried to sell me some for $24, but i found the same thing online for just 11.99. Its about the same price as the Kent liquid calcium so I guess its worth a shot, unless somebody on here had a bad experience with it. Thanks everyone. James

Thanks for the help guys. I got an RO/DI off of ebay about 6 months ago. I tested my tap water and the nitrates in that was around 20ppm alone. I'm going to get a calcium test kit this week to see if I really need to invest in a kalk setup. There was a small colony of polyps on one of my larger pieces of LR that I got last summer, but I think they died off from high nitrates. I actually noticed that I might have a couple of polyps coming back!! Not sure if they go into a spore mode or maybe hibernation of some sorts until water quality gets better, but its definitly on the same spot were the colony used to be. I do have a couple bottles of Kent liquid calcium, but didn't want to add any extra until I get a test kit.

Thanks for help Howard. All of the high end stuff really gets overwhelming when you try to start learning from scratch. Also, its good to be back, even though I never really left. With all the stress of school, I realized it was foolish to throw away the one thing that I still found relaxing. Not to mention I hadn't tested my nitrates in a couple weeks when I made my decision to leave the hobby. When I tested my water I couldn't believe my nitrates had actually dropped that low. I even went out and bought another nitrate test kit to make sure. Are there any do it yourself plans on how to kalk dose?? or a beginners guide.....possible "kalking for dummies"?? I don't plan on doing it any time soon, but I'm running out of reading to procrastinate with.

I started my 125 as saltwater last summer, so I believe that the dried out baserock I used has finally become "liverock". I actually did get about 50lbs of established liverock in the beginning also. I have a berlin HO turbo skimmer. I have a 6 bulb t5 retro setup. i also have a 30gallon refugium filled with pods and stuff. I have some sawgrass calerpa which I've had for about a month. Also probably a contributing factor to the lower nitrates. Just got a small handful of chaet for the fuge today. Hopefully nitrates will be a thing of the past. I just traded in my spotted hawkfish and 2 striped damsels today to start from scratch. No more fish. After months of high nitrates, my nitrates finally tested below 20ppm. Time to try some new things. Here is my situation. Growing up with freshwater, I've always been, and probably always will be, a fish person. But I wouldn't mind having a few things to pretty up my rocks to go along with my fish. I plan on getting an anemone with some clowns, something I've wanted for a while but my nitrates have been too high. 1. If I have clowns with the anemone, do I still have to feed it. If so, what do I feed it?? How do I do it? 2. I have had one single mushroom, similar to this one http://www.liveaquaria.com/product/prod_Di....cfm?pCatId=668 and it stayed the only one the whole time of having high nitrates. In just 2 short weeks, there is now 3 of them. Nice. Do I have to feed these guys?? If so, what food and how?? 3. I've actually read alot of stuff on here but alot of it is geared towards the hardcore reefers. If all I want is an anemone or two, maybe 2 different types of mushrooms and maybe 2 colonies of small polyps, I don't have to mess with the kalk reactors and all that hardcore stuff do I??? Thanks for any input guys. I'm hoping to take advantage of my dues and actually start attending some meetings and stuff. When grad school permits of course. I'm sure I can gain 100 times for knowledge from attending the meetings instead of the just asking random questions on here. Alright, enough procrastinating, got another paper to write. James

I was also curious to know what experiences people have had with the small aragonite. Does the small aragonite still give you the anaerobid denitrifying qualities??? I would assume that you could vacuum the small aragonite unlike the DSB. One of questions I've always always had is how do you clean a regular sand bed?

How deep should a Sand Bed be? I'm setting up a 42gal hexagon, which is pretty tall, so I want to know the pros and cons of making the sand bed as deep as possible. How deep is too deep?? I want to maximize the de-nitrifying aspect of the sand bed. Also, how many fish is too many fish for a 42 gallon hex? I'm planning on just having a pair of clown, or maybe 2 other random fish. Any and all help is always appreciated. James

Is the RO/DI is still available? Thanks

How much for the RO/DI unit????

Since you're up in B-more, I would check out the aquarium center or exotic aquatics in glen burnie. www.exoticaquatics.com or www.aquariumcenter.com

If you look at the LFS topic when you first sign into the forums section, it'll show you many of the good local fish stores.

I'm about to buy a 6 bulb retro system. My tank is 6feet long but I'm thinking of buying the 4feet bulbs since I know they are so bright. And being that the bulbs are going to be around a foot above the tank(screwed into the canopy) I figure the light will spread out and cover the whole tank. I'm hoping to get macro growth in my main tank, as well as my fuge, to help get my nitrates down, plus its food for the tangs. Then I can just throw out the pruned macros from my fuge. Thanks alot for your comments. I had pretty much made up my mind I was going to get them, I really just wanted some input from others. thanks again.

Does anyone know the truth about T5 lighting?? I've read people arguing about the strength of the bulbs. I know there are 2 ratings for the T5 bulbs, regular and HO, and obviously the HOs are whats used in our hobby. I've been told that the HOs put out light equivalent of bulbs twice their wattage. is this true??? If anyone knows someone who had success with these lights, please let me know. Thanks again everyone.

Thanks for the help. I actually just got a yellow watchman today. Figure I'll let him settle in then get the pistol in a couple weeks.

Also forgot to ask this. I know that gobys will make tunnels in the substrate. What kind of substrate allows this??? I have a 125gal with a mixture of 40lbs aragonit and around 60lbs of crushed coral. Would this be ok for tunnel/cave digging?

I've read about people housing these two and finding a symbiotic relationship. Is this really true?? If it is, I'd love to get this. I've also read bad things about mantis shrimp and they they can be predatory to other creatures in my tank. Are pistol shrimp predatory??? I have quite a few small hermits and snails, which is why I'm asking. Thanks guys.

Ok everyone, here is the situation. I just got around 60lbs of unbelievable live rock from someone scrapping their 55gal tank. There is massive growth on all the rocks. The rocks were only out of water for about an hour. I already had around 30lbs of cured liverock, but nowhere near as established as this stuff. I have a fish only tank, and I'm wanting to keep as much of the growth on the rocks as possible(also not trying to have a massive dieoff killing everything in my tank!!!!!!!). I add iron and iodine for my refugium(up and running for months), and I've been adding calcium to the tank since I put in my original 30lbs around 3 weeks ago. Am I missing any supplements for a fish and live rock only tank????? As you can see, I know alot of the basics but I figured with something this huge, its always best to get advice from veterans of the hobby. Thanks in advance to everyone for any help and advice offerred.