Timfish

Here's a bunch of links for you to check out. The material will be covered on the semester final. "Coral Reefs in the Microbial Seas" This video compliments Rohwer's book of the same title (Paper back is ~$20, Kindle is ~$10), both deal with the conflicting roles of the different types of DOC in reef ecosystems. While there is overlap bewteen his book and the video both have information not covered by the other and together give a broader view of the complex relationships found in reef ecosystems https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-R2BMEfQGjU Changing Seas - Mysterious Microbes https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c7hsp0dENEA Microbial view of Coral Decline https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NAD26LGERj8 Nitrogen cycling in hte coral holobiont https://youtu.be/DWItFGRQJL4 BActeria and Sponges https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-oLDclO7UcM Maintenance of Coral Reef Health (refferences at the end) https://youtu.be/dGIPveFJ_0Q Optical Feedback Loop in Colorful Coral Bleaching https://youtu.be/oadKezUYkJE DNA Sequencing and the Reef Tank Microbiome https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ghxVSmLhxUg Richard Ross What's up with phosphate" https://youtu.be/ZRIKW-9d2xI 15 Answers https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pqTuQDzjlv4

You can hook you RO/DI directly to your sump but it's risky, sooner or later float valves can have issues. If you do I'd set up a couple different alarms for going off if the water level gets too high and if water actually makes it to the floor. Over the years I'd say 98% of the pests I've run into have been from other aquarists, not from live rock. The sponges especially are hugely beneficial for reef ecossytems. Even if you put rubble like Grog mentioned in your sump the sponges will migrate to your tank. Once ammonia drops you can start adding easy corals, they'll help mature the system faster by competing against nuisance algae for nutrients. Initially and periodicly you going to want to get in your tank to siphon algae out so don't be afraid of getting into it. See these threads on algae control. http://www.austinreefclub.com/topic/34556-hair-algae-a-case-study/?tab=comments#comment-275433 http://www.austinreefclub.com/topic/39043-hair-algae-a-second-case-study/?tab=comments#comment-325744

Looks like a great start to a nice build! FWIW I wouldn't bother with filter socks or filter rolls. FIsh poop is an important part of the carbonate cycle on reefs as well as urea , ammonia and phosphates for corals. (Good to see you don't have a skimmer on your list ) Be sure to use some maricultured live rock (Gulfliverock, tampa bay or KP aquatics) to get sponges and other stuff that can't be stuck in a bottle. Dr. Reefs Quarantined Fish sells conditioned and quarantined fish as well as Biota's captive raised yellow tangs and other fish (Tigerpyges angels are on sale for $1799.99)

I'll put $50 on the galaxia

How did easy did you find installing and using the PARwise app?

Mike, you should be proud of what you accomplished. One of the things that stands out for me was the high participation rate compared to the bigger forums. This was especially apparent when the various social media platforms started impacting the forums and ARC kept a higher participation rate and posting rate. I'm grateful for your friendship, thankful for the opportunity to build such a cool tank for you (been thinking about that design for a couple decades) and honored you chose me to take the reins! (But don't call me if you ever decide to move that tank!)

They make spring loaded door hinges that will close doors. 😁

What! You;re feet aren't wet yet?! I haven't messed with one but since it's pulling 185 watts it's going to generate a fair amount of heat at full power. Looks like the heat is vented out the ends so it's not blowing down on hte tank. The light itself will heat the water and corals a bit but your pumps are likely going to be the major source of heat. If you'r erunning a UV it can add quite a bit also. CHeapest and easiest way to cool a tank though is with evapoartive cooling and mounting a fan in the stand to lower the heat and himidity in it would be an unobtrusive way to do it.

Oooooops! Got 4 tangs in this system and none are easy to get full shots of. None are particularly shy but when someone is in front of the tank they're each trying to beat everyone else to where food might be. 😏

Here's some current pics: Two different Pagaoda corals. The larger brown polyps are Turbinaria peltata. The smaller green, T. patula. Yellow tang purchased in 2022 Purple Stylo Toadstool, there's a couple in this system that are daughter colonies of a wild colony purchased in '97 or '98. Unlike some others that have been very fast growing these have been pretty slow. This colony is about 2 decades old. The mother colony started to decline and died about 10 years ago, but one curious item was the daughter colonies displayed very different behavior from the mother colony. While the mother colony was "moody" or would often be closed up the daughter colonies would usually be open and on occasion might be closed while the mother was open.

Not very neighborly behavior! Looks like some nice sponges ans a big tunicate just behind it on the right side.

Could be a curlique anemoe

They can be anchored pretty deep into holes or crevisas. I try to identify it'd hiding hole and bore inyo iy with a screwdriver and rinse it well ina bucket of saltwater to flush off any remians.

There's a couple species that are found threw out ttemperte and tropical Atlantic, mediteranian and caribbean. It's rare I get it on live rock, far more likely to get it from other aquarists.

First is an aiptasia, not a majano. My suspion is it's a different species than the brown one that causes issues in aquaria but best to get rid of it. (For just one I'd put use a bucket of aquarium water to hold it in and dig it out with a flat blade screwdriver. The second is sponge and beneficial, looks like two different species, actually.

Sorry to hear about your Coral Beauty. ☹️ Keep in mind it may have had a problem long before you added it to your system. I've had a several times over the decades when a group of fish ordered at the same time all die about the same time even though they were distributed to different systems.

Scientists discover cause of Sea Urchin die off in the Caribbean https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2023/apr/24/scientists-discover-why-sea-urchins-are-dying-off-from-us-to-the-caribbean Here's the research paper https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/sciadv.adg3200#sec-3

Depending on the filter they can help alot. Also, friend of mine has gotten pretty good pics with an aftermarket camera app.

Here's a pic. Had to play a little with color temp to get it to present the colors it shows in person. Pic is close but to my eye it's not quite as purple as it looks.

Probably going to have to mess with the lighing spectrum. These were the brown ones you had back in 2015.

🙂👍 That's a good example of how dynamic bugs can be. Aquarists tend to think of their systems as relatively unchanging or even static. In reality the microbial processes are very dynamic and changing constantly with some showing changes with the daily light cycle.

Real Reefers don't need labels.

Hey, stuff I got from you last time is doing great! I need to take a pic of the birdsnest, it's turned a real nice purple under some custom LEDs in one of my tanks. :)