lewisweil

Ive got a 40 gallon breeder stand. Metal. I really like the stand but have no plans to set anything up. Pickup only. Im in 78752 just north of Mueller and Windsor Park. Will give address in DM. 

Got one accepted offer and a back up offer. If they both fall through I'll let y'all know. 

SOLD 

definitely was not expecting it to be sold within three minutes when i posted it at midnight. glad this stuff is going to get some good use.

Must pick up from Austin TX 78752 (near Mueller) and take everything as is. Not willing to sell individual items.

My reef crashed during the blizzard. I've decided to clear out all my gear, take a break, and then start from scratch. 

Reply or DM,

• Nuvo Aquarium Fusion Nano 20 gal  (24”x15”x13”)
• Fluval Stand
• 2x Tunze 1073.008 return pumps
• Kessil A160WE Tuna Blue lamp w/ controller
• 3x Triton ICP-OES test kits
• AutoAqua Smart Auto Water Changer Touch (automatic water changer and ATO)
• Tunze ATO Water Level Controller 5017
• 24” Twinstar Lamp w/ programmable timer
• UNS surface skimmer
• ATC refractometer
• Hanna dKH checker
• 4x 5 gallon jugs
• 2000 mL Tropic Marin- All For Reef (one part dosing)

Yeah a lot of criteria need to met before home solar makes sense.

My only things to add for folks thinking about a generator is the noise, they can be louder than you expect, especially in the quiet of a power outage. My brother who I mentioned has a pretty serious generator, run an extension cable to his neighbor during power outages. It's the neighborly thing todo and also makes them not so putoff having to deal with the noise from his generator.  

anyone know how the lfs are doing? I'm worried for aquadome, rca, and aquatek! 

We're looking at multiple powerwalls. I'll share in case others are looking into solar as an option. I had my call with the solar company on Saturday. If you only have one powerwall battery it only serves as a backup for a handful of lights and appliances. If you want to run your AC and any other high load equipment you need multiple powerwalls. 

In Austin and you run solar you are still on the grid, your solar output offsets energy used from Austin Energy. The credit per kwh is pretty generous. If you don't have your panels connected to a battery though and the power goes out you still lose power. Because you are on the grid the power company cuts you off too because the electricity coming from your panels is still going into the grid and would be a hazard to the people working the lines on the restoring power. If you have a battery your panels keep working because the electricity has somewhere to go. So unless you have a battery you still lose power just like everyone else. Adding batteries can be more expensive than the panels themselves. 

We have a 1600 sq ft house, its just me and my wife and our roof happens to have enough exposure that we can generate enough electricity for us to meet all our electric needs. That combined with the 0.99% financing and not having an electric bill means the math makes sense for us. You do have to check a lot of boxes before home solar is worth the trouble. 

My brother who has two kids and a bigger house opted for a generator, he would have needed a ridiculous number of batteries to cover his needs. 

I have a nissan leaf, which is 100% electric, so being able to charge in a power outage will be amazing. It was actually great having an electric vehicle this last week but that is another story. 

I'm surprised to not see more talk of the blizzard. Maybe everyone is focused on recovering and not posting on reef forums. 

I've talked to other aquarium keepers and many of them have 100% loses. I lost the vast majority of my corals. We are just north of Windsor Park and Mueller. Our neighborhood lost power Sunday night. It was supposed to be for 45 minutes. We didn't reliably get power back until Thursday. Monday I tried to keep the tank warm by floating bags of seawater i heated on the stove. If we had gotten power back then it would have been ok. But between trying to maintain the household during daylight, the risk of carbon monoxide building up from running the stove, and sheltering together at night for warmth, I had to accept that I couldn't keep it up indefinitely. The house was in the 40s, I don't know how cold the tank got. 

Most of my corals I had grown from just a couple polyps. I like getting corals from the mystery $5 tank at Aqua Dome and growing them out. It hurts to see them as just white skeletons. 

We got power back Thursday afternoon. Once I was convinced it was back for good I started cleaning out the tank,  planning on breaking it down. It smelled horrible. I was shocked to find my platygyra, a gorgonian, and two leathers were still alive. Barely alive, but not dead. What started as a tank tear down turned into a rescue mission. I had luckily had some pre-mixed seawater on hand and did big water change to get rid of the detritus from the dead corals. The platy seems to be doing ok. There is some receded tissue but it seems to be stable. Platys are so expressive when you keep an eye on them. 

I am planning on giving the surviving corals away to help someone rebuild their reef and then scrapping the tank. I'm going to take a break for a bit and then start again from scratch. We are looking into solar and powerwall battery back ups and into a proper wood stove for heat. Between the rolling blackouts last summer and the possibility of the polar vortex becoming a frequent event I need to rethink the extremes that my household and aquarium life support systems are facing. 

what part of town are you in? if you can be near mueller i'd happily give you a nice clump.

Lost most of my corals, house was in the 40s. Not sure how low the tank got. I was absolutely shocked to see my platygyra was mostly ok. 

I set the tank up in a way I wouldn't recommend to most people. But I am both lazy and like to think I am better at this than I actually am. The tank was used, so I was letting it run with freshwater to clean it out. While that was happening I was on the road and when I go out of town I like to visit LFS and buy something if I can. Well I bought some Chaeto while in Corpus Christi... except I didn't actually have a saltwater tank yet. So I did a dumb thing and just added salt to the freshwater when I got home. Let it circulate for a couple days and added the Chaeto ball. Not a best practice, don't follow my example. Worst case I lose the Chaeto and start over. I ran the system with activated carbon and polyfilter to get some elements out of the tap water. Spoiler alert, it all worked out fine and I have happy corals. Following my experience in freshwater planted tanks I decided to wait until the Chaeto was showing signs of active growth before adding any other livestock. Which was a couple snails. Next time I'll post the saga of my snails and the first corals. 

I think this tank build is going to be about showing how much dumb stuff you can get away with and still have a successful tank. 

• 20 gallon Innovative Marine
• Kessil a160 
• no skimmer
• single Tunze 008 return pump
• dosing with Triton four part
• dose with Acro Power every other day
• target feed with Reef Roids about twice a week. 

I haven't had a coral tank in a few years so this is my system for getting my sea legs back. I started it back in February and I will make some posts catching the thread up to where the system is now. The tank is corals only. I am growing them out to donate or sell and keep a few as pets for a project later. I got my first ARC corals at the frag sale back in March. I've been picking up a few from the $5 tank at Aqua Dome and the occasional frag from Aquatek and Austin Aqua Farms. Right now my bird of paradise Seriatopora and my Acan are my coral babies. 

The tank has no skimmer. There is a filter floss, carbon or poly filter occastionally. Otherwise filtration is down through small weekly water changes and by the ball of Chaetomorpha in the corner. 

More soon, very glad to be back on ARC! The frag sale in March was excellent, so glad to see the local hobby doing well. 

Anyone seen any in an LFS or have some I could get off of you?

I'm working the shop Sunday 12-6pm. Come by and say hi. And take advantage of the ARC discount.

...you should be.

We made an exception for you. No one else got to buy anything.

It was great seeing everyone! Glad the hermit came out of their shells.

They are giving the opening week crew a break and I am coming in Sunday to take a shift from 12-6. Come say hi! My real name is Lewis.

I'd love to give ARC homies a tour of the shop.

P.S. I am going to start planning a party for all the fine folks who waited so patiently for the store to open. I'll let you know as soon as I have details.

The best kind, free.

I don't know. Depends on who went to pick up the beer. When I organize the next DLaF I'll be sure the beer is of note.

What kinda beer?

Twisting it with booze and money.

Roger decided after all this work he needed a beer and so did everyone else. Drink Like a Fish tonight at Fish Gallery Austin (6500 N. Lamar next to Threadgills. Open until 8pm) come grab a free beer and see your new fish store. Plus opening day special, 20% off an item under $100. I am going after work and will probably be milling about.

We will certainly have more events in the coming months with more notice.

Open until 8pm tonight.

Exactly!

When I was there a mom and her kids were there and one of kids told the mom that "Wow! This is so much better than Petsmart!" =)

The FW hobby is like the gateway drug into SW hobby. A store like FG has a lot more retail appeal than any of our other LFSs and having kids programs etc will get more people, eg families, into the fish hobby overall.

Some people just do FW without the hard stuff, or try the hard stuff and go back to FW. Or do both.

I believe there is another big saltwater section going in. But ask for Mike, he is the fish manager and let him know what you would like to see.

Thanks for all the nice words, I am really happy with it and I know it will just keep getting better with feedback from the community.

When we get the keg? I dunno.

Sarah decided to tell me it was go time in the middle of a show last night. I was trying to rock out while making posts from my phone.

So excited.

Remember it is a soft opening with new employees. It is a good time for suggestions, but be gentle. Let me know how you like things and I will let the owner know.