renman303

Not for sale anyway...someone has to take charge of watching the tank..."Watchfish".

Nope, just a regular Ocellaris Clown.

The largest of my three Clownfish is half Pirhana. He rips me up every time I put my arm in the tank to try and move or clean something. Not the greatest pic but you can see he drew blood from about 10 bite marks.

I use Gorilla Brand "SuperGlue". The cap never clogs. As for mounting a Frag, dry the rock piece that you want to mount the frag on with an old towel as best you can. No big deal if it's a bit damp. Same with the bottom of the frag. Place a drop on the rock where you want to mount the frag, (I always "dry-fit" first to see how evenly it will sit). Hold it in place for a minute. You can let the frag out of the water for a few minutes with no problems. After all, the tide does go out and expose the reef every day... Blow on the glued spot for a minute to accelerate the drying. Then, put it back in the tank. Cheers!

I use Gorilla Glue's "SuperGlue". Not regular "Gorilla Glue". You also get about twice as much Gorilla brand Superglue as any other and the cap does not clog...ever!

My 9 year old daughter, Gina "G" is playing the "Hairy Man Festival" in Hairy Man Park in Round Rock on Saturday, 3 Oct. We are on from 12:00 - 12:45 p.m. Gina "G" has one of the drum solos in the show. It will feature about 20-30 drummers in a drumline but....with complete kits! Come and see her. If you can't make it, here is a link to her Facebook site and some of her YouTube Videos. She may also be playing in the spring for the SXSW Festival in Austin with another band. Gina Bongiovanni-Osmar

Syphon and H20 changes first. Get everything in check before adding any other thing. You could really use a sump. Once you get the sand cleared I would get another 50-75 lbs of LR. I even have about 50# in my sump as well. LR will become your primary filter for your tank. Generally, I don't siphon my sand at all unless I had a problem. But, if you don't have any diatoms that are laying on the top and it just appears "dirty". Getting some of that out of there is beneficial. Just plunge the siphon straight down in overlapping circles. Do not "Stir" the sand. I would use a trash can to gauge how much water you are removing so you know how much new salt water to put back in. I posted on your sand cleaning as well....what is your salinity?

You don't want tap water because of all of the chemicals like chlorine and phosphates in it. That will kill all of your tank mates. Inverts are particularly intolerable of chemicals. Your dKH is coming down but still needs to be below 12. Calcium looks good! pH: 8.2-8.4 is perfect! Syphon the sand as you go. If you need H20 and don't have an RO/DI, go to HEB and buy it by the gallon. See if someone near you can make you 20 gallons of RO/DI for the next few days? Most of the LFS (Local Fish Stores) even sell ready mixed salt water that you could take home in 5 gallon buckets if you buy a few with lids from The Home Depot. Nitrates are TOXIC. Syphon the sand. Borrow a syphon from someone nearby. What do you have for LR? (Live Rock)? Keep writing this crap in your log...you're getting there...

When you do your readings, do us a favor and list them here as "Before" and "After". Then we can see what progress has taken place. Dave

BTW....I would highly suggest you get a tablet to take notes on. I use an accounting book because of it's ruled lines and columns. In the first I put the date. Then, "dKH", "Ca", "Mg", "Salinity", "Other". I would immediately start a running log with the readings that you first had. Then, with yesterday's date list the 20% water change. Anytime you do ANYTHING, list it. Then you can look back to see what the outcome was and how to correct potential problems. On the line under the columns where you list the readings I write stuff like; "Did 10% water change, added 50ml of Mg". Here is a copy of one of the pages of my log...Hope this helps. aquarium log.pdf

Get rid of the Bio-Balls and netting. It's just a trap for Nitrates. This is permanent. You need a good sump for your setup. I use a 120 gallon feed troth! I do have a 55 gallon tank that you could easily make into a sump. It's $50 if you are interested. Buy a really good pump like an "Eheim 1262". That should do the trick for cycling the water but you still need movement in the tank itself. I'm a big fan of "MaxiJet 1200's". They are cheap...about $30 and move 295 gallons per hour. If you like they have an add on impeller that causes them to move about 3 times the water for about a $10 upcharge. I would get 2 of these to start. Ca should not be over 450. Keep it in the 425-450 range. If it falls to 400 nothing is going to die but 425 is ideal. Use that canister only to move water. If you ever need to, you could add Carbon. I personally never run carbon unless there is a water problem. You should come up and see my setup. I also have a blog that will show you most of what I have.

Yes, they will get eaten...my bad. You can get a syringe and inject them at the base with RO/DI...I believe? Which reminds me...where are you getting your water from? Please don't say, "Out of the tap". You need RO/DI water to mix your salt in. Otherwise Phosphates will be high. Which reminds me again....what is your Specific Gravity?

Your alkalinity (dKH) is WAAAAYYYY too high. Should be between 8-12. Mine is constantly around 8 or 9. Cindy and Robert Manning (cmanning) have the same. That is where I learned a lot of this. Nitrate=20 is also way too high. Do a 20% water change. In about 2 days do another 10% to bring things down rapidly but not enough to cause anything to go into shock over such a huge change at once.Keep doing changes until your water dKH is NO HIGHER than 12. I would get it to about 10. Aptasia...Just buy about 3 Peppermint Shrimp....after the water changes. Keep us posted. Dave

I agree with Stoneroller. Take it from me, I wasted about $3k worth of fish and corals before I stopped the insanity.

The hitchhiker is probably an "Aptasia"...get rid of it...However, that is not the problem that you are having. How long has the tank been up and running BEFORE you added any animals? When did you get it? How did you acclimate it? If you've had your water tested and the coral has not been in there very long. It may be in shock. With the very little lighting that you have I would suggest that you put it near the top of the tank close to the lights. I'm running 3 Metal Halides at 400w each plus 4 T5's at 54w each. Do you have good water movement? If not, go buy a surplus pump to put in the tank to get the water moving. What are your water parameters??? I know you said they were good but, what are they? When did you have the water tested? If it's been awhile and you have not checked the water in awhile the parameters may be drastically off! Also, I do 10% water changes EVERY WEEK. Nothing is off in my tank because it doesn't go very long before being re supplemented. What are you supplementing your water with in terms of Alkalinity and Calcium? These are the two most important chemicals. You must have some sort of Calcium Carbonate and some sort of Sodium Carbonate to keep the Calcium at about 425-450 and the dKH should be about 8-12. You may have to monitor these daily for awhile. This is from Drs Foster and Smith website:Scroll Coral Turbinaria sp. vary in the amount of care they require. Those that are highly convoluted or thin plates, like this one, are the most difficult to care for. It is a peaceful reef inhabitant and does not bother other corals that are placed in close proximity to it. However, it should still be provided with ample space away from other corals because it does grow quickly. It will require a medium light level combined with a medium water movement within the aquarium. For its continued good health, it will also require the addition of calcium, strontium, and other trace elements to the water. It will benefit from additional food in the form of brine shrimp or plankton. Ruffled Ridge Coral (Turbinaria sp.) QUICK STATS Care Level: Difficult Temperament: Peaceful Lighting: Moderate Waterflow: Medium Placement: All Water Conditions: 72-78° F, dKH 8-12, pH 8.1-8.4, sg 1.023-1.025 Color Form: Green, Tan, Yellow Supplements: Calcium, Strontium, Trace Elements Origin: Fiji, Tonga Family: Dendrophylliidae Polyp Size: SPS - Small Polyp Stony

It looks that way. When did you get it? How did you acclimate it? What type of lighting is it under? Is it touching any other corals? What are your water parameters? I have this same type of Coral. Let us know your findings ASAP.

I'd love to come down and jam sometime. My 9 year old daughter, Gina is a phenomenal drummer. Plays in two bands with 40 year olds! Gotta hear her on her Facebook Page under "Gina Bongiovanni-Osmar". Someone recently heard her and wants to put her in a band to play at SXSW! Now, that would be a draw!!! Dave

I may have the pics in my Blog but, I bought a standard 72"x24" stand. I just used about $10 worth of wood to reinforce it. I put up 2"x10"'s vertically on each end and in between the three doors front and back. Then I notched the 2x10's and ran 2x4's across the top of the two center braces in pairs...No screws. You could park a Hummer on it now. Dave

It works great! Tie it to the canopy with about 12"- 18" of fishing line (no pun) and drop it in the water! It constantly moves causing more of the fish to have access to it and have to chase their food.

Sorry guys, This was from March of 2008. I'm well underway now.

Bulk Reef Supply's 2-part system is the most cost effective that I've found. I am having great results with this in the past month. About 1/4 the cost of B-Ionic!

It may be a Tie down clip? Acadamy has them in the camping section although you have to buy a 6-pack of them. McCoy's Building Supplies has them individually for $1.59/ea.

Ditto Gabe on this one. I melt one cube once a day plus one tightly rolled hunk of Nori on a "tent clip" tied with fishing line (No pun...courtesy and kudo's to the Mannin's for this idea). Once every 3 days I melt a cube of some sort of Coral plankton food and dump it in the water stream AT NIGHT. Turn off the Protein Skimmer if you are using one. I don't spot feed corals but do give a big chunk of fresh shrimp directly to both my BTA and my Tiger Serpent Star.

It's a bit tough to reach the bottom on mine (it's 31") but I would do it again. If it were a peninsula, and/or a brick style vs my Eurobrace, that would make it much easier.

Just thought I'd share this with everyone. I posed some questions to Moody Gardens and while general in nature I thought it interesting to see what the big boys are doing in terms of Marine water, light and chemicals. I do weekly 10% water changes and it was nice to see that this is what they adhere to as well. Cheers! Dave "Greetings David", Thanks for your enquiry about our marine aquariums, I’ll answer your questions as best I can. If you have any additional ones, please let me know. Most of our systems are very simple but efficient, we have biofilters, mechanical filters using floss, bags, and cartridges, protein skimmers, UV sterilization, and some of the tanks have ozone. We don’t use turf scrubbers but do have refugiums with macro alga on the coral holding systems. Water quality parameters differ depending on the animals housed in the exhibit and their requirements. I’ll give you parameters for our warm water marine tanks and reef exhibits. Temperature: 780 – 84o F pH: 7.8 – 8.3 Salinity: 32 – 35 ppt NH3: 0.00 mg/L NO2: 0.00 mg/L NO3: 1 – 10 mg/L PO4: 0.00 mg/L Ca: 250 – 450 mg/L Alkalinity: 2.0 – 4.0 meq/L We perform 10% weekly water changes as SOP and as needed to maintain optimal health of the animals and system. We are very fortunate here to have natural seawater available to us from Offatts Bayou, an adjoining body of water to West Galveston Bay. The water quality remains fairly consistent all year long which really helps us out, though we do have to deal with some extremes for rainfall or drought. If we have to add salt to the seawater, we use a commercially available mix made for public aquariums in Dallas. We also have a few RO units available for that purity of water if we need it as well. Lighting conditions vary by tank, depending on animals and environment. We use a combination of PC’s and metal halides, together or separately on a 12 on/12 off cycle. The PC’s are 65 watt square pin 10K’s or actinics and the metal halides are 400 watt 10K, 14K, and 20K’s. The primary consideration as to the combination we use is the best intensity and spectrum needed for the target animals, whether soft or hard corals to our dimly lit deep water tanks. For the corals we usually use a combination of 10 and 20K’s, it’s a good formula that works 90% of the time. No real need to reinventing the wheel. As you know though, you always have to tweak the externals; light, flow, water quality, chemical additions, animals placement, etc, to get things just right. Aquariums are dynamic environments that constantly change day to day, demanding our attention to detail. They’re also quite forgiving because nature has an extraordinary way if keeping itself in balance. I hope this has helped somewhat with your questions. The best of luck to you and your club, remember, we are stewards of the animals we care for and it is our privilege, not right, to share the earth with these beautiful animals. Take care. Roy Drinnen Assistant Curator of Fishes The Aquarium at Moody Gardens One Hope Blvd. Galveston, Texas 77554 Off: (409) 683-4103 Cel: (281) 642-5354 Fax: (409) 683-4943 [email protected]