Kaplanm

Algae is *not* a problem. My Hydra 26's are causing it to grow at an outrageous rate.

I'm not too worried about the Nassarius snails, I've got 2 living quite happily in my 5 gallon. They're just so cool how they rise from the deep.

And the first of the livestock goes in!

Today we added the cleaning crew:
20x Astrea snails

5x Nassarius snails

2x Emerald crabs

2x Serpent Stars (look like they may be Ophioderma rubicundum)

1x Peppermint Shrimp

I also took the liberty of adding an ornamental I'd wanted for a while

1x Coral Banded Shrimp

I also got myself a couple of corals to start with

1-3x Xenia (The colony looks like it's on 3 little rocks. I'm debating whether to divide)

1x Birdsnest

3x Blue Mushrooms (They're really tiny, but I know these little guys grow fast)

I'll grab some photos of them in a bit. I'm letting them acclimate to the tank for a couple hours before I start to ramp up the lights.

I tried a Jager for my 5 gallon nano and was dissatisfied. I was getting temperature swings of about 4 degrees every day. I'm only trying to heat the tank to about 8 degrees above ambient, shouldn't be that hard.

I switched to the Cobalt Neotherm and it's been solid as a rock ever since.

I run a nano.

Eheim jagger

http://www.drsfostersmith.com/product/prod_display.cfm?pcatid=23726

That said. I was not interested in dropping $50 on a heater for temporary quarantine tank.

Thanks for the tip. It's cheap enough I'll give it the old college try

I'm setting up an incredibly small quarantine tank to quarantine new incoming frags. Right now the tank is approx 2 gal, I need to find a heater that'll keep it at a reasonable temperature. I've been looking at some of the "always one" beta heaters but a lot of reviews point to the fact that they have a nasty habit of just going berserk and cooking things.

Does anyone have a recommendation for a nano heater I could use?

I'm looking to pick up a second MP40W ES. Does anyone have a used one laying around that they're looking to offload for a reasonable price?

Thanks for all the response folks. I got a hold of SAM and will be stocking up on starfish tonight!

Lets say a half dozen -> dozen. I know they breed pretty quickly

I'll ping SAM and see first.

I know they don't typically reassign ports. I'll give it the ol' college try and see if that works.

Step 2 is figuring out how to tie it into an Android app.

I know this seems very, very weird; but I'm looking to lay my hands on a bunch of Asterina starfish.

I'd prefer if someone has them and *knows* they've not had problems with them eating coral, but if not I'll bite the bullet and just keep an eye on them myself.

Does anyone have a good method for doing live webcasting of their tank? I've got a spare webcam, and the know how w/ software and networking, but the sticky bit is that I don't have a staic IP to set up a webcast from. Is there a good software solution for working around that?

If there are *any* left, I would love some. Just starting out my brand new tank.

Most of my rock is <5lbs. (There's a few outliers, but nothing bigger than 20). I managed to track down some *seriously* light rock. We were at the store and both the clerk and I couldn't believe how much volume the 40lbs of rock I selected came out to be.

River City Aquatics FTW when it comes to live rock.

Don't they have a habit of jostling rock work. I'm only about 70% confident in the stability of my rock work at this point. I'm either going to drop some zip ties in or maybe bust out the putty (which works MISERABLY).

I tend to glue all of my frags directly to the rock work, so I'm not too worried about them grabbing frags.

I do love the way they look and act.

I'm going to need some help picking out some SPS specimens soon.

I know I want to run some Acropora, and I love Montipora. Any other recommendations? I'm looking for either incredibly vivid color morphs, or incredibly unique shapes.

Alright, you've sold me on them. I've always thought they were kinda cool.

How about Sally Light-foot crabs? They're creepy, but I wouldn't mind adding at least 1 to my Invert menagerie.

My concern with the Emerald Crabs is that aren't they known for being a bit nippy on the corals? Since my major though process going into this tank is a heavy coral/inverts tank I don't want to do anything that'll seriously jeopardize that.

Huzzah! We're off to the races. I still need to re-distribute the sand a bit, but all the rockwork is in place, the lights are hooked up, skimmer and pumps are running. So I'm going to give it another few days and then it's going to be time to add Cleanup Crew.

I'm going to stay away from Hermits and I think in the end I'm not willing to take the risk on urchins. So right now the leading contenders for 'da crew are:

15x Astrea snails

5x Nassarius Snails

2x Ophioderma appressum : AKA Banded-arm brittle star (Introduced later)

1x Valenciennea puellaris : AKA Yellow Diamond Watchmen Goby (Introduced later)

I know buy count for my 60 gallon bow that's a light list, yet especially this early on, I'm going to keep the numbers low. As I see things start to pop up I'll bolster the crew as necessary.

Some of the bigger pieces are over 10lbs a pop. Particularly the 2 big plates. (See photo below)

I had already picked up 2 kinds of putty that River City stocked. Both the purple and the green stuff. I just get jittery any time I'm putting stuff in the tank that doesn't *need* to be there.

If I later decide I'm not happy with the rock structure, is it something simply like striking the putty bond with a chiseled to get it to release, or is this one of those "when it's done, it's for life" type deals.

is there any risk with that 2 part epoxy leeching chemicals back into the water that are bad for the livestock?

That urchin idea sounds cool. I've always thought they looked cool.

On the topic of aquascaping, How do people secure their rock? I want to create one of those kinda neat hole-y layouts, but that all seem to defy gravity just a bit.

I'm hoping to find a way to dodge hermits. I've had a couple in my 5 gallon nano and they just stomp over *everything* I figured for a substrate crew the Diamond Goby would work, and perhaps a serpent star?

Is there a piece of livestock that in particular is good for keeping rock work clean? I'd love a mandarin, but I really want a captive bred one. This tank is too small and without a real 'fuge' so I'm afraid that a wild one (besides the ethics of wild collection) will starve.

Noooo... SSRs! I guess that'll put the two I have to work instead of just propping up my webcam.

I'm not familiar with SSR as an abbreviation. Care to clue me in?

Any chance we're fortunate to have an electrical engineer on the forum?

I thought I'd read if you keep the anemone on a piece of live rock surrounded by sand they'll stay put? I should have enough of a sand gap in the foreground to keep it anchored. Or do they just release at that point and go for a ride on the current?