beefytang

+ 1. I've got a lot of them too and my rock is getting white spots like you mentioned.

Austin isn't really big at all. Just TONS of traffic. And I wasn't kidding about the market up north being larger than Austin. There are more than 2 LSF in Arlington (I'm not even factoring in the entire metroplex). It's just that 2 were so exceptional I had to mention it. It's a numbers thing, I guess. There are more consumers, therefore more choice. I think all the LFS should check out their competition in other cities to improve their local offerings. It's a good thing. But often, businesses become complacent or blinded with the love of their own brand that they don't notice others might be doing it better elsewhere. Or they're just in it for the money. Also, in my observations, the LFS here in town seem more focused towards freshwater, with the reef stuff as somewhat of an add-on. 100% understandable. Freshwater is so much easier to deal with. You know that reefing is a lot more complicated and involved. It takes a certain level of dedication (and crazy) to set up a reef tank. Special equipment that costs a fortune. Hard to keep some of this stuff on the shelf in a small town because of the cost. But no one should be defensive about north vs south. We benefit from competition, not complacency or inaccessibility. At one LFS here in town I was asking about reef frags awhile back. The employee (perhaps an owner) scoffed at frags saying no one wanted them...only big colonies. To me that seemed really out of touch with the customer base. Not naming names because in spite of, I still love them and give them my money whenever possible. But sometimes I'm left wanting. I'm not alone either. Anytime anyone tries to set up a group buy, it's for these reasons. But the stores I was referring to up north were both big on the frag scene. One in particular actually had frag tanks low enough that you could view them from above (aka a real frag tank). Haven't seen that in Austin yet, except at Deep Blue (RIP). Lots of Chalice, Acans, Zoas, etc I rarely see here. They were REALLY into it. Also, you don't have to make a reservation to go into these stores. They keep regular hours, open at least 6 days a week. PM me and I'll give you directions and you can go see for yourself. You'll be blown away. And in turn, send me the names/locations of all the reef stores you mentioned here in town, Austin proper. I love going to a LFS! I've been to AquaDome, Aquatek, Gallery of Pets, and RCA. So if you say there are 12 in Austin, then there are 8 I haven't been to. Not interested in coordinating meetings at all. I do my part on ARC in other ways. And I give away a lot of free frags through ARC. Thankfully some reciprocate, others do not. Just playing devil's advocate on the meetings. Sometimes you can't get a ball rolling without making some noise. I mean come on. We don't have a meeting in eons and all of a sudden we're going to have a tour that one could argue consists of multiple meetings in a single day? When it rains it pours, eh? FYI I've lived in Austin, left Austin, came back. Thinking about leaving again. It isn't what it used to be. There isn't a lot to do here sometimes. Costs a lot. Traffic stinks. Trying to remember why I moved back. But you certainly remind me why I left the first time. That good ol' Austin is king attitude. Ugh. ;-)

I like small tanks, myself. But you have to think of the experience a large group of people would have trying to cram around a little tank in a person's home. It's like inviting a bunch of people over to watch a movie at youtube on a little computer screen. That's the nicest way I think I can express how I perceive the idea. I hope it isn't too harsh. I don't want to hurt your feelings. =D

True. Two of the nicest tanks I've seen from ARC'ers aren't even in Austin. Mike Delgato in Salado and the Mannings in Leander. At the very least, if a tour never happens, maybe someone will start a full tank shot thread soon.

Yeah tanks fresh out of a cycle or under 100 gallons seems a little underwhelming for a group tour. Maybe people like looking at bare live rock in small confines....OMG HEY LOOK A STOMATELLA! =) The really interesting tanks seem to be large, well aged and encrusted. Didn't know Marc's tour included the club. I didn't see any group shots in his article or anything so it gave the appearance of one-on-one visits. What happened to Headless? Did he enroll in reeferholics anonymous?

That's where reef networking comes in handy. Make a friend and get a personal invite. Marc Levinson did a tour here and made an interesting article of it on his site. http://melevsreef.com/pics/07/09/austin_tank_tour.html

I love our LFS here in Austin. You make do with what you have. But I don't think they are as much on top of reefing trends as they are up north. I'm not much of a customer anyway with a puny 20 gallon tank. But my point, and not well-articulated earlier, is that Austin is a REALLY small market. And the saltwater fish/reef market is especially small here. We don't even have a city aquarium and we're the capital of Texas. It's kind of a bummer. Getting together at people's houses for a meeting? I think it's a bad idea. All it takes is for one unfortunate incident and a cloud could hover around the "club". For example, someone steals something and next thing you know, everyone is suspect. Or someone gets mauled by a dog. Any number of things could go wrong. Plus, if you're going to have a meeting at someone's house, there better be a REALLY good tank involved or it'll be boring. I guess if people are willing to take a risk, it's their right. To each their own. If people want to fork off and do their own thing, more power to them. But I question whether doing such things under ARC would be a liability for Andrew. Personally, I like visiting people to view their tanks one on one. Most houses aren't all that great for big crowds. Even if you have a 100+ gallon tank, with 30-50 or more people it's impossible to view with any degree of comfort. What might be ideal is a frag swap at a community center but I'm sure something like that has it's own unique hurdles.

Supposedly we had a new meeting organizer assigned back in October. But apathy runs deep in Austin and nothing ever came of it. Probably best not to even bother with meetings. It's too small of a town with nothing going on really. I think meetings like the one at Mike's office is about as good as it gets, due to ample parking space etc. No dogs to deal with or tiny tanks. All the serious reefing seems to be going on up north or perhaps near the coast. The LFS are far more serious than they are here. In places like Arlington you have two LFS within a few miles of each other with massive 500 gallon tanks and corals etc you rarely find available here. In Dallas you have the World aquarium which puts anything Austin has to offer to utter shame. Not trying to be a downer or anything. That's just the way it is.

You're right about the pico. As tempting as it is, I'm sure it's a bad idea for a lot of reasons. I think I should be content with just looking at photographs of them on the internet. Def would like to have a Berghia or two for aptasia, though. Finding them in Austin is probably going to be a challenge though.

Those reflectors are really cool....never seen anything like them. I'm guessing they're designed that way to reflect light in random directions? And yeah PFO lighting has some nice stuff. Seen the prices on their 72" Solaris? Whoa...

hah yeah. the dreaded maxi jet kills em every time i bet.

It's a great looking fish. But I hear they're tough to keep. From what I understand, they often eat coral, are prone to dying (often caught using cyanide) and many suggest if one does keep them, not to house them in tanks smaller than 55 gallons.

I can spare a few if you really want some. One of the first saltwater creatures I was ever given was a striped serpent star. Still have it. It's very peaceful but rarely shows itself. I hand feed it shrimp about twice a week. Funny, I just found this starfish link a few minutes ago. The eight-legged starfish is really cool. http://www.scienceray.com/Biology/Marine-B...the-Seas.371893

That's exactly what it is. All sorts of stuff just vanishes right into that thing. Chromis, hermit crabs. My sanity. ;-D

Nice shots. I really like the wall pano. I noticed you mentioned on the notes you wanted to fix the seam on it, near the top. Easy to do in Photoshop. Invoke your rulers. Using the lasso tool or marquee tool, start a selection from the top left at 350 pixels, draw down just above the antennae (about 75px down), go to 750px, and close the loop. Feather the selection about 10 px then give it a horizontal motion blur of about 295px. Takes it right out.

Hehe yeah they're pretty swift. If you have any small rocks or frag plugs on your sand bed, try lifting one up...you'll probably see a few underneath.

Yes, that's what they are. If anything bugs our zoas, it's those things. I'll try your technique, although most of mine are burrowed in the vugular pores of the live rock. Makes it tough to get at them. Got new shots of the nudibranch. Hot off the camera. Found it on the rock it came in on. I think this one eats algae or clove polyps...thats what was on the LR when I bought it. Didn't buy the rock for the polyps, though so I don't mind it cleaning them off. But I think, as some have suggested, that they may pose problems later once the cloves or algae is gone. Gonna have to ball up and make a decision to get rid of them I guess.

Good question. I was wondering the same thing. I haven't seen them anywhere locally. LFS should start stocking them...from what I hear they're among the best.

Hey Mike! Yeah I've been through the pest nudibranch stuff when I first started keeping zoas...it really sucked. I do have some irritators, though...the micro-stringy sort that extend over 3-4" out of live rock etc. Not sure exactly how to deal with those yet. But as for the nudibranchs...fascinating little creatures. I hate to get all John Wayne on any of them before I know they're detrimental to our corals. Someday I'd like to make a nudibranch pico with some of the more exotic varieties. Saw some nice ones at RCA awhile back...tempting!

If they look like these you're fine: They're scavengers, beneficial to your substrate. I have a larger set of starfish that hide in one particular rock of mine. I've never seen the whole thing but whenever I feed the tank, it will gently extend it's legs out for some food. So I'll hand feed it a little something.

From the causal name "dime clam" and "jewel box clam" I was able to track down some more info: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spondylus http://www.conchology.be/en/availableshell...ylus&page=7 Since I don't know squat about clams, etc this is really interesting stuff. I think the ones I have are Spondylus varians.

Very impressive. I've never seen one of these before. Kudos on your ninja octopus-keeping skills.

Thanks Mike. I'll dig around and see what I can find.

My wife bought me a pair of rics. Each one had three mouths. Thrill! =D It was a great sale. Don't miss the next one, Robb. Lots of people there but they managed to get us in and out really fast with no waiting. The RCA crew is awesome, as always.

Here are the pics of the mussel and the nudibranch. The nudibranch seems kind of bunched up in this shot, a little more dirty than the last time I saw it. As you can see, it doesn't have all the frilly effects as the zoa eaters. The mussel is really small. About the size of a pinky nail.