Pies

They are on most lists of 'unkeepable' fish, even public aquairums struggle with them. I have watched parot fish eat live coral many times, and the reefs are scarred with parot fish teeth marks. I would leave em well alone. Pieman

Agree with Layton, very hard to get cost effective titanium pipe/coil and plastic won't conduct the heat. As for moving the tank, even if a chiller was 1 million dollars *add austin powers accent there* it would be better than moving a tank. Good luck, I too have concerns about heat over the summer as our new house is so much sunnier than the last. Be interested to see how everyone goes. Pie

You can wire the fans onto the same timer that runs your lights, that way they are on with the lights, and off with the lights. How hot is it getting? Most fans will knock off between 2-3 degrees. You can also raise your lights. Chillers are damn expensive, both to run and to buy. Pie

$1,200.00 for the TS24 kit from memory, approx 15months ago. I am on the lookout for 2x STREAM pumps, 6100 or 6200 (or 1 of each). Anyone whos looking at sourcing some (alois? chimera? steve?) please let me know i'd be keen for 2. Also I have a TUNZE 4way controller for sale/trade without pumps. This is the normal TERBELLE controller (same as the one that comes with the TS24 kit) and has the light diode thingie with it too. Perfect working order. Piemania

Pretty bold statement for someone who 'works' for a bank! You couldn't get a job with me anyway, skills and intellegence required. As for why don't I bring something in? No need, others are already doing it. However I don't see how supplying goods for profit can be considered supporting the hobby, more like feeding off it. However if your saying you will sell to us all at your cost or there abouts, I take it all back and am sorry for my comments. I guess the personal insults continue until the mods step in (where are you, I'm waiting.). All that aside, the products that Alois brings in a very good, I have brought lots of stuff from him, fish, corals, lights, test kits, STREAMS etc and can't complain about the products or the price. I hope Alois continues to bring this stuff in as there is obviously a demand for it. Pie

Ben - I've used both NSW and ASW at the same time without issues. I will revert to ASW in emergency situations and so far it doesn't appear to have caused me any issues. Pie

Alois Walloner - Stop editing your posts after I reply! None of that stuff was even there until after I replied! Ohhh its a hobby for me, its business for you mr "Deltec, when only the best will do". I take offence at being told to get a life, I dont think personal insults are allowed on this site, I don't insult you although now I am woundering why. If you want to insult me, give me a call and do it directly don't hide behind your keyboard. Get the thread back on track - Don't forget I am running streams, sold to me by you, after you had already used them and said they were no good. Its good to see you finally following my lead, taking my advice and using them. Pie

Why do you feel the need to insult me? Pie

And of course if you do want to buy 'the real thing' Reef will sell it to you. Reef have you checked out any of the DIY STREAMS? Nope? How do you know nothing beats the real thing? Bad for business to find out? Pie

T5 on at 11am T5 on at 11:30am Halides on at 12:pm Halides off at 11pm T5 off at 11:30pm T5 off at 12:00am Reverse light sump

Layton that sounds perfect. Can you pm/email me the details? I assume you can help me with wiring diargrams? Probably won't do it myself but 3 of my team are electricians so will ask them to do it for me. So for $90.00 you got EVERYTHING you need to run a buld except the bulb? If so that sounds like a perfect option. You are obviously happy with them? Also what bulbs are you using? How much and where from? How about a pic of your tank with the 3 bulbs running? Thanks for your help, I am very keen to get the lighting sorted. Piemania

Progress? A Little Well the tank is at 'stage 1' for fullness. Its as full as its going to be until I get the rockwork sorted. Its running on the overflow using my new 'system' that allows me to drop the height of the water significiently. This has worked out much better than I had hoped. The split overflow system will also provide a platform to attach 2x streams too later, info to come So i've filled the tank. The next big job was to connect it to the existing system, which was completed on Saturday. This means the existing tank got a 1000 litre water change! Oddly everything is looking fantastic! It also means the new system is now being freshwater topped up (auto), kalkwasser is added, water is skimmed etc. This was a big milestone and I am glad its all over. My 3 foot sump is now running 3 tanks and its a little over worked So i've moved all the rock from my sumps (not entirely true, i've moved all the larger pieces) up to the main tank. Its just resting on the reef racks, seeding the new tank with life and letting me see the rock for getting ideas about aquascaping. I will start the rockwork next week, too much on this week. I've also moved up a few soft corals. This has been done only to give me some room to move in the other tanks. So they are just littered about the tank. Not sure exactly what I will do with the softies, I want to keep some and they have NEVER looked as good as they do right now. I suspect I will keep one end with softies (the bommie) and the other end with stonies. But as always this is subject to change. I was also given some snails/conches to help as a clean-up crew. WOW these little things are so small, yet eating soooo much algae. Note one of the photos captures a couple together and some nice golden diatom too These things are small, maybee .5cm long but eat heaps. I also introduced 2x Astrea snails today. So thats it for progress, looking good, starting to get algae growing which has to be a good sign. All the fish are OK, no leaks or anything going wrong or in need of a change. So far its all gone like clockwork, nothing hasn't worked out perfectly and its all looking good. Fish are still months away (probably) but corals will start to be moved into the tank soon as possible. I still need to source a return pump (thanks again for the loan of yours Steve) and lighting. Anyone selling any 400 watters? I have a few options but still arn't 100% yet. Going to put it off as long as possilbe or until a deal too good to pass up comes through. Pie

Whats the pipe on the front of the sump holding the skimmer the points down but isn't connected to anything? Looks like maybee some kind of disconnected bit without any bung or stopper on it. Pie

Created as a place for scientific study, the reserve has inspired its many visitors. Being able to swim amongst thousands of friendly fishes, has first created awareness, then awe, followed by support for saving the sea. When the marine reserve was opened, education was never mentioned as a potential benefit. However, over time, as the environment around Auckland degraded further, schools chose to travel for two hours to find a place with marine life and clear water. Feeding the fishes became the most popular activity inside the marine reserve, and reached problematic proportions. But stopping it altogether, created other problems. Choosing the right size and shape of any marine reserve is critical to its later success. There are important lessons to be learnt. the access road To cater for the increased amount of traffic to the beach, the Goat Island Road was upgraded, causing masses of mud to enter the marine reserve - yet nobody took action. Why? The land forms an integral part with the sea, particularly where run-off is dominant. The steep agricultural land around the reserve has suddenly begun eroding, with devastating effects. When a marine reserve is successful, the fish stocks inside build up to the extent that they become hard to resist for poachers. It just pays to fish inside. Read the story of the sunken car wrecks. policing Local and visiting users are the best agents for policing the marine reserve but it can be annoying. Amenities like parking, rubbish containers and toilets become more urgent as the reserve attracts more people. Marking the sea with buoys, moorings and markers is necessary. The marine reserve protects scientific experiments, allowing scientists undisturbed study of the sea but recently, research became more and more politically focused. Monitoring is important for any marine reserve but it should focus on all species and whether the reserve's objectives are being met. It could be argued that a marine reserve could run itself, but wherever people congregate, some form of management is needed. The centrally led management of the Goat Island reserve has shown that it leaves much to be desired. *stolen from seafriends*

Is Goat Island actually a reserve? I thought it was a sacntry not reserve? A sacntry is just a place deviod of fishing but a reserve has concervation measures taken. The reason I ask is that I have been to goat island. Yes it has lots of fish, but there is nothing natural about it. Zillions of fish begging to be hand fed food from anything human. First of I would like to say that I am a supporter of reserves/sacntries. I don't eat seafood and I love to dive If you look at Kapati Island, 1/3 is a reserve. As a diver I have dived both the reserve and non-reserve parts. I can tell you its no different in the reserve than outside of it. As it turns out we know what parts are reserve and what arn't, shame no-one has educated the fish/crays etc. Comercial fishing is bad. Sustainable fishing is just 'marketing lipstick' to make people feel better about there purchases. I worked at Sea Lord Fisheries for almost 5 years, there is nothing sustainable about taking 10s of thousands of tonns (tons) of fish product a year. Yes there are quoters, but like all things legal there are as many loop holes and work arounds as there are protections. e.g. There are some islands in the pacific (atols) that are only above water for a few days every month a few months of the year. They are 'owned' by NZ. During the time they are about water they are hammered, as the rules for fishing inside and outside of the 12 mile limit change. So as soon as the technology shows they are above water, hundreds of fishing boats lay it wait, hammer it. e.g. (changed by law recently). Factory boats who can process there own catchs on certain foods (Hoki for example) weigh it in finished product, not in raw product. You get a lot more fish in a tonne (ton) when you arn't weighting skin, tails, heads and guts. e.g. Scampi, watch the news. And don't get me started on the whole 'Maori' tribal fishing debarcle. The planet is slowly being raped, don't expect the reefs to be treated any differently than anything else. Piethedistroyer

Suphew - Thats a bummer man Insted of lids does your tank have a lip around the outside? Also a tall collar can help. Maybee you will have more luck with your new tank Pieman

RnB - Wrong. Its a documented fact the coral spawning on the Great Barrier Reef is controlled by phases of the moon (ALWAYS 4 days after the 1st full moon in March or something as accurate as that). However moonlights are mostly gimmick for the marine tank and un-nessessary but can make viewing at night more fun. Pie

I wasn't allowed a big tank either, so I had to settle for what I have now

Asian food store. The also have lots of other 'seaweed' type products that I feed on ocasion. I've been feeding seaweed seaweed from the ocean a lot lately too, the fish LOVE it :>

If you put the pump and SCWD in the tank your NANO Reef will become a ULTRA NANO REEF, won't be much room left in there.

Yeah i'd love to see someone try and build a DIY Sea Swirl. They are great units but can't be too hard to make? Still I got my 2 for a sweet price anyway but they are well worth the investment IMO. Streams are OBSCENE for their price. But to be able to control the flow from 30%-100% thought the contoller is something you can't do with the DIY joobies, but you could always switch them on and off. JoeBlog, got some pics of your DIY Streams? Love to see em, what pump did you use. My biggest complaint about the Streams is the difficulty in hiding them. You can buy a foux rock to put them in, but its like $100.00NZ or more!!! TUNZE stuff is soooooooooooooooooo expenive. Piemania

Yeah sorry for the late notice, it was one of those 'lets just hope it works out' sort of things as I had people comming over anyway. Only 4 of us, but still lots of information, equiment and stuff for swap/trade etc. Looks like Jigsaw got a couple of MH Light Ballasts for trade of drilling a few holes. Anyone who wants calurpa from my tank can have it, a few mushrooms etc taken away too. We will try and organise this to happen every 4-6 weeks, and slowly bolster our numbers. Suggested we have each meeting at someone elses home to share the travel and to get ideas and see everyones setups. Good to see you all, see you again next time. Wellington Reef Keepers so far: Pies Suphew Jigsaw Barney W Steve A Ira Spinedoc Its a start. Hopefully there are others out there too who will tag on. Whos place is next and when? Piemania

LOL

Chimera - I don't appreciate you inuendo. Infact I find it personally offensive and I expect you to formally appoligise and remove your post. PC Pies

Heya Dan As Ira said the Ocean Motion does a similar thing to what you suggested. Also the SCWD it just a special 'T' plumbing joint with gears. It switches between the left had T and right hand T every 15-20 seconds depending on flow. They are perfectly silent and require no power. I am running one on my 3 footer and it works out brilliantly and works exactly how they say. It is driven by an Ehiem 1262 and is connected to my SUMP return. The Sea Swirl is an 'up and over' mechnical piece of plumbing. It swings the return nozzle back and forth accross a 90 degree arc. They can also be used on closed loops but have to be exteral of the tank, all you see in the tank is the L shaped elbow the returns water. These units require power, are perfectly silent. Personally I think the Sea Swirl are a MUST HAVE, they provide far more realistic water patterens and generate true randomenss. However they will probably not be enough and will need additional suplimentation from other sources. TUNZE STREAMS - These are just big powerheads. They are big and ugly and hard to hide. The are also obscencly expensive, with the pumps costing well over $500ea and the controller close to that (and thats at a major discounted price). The reason people use them is they produce a wide flow (called lamaner flow) which is good for corals where a pump sends a more forcefull narrow 'beam' of water. They also (the 6100, most common model) move 12000 litres of water an hr! this is the same as 4x Ehiem 1262 pumps, but the consume less power than a single 1262! This is why they are so popular, a great unit and the best way to give the tank MEGA circulation. Typically people use a combination of seveal different methods (I am using STREAMS x3 and Sea Swirl x2 + Ehiem 1262 x3). Hope that helps. Pie