Pies

Layton - To be fair it didn't sound like you were/are using it correctly. My paramaters are the same as when I started. Nitrates sitting bellow 5, all other things are the same. I have noticed that my skimmer has been pulling out HEAPS more gunk the usual. I have managed good colour with my corals anyway but a few that have shown no evidence of every changing colour have done so and continue to change. I have posted many pictures of my SPS corals on this forum for people to judge the colours for them self. Other observations - Tank glass. I used to have to clean my glass every day, if I didn't the 2nd day algae would be obvious, and the 3rd day it would be think accross most the glass. Now I have not cleaned one section of the glass for 6 days, but needed to clean it today. This is a drastic change. I would also say that several corals I have had that NEVER grew at all have started too, without being moved. This is good. One problem with my obsevations - Light. I changed light bubls about 1 week into the Zeovit system. And I think that some of my changes can be attributed to this, which makes things more difficult. Reef has told me he has been having good coral growth and colour under his new bulbs (we are using different bulbs), which shows that new lights can make a big difference. Zeovit & Pies for the future. I am confident that I will continue the system for at least 9 months. I am also only using it as per Brendons instructions, this way if it fails or does not show results he cannot claim it to be in the way I used it. I would say that so far its been positive but I am not an easy sell. What say NickS and Steve? Pieman

IRA - I'm not offended but you are always so negative, you could have phrased your response better. Reef - Ira has got a reef tank and has successfully avoided the 'wall rock', he has insted gone for the '3 white rocks sitting on the sand' look. Pies

Encrusting and plating Montipora of some description. This coral was brown when I got it and has been growing well ever since. Its encrusted over 3 rocks, holding them together. Its also getting greener as it moves towards to the light.

Metellic green Acropora frag: 25th April 2004

I sense some friction, I think Brendon & Alois should just have sex together and spare the rest of us all this foreplay...

Geez Steve our tanks suck...

Thats almost double what I have paid on 5 seperate ocasions, they must like me, or not like you.

I spray paint the back of my tanks either BLACK, Sky Blue or Very dark green. Personally I think the backing paper looks tacky. YMMV. Pies

Both awesome! I like the idea of propogated coral sales. Looks like they had some great stock too, big corals in there like the birds nest etc. Have to be patient or have a massive facility to do it though I guess? Very nice.

3TB seems like a lot, how do you end up with 3TB of disk at home? Thats more disk than we use at Parliment for 1100 users (in fact thats 3x more disk). Infact thats approx 2x as much disk as ACC uses accross all of NZ. You can buy a static from Telecom, not expensive. We don't need a static anyway though, if you've got 24/7 access and lots of disk I can organise DDNS for it as long as your running Windows or Linux (no Unix, no Sun, no Apple). 1-5gb should be plenty. Would also need a service to upload to it, FTP is OK for me but some form of easy to use htm would be better. Or better yet can you provide this service via the front end software running on you web site? Pies

URs backend is out, I am sure it will be back soon enough. We shouldn't be linking from there anyway. We need some perminant online diskspace and upload access, local would be best. I could do it from here but have no intention of running a PC 24/7. Anyone else got access to free disk?

Dissapointed that no-one else has joined in with some growth photos! Am I the only person here with corals growing? (Steve I know you have Xenia, Steve I know you have green star polyps). OK I started with this in June 2003, one of 3 of my original Acropora. When I got this piece it was badly receeded and the DARKEST brown. It has some Montipora Cap attached to the bottom of the rock. It was also covered in hair algae. This coral has given me some pain as its been fragged into 4 seperate colonies, this one is the 2nd largest, with the largest being about twice this size. I have swaped one pice and have another piece available for trade. I love the way the Montipora is growing around it, looking like a giant flower. The Acropora wins in battles vs. the Montipora, and often their is bleeching where the Acropora has attacked it. This is by far one of my best growing corals, under blues another pice has gone bright green but I like the yellow. Pies

Layton - Yeah and I still have some room for more, so hook a brother up! However: This one is brown, always brown... However it has stunning green polyps and grows well. Hints of metellic greens and some purple, wait and see... My current favorite. I think this may end up being a stunner. Its always been a deep purple/red colour, not its lightening up I think it will be a total purple thick branched encruster. AWESOME! Another coral that started life brown and is slowing shifting towards what I suspect will be green, it has purple/blue growth tips. Don't have another other good photos. I'll grab and update on the metellic green plate, sky blue plate later tonight. Also there are a few others kicking around in their but in awkward spots. I'll see what I can do. Pies

Photos! Good luck with it.

Here is a piece of Xenia given to me by my good friend JetSkiSteve. Is is about twice the size of the piece when I got it (a few weeks back), it is pulsing fast and looking great. I have another species of Xenia (pom pom, silver) which has been doing great but I notice latley its been a little faded. I have just moved it into my frag growout tank. I think something has been eating it, maybee my rabbit fish but not sure. Anyway here is a pic of mine, how about some pics of yours?

Well...

Overall I am fairly happy with the way this tank has gone. My tank is looking so much clearer now that I have removed small frags etc from the sand bed.

Well I lost momentum on this little project after starting it. The problem was that during this time I resigned from my job, found a new job, planed a holiday, am trying to buy a new house and went to Auckald for a week. So it was hard to stay focused. Initially I wanted to use an EHIEM 1262 to run the SCWD feeding the tank. Money has however stoped this from happening, I have a spare Ehiem 1050 (1200 litre/hour) so am using this. It does't pump through as much water is I would like, but my poor sump is working so hard I think it could do with a break. There is nothing wrong with the 1050 just doesn't stir up the tank as much as I would have liked. Water movement. A little confused on what to do for additional water movement for this tank. I would have liked to use another STREAM but it would blow this little tank apart so I needed something else. Sticking with quality equipment but wanting more random current I found a good qualityh (IKS i think) top loading electronic pump, second hand. 3000 litre an hr. I also brought the TUNZE adapter to run this on my TUNZE controller. These pumps sit out of the tank (above it) and only have a small piece of plumbing in the tank. More stealth than a power head and less heat transfer (because the pump is above the tank and out of the water). This is working well and swells the current nicely. Lighting. hrmmmm. Through the trade an exchange I ended up with an Arcadia series 3 pendant for the tank, with 1x 250watt MH & 2x 2ft T8s. The plan for the 3 ft tank was to use 2 exisiting Arcadia ballasts I own but in the end I got the Arcadia for a good price so what could I do? This unit looks great and works well. I am getting some intense glitter lines on this tank, it has a 14k Arcadia bulb running at the moment, which is bluer than my tank and slightly less intense yet still very crisp. Plumbing to and from the sump is provided via my new favorite kit, the 19mm black PVC irigation pipe. I am so happy with my laser cut perspecs overflows I had made. These are PERFECT and will be identical for my next tank, but I will make lids to keep the light out. Also I cut the standpipe a little higher than last time, this means less noise as the water doesn't splash into the overflow box the same. Stock. Currently a few pices of live rock and lots of coral scraps. This tank is a refugium/coral growout tank. It will have 1 fish and other than that just rock and coral. I am not going to put much rock in either, just a few bit pieces to help give the tank some dimention and something to attach a few soft corals too. It has a light dusting of sand (5mm-1cm max). Ohhhh and its full of glass shrimp right now. I have noticed a few spawnings in my tank latley, and I suspect its these shrimp in the refugium. Great live food for the coral and fish, so I am loading the system with shrimp. Ocasionally once gets sucked back into the tank, where a hawkfish chases it and eats it. Live food, GREAT. So thats it, the whole this is running from the existing sump, so other than adding more water I don't need to do anything differently. The thought of running 2 skimmers and watching 2 tank paramaters is a scarey one and I don't think I would have time to do that, so this works out well. Also the intention to not add fish to it means my system is being 'diluted & increased' which should help stablise my paramaters, reduce the need for as frequent water changes etc etc etc. Its all good I hope. A pic: Pies

I have had 7 boxes (20kg+ live coral and fish) sent to Wellington from Auckland this year with PACE, $75.00 per 20kg, next flight same day priority. Just checking my invoice from ZeovitNZ, who sent me a box containg several corals, snails and some product, same day (sent at 10:30am in my possession by 1pm) $82.00. I assume this is because it was over 20kg. Pies

IRA - I offered to get you the test kits as a favor, but I was unable to confirm you a price, you told me you didn't know what you wanted without knowing a price. I even offered to loan you mine, you declined. I am glad you are getting them somewhere else, saves me the hastle of having to deal with you. As for the skimmer story, not sure you being completely honest, but to be completely honest I don't care. Get over it? Never my problem to begin with... PACE same day will do 20kg for $75.00. I wouldn't want my rock to be out of water for much more than a few hrs, will help reduce any amonia spikes from die off. Won't matter in a tank with no life, but I would be concerned about it in my own tank. I would reccomend getting as much of that rock as you can while its available. Equipment is always around, good rock (especially at the price) isnt. You could argue that rock is the single most important part of the whole system. Good luck Pies

IRA - Stop your moaning, I tire of your endless 'poor me' attitude. The reason no-one bothers to tell you about anything thats around or to help you out is because you always know better anyway and don't take the advice offered. Hence the reason you ended up with the skimmer you have. However in spite of my own good judgement here is some help: Reef has a brand new 250watt pendent MH DE (double ended) for sale for less than $500.00 including a new bulb (10kBLV but he would sawp it for a Coral Vue 12k or 14k if you asked nicely and thats what you wanted). NickS has a skimmer for sale, its been running his large (600 litre+) tank no problems. JetSkitSteve has (or had) some ehiem pumps for sump/circulation. Reef has/had some Hagen power heads. JetSkiSteve has access to some GREAT live rock complete with mushrooms, copepods etc, infact I might take it myself. I have offered to get you test kits and additives but you made it to hard for me. What about posting a WANTED add this boards T&E section. Pies

I agree with Warren 100%. I use 2 300watt on my 1200 litre saltwater reef, and one of them is set to come on at 20degrees and sound an alarm, so its just a backup. 2 heaters in a small tank is DANGEROUS. Take my word for it the chance of a heater sticking on is far more commin than one failing. 2 heaters is twice the likleyhood of this happening. The fish can survive just fine at a lower temprature for a while, a higer temprature will kill them. I have been using Visitherm heaters (glass ones, not the newer stainless steel ones) for many years without complaint. I have tried others including Ebo Jager (the most expensive ones), and will stick with the Vistherms. Good luck. Pies

Doch - Since your in Auckland you should organise a trip out to the shore and meet JetSkiSteve, look at his tank and ask him some questions (you won't mind right Steve?). Doch - The LFS (Local Fish Shops) are interested in ONLY one thing, you success is not in their best interest. Take is slowly. When I started out I didn't buy a single thing without discussing it with Steve or Reef first, between the 2 of them they have saved (and cost!) me thousands. Doch - The rock you brought (dry white rock right?) is OK, but its dead. It will liven up, given much time (6 months or more) so its not wasted. JetSkiSteve has a line on some very good (and old which is good) rock, even if you can only afford a little this will help seed your tank and introduce some bacterrie, algae (the good stuff, purple) and other little critters you can't get from the dead white stuff. IRA - There is quite a bit of 2nd hand stuff around at the moment, and many bargins to be had. We (through JetSkiSteve, thanks again steve) got a double 250watt metal halide light fixture (Arcadia Black) with a centre PC moon light for $400.00. A very good price. We got a GREAT skimmer a month or 2 ago, $400.00 for an Turbo Floater 1000. There is a GREAT TUNZE insump model for sale (from you good mate Reef) for under $600.00, its only 2 months old and he has been testing it in a small tank. There may even be a (mine) DelTec apf850 ($900) as I have found a DelTec APF 900 2nd hand. Steve has decked out a whole tank for a Friday, with all stock, rock and sump + skimmer in 2nd hand gear. Got to be in to win. Good luck, stick at it. Pies

I mostly agree with what Reef has said: 2nd hand is the way to go and JetSkiSteve is the man to talk too. There are some cheaper options for skimmers but ultimatly a good skimmer is worth the $. Most people who buy cheap ones end up buying an expensive one later, so why not cut out the first step? Lighting in a shallow tank normal fluros are 'OK'. But the type of coral you can keep is going to be limited (still some nice stuff out there). If you can't afford it all or are more interested in fish than coral good fluros are OK to start out. Reef didn't mention test kits. For a new tank you will need Amonia, Nitrite, Nitrate & KH. You may also need some supliments (KH/PH Buffer). Salifert is a good brand and more affordable than you may think. AVOID Hagen test kits. Reef also didn't mention rock... Live rock is often over $10 per KG, I have over 150kg in my tank, I suspect reef has over 250kg. If you can afford it pay extra for the better quality rock, its the MOST important part of the system. Reefs sentiment about the cost is right, not sure about the amount. The thing to remember is that if you don't have the money, you chance of success is greatly limited. So I would say if money is tight, then hold off for now, save and study. I am not willing to say how much my tank has cost, but to give you a hint I think I have spent about $5,000.00 more than I intended (excluding stock!). Good luck. It is a great hobby and I've met some great people so don't let me or anyone else put you off it, just understand the commitment before you start. Pies

250watt 10k BLV here.