tHEcONCH

3-4 cubes of brineshrimp, a nip of Reef Solutions, a nip of Reef Plus, plus a half teaspoon of Reefroids 2-3 times per week. Sometimes I add pureed (sp?) shrimp / prawns / muscle or a nip of Koralfluid. Last night everyone got pureed fresh muscle for a treat. Don't try this at home, kids - it takes a while for the biofilter to adapt - and I do a lot of water changes too. I really should get a real skimmer.

I tried, but I couldn't get it into an envelope :oops:

Sure - but it is nothing pretty! Just an 80 litre tank with a few bits of rubble and weed in it :oops:

Maybe I should post some pics of my feeding - you'll be horrified! But I should say that I think Zaita is right about Mandarins being generally hard to maintain in small aquariums like RSMs, and he is right to be concerned about how I will maintain two in such a small tank - I am too, to a degree. That said, I have a very good population in the RSM (largely due to very heavy feeding) - in fact with one Mandarin I could always find pods running around on the glass at any time of the day. I've also set up a second tank with no fish specifically to grow a range of small feed organisms, and I have a home available for one of the Mandarins should things begin to go badly. I will put the welfare of the fish ahead of my ego.

One more action shot:

Yep, mine's going bananas too :-?

Thanks for the advice I'm putting pretty much any small organism I can find in the 'random critters' tank into the RSM - I'm pretty sure they (the female at least) does eat little amphipods, but if not then I don't think there is any harm in adding them anyway. I'll keep people updated.

I'm growing them and amphipods etc in a seperate tank, but I plan on making some sort of sump as well - plus I ocassionally harvest out of someone else's sump just to be sure. I'm mindful of their requirements, so if either show signs of weightloss or stress the male will be going to a new home.

I just released the male on to the other side of the tank - of course they immediately saw each other and spent the next 20 minutes dancing. Now they follow each other around the tank

A few random pics: Photosynthetic Gorgonian frag Black Sun (Tubastera Diaphana) Orange Sun Tubastera Faulkneri Hungry Oxypora MANdarin and friend...

AHHH!!! Stupid slow interweb again!!!

And yes, that nipper approaching from the bottom right did get me Gooood!

Largish Blue Tip Acro frag for sale here: http://www.fnzas.org.nz/fishroom/here-v ... tml#314415

Awesome pics as always

What do ya mean? That was last night... :lol: Here's some more after I loosened up a bit...

What about a black light and disco ball for after hours?

Most shops restock weekly or fortnightly, so they could well have been new. Your temperature sounds fine - so just wait. Watch out for brown soft 'rot' at the base of leaf 'stalks' - if you get that, pull that leaf off.

A coffee machine, big TV, and free interweb access?

Hi there - don't be too alarmed - most plants offered for retail sale are grown hydroponically and so have 'air' leaves which the plant must drop and replace with 'water' leaves once submerged in a tank. If they have already done that and are not growing well, then it is most likely a heat (excess) or nutrient related issue. Flourish Excel seems to be a good fix for most plant problems.

Hell no - most of us just use Figian rubble

Not really... officially legitimately like... but I could embed it in something else...

I've actually ditched my fancy JBL auto-CO2-dosing-PH-measuring-valve-shutting-toast-making set-up because the plants grew too much - I was pulling hand fulls out every week just to make room for the fish. It certainly works, but sometimes a little too well :lol:

"A verbal agreement isn't worth the paper it is written on" - but 'cash' usually means that it is the final price and that they aren't going to declare the income for tax purposes. If he has now decided to put the job on the books, then I would think that the 'cash' price should become the gst inclusive price (i.e. $400 + gst)

Agreed.

I've started writing one for him - I really must finish it...