lduncan

Anyone else find it humourous that this skimmer probably holds more water than some peoples complete systems! Layton

Yip, totally agree, I think I suffered from all three of those problems with my first tank! Layton

No, 150 Watts of Flouro is not as effective as 150 Watts of halide, this has been proven to be true over and over again. Although I have yet to see studies on the reasons why, I suspect it has something to do with the intermediatry step in flouro lighting, the phosphour coating. I believe there are significant losses in the amount of light "power" which is actually re-emitted. As far as lighting goes on my tank, I have two 400 Watt 10000K bulbs (over a 6 foot tank), and i'm very happy with them. I started with flouros, but once I got halides, I wouldn't even attempt a marine tank without them. Layton

JackJackJack The restriction of live rock, most soft corals, and also some fish species in New Zealand is due to MAF (Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries) regulations. I know that this is a frustrating matter for many hobbyists and importers here in NZ. No real logical reasons behind the species not permitted into NZ other than a lack of infomation at the time the list was compiled. Who knows, maybe they are trying to protect us hobbyists from lionfish venom, which must kill millions of people each year. ;-) The reasons for it not being altered are really due to time, cost, and all the red tape surrounding it. I know some people have done a lot of work on behalf of reefkeepers in NZ to get some of this stuff into the country legally. As far as prices for stock, you are much closer to Indonesia (where a lot of fish come from) than us so, freight is cheaper (a major component of costs for importers here) and you also have your own reefs on your doorstep (Don't know whether they allow collection though?) I guess economies of scale also come into it as well. Layton

I have to go with reef on this one, please do not buy any fish to put in the tank yet. Like he said, it is very different from freshwater. Most experienced FW fish keepers could setup a tank to house almost any freshwater species in a week or two and not incure any fish losses. This is where a lot of people go wrong when they move from fresh water to marine, they think that they can do this. Then they find out the hard way that it really can't be done. So please listen to what some of the people have to say, especially on this topic. They have a reasonable amount of first hand experience between them, and their tanks speak for themselves. Anyway, here is a peice of addition advice which I have found to work successfully on my second tank. You will go through a period during cycling where algae will go crazy (there is no escaping it really). Generally you will get a lot of diatom growth, which looks like a brown power coating on everything. In my opinion, this is the best form of algae, for the simple fact that it is easily cleaned, and skimmers are very efficient at stripping it out of the water column. So my advice is when you reach this stage, let it grow, and blow it off the rocks and sand into the water column every couple of days, and this is the important part. AVOID doing any additional water changes, I think when people see things go wrong with there tanks, they tend to look to do water changes as a quick fix to their problem, however, I believe that doing frequent and significant water changes can upset the equilibrium of a tank, which can often compound the problem. So my advice is really that excessive water changes can really cause more bad than good in a reef tank. Layton

Yeah, I can see where your coming from. But i would still prefer tropical. Each to their own I suppose. Layton

Why not go tropical marine, rather than cold water? Much more interesting to look at. Here are some pics of a 850gal (around 3400L) tropical marine system:http://www.reefcentral.co.nz/index.php?module=photoalbum&PHPWS_AlbumManager_op=view&PHPWS_MAN_ITEMS[]=7&MMN_position=14:4 Layton

How much cash have you got to play with?

From my various trials with lighting, i've come to the conclusion that really, there is no substitute for metal halide lighting. I run 2 400Watt 10000K bulbs on my tank, and that's it, no actinics or nothing. And I'm very happy with them. So I would recomend 2 x 250 Watt MH 10000K bulbs, (i'm assuming here that you would like to keep any sort of coral, from softies to high light stonies) As far as drilling the tank, in my opinion, for a tank that large, there is really no other option than to have it drilled (unless you want a lot of unsightly gear in the tank itself). The reason for this is two fold; 1. I've never seen a reliable self priming "siphon" overflow system yet. Meaning, if the power goes out, you risk you tank emptying onto your floor. Or if the siphon breaks, you end up overflowing your tank onto the floor. 2. The shear volume of water that needs to be moved is also too large for anything other than a drilled overflow. However, there can be significant problems with drilling old glass, as it becomes significantly more brittle with age. The only way to have a (glass) tank drilled is by a professional glass shop, which will have the necessary diamond coated hole saw bits, and even then they will probably not provide any warrany against breaking it. Speaking from recent experience, and considering your from Western Aus, you will need a chiller. A relatively expensive, yet indispensible piece of equipment. Layton

Sorry, that was a typo, the heater was $150. I decided, after hearing similar stories about heaters becoming stuck due to arcing "welding" them on permanetly elsewhere, that i would not buy a cheap heater. It is only a 150 Watt and is hardly ever on with my halides running, and several pumps. I think I was really lucky to escape with no fish loses, but my large pink pocillopora, is not looking so flash at the moment, I would really hate to lose that. Layton

Where can I get such a device? I have only ever seen these devices for room heating, which is obviously different from monitoring water temp. The only device that comes close is an aquacontroller or similar, which costs into the thousands, even for a basic one. There are a lot of "what if's" in this hobby, you do your best to avoid, however sometimes it is just not practical to prevent every little possilbe thing which may go wrong. It is unfortunate when things like this happen. Layton

Just letting everyone know about my new website, http://www.reefcentral.co.nz (very original ;-) ), You can read a bit about me, my tank, and all about my disaster of a weekend, tank wise, last week. Be sure to check out the image gallery, especially Steve Weast's tank! Layton