lduncan

Can you tell a difference of 5% in the test? A 5% in this sort of test isn't that significant considering weighing errors, reading errors, reagent quantity errors, printing errors on the slide comparison sheet etc. I guess you could always make the standard both ways, and see if you can tell the 5% difference.

Yes 14.4 grams is close enough. You can add the 5 mL to 95 mL of water is more acurate, but the error from a 5mL difference is going to be insignificant in the scheme of things.

not running rowaphos, or zeo stuff any more either?

If all types of corals are effected, I'd dump as much of the water as possible all at once, 100% if possible. Making sure that the replacement water is: • same or slightly lower salinity than existing. • same or slightly lower temp than existing. • pH is similar. Corals are hardy, they will recover so long as conditions are good. Making sure the water is right is the first part. Then i'd run halides for 4 hours a day for a few weeks, split into two 2 hour periods a day. This should stimulate zooxanthellae densities to increase. Those corals don't look dead... just bleached, they can recover. What bulbs are you using? Layton

Have you done any large waterchanges?

Good isn't it. Have you seen what effect it has on P and N yet? I won't run a tank again without UV. I never liked using carbon, UV does a much better job, plus it doesn't put more phosphate into the tank like carbon does. Layton

They have divided the tank up amonst themselves. They each patrol a 2 foot square of teritory. I have two females, and one male. The male sits in the middle, and alternates between the females in breeding. God knows how they get close enough to each other to breed though. They are always keeping the others out of their territory.

:lol: I have three of them. They have no problems chasing a much bigger sohal tang out of their territory. They're crazy enough to take on almost any fish... and win.

That's what people say when they don't have real proof to support their opinion.

like I said, depends on your definition of "good". Layton

:-? I'd say the opposite. Depends what you mean by "good" i guess.

Yip, they are not a true parasite like ich, they are just preditory animals, they kill healthy corals, and the corals seem to have absolutely no defense.

My observation of the monti nudibrachs is different to that. The green cap that I had, which was massive (14" +), and growing the fastest i've seen any coral (around 1.5 cm a week!) seemed perfectly healthy, and in a couple of weeks it was wiped out completely by the nudibranchs before I could figure out what the hell was going on. They definately attack corals which are healthy. The corals have virtually no defense against them. Layton

It's just the patronising snarky comments which make me not want to bother posting in the first place. I tried to design the mix above to be practical to make, based on workable volumes, weights etc to make it as acurate as possible given the situation. Layton

:roll: Well, don't worry wasp, if you find my advice too hard to swallow, i'm sure Randy's will do the trick too.

It's easy if you know what your talking about wasp ;-) It's a two second calc to work that out, no research needed. Doing it by volume is impractical, it's far more inaccurate. If you're worried about water (it's not very hygroscopic like calcium chloride is), you can dry it in the oven (couple hundred for 15 min should be more than enough time).

It's a species of coral eating nudibranch.

I see exam procrastination is still alive and well ;-)

I had an outbreak of those a few years ago, it wasn't one, it was a wave of them. They must have come attached as eggs. They were relatively easy to (permanently) remove though, unlike those damn monti nudibranchs!

Disolve 15.2 grams of potassium chloride into 1 litre of water. Mix well to dissolve. Then take 5 mL of this solution and dissolve it in 100mL of water. The resuting solution will be around 400mg/L K Just know, that without acurate scales it's hard to make an accurate standard. For example, following the above directions, then if you make a 2 gram error in weighing, then that effects the standard by about 50ppm. Layton

I think these potassium kits are using sodium tetraphenylborate, which forms a precipitate with potassium. What do the reagents smell like? Phenolic? I would have thought that it would be well suited to a colometric style test. The reason why there are no potassium kits around, is because no one cares about potassium levels ;-) ... unless maybe you're a doctor.

Is there a easy source of pure methanol? (i.e. free of denaturing agents you find in "meths") It's generally considered more toxic than ethanol Vinegar is an alternative.

I think there are/will be real problems with a very small number of specific species of fish, and in-particular anemones. But for the vast majority of fish, the population doubling times is low enough that the real impact of removing them is small. And as far as corals go, by far the most destructive practise is limestone mining for building material. Then there is global warming. Which has yet to actually show any real long term destructive effect on the reefs. All the hype about the reefs disappearing in the next 50 years, seems to be just that - hype (as convenient as it is if you want to get funding for research). They won't disappear, they just won't be in the same places as they are now. They will (and are) moving. They've done it before, and there's nothing to suggest they won't do it again. The hobby isn't killing the reefs. There are a multitude of other practises which are causing significantly more damage the fish and coral collection. Sure it's not helping, but for the most part, it's a drop in the ocean relative to the other reef killers out there.

and I though the crosshatches were expensive! You could probably fly to Africa, and personally collect one for less than that! The ultimate in cool looking uncommon triggers would have to be Xanthicthys caeruleolineatus

Nope. A full siphon when setup they way I have it, is self adjusting to this, and stays silent through both increases and decreases in pump output (within a surprisingly large range of flows). The physics makes sure of that. You'll see small changes in the water level in the overflow box, but the overflow will stay silent. The range of flows for which the overflow stays silent, is determined by you. No adjustment necessary. Set and forget. Layton