aer0

Any feedback at all? any suggestions for the tank going forward?

specifically what Cichilids are you keeping in there? Many american Cichlids dont actually require that high PH, Alkaline water, you mention Africans... specifically what Africans are you keeping? So i would look at what your tap water PH is, many people have great success with that lower ph water as the fish do adapt... but if you are trying to re-produce fish or keep them in the most ideal habitat then yes replicating the water conditions of the natural environment is most idea. Ive never kept limestone rock in my tanks but I do run coral rock in my African tanks, my filter on my African tank has 3 media trays, 2 of those media trays contain broken up coral rock, this has two effects, biological hosting of the good bacteria for my cycle and the additional benefit of having a natural higher PH level. There are products around like PH up and proper PH, but these are going to require constant dosage and monitoring as you do water changes... one hopes regular water changes... As for your fish not eating your plants, again its specific to the breeds, what diets you are naturally providing for them etc... Cichlids wont ALWAYS eat plants, but they will if they want, and if they are not being fed the wide range of food they want they will... they will also dig, pick up your plants and leave them floating about, kill off new shoots... then again they might not and you might be someone lucky enough to have fish that leave your plants alone EDIT: DavidR's link is spot on, that article explains it better than I ever can

This is my workplace fishtank Its around 50l, its a nice glass tank, i dont know what type of glass but its utlra clear and really nice, its finished well with black silicon. At the moment ive got a 30cm t5 light with a sunglow tube, im going to build my own replacement LED array to replace this one day soon, but for now its ok. Im running a Boys EF-05 external mini canister filter, its designed to work for tanks upto 100 litre I think so being on a 50l tank its going to be just fine for me, I dont think i'd personally trust it on anything bigger than 50l. its got a large foam secion and a second section with a bag of ceramic rings and a bag of activated carbon - I love how the carbon leave the water super crisp. Its got my spare jebo heater in at the moment, my previous was on the fritz so was removed, ill be replacing the jebo with an ehiem E series soon. Im running a white silica sand bed, quite deep... I like the look and its not that hard to keep clean... loads of rock/caves for the fish, some coral rock/river pebbles and some other types of rock. Light planting, 3 plants that are constantly being attacked by my fish... i don't know what type of plants they are. They are not in the best condition really but I wanted to try use them to keep the nitrate levels down along with providing a bit of a tankscape. This tank is supposed to be light entertainment/distraction for me at work, Its got some juvie Cichlids in it, a revolving bunch of fish as they get bigger im moving them on to my 400l Cichlid tank at home. This is the tank in live action, running an old filter: And this is the tank as at today. My two Electric Yellows One Two And the Three plants One Two Three

Ok so I ended up installing those lights, I had already bought them sorry wellydave so I might as well use them and see how they go. Ive installed everything except the UV LED's, im still building the correct enclosure for them and the required resisters etc. I bought one of these http://www.trademe.co.nz/electronics-ph ... 935482.htm So im using the 240 -> 12v that once powered the original halogens to power this... on permanently is one strip of blue then running off the timer, currently 7:30 till 21:30 is the replacement MR11 LED's i spoke about earlier along with a second blue strip LED and a white strip LED. once completed the UV LED's will be on this circuit and maybe some other coloured ones as I still feel its very "cold looking" I can run more of this setup, power supply can be upgraded easily based on the way i laid it all out... so again, pics time this is the setup inside the original light hood, 3 strip lights and 2 replacement MR11 LED array's with my hotglue on light covers to protect from water horrible photo but this is the night lighting, single LED strip on... its actually a lot darker than it looks but ive only got the iPhone for tonight. And this is the tank with all lights running, the dettol can i put behind the tank so you can see how its pretty clear all the way through. Ill get the nice camera out tomorrow for some good photos when the zoas are all open, i think they got upset with me messing around with the lighting tonight

you on the hunt for one too eh Dave...

at the moment having your tank bare like it is for the cycle process i'd probably have the crab in the main tank... this way you have "some" life in there and you feel less inclined to populate the tank early. this also gives you time to work out what he is and decide if you want to keep him or pass him on. Primo looking tank by the way, I can see good things coming there

so im going rant a little more now that im awake (3 coffee's down) another way you can look at it again planted sump... things like Cichlid tanks, requiring more high ph water and they are also digging little buggers right... so making it hard to have a planted ciclid tank. So im sure there are some nice plants out there that you can put in the sump that will help maintain nitrate levels and still thrive in that higher PH water. on the flip-side of that all... if you really wanted to go this way you could run the sump like a planted display tank? thusly having a fish populated main display then a beautiful planted tank below that happens to be on the same water loop and acting like your sump...

the way i think of it, the sump's main goal is the better health of your display tank right... so anything you do in there should be with that goal in mind... So.. filtration using rock/filter foam/whatever hospital area for sick/attacked fish plants/algae for healthy display tank removal of heater and other ugly items from display in the case of marine, skimmer in there too thats just my view on it... i'd love to incorporate growing some edible plants into the sump area, if they help with nitrate remove and full my tummy then im all good with that! you could build some kinda hydroponics type setup using it...? EDIT: a quick google of this brings us to "Aquaponics" http://community.theaquaponicsource.com ... aquaponics

woah, 850l for your first marine tank! im quite Jealous tank looks good, loads of LR in there.. what are you using for lighting? Skimming?

what about some bumblebee gobi? I was in Napier over the weekend and know the petshop over by Onekawa has some in stock

nice work im epic jealous of your tank

yeah good point, I could remove all the lighting i have there and replace with something much nicer... however you are right its down to how much I want to spend... And being that im on a tight budget with this and I enjoy doing things myself i'd like to do it that way if i can

flow is being taken care of an Aqua Syncro HWM2000 rated at 600l/h the standard HOB filter is also providing a bit of water movement is it flows back down in

My Jack lives with Electric yellows, demasoni and blue zebras thats about normal though right

good point these are the MR11 replacement's http://cmledlighting.co.nz/led-replacem ... ol-white-1 previously described as "0.7W wide angle MR11 globes that fit into the existing halogen fittings. These are rated at 6400 - 6600K." not sure if thats accurite these are the strip lights http://www.jaycar.co.nz/productView.asp ... rm=KEYWORD http://www.jaycar.co.nz/productView.asp ... rm=KEYWORD so I have one strip of the white and two of the blue and these are the UV LED's http://www.jaycar.co.nz/productView.asp ... rm=KEYWORD I have two of those but can easily buy more to suit or other colour LED's to build into the array if you all suggest?

Is there such a thing at too much light? At the moment im running the two MR11 LED array's during the day but they switch off at night. Ive just purchased three small LED arrays 2xblue and 1xwhite to add to the lighting and run some night lighting in the tank... Ive also bought 2 UV led's i was thinking of adding to make the coral "pop" if you know what i mean... is this a good or bad idea? what i was planning on is having the following running during the day 2x MR11 LED arrays's as displayed earlier in thread 2x blue LED strip lights 1x white LED strip light 2x UV single LED's for "pop" factor then between 9pm and 8am it would just be 1x blue LED strip lights 1x white LED strip light 2x UV single LED's for "pop" factor or should i have less at night, remove the UV's at night or all together?

i think I have a few fish that are the result of this, or something along the lines of it.... ill take a photo tomorrow

thanks, current mission is finding flat slate/rock so i can build loads of caves for them

like hitting the rebellious teenage years

thanks Wellydave, yeah you are spot on.. i got them from petcentre in Lower Hutt Im glad its not just me or something im doing wrong then... I wonder if its going to get any better or any other Zoa's i put in will go the same way. here are a couple more photos

hey all, Are there any members on here that breed interesting/rare pec's and sell the fry? looking at some of the prices in LFS... these fish demand a high price, im just wondering if there are private breeders out there selling for less or having stuff LFS dont get. im looking for L240's gold nuggets etc...

So i know im pretty new to everything marine, I appear to be learning the hard way... it looks like my one and only startup coral is a bit sick looking.... this "was" a nicely coloured green zoa, can anyone suggest whats happening to it? have I got insufficient light or bad water? Im doing 20% water changes once a week due to only having stock filter running on this tank. am using NSW as you can see it has some weird white looking spots on each head... the heads all open each morning when the lights come on and close at night so all active just not looking well

i buy mine from countdown lower hutt normally, not sure if upper hutt stock it.. its a good price and you can re-use the bottles to store NSW or RO water in

sorry all but Oscar didnt make it I wont be getting another Oscar for a while, I need to finish my African tank before I start on another tank for my office. Im thinking of upgrading the tank I keep at work to something large enough for an Oscar, do you think 150l is big enough for one Oscar, or should I aim for bigger?

you can buy puredue