SanityChelle

What were the water parameters?

Well, there's nothing important in there at the moment, and it's all out in the garage, so whatever colour it goes, it's kinda interesting.

This marine stuff is... well, pretty slow. Patience is a virtue, I guess. Only slightly browning so far. I've added in more food to feed the bacteria a little faster, so we'll see how that goes.

Might have to give it a go with my old bowl... :gpo2:

I do quite like the looks of those. I hope you are successful. :thup:

You could just get a 60L or so plastic bin, and sit the water aside for 24 hours or so. I don't the exact time it would take, but I've heard people do that to let the chlorine evaporate, so they don't have to conditioners. I haven't checked it myself in a while, so I would suggest doing a bit of googling on it.

You'll find you'll likely lose your twisted val if you're dosing Excel. 2 or 3 capfuls sounds like a lot, is that the dose for your tank size? Brown algae is usually a symptom of a newer tank. How long has the tank been set up for? I find it hangs around for a good few months after setting up, before slowly disappearing.

The lamp I got was bayonet, so I suggest picking the lamp you want first, getting it to see what style connection it has, and then try find your bulb to fit it. This is the bulb I'm getting for my marine tank, but I need to buy an adaptor as the bulb is screw in, while the lamp is bayonet.

:bounce: IT'S SO EXCITING!

The first setup! I found a little wp-10 wavemaker in a drawer that I had forgotten about (I knew I kept it for a reason!), so that's on there to get all the crap out of the rocks. It's just soaking in freshwater right now.

I went with the $10 black clip on light for my 40L marine tank, and will be buying an LED bulb from Aliexpress to go it in. There's heaps you can get though. https://www.thewarehouse.co.nz/is-bin/I ... ter=submit

Woo, got my light fixture, and have just ordered the bulb (and the adaptor because the fixture is bayonet, but the bulb is screw in). Coral I'll hopefully be getting this week from Petstop ( :phb: I know, but everywhere else around me only has huge rocks too big for the tank).

The question is: How did she lose her goldfish?

So... you lied?

I didn't see this was in the off-topic forum initially, and was really confused what type of fish this was.

Definitely keen on your offer! I've sent you a PM. I'm also looking at the marina slim 20 as a decent HOB to put carbon and purigen in. I'll be going on a coral scouting mission this weekend, so hopefully I'll find something that will work well in the space I've got.

Microsorum pteropus is all the same species: "an aquatic fern from southeast Asia, is highly variable with several different geographic varieties that vary in leaf size and shape". The different varieties haven't been 'unallowed' as such, they're just harder to come by in NZ. I had a piece of trident not that long ago, given to me as normal java fern. As Alex mentioned, it's mostly because people just don't do plant imports often anymore.

The best place to buy plants is on Trademe. They're far cheaper on there than any of the stores. http://www.trademe.co.nz/Browse/Categor ... region=100

Ah wait, that particular video is about someone else, and has been mislabelled. From Keng Lye:

The artist is Keng Lye. He's very clever, but very rarely sells his work outside of gallery exhibitions. https://www.facebook.com/pages/Keng-Lye/317060285087978

Obviously, I'm already planning a tank upgrade in my head, but I want to give marine a go in a smaller tank, just so if I stuff anything up really badly, it won't blow my bank account to pieces quite so badly.

Recently, I realised I could get away with setting up a marine tank without breaking my no-more-tanks promise thanks to the three bay tank I have in the garage. I used to use it for African fry and fighter fry, but have had a spare bay for a while, so finally, after lurking on Reef Tank Junkies for a while, I've decided to give marine a go in the spare bay. I'm a total newbie, but have been asking questions on NZRTJ, so I figured I should probably collect all that advice in to one place. Stuff so far: 45L tank - 44cm(L) x 35cm (H) x 30cm(D) Heater Filtration - 4kgs of live rock, and an internal/HOB filter for carbon/purigen Lighting - Clip on desk lamp + this LED bulb Water - Pure dew for topups, and NSW from probably Bethells Beach Refractometer Marine Test Kit - Will get off TM Cleaner Shrimp Possibly Citrinis Goby Possibly Turbo snails (have been recommended these) Corals will be mostly zoas, as I think they're gorgeous. I'm not sure of the jargon yet, but apparently it'll be mostly 'softies' and possibly easy LPS? I'll be getting this stuff slowly as I don't really have the funds to get everything straight away, so there's plenty of time for more reading up about marine tanks. Anything advice or help for super newbie like myself is totally welcome. :happy2: I AM VERY EXCITED. :happy1:

Haha, make sure you do your own research before you believe anything from Animates.

Also found this wiki page that suggests that there's another species (Marisa cornuarietis) that gets sold as ramshorn snails in stores, but aren't in fact related. So maybe these are these are the ones you've seen in stores?

I've never seen ramshorn snails sold at shops, so I can only guess what they are. As per the article I posted: