rainman

pfffft... 'sif DIY is bad. Check out Weatherson's DIY madness on RC if you want to see some DIY that is better than anything you can buy. Have a look at his ridiculous skimmer, for example. Here's another nice Aussie tank: Reef_bug's tank

got effort

no, sorry.

The sump is actually outside on this setup. It's a large pool-filter type container that is half underground. This helps with cooling during the hot winters and keeps most of the noise outside too.

This is the back of the big tank I mentioned above. Those are 20000k 250W MHs. Click here to see the front. I don't have the specs.

Yeah, there are a variety of local collectors and healthy trading between aquarists. The aquarium collection fishery is a limited entry licensing system with limited collection areas, relative to the zoning of the GBR Marine Park and World Heritage Areas (which was updataed on 1 July to conserve 30% of the reef), etc... The licenses go for about A$140000. Chimera, it's just algae producing O2 when they photosynth. I'm getting some hermits/snails to clean it up.

It's true that in Oz the local species (i.e. GBR) are quite cheap. Clowns and so forth are now commonly aquacultured. It's also true that imported species (esp. from Hawaii/Red Sea such as Yellow/Purple Tangs remain very expensive. Well, anyway, it's cool that you guys have an underground reefing scene in NZ!

Thanks pies. I'm heading over to a mate's place this afternoon actually. I might post up some pictures of his tank. It's a 8x2x2.5 in-wall number, you guys will wet your pants In the meantime, here's another couple of acro shots for the SPS die-hards: The little frag on the middle-right of the bottom photo is from a bright blue colony. It should colour up nicely.

Thanks. There's actually 5 fish, but they're all hiding. 1x sailfin tang, coral beauty, blue chromis, gold-head sleeper goby, bicolour blenny. The specs are pretty standard, with a great deal of DIY action. Equipment: 3x14x16 AGA with DIY overflow and durso standpipe, Resun 1/6 hp chiller, Ablite reflex reflector in DIY retrofit hood extension, 1x250W 14000k ballast and bulb, DIY denitrifying coil, DIY auto top-off, plenum in custom DIY sump, Queen 2000 skimmer (needs upgrading). Water chemistry: Temp 25-27, pH 8.4, Ca 420ppm, Alk 120ppm, Phosphates ~0.05ppm, Am. NO4. NO3. all 0ppm. Feeding and dosing: Artemia, Mysis, Rotifers, DIY two part Ca and Alk solutions as needed. Most of the corals are fairly recent additions. However, the have already started to encrust and grow and will hopefully fill it up a bit more. Here's a shot of the coral beauty... There are some more on my website.

Yeah, I'm sure they're right, but it's just such a shame. Everything must be so expensive and I doubt that you see that many SPS frags in LFS etc.. (not that you really do here, but at least you can order them etc...). It might hamper your efforts.

Here's mine...

NZ$70 for a bicolour blenny, you poor guys