dan_from_nz

I've been hoarding around 100kg of Coral rock (dry) for a few years and no longer have space to store it. Wanting $4-8 per kg depending what quantities are wanted. If any one is interested? Currently stored in a wool sack with smaller rubble sized peices in plastic bags. Can help with transport depending on where you're wanting it. Please feel free to pm me for more details.

If you notice in the first picture (the coloured one) there is no substrate there, in the second there is substrate. The owner of the tank has obviously started breaking down their tank and stirred up stuff that was in the substrate, it would undoubtedly not change the conditions of the water as it was already in the water anyway, although stirring up the substrate will release the anaerobic bacteria giving off a sulphur smell which of memory is toxic to fish.

I say he is smart especially if he is a young boy How can they be getting ripped off the value of somthing is the benifits less the costs. The people that pay for them may get a good feeling by knowing they help a young child. I agree that yes you can get them cheeper but what are the costs involved in getting them cheeper? Time to learn where to catch them, time to catch them, petrol driving to catch them, time driving there Costs aren't puerly represented in $$$$ just what most of us focus on

I would sugest posting this in the saltwater section, you will probably get a lot more replys through there. Most marine tanks have sumps I am assuming you don't want to do this (it requires plumbing drilling of glass etc etc). My first bit advice would be to do alot of reading. Just like freshwater you will save ALOT by doing things right in the first place. are you wanting a fish only tank (FO) a fish only with live rock (FOWLR) or reef tank?

they are an awesome fish I have wanted one for ages but still haven't set up my brakish tank

I don't think it was blue enough to be cyno I don't know about forming a slimey sheet but I found it grew on the gravel and then started smothering my ambulia a customer of mine had the same thing

you may find your phosphates are not dropping because many phosphates are bound so will be leeching into the water as the waters phosphates are dropping making no change to your phosphate reading. I had a phosphate problem about a year ago and it took about 6 months of running jbl phos-ex (one pack a month) to get it down. It is also important you use a good food, with your discus because they have a short intestine track they require a high protine food you may find if your food has low protine you are having to feed them more creating more waste and leaching more phosphates into the water. Good luck Daniel

I have had this algea also, never seen it prior and even at 0.5 ppm phosphates it was still present

Ammonia gets more toxic at higher ph levels, I find the most important thing to check is ph. I test my tanks when there is a problem but always advise begginers to be alot more thorough in doing their tests as they don't yet know tell tale signs of somthing about to go wrong. Plus just because fish arn't dying doesn't mean they are living comfortably in the conditions they would in the wild. The biggest cause of disease in fish is stress and in my experience the most common cause of stress is the wrong ph Good luck Daniel

I have had a few pantadon butterfly fish they are one of my favorite fish. I never heard of them eating adult guppies but know they will eat a top dwelling fish as large as a hatchett. They are a neat fish but don't like change at all and I found were a little harder to keep, I had one die once because my baby fighters got out of their breeding trap it ate them then wouldn't go back to dry food after being fed live food.

Wow Nice tank steve, I have seen your web site once before and was really impressed -seeing those photos only impresses me more I live in Napier and from what I have heard there are about 5 reef keepers in the area, although I would say that there will soon be more as there are 2 pet stores stocking marines and my store is currently cycling a reef tank. look forward to more photos regards, Daniel

If your filter switches off for any reason you shouldn't just switch it back on (too late now I know :lol: ) I accidentally had mine turn off for a couple of days and just switched it back on walked back to my tank and all I could smell was rotten egg. I didn't ask anyone so could be wrong, but came to the conclusion that by turning it off there was no more oxygen for the arobic bacteria to breath, anarobic bacteria then grows and feeds of nitrates and assuming that it is the same theory of a nitrate filter if the water flow is to slow sulpher is created (I have no idea of the chemical explination of this part). I didn't loose any fish though just changed a whole lot of water

LOL I to have done that The worst part is I still haven't learnt from my mistakes and do it on a regular basis

I would sugest adding fish from your other tank, the reason being normally mature fish are hardier than young fish and Pet store have fish that have already been stressed a little by being imported then courierd overnight so would not be as hardy as fish that are nice and calm already in your tank Good luck, Daniel

Hi Tigerson, I'm the one that sold you the tank. I hope the neon's you got today are doing better than the last ones. For thoes interested the tank is a 28L Aqua One cr320 Napiers tap water is safe for fish, yes it did have a heater and was up to temperature. When the fish died ammonia was 0 nitrates 0 and nitrites 0 The tank was brand new and no chemicals were sprayed around the tank. I advised 2 neons for cycling because I thought they would be easily hardy enough (my first tank many a year ago was cycled on 4 Neons and 3 glowlights similar volume and was fine) The PH did come out at 8.0 could it be that the ph was a little high??? this has now been buffered down to 7.0 using Aquarium Pharmisuticles PH Down They collected 2 Neons today and have been given a squirt of Cycle to try and see if it helps. If you do have any more problems Tigerson call me and I will come around with some cycled water out of one of our display tanks and some cycled gravel. Good luck, Daniel

go to the saltwater section and look at some of the threads in there, there are lots of threads that explain sumps. in a nut shell your tank (main display tank) has an over flow at the back of it (or a weir but overflows are better) that then runs down to your sump. page 6 of "first look at new setup" written by pies shows a durso stand pipe and the overflows http://www.dursostandpipes.com/ this link explains how a durso works down below the main tank is the sump (for freshwater this can commonly be a wet dry filter) that the water flows into and gets pumped back up to the main tank (so your main tank is constantly over flowing) from what I have lernt (and read) the trick is to keep it simple and probably go visit someone that is running a sump to understand properly how they work it is kinda hard to understand without seeing it working Good luck Daniel

doesn't the rocks sand/gravel etc displace the water by its mass so effectively would still be the same weight (as the water goes up by the weight added)???

I don't know anything about the brazillizn puffer but would assume it is peacefull for a puffer not nessacerally a peacefull fish, it would be a risk putting it with a beta.

depends what size pump you are looking at getting I have heard step down transformers are inefficient so would waste power

All smaller air pumps work the same way (well most do) they have a diaphram that brakes down over time and is not covered by warrentee. A cheep air pump that puts out a good amount of air is the cosmo range, it is available at Critters on Thackeray st in Napier Good luck Daniel

I have read it is better to have the comb at the top only as the surface water contains the majority of the protines and is the section of the water that needs skimming most as for the return piping running under the piping you would have to run a non return valve which would slow your water flow good luck Daniel

if the sunlight is going through perspex (i.e. a clear roof) 100% of U.V. rays would be absorbed and through glass 50% this could make a difference. I don't know if Kalvin rating would it is more the spectrum that is achieved by running a particular coulour temp isn't it. I read that it has to be a "blueer" spectrum than the sune because they are normally deeper in water than our tanks are and the water aborbs red and green rays very fast meaning the coral grows under a blue light. I'm sure someone that has done alot of scuba diving and looked up at the sun from a reef could tell us what sort of light comes out

aparently there is a range of tropical sea horses comming into the country through the sea horse farm in Napier. I am looking at getting some but not sure how deer they are yet

two small filters is definatly better than one large filter,

I rung a while ago and they rung the importers that said they couldn't get them any more, I read an article on the internet that they are hard to get hold of now as they built a damn or somthing in the area they were in and their diet was unique or somthing 12 isn't that many I think there would easily be 12 on here that were interested in at least one