wasp

Ha Ha I know that was a dig. I was going to say wait for the bite, but the bite's already happened!! :lol:

If you look at the post by Feelers, on page 2, with the photo of a skimmer, you'll see in the collection cup some brown gunge. That brown gunge is loaded with nutrients that make algae grow. Removing it by skimming is one of the best things that can be done to control algae.

Hi Vicki, the rocks will take around 6 weeks to cycle. In the mean time it is very likely the seahorses will suffer & possible die. As you're 3 hours from the shop it may not be possible to return them, but if you have a source of seawater you could keep them in a different container & do a 100% water change each day, just ensure the container is well aerated. To test when the rocks are cycled, for the first 2 weeks or thereabouts you will have ammonia in the water, then ammonia will subside as it is changed into nitrite. It will take around another 4 weeks for nitrite to subside as it is converted to nitrate. Once the nitrite is gone it will be safe for your seahorses. You should then monitor nitrate periodically, I'm not sure how much seahorses can tolerate but just make sure it's at a safe level for them. The brown crud on your rocks - hate to tell you this but unless you get a protein skimmer it is likely you will always have algae etc growing. BTW vodka can be effective, but ONLY if you have a skimmer. No skimmer, no point dosing vodka.

After reading the thread on Zeovit.com about lighting hours & colouration, a few weeks ago I cut my photoperiod from 10 hours to 8. Don't know if it's coincidence, but over the last week or so there has been an improvement, and intensification, of colours. Encouraged, I have further cut the photoperiod by another hour, to 7 hours.

Should work although yours is a largish CB, in a smallish sump, you would need to put a foam filter over the pump inlet to prevent the shrimps dissapearing up it. But confining the CB to a smallish tank where a steady supply of food can be floated around him is the right idea to get him started eating, if he is not already.

Yup, bought it written off and panelbeated & painted it myself!! I'm not a panelbeater but once did a 6 month stint labouring in a panelbeating shop so can do that stuff if I've got enough time.

Here's a pic of mine eating from my fingers, please excuse poor photography the lighting is not the best in the garage. Once he learned how to eat chopped mussel I got him to eat from my fingers, so now I have blended some mussel to pulp in the blender, and mix it with pellet. He eats from my fingers so he doesn't know it's pellets. At first it was all mussel with just a few pellets, and I'm slowly decreaseing the amount of mussel so hopefully he will eventually just eat pellets. Then I'll do the same thing to get him to eat flake, and then hopefully he will be able to go in with other fish. There is nothing in my small tank for him to eat naturally, he will have to eat fish food. He was a very small fish when I got him, he has close to doubled in size in a few months, probably because he has a tank to himself.

Haven't got mine eating peanuts yet, but after several months of training he is eating pellets. But only from my fingers, ignores them if they're floating around. I am keeping him in a seperate tank so the other fish don't eat all the food, & spend 5 or 10 minutes a day training him. It's been a long slow process but the end is in sight now, once he can also eat flake he will go in the main. One thing for sure, after all the time & effort I've put in to him if anything happened to him I'd be MAJORLY upset! If I can snap it, I'll put up a pic of him eating out of my fingers, which I have had to make him do so I can get him to eat stuff without being able to see what it is. When I got him he would only eat live baby glass shrimps.

They can be trained to eat flake & pellets but it takes a few months.

A year without reading is VERY slack. Chimera which is your power company?

Cool! I see the copperband, is he still hanging in?

More to it than just the camera Drifty, that's a great tank! I'll look forward to seeing update shots as things progress

Hi Helifax I'm not sure how the 6 line will go with the firefish, but 6 lines can get a bit nippy & in your size tank it is likely there will be some scuffling between the 6 line & the clowns eventually. Doubt he will bother the shrimp though.

8 hours

Any of the above are fine, they're all good. If you add kalk only, you may find that after a while your alkalinity & calcium get a little out of balance with each other. If that happens, add one of the other two to balance things up again.

Some very cool pics!

Look forward to it!

Sounds like your tank's running better than you thought Suphew

One thought - every now and then a faulty batch of ASW comes out, this has been documented many times on Reef Central. Not saying it's that, but perhaps try a different salt anyway?

Good job Weka! First person I've heard of to make one that actually cools the tank effectively!

Well I hope it is the KH, although I have to say I've had KH lower than that with no major problems. I googled antiphos but was not able to get the precise formula, however if it is one of those aluminium based ones that leaches aluminium, that can cause problems, in fact, the same problems you've got. If fixing the KH does not solve things, before you go away I'd pull both the carbon & the antiphos, and do a big (75%) + waterchange, then try to narrow things down when you get back. Perhaps change to an iron based phosphate resin & see what happens.

What type of phosphate resin are you using? Is it iron based or aluminium based?

Yes the colour varies depending on water quality, and also what phase I'm in with the zeovit dosing. So people wanting frags are welcome, but be warned it is just the common old normally orange monti.

Speed, a salifert kit does not go down far enough to always detect Po4 in tapwater, but trust me , Po4 is in there!

What Cookie said.