wasp

Yes. A rugged good performer. This particular one not adjustable though although some are. The brand is Seko, there is an agent in NZ.

Yes the Salifert one is similar to Rowaphos, although Rowaphos claim there is a difference.

IKS is reputed to be excellent, but I'm not particularly impressed with my one. The other one I've got I prefer, comes out of a washing machine.

My own humble opinion is that you will get the most dramatic improvements on a tank with nutrient problems. This is an excellent example, UV made great improvement http://www.fnzas.org.nz/fishroom/3-vt16 ... l?start=30 Tank that's already running sweet there will not be a huge improvement, as Bob Fenner correctly pointed out. I think it is a bit rich to refer to Bob Fenner as ignorant. Also think it is a bit rich to refer to Eric Bourneman as ignorant. Also it's a bit rich to refer to people who disagree as having "sheep mentality". Layton you may find your audience more receptive to your ideas if you could get a better grip on your tendency towards abuse / name calling. The reason in another thread I referred to UV as a bandaid, is because I am much of the same opinion as Fenner. It works best in a tank with problems. Does that make it wrong to use one? No. JDM, for example, is doing everything right, yet for some reason has a major nitrate issue. So for him, UV may well be of help. But that will also be why most of the TOTMs don't have one. I'd also suggest that you would expect a percentage of TOTMs to have one, some of these tanks have had a lot of time & money & equipment lavished on them, so if the owner thinks a UV might do something, why not stick one on. For me, the scientific arguments in this forum are mostly gobbledegook. That's because the people advancing them for the most part are not scientists. What I'm interested in is results. Layton claims certain specific benefits to his tank from UV, and in this case anyway, I believe him. I also have some reservations about certain aspects of what a UV does, but end of the day, in some cases such as Layton it does more good than harm, so it's just a case of wether a person wants to spend the money. Looks like a number of people may go UV so will be interesting to see how it goes once a few more people doing it.

If the water going in is of basically similar parameters to what you take out, no issues. When it can go wrong is doing a big water change with water quite different. However provided livestock is healthy you can get away with murder I think the risks are overated. Same thing happens in the wild when the current changes. After your last performance I didn't think you'd be up for another one :lol: Depends what type of resin you used, if it was Rowaphos, which is very efficient, the recommended dose can shock a tank, especially when you already got weak corals. What some people do is when starting with it they put the reactor on a timer. 1 hour a day for the first few days, then increase gradually so after a couple of weeks it's on full time. But hey, whatever the cause, good luck, hope it's not too bad! Been there!

I wouldn't get too carried away cleaning it up too fast. Too much change too quickly can be harmful. Too much Po4 resin too quickly could have puit the nail in the coffin. If the red stuff in the pump is just "rust", don't worry about it. Rather than continue stripping the water with various resins, a few water changes may be better, although sounds like most of the damage may be done.

If you removing zeovit, perhaps the most simple solution would be to use a UV. Favourable comments from those who tried them, it's plug & play, and Layton said UV got his nitrates to zero in a few days. If I wasn't using zeo i would probably use one of these myself.

Interesting to see it all worked out properly Duke. You are a bit cheaper than my "guestimate", but I'm using a few extra things also, albeit in tiny amounts. So I think your calculations pretty accurate. So looks like someone considering zeovit, could think around $106.00 per 800 litres per month.

Ok I'm a little rusty on prices because some of the chemicals I bought when I started, I still have. Don't use much of some & I cannot remember what I paid exactly. It also depends if you are just going to use the essential "basic 4", or if you want to use other stuff also for further enhancement. My tank is 200 litres and my GUESS is, for the basic 4, 20 or so $$ per month, and another 10 - 15 or so for the rest, I'm pretty much using the whole range. This could be multiplied by 5 for a 1000 litre tank. So for a big tank it is fairly expensive, one of the reasons I stayed with a small tank when I upgraded. I probably could go cheaper, but I don't skimp, anything I think I should use, I use. BTW anyone else please say what your costs are also, be interesting, there is probably quite a variation depending on how people use it.

Well said, sometimes I think it's amazing! He He! Sounds just like zeovit :lol:

Here's my take - If my nitrate was 50 I'd be pretty sick also, I can understand the frustration. I can see Brendans side too though, here's why. - When I started zeovit, it transformed my tank, and in a short period of time. I found it awesome, and assumed it would be the same for everybody. I did not hesitate to recommend it, regardless of critisizm and argument thrown at me, as I went by what I had experienced. However, several people, usually with something wrong with their tank they were trying to "fix", contacted me asking about zeovit, and I said yes do it! That's when things started to go wrong, they'd ask me about dosing and I'd basically tell them to do the same as I was doing. Most often, it didn't work for them & I'd feel bad as they had spent the money. I must have just been lucky as my tank was obviously just right for the recommended dose rates. I've seen it on zeovit.com also, many different tanks have to use very different dose rates to achieve results, as all tanks are different. Some people also "fall by the wayside" and give up zeovit altogether as they could not make it work. Knowing how bad I feel about this when I've been involved, it must be pretty frustrating for Brendan. The zeoguide basically recommends two methods for dosing. Firstly it gives a recommended dose rate for each product. But then for many products, it gives bioindicators to detirmine if you are under or overdosing. So a person should start with the recommended dose, but then observe the tank & look for signs that too much / too little is being dosed. In this way the correct dosing schedule for each individual tank is eventually arrived at, but it does require effort. Me, I watch the tank carefully, and although I have a written dosing schedule, I would make some small change to it every 2 or 3 weeks. I see this as part of the challenge / enjoyment of the hobby, but I can also see for many people this is just too much work. Also, when I set up the tank I have now, I was not able to get the zeovit going for the first couple of months, and during this time the corals suffered badly. Once I finally got the zeovit running it took months to have any effect, not like my first experience with it at all, and this despite by now I had good knowledge of the product. If I was a zeo newby I could easily have chucked in the towel. So it is definately different in different tanks.

Looking pretty good! Just looking at it it is hard to see anything obvious to cause those high nitrates. Everything looks ideal. Even the rocks are nice and clean which is strange with a phosphate reading of 0.03 Salifert.

:lol:

Here is some info, they are very cool. The only thing in this little article that differs from my own experience is it says they hide during the day, mine are a bit more timid during the day but still move around in plain view. Their "eyesight" is pretty much just detecting changes in light, they can detect me if I put my hand up to them & point their spines towards me. http://www.liveaquaria.com/product/prod ... pCatId=591

Putty not so good for this cos the frags will expand and shrink. Options are ties, impailing with something like a toothpick, or just wedging somewhere they will stay put, I'd do a bit of all 3 methods to improve your odds. Bear in mind healing is very slow for these things, it can take several weeks for them to attach to a rock properly. I can see though you might end up with a tankload of these things! :lol:

Whoa you don't ask much! :lol: If you can remove the leather before chopping that will save the water changes etc, after chopping leave it out to bleed for 1/2 hour in a bucket. But if not a quick chop just 1/2 way up the trunk or whatever seems best, then chop the head up outside the tank. They can be tougher to chop than you would expect, a razor may be too flimsy. I'd use something like a kitchen knife, try to get it razor sharp first. How to use the carbon is just however you think. If it was me I'd carbon heavily, but only for a few hours. Then stop the carbon and let things sort themselves out. Likewise water change just whatever you are comfortable with.

Yes. I have a 3rd one in another tank, there is no coraline in that tank but a good algae supply, and it's been living there perhaps a year or so, so they must be able to eat either or.

Another interesting thing I just noticed, look at the 2 pics. Both of the same bit of coraline, no photoshopping, but shows as 2 different colours in the 2 different pics!

Cutting is the easy part, nothing to it. Getting it to survive afterwards is the issue. All advice given so far is spot on, but my 2 cents would be that after chopping it, do save a few bits and stick them in various locations around the tank so if you lose the origional, you have a good chance of at least one surviving to carry on. To tell if your frags are doing OK, what kills them is bacterial infection, if you see them turning into jelly, that is the infection, either clean it with a good blast of water in a bucket outside the tank so it doesn't spread to the others, or if it's too far gone remove altogether. The new frags should be positioned in decent current to keep them clean. To me anyway, the safest way to frag it would be to chop the "head" right off, so the base can regrow a new one. Then chop the head up as you see fit, & position some of them around the tank. Once they are established if you end up with a few spare you can sell or swap them.

Yes it does look like a paint bomb :lol: In real life he's cool though one of the best things in the tank. There's 2 of them so double cool! Evil it's not that I wanted them to eat coraline but if there is no algae that's what they eat, but luckily there's plenty coraline so no worries. Also on glass the coraline gradually gets thicker then falls off in big chunks so this way it gets thinned out and regenerated.

Well learn something every day! I never picked that up before about the start2 dosing, I've been dosing WAY less than recommended. Think I'll increase it a bit & see what happens. Also JDM I've been thinking about your nitrate it does seem strange for it to increase from 15 to 50, even in a non zeo tank this would be a very high level. Dosing zeovit, even if the doses are wrong, it should still push levels down. Anyhow, it will be interesting to see what happens I guess increasing the start2 so markedly would have to have an effect, but I just wonder if there is some other issue. However, we'll see. Fingers crossed!

I would not recommend increasing the zeovit rock. There are greater minds at this type of thing at zeovit.com, howabout signing in there and asking about it? You will have to give all the details about your tank, and they should be able to sort it. But agreed, you've given it a fair shot & it's not working, something needs to change but I'm sure they can tell you what it is. Personally I don't think there is anything wrong with using a nitrate reactor, but give zeovit .com a shot first you may save some money.

This guy spent the night where he is pictured, yesterday it was solid coraline, today look how much he ate in one night! It is quite amazing to watch hime from the other side of the glass bite it off. His mouth is 4 little needle type things they must be incredibly strong.

2 x 150 or 250 watt halides will be the most common set up for a 4 foot. If you are primarily planning to keep sps corals go 250 watt, or 150 if it is mainly lps & softies. Although you may get away with 150 watt for sps also. 20 cm and up to 30 cm off the water is fairly common. Also there is a ton of halides for sale on Trade Me, or at least there was when I was trying to sell mine!