suphew

Depends what sort of fans you are looking at using, I assume you thinking of a DC transformer? But don't assume all fans are 12v dc, most computer fans are, but a lot of fans are 240v ac and some are even low voltage ac. If you already have a fan it's power requirements should be written in the fan.

And yet you relate to fallout 3 hmmmm interesting

I pity the mother, wouldn't have been fun getting those out.

Not sure if you guys have spent a lot of time on a farm, but unless that 'bull' is middle aged and growing man breasts I think you'll find it is a cow. :roll: Not surprised she is angry, from the look of those ribs I'd say she came off a Crafar farm.

I was chatting to a lady who had just moved from Blenheim to Carterton the other day. She was about to go pick up her cat. She'd called a pet courier and was quoted $300 Blenheim to Wellington and $500 Blenhiem to Carterton! Thinking it would be cheaper to drive down and back herself she rang the cattery. The cattery owner in Blenheim suggested she call Sounds Air (or what every they are called nowdays) and offered to drop the cat at the airport for her. Sounds Air charged her $20 and lent her a cat cage for the trip!!!

I heard there is going to be no "free to air", either pay or miss out. Best option I recon is the pub, rather spent the $40 on beer

NZ temperate is similar at the basic level to tropical, but very little stuff is photosynthetic, which means it needs to be fed. This leads to problems with waste removal (which is why skimming is so much more important), and also a lot of critters will either eat anything and everything in the tank or are very specific feeders. There's not a lot of middle ground. Also the natural rock in NZ isn't coral based and tends to be volcanic so it's difficult to get a balance between the filtration you need from the live rock and the biodiversity you need for feeding etc from local rock.

Damn just went thought my "box o bits" cause I thought I had one for you, turns out it's the curved one, but for a 104/204

BTW your stainless tube will rust, you will get about 6 months out of it. Even 316, I've tried it. This is why proper chillers use Titanium tube (and cost so much). Sorry to be the bearer of bad news. http://www.azom.com/Details.asp?ArticleID=863

I would put the carbon on top or leave it out completely, carbon needs to be change regularly and you don't want to have to pull the whole filter apart to get to it. How much room do you have? What about using a 4 liter plastic bucket, lots of building stuff comes in them plaster etc shouldn't be hard to get hold of one. I use an 8 liter paint bucket for the filter on my pond, it is just filled with bioballs, I didn't used to be able to see more than an inch or two into my pond now it is crystal clear.

Rockpool critters may deal with temperature changes but it is the long term heat that gets them. Very few healthy rock pools don't get fresh cold water dumped in them a couple of times a day. A chiller is a must really, especially coming into summer.

I was actually thinking that was pretty cheep for acrylic. I paid $60 the acrylic to do my overflow box, which was smaller but coloured.

What sort of bracing are you planning on? My tank is a similar size, little bit shorter but a little bigger on the shorter sides, I just measured it and it is 10mm glass and euro braced.

If its for saltwater I wouldn't recommend a spray bar (above the surface at least) you would get salt spray every where.

I'd recommend using glued PVC pipe rather than push fit hoses, I've seen them leak too many times. Another option you could look into is what they call spa flex, it's glued pressure pipe but flexible so you don't need elbows etc. The only problem is I haven't seen it in NZ (but I haven't looked hard), it's talked about a lot on overseas forums so I assume you can buy it. As Ira says up and over is the best simplest option, your return needs to go close to the surface anyway so you can have an anti syphon hole.

What about using it to put in the roots of pot plant, I've read that peace lilies can be used, and there are plenty of other options. Basically you'd be creating a hydroponic setup. If nitrate reduction is your primary goal, I've been waiting for fresh water keepers to discover DSB's (deep sand bed) as used in marine tanks. I can't see any reason they wouldn't work for fresh water, and suspect a lot of people are actually doing it with out realising. I have a 4-5 inch deep 'sand' bed in my fresh water tank and so far it seems to have been behaving like a salt water DSB would.

Thanks for pointing that out Puttputt, was reading too fast. Do you have any useful advise on combating Green glassy bubble algae?

They are used a lot for marine tanks to remove corallina algae (the hard red stuff). Problem is when you can use a paint scraper from the $2 shop or an old credit card $40 is a pretty tough sell.

Can you post a picture, normally bubble algae and grassy algaes are two different types. There are some differences to how you fix each but there are also some common base problems. Nitrates and phosphates. Addressing these will go a long way to fixing most algae problems.

The quality of the pump also makes a huge difference to how well it will pump up hill. Once you have an idea of the pump you want check the box for an output curve or failing that check the net. Every resonable pump will have one. To save having to do all the height and fiction loss calculations I find working on the rough distance from the high water level in your sump to the high water level in your display, plus half again (for fiction losses in pipes) will give you a good enough number to work with, this usually equates to about 1.5-2 meters of head height.

The main issue with gravel and filtering is the lack of oxygen, the bacteria that do the ammonia to nitrite to nitrate process need oxygenated water, so only the very top surface of your gravel will be acting as a filter. The lower area will be populated with anaerobic bacteria (don't need oxygen) that convert nitrate to nitrogen gas. This is why canister filters go toxic if the power (or water flow) is off more than a few hours. Plants also make good filters, a heavily planted tank with a relatively low bioload would also be fine.

Thats true, so long as you don't mind ammonia and dead fish. Your whole tank is a filter, every surface is covered in bacteria, unfortunately once you get more than a couple of fish the surface area of the glass and decorations just wont keep up with the ammonia so you need more surface area

Not doing a very good job of avoiding filters then :lol: I know I shouldn't ask, but why on earth would you want to avoid filters?

It's more important to get a colour of light that you like the look of rather than worry too much about the plants. The tubes put out the whole spectrum (well most of it anyway), they just put out more light in some parts of the range. So long as you have strong enough lighting the colour doesn't matter so much to the plants. If you go too low the lights will make the tank look yellow, the higher end will start making it look crisp and a bit to sterile for some. If you get tubes for an electrical wholesaler rather than a pet shop you will only pay about $10 or less a tube, so it is affordable to buy 2-3 different tubes and try them out. I'm running a couple of 865 tubes and a 'blue' tube at the moment. Another important factor to consider if you are wanting to grow plants well, is to remember to replace the tubes at least every year.

Sorry the thread was becoming too political. http://www.fnzas.org.nz/fishroom/viewtopic.php?f=18&t=36158 Craig