henward

yes very true. i have lately been a convert to a more minimalist and low stock type of tank. the maintenance is much less! i always agree over filtration is key. I guess in a way the way i saw it was More volume lower stock same turn over and bio media capacity means still over filtered..... unless im missing some calculations in my head. i guess, reason why is that it would reduce my planned spend by $500 to $700 by keeping same gear and capacity.

Planning my new tank, it will be a go!! New tank: 2600 Litres My old tank was 1200L my question is after a lengthy discussion with David is this. Should i increase filtration bio capacity in my new tank. I am leaning now, towards a NO. feedback would be awesome. My old set up had a 6000LPH return pump sump x amount of bio media 3x fx5 Average of 60 to 65 fish My new tank, will actually have less fish. approx 20 fish max. but because its a higher volume, the instinctive reaction is to increase return pump output. But i was thinking, after david told me that we really over do our filtration especially bio.... In the new tank, i will have identical bio media, Same return pump, same sump, and 3fx5... basically identical filtration configuration. But it will have less fish, and more water. Do i really need to have a higher output of a return pump? I was thinking no, cos i have less fish and no point of having a bigger pump for the sake of it, the concentration of waste is gonna be way less due to higher volume (more than double) and less fish. So effectively, my bio load is gonna be cut by approx 60% to 75% so i was thinking of just keeping my original Return pump, keeping my bio media and the fx5 to take the brunt of the mechanical filtration and extra margin of bio filtration. Feedback would be awesome!!!

i removed mine even when brand new. they will cloud quickly.

I am chinese, and i also find it disturbing. but then again i understand in a country where any food is food, well, you cant blame them in a way. in saying that, therre are certain things that they do that are based on superstition. tiger balls, even turtles i think are consumed for supernatural beliefs. which is stupid. the problem here is CULTURE, not race. In my completely upfront opinion having seen that side of the culture and growing up in a modern western country and assimilating in it. I believe that the problem is any human groups that practice old 'customs and culture' are primitive. this holds many societies back, asia is very bad with this, so is africa. it stops progress. china is quite modern yet in some ways not. they are very smart in a lot of ways but still believe in superstition whcih is really an oxymoron. how do you stop it? easy - you set up what you could call a world police:) ok maybe not easy.

Exactly what it is, its like facebook but only for photos. you have editing features, basic stuff, but it makes amateur photos look better lol i mean this photo is just a photo, but the filters etc makes it look nicer i suppose. for my work i need to explore all social medias, so went onto pinterest either, that was quite boring. weird though, Instagram was purchased by fracebook for 1Billion dollars! so.... i guess it is not that bad right? lol

Playing with instagram

Commercial operators also have to declare GST and all that, so they cannot alter receipts from the supplier. It is easy enough to ask overseas traders thta send products over to alter invoices to lessen the value and lessen the GST burden. Not that i would ever suggest such a thing.......... But it is easy........... The end of the day, distributors have agreements with the makers to generally be the only one they ship to. This doesnt stop the ability to parallel import things. but when it comes to fish food, i think distributors get a good price - its how much mark up is put on wholesale and retail. Do you sell High volumes or lower volumes to make profit. nz is a small country, more likely than not, it will be a high margin model for a country that has low population which usually translate to a low turnover market. Unfortunately, pretty soon - every retailer will have to embrace and adapt to the internet market. largely because there is no choice. Information enables the consumer to drive the prices down. THe likes of pricespy for electronic goods for example is a site devoted entirely to finding the cheapest price, that is its sole purpose, otherwise this would have been impossible to do wtih out the internet. Generallys peaking, it is not worth importing your own fish food unless you use large amounts. when i had all my collection intact, i would import $600nzd of fish food at one go! now, i dont even bother, its not worth while... when i first imported massivore for personal use, i got stung with a MAF fee cos it was a new product and was not registered in their books apparently, even though the ingredients are identical except it its proportions to other hikari items.

cute, amazing how a small bird has so much personality!

I agree!!!! heavily considered that. but the royals would put the plants to bed! i think they would just rasp and rasp even if they are not eatng it and kill plants.

Thanks! i love the guy, colour is coming out nicely, comparing him with others overseas to see how my development is going. it is really genetics and good water that counts most i think. unlike cichlids, i dont think the food plays a HUGE part in their colour. my parrot becomes super red when eating red enhacing food, i dont think aro gets like that. i think its more genetics. its development happens regardless of my feeding. of course i try to feed it good food with reddening stuff in it, but not that much anymore. just protein. Yeah, it picks off the goldfish as it sees fit. average 1 a day now, when younger it would eat much more haha it would pig out on prawns AND goldfish in one day untill its so fat it can hardly swim. now its much more disciplined with eating! probably instinctively knows the effort vs ratio of intake! :rotf: If i buy into a house, i am definitely gonna comm it with a few black aros and a couple of silvers in the big tank. id be happy to get this guy to 60 cms. 10 to 9 cms to go! would be nice if the deep orange rims spread to the centre of scales. should in time. its only 2.5 years old, apparently, 6 to 8 is the 'bloom' colour period and the colour just gets more intense and coverage becomes greater as it ages to 20s.

Haha was giving me grief about prawns. so decided, i will feed it what it wants. the goldies cost 85c per piece shipped! so i feed the goldies pellets and goodies, gutload! ill re train back to meaty foods later when i intro it to aro comm:D then im sure it will eat due to dcompetition. i want it big, dont wanna slow down its growth by partially forcing to eat what i want it to eat lets call it an aro/goldfish comm

havent really tgained much on length, maybe 51cms. but girth has definitely increased power glo light, no tanning light in tank. just shows the colour development of the fish. may 2011 Sep 2012 May 2011 Sep 2012

I have a leo that is very yellowing with big dots. very different looking to the wild types. it is simply a morph, a basic morph in time im sure those ones will be further refined to produce other types of morphs. albino, well, thats not likely in saying that. if one was to surface, it could be from the current pool of genetics - relatively, they dont produce that many babies for a reptile right, not like beardies, so it could take time to surface.

I think the vbackup heater Is great idea. It slows down the temp drop too. So far working very well.. temp is good

from what i gather they are all pretty generic in side, companies make the actual unit inside, and sensor, only the box and presentation is different. i am using engineering grade stuff. father in law works for a large electrics company. see how it goes, i am monitoring it regularly. but i agree, 1 poihnt of failure, in saying that, many overseas use this as their main heatng method but i am weary of that so dont get me wrong. i found that there was extreme difficulty synchronising the heaers to turn on an d off. so, this way, i have them all turning at once. the sensor for the temp controller is in the over flow, just before it enters the sump. so it is taking temp readings from the tank itself, not in the sump. by puttng the sensor by the heaters, i found by measuring 1200w of heating all on at once does affect the temp of that chamber, i didnt think it would, but definitely does, by almost 1 degree. so having it by the over flow measures the water directly coming out of the tank i figure. i have used 4 different thermometers to ensure the unit is measuring accurately as well. its all with in .1c of each other up and down. the unit can handle 2200w of heating easily. so for a bigger set up, i would prob get another couple of jagers and bring that up to 1800w of heating, mainly because it brings the temp back up faster when needed. who has used one and failed ?

Thermostats on Jagers don't work in a synchronous manner. So some turn on n off in different ttemps. Trying a temp controller so all 1200w work synchronously (if that's a word) now. I bumped up the heaters 2 degrees each to make sure it doesn't turn off while on and let controller control them. Heats up to 28 and doesn't let temp drop below 27c. Who uses temp controllers? Feedback and suggestions will be cool

Swanson industrial sands you can buy the huge bags for dirt cheap.

actually, the crash comes from the build up of water in the tank itself, then when it 'tips over' down the overflow, it has the waterfall effect. the water actually arcs and crashes. IF you have enough drain power and enough over flow surface area. Then the water should in effect not arc so much ideally, the water pumped into the tank from the sump is close to the volume that the overflows can drain. if so, then the noise is minimal my tank right now, has little noise in the overflow, the noise actually comes from the water entering the socks. the overflow doesnt arc, the water just flows against he wall, and quite quiet. SO, my goal is to first make sure my overflow is big enough, both of the over flows, that i dont accumulate water in the tak itself, and that the drain is equal to or greater than the return pumps power to pump water into the tank. make sense?

wrote to that website the guy said that for a tank 2600litres plus the high output. I am looking at bout 11k minimum LPH to 15lph. he said that it will make a hell of a sound regardless of how you do it cos of the massive volumes of water. interesting.

why not both quiet? sorry, you mean one overflow is just pure full on drain another quiet? looking back to my old 1200Litre, man it was loud. i can hear it outside the garage lol i was thinking both quiet, but i am unsure if this compromises flow due to the structure and arrangement of the pipes....any feedback on that?

http://www.dursostandpipes.com/make-you ... iy?start=3 Reading through this. Why does it start off small and then increases in diameter, im confused. why bother reducing the diameteR? why not just make it one straight pipe to the top of the same size? any experiences on that? i am thinking, If you had no reason to move the tank, my tank aint movin. can i just silicone and properly fit the pipe on the overflow not intended to be moved or unscrewed? also, they use 1 and a 1/4 inch pipes, If i was to use 1.5inch or even 2 inch, is this ok? let me know your thoughts. flow in the tank i intend is gonna be quite high.

http://www.dursostandpipes.com/ yes!!! like this link seen that, so that type of piping set up, you can make that a thicker version? or do you just have to have 2 thinner ones? rephrase, will that work with one thicker all around pipe? also, does the flow suffer due to that 'bend' on top that stops the noise? Thats what i want, seems very quiet. i want it as quiet as possible. also you mentioned the small hole at the top. does that matter if you make it bigger? my new tank set up will have 2 big overflows on each corner, i will also make the over flow square so there is more 'drain' capacity from the tank water level. i could probably fit 2 of the thinner pipes or 1 quite thick one. correct me if i am wrong. the key to quietness is : 1) the actual opening of that pipe MUST be quite high up so the water draining from the tank does not act like a waterfall and make a racket? is that right? im scared that it wont flow fast enough to drain and water will accumulate in the tank and flood. also, i dont want it so when the pump turns off, i dont want there to be too much accumulation of water in the tank itself that it overflows in the sump. make sense?

seeing these designs with the bent pipes in overflow. dont know how they work, can someone explain please:D my next overflow i want to be quiet but very high flow.

HI Mark, Could you kindly respond to my PM. I have sent you 3 PMs. Thanks

heating is a funny thing. you can stretch your heaters and sacrifice water temp stability. the more you have, the more stable your water is from experience. big a 1000litre tank, 3 is fine IF you have the tank inside the house, where its relatively insutalted. in a completely uninsulated garage, i suggest insulate the garage, you could use up to 6x 300w heaters and still lose too much heat during winter and cold nights. i would recommend 4x 300w jagers (it has a better thermostat) that keeps temps closer to desired temps. that is the key with heaters, heat is heat no matter how it comes into the coils, under water, heat is efficiently transfered to the water regardless of brand, but jagers have good glass, good computers in them. as for pump. i would recommend 4 to 5 times mini8mum per hour, more is better but your overflow (generally speaking) will not be able to handle 10x per hour, you have to design a tank specifically for such flow, thats heaps. you will end up topping the tank out too much i believe if you do that, if you have a comb, even worse.