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Jeff's Classroom Tank Journal

Jeff Rehling

Jeff Rehling

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Day One! Thanks so much to the members for the donations so far!

Stocking Plan:

Black/white sand
Marcorocks
Ghost skimmer

Mated Clowns
Corals
CUC

Will post photos when I get the sand and rock in!
 
Will be building a stand over the thanksgiving break
 

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Journal update: Trigger systems donated a 5 gallon ATO tank. Cobalt is donating a heater and food. still waiting to hear from Marcorocks. I submitted the list of equipment to Joe at Ultimate Aquarium hoping he can match BRS prices.

Does anyone have other suggestions for donations? The dude in Florida that does CUC...what's their company name?
 
Update...Ultimate Aquarium (THANKS JOE) matched BRS prices so...

MP-10
Skimmer
Marine Pure
AI Prime light and mount
Salt
Sand
GFO media
Auto feeder
all on the way

Bruce...reactor, pump, rocks, and unknown goodies

Cobalt: Heater and food

Trigger: 5 gallon ATO tank

Kris: AIO IM 24 gallon tank

Kimmie's Clownfish: 2 clowns

Still need:
Stand
Test kits
ATO
And...???

Thanks to all...my students are so excited
 
Yeah. Look -- it's your tank, but I'll give my two cents again a I did with the idea of putting a BTA in immediately. If this is supposed to be an educational opportunity for students thenrushing it makes no sense on a whole bunch of different levels -- levels that this club is designed to educate against. A tank cycle allows myriad educational opportunities to discuss the nitrogen cycle, micro-fauna, etc. Perhaps the best opportunity is the chance to discuss sustainability, good animal husbandry and responsible care of these animals that the kids will be working with. Dr. Tims isn't a magic potion that allows us to ignore the conditions in a tank during the cycle. Even with Dr. Tim it can take 3 weeks+ to finish the ammonia off in the tank completely and introducing livestock puts them through a difficult and painful period in conditions that cause them distress. Dr. Tim's alone also only adds some beneficial bacteria to jump start the tank. You still have to figure out how you will increase that population and finish the cycle. Will you dose ammonia? Ghost feed?

So yes -- too soon.
 
Bruce makes good points about potential educational value to going slowly but....

I disagree that Dr. Tim’s doesn’t allow you to add fish safely right away. That is exactly what it is designed to allow. I and many others have used it that way with zero losses or signs of fish stress. Of course while monitoring for ammonia and nitrite at least daily (with barely a detectable blip).

Dr. Tim only later added the fish-less cycle option to serve the customers who can’t believe it is safe to cycle with fish because of the unethical way people used to do it without bacteria additives. The fish-less cycle takes longer and does have ammonia and nitrite bumps because of the artificiality of the ammonia added.
 
I appreciate all the input. When I started my home tank, I had cured live rock from another tank and put in bio-spira and added two clowns and a damsel same day and didn't have any issues.
 
I think if you have live rock already cycled, lets say, from your tank and water lets say, from your water change, I'd give it a "go" but from the educational point of view I'd hold on the fish; tell the kids although no "life" form can be seen, it is building a life sustaining colony. Perhaps test for nitrates and show the color then again few days after test again and when the time is right, bring the fish over which you may have at your home tank ir if needed, a QT/holding tank.
Looking forward to the progress!
 
Before you stock a lot you might want to see if anything pops up you don't expect. Do you know the room temperature nights and weekends? Also, kinda cool to start with something small like snail or hermit so kids learn to look small before adding fish. Stock up on orange art supplies if your kids are into art and want to make your clowns, haha.
 
Update, stand donated. Bruce hooked me up with rock. Equipment's coming in Wednesday. Wife is going in to help me set it up Friday. Plan on getting it running with the seeded rock and a bottle of bio-spira and letting it cook over the weekend. I'll do testing Monday and hope to get a fish in there next week. Kimmie's clowns are coming the first week of December. Decided to wait for the tank to cycle a bit.

Equipment coming:
40 pounds Indio-Pacific black/white live sand
MP-10
AI Prime light
Eshopps skimmer
auto feeder
Marine Pure spheres
3 sponge kit for media caddy
Salt
GFO

Marcorocks 20 pounds

Equipment donated:
Stand
Tank
Heaters
Reactor NIB
frag plugs
Rock

Stocking Plan:
2 clowns
2 cardinals
1 firefish
CUC

Corals:
Utter Chaos zoa (from Nelson)
torch (from Mike)
GTBA from Mola
 
Family issues prevented me from getting setup over the break, but Saturday's the day. Will be filling it and getting the scape done. Having issues with the AI Prime light connecting to the school wifi, so will have to manually run the light. Got a nice $50 donation from one of the parents so that will fund the CUC and livestock other than Kimmie's clowns. Bought a lid screen kit from MD and will put that together this weekend too. Thought maybe of taking the tank to TAP and have them craft a perfect fitting acrylic top, but that will likely be pretty pricey with the curved edges. Photo's pending
 
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