Kmooresf
Supporting Member
Nah, something I picked up at work from a co-worker. He grew up in Boston.
Leemar Starphire 290
- Thread starter Kmooresf
- Start date
Nah, something I picked up at work from a co-worker. He grew up in Boston.
Kmooresf
Supporting Member
New, part time store in Pacifica. Called "The fish Doctor." Nice guy, who primarily does maintenance and set up / emergency help type stuff. However he has a nice space with some coral tanks and some fish holding tanks. Seems very knowledgable and stoked on the hobby. Best to call first to make sure he is open.....I think mainly on the weekends at the moment, but he can meet there if you call. His name is Mike.
I literally stumbled upon it while walking my dogs one day. He was carting several buckets of reef salt across the street. I was like....um, do you have a reef tank? He laughed and showed me his garage space full of stuff. LOL! Pretty much on the same page!
No sign on his building yet, so make sure you take the address if you decide to go.
Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk
Kmooresf
Supporting Member
Oh, and your frag is alive and well......... In about 9 places! LOL! No one leaves this house without a frag of it. LOL! Price of entry! Love that coral.
Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk
tankguy
Supporting Member
Sounds like its time for a visit
Kmooresf
Supporting Member
Congrats Steve!
You need to start a tank thread yourself. Others might find inspiration as well. It's not just for others, I find myself looking back through and remembering all the struggles, and seeing just how much it has changed over the years. My hope is that long after I am done with this tank, I can re-visit. Kind of like the video's. It's a great way to show others, but it's really for my own documentation.
I make accidental frags all the time, and I'm working on a new frag tank (working on is a fluid term. LOL! As in, sometime this year.) I'm happy to get you a frag of the raspberry lemonade.
Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk
Gudhjem
Guest
Awesome! I may remind you about that frag as soon as I have a few things worth offering in return. Working on a tank build story as well.
Kmooresf
Supporting Member
Well, I have way too many projects going, as usual. However, one that I finally made some progress on this weekend, is a new frag tank stand. Bought the frag tank a few years ago, or at least one year ago, but never have done anything with it. I wanted a bigger frag tank, so I can house some algae eaters. The current frag tank is one I made myself, and it sucks. Maybe 20 gallons total, and an algae and aptasia nightmare!! Anyway, I am hoping the new tank will be a bit easier and really give me some space for frags. I am OUT of room in the big tank, and have many corals on the ground, spread out all over. It's just too much, and I would like to clean up the display a bit.
Frag tank is a used truvue at 48" x 24" x 12" = 60 gallons.
I made the stand the same height as my display stand at 40" and plan to light it with two kessil A360w. Should get perfect coverage with that 24" x 24" per light. Gonna have to get creative with the overflow and plumbing. Hoping to keep it quiet, and it came with holes drilled in each side, so it will be interesting.
Will add doors at some point, still have to make those.
Frag tank is a used truvue at 48" x 24" x 12" = 60 gallons.
I made the stand the same height as my display stand at 40" and plan to light it with two kessil A360w. Should get perfect coverage with that 24" x 24" per light. Gonna have to get creative with the overflow and plumbing. Hoping to keep it quiet, and it came with holes drilled in each side, so it will be interesting.
Will add doors at some point, still have to make those.
sfsuphysics
Supporting Member
beautiful work.
Out of curiosity what type of algae eaters do you plan on housing in a relatively small tank?
Out of curiosity what type of algae eaters do you plan on housing in a relatively small tank?
Kmooresf
Supporting Member
Thx. It's a mix, because I bought at Home Depot. Birch veneer 1/2" ply, 2x2's for support. 1x4 poplar cross braces because it was lying around, and trimmed with 1x3 white pine because that is all they had. Lol! It will be a dark stain, so hopefully they all look similar in the end.
Kensington Reefer
Supporting Member
Oh yeah, you've got a problem!
I empathize
I empathize
Kmooresf
Supporting Member
Well, the thought is a small bristle tooth tang and an algae Blenny. I'll also house a couple small wrasses. It's a small ish tank, but a decent amount of swimming room being 4'x 2'.
Kmooresf
Supporting Member
Thank you. Nitrates have never been an issue with this tank, as I have a MASSIVE skimmer, about 300 + lbs of live rock, at least 150lbs of live sand (including the DSB in my refugium). I believe I just have enough area to grow sufficient bacteria to control the nitrates, plus the skimmer helps eliminate a lot before it turns into nitrate.
As for Phosphate...........I do several things. I do actually rinse all my frozen foods. I do this for a few reasons. Yes, I believe it helps with phosphate control, however I also dose out my frozen food into ice cube trays. I do two 12 slot tray's at a time, so I have 24 days of food. One cube is one feeding, so if I have a house sitter, I don't have to worry about overfeeding. It also makes it much easier on the daily, if I'm tired. I just throw a cube in a bowl of tank water and let it sit / thaw. Then feed with a turkey Baster. I also use an auto feeder for pellets of two different sizes that feeds three times a day.
I do 80 gallon water changes every two to three weeks, and I use GFO and Carbon that I change out every other water change.....so 4-6 weeks. I have a large amount of chaeto that grows in my refugium as well. I run the GFO very slowly, but if I notice an algae spike, I will turn up the flow, and it will usually fix it within a day or two, but I try to be careful with not "shocking" the tank by dropping things too quickly.
I think that is pretty much it for the Nitrate and phosphate.
Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk
RandyC
Supporting Member
And you would likely be correct @Flagg37. Most of the phosphate/phosphorous is lock up in the actual food.
From Randy Holmes-Farley - http://www.advancedaquarist.com/2012/3/chemistry
"Now that we have some information on the phosphate in foods, we can critically examine the concern that many aquarists have about foods, and specifically their rinsing of frozen foods before use. A typical test you see is someone taking a cube of fish food, thawing it, and putting it into a half cup of water. They then test that water for phosphate and find it "off the charts". Let's assume that means 1 ppm phosphate, which would give a very dark blue color in many phosphate tests. Bear in mind this is a thought problem, not an actual measured value, but it is typical of what people think the answer is.
Is that a lot of phosphate? Well, there are two ways to think of the answer.
The first way is as a portion of the total phosphate in that food. A half cup of water at 1 ppm (1 mg/L) phosphate contains a total of 0.12 mg of phosphate. A cube of Formula 2 contains about 11.2 mg of phosphate. So the hypothetical rinsing step has removed about 1 percent of the phosphate in that food. Not really worthwhile, in my opinion, but that decision is one every aquarist can make for themselves.
The second way to look at this rinsing is with respect to how much it reduces the boost to the aquarium phosphate concentration. Using the same calculation as above of 0.12 mg of phosphate, and adding that to 100 gallons total water volume, we find that phosphate that was rinsed away would have boosted the "in tank" phosphate concentration by 0.12 mg/379 L = 0.0003 ppm. That amount washed away does not seem significant with respect to the "in tank" target level of about 50-100 times that level (say, 0.015 to 0.03 ppm), nor does it seem significant relative to the total amount of phosphate actually added each day in foods (which is perhaps 50-1000 times as much, based on input rates from Table 4. Again, the conclusion I make is that rinsing is not really worthwhile, in my opinion."
