Re: The Official Asylum Reef Tank Thread
 

Thanks, Mark.
I'm super excited about getting some more stock, getting her growing, and seeing what it looks like a year from now.
I gotta get some pulsing xenia and yellow clove polyps. I know it's rookie stuff, but I'm going to apply "reef what you like, like what you reef" to it. :D

Re: The Official Asylum Reef Tank Thread
 

Take it slow. Reefs are like race cars the faster you go the harder you crash.

Xenia is wonderful! very pretty swaying in the "breeze" Are these the kind of yellow polyps you are looking for?

http://fc02.deviantart.net/fs71/i/20...lfgang8810.jpg

Re: The Official Asylum Reef Tank Thread
 

I think those are them. I'll look in my book when I get home. They're supposed to be real hardy and a beginner critter. I just like them cause they're yellow.

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If these are in fact the right ones I'll send you some I have a colony the size of a football lol.

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I came home and looked, those are them. They're just called yellow polyps. They say they grow real fast and they're kind of a pain in the ass. :)
I was gonna go to Captain Larry's tomorrow, but he's closed. There's a place in Kent that's pretty lousy, I should have stopped there today to see if they had anything, although I'm kind of afraid to buy anything there.

Re: The Official Asylum Reef Tank Thread
 

if you have a reason to be afraid I would avoid buying from there. Same as here in Cigar world. If A supplier supplies questionable sticks mold, fakes, bugs, whatever. Trust your sources.

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The place looks like they suffered a flood, hurricane, and a fire, then college kids moved in for 15 or 20 years.
I didn't give their stock, the little there was, much of a look. I just wanted out of there before I caught something. Mind ya, this is from a guy who worked in sh1t most of his life.

Re: The Official Asylum Reef Tank Thread
 

Girls in Birkenstocks:sh?
Smelling like patchouli?
(not that I know anything about any of that...)


I would send you about 10 heads of Xenia if you think they would survive the trip. They are a beautiful weed in my big tank but I have not seen them grow anywhere else much.

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They'd never make it, Lance. Thanks, though. :tu
I found some in a place in Pittsburgh before. It's gone now, but the place across the street has been there since I was a kid and they have nice stuff. I found another place in Pittsburgh that has a HUGE selection, but we weren't looking for corals when we were there, just fish.
I'll probably have to head down there if I'm gonna have any luck.
The Cleveland/Akron area just seems devoid of any decent livestock places. I guess I'll just have to go across state lines to get the job done. :D

Re: The Official Asylum Reef Tank Thread
 

My replacement filters and membrane and DI cartridge came for my rodi unit. I got some tubing and fixed a leak, too. I got her all fired up and made my first 20 gallons of water. After feeding tomorrow, I'll clean some brown hair and start replacing a ridiculous amount of water for the next couple months until I get this hair under control.
When I was talking to the air, water, and ice girl, she asked if my system sat unused full of water. I told her no, then realized it sat around for quite awhile when I moved here. Apparently that's a very bad thing. It ruins your membrane and makes your RODI water smell like fish.
So there's yet another self-inflicted catastrophe I've set upon myself.
I'm glad it happened, otherwise I'd have never learned. My stuff is none the worse for the wear, and soon it'll get better.
I've learned volumes about reef keeping in the last month and keep reading constantly. Soon I may be able to keep stuff alive. :D

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I've replaced 40 gallons of water and there's a DRAMATIC difference in the tank. The brown hair is starting to "sluff off" or slide off things, and it's puddling up on the surface a bit.
Despite my stupidity, my mushrooms are making babies all over the place, and the trumpet coral is dividing one of her polyps. She's turning from a five polyp lump to a six polyp lump.
The big mass of green paly's is making babies galore, and the radioactive eagle eyeball thing is five times it's original size, has picked up some color, and is dividing very rapidly. I couldn't be more pleased. :D

Question:
The trumpet fell off the small piece of cut plate glass she was glued to. Can I use super glue gel and stick her somewhere permanent?

Re: The Official Asylum Reef Tank Thread
 

yes. make to use super glue gel. The thin stuff wont work. Gel is the key

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Thanks, brother. I have a whole bunch of gel. I discovered it because of the fish tank, and it's all I buy anymore. It works great. :tu

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Good on ya. When I first started io used the thin stuff and it spread over the colony and they got glued shut. No bueno.

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I'm pretty sure you're the one who turned me on to the gel stuff in the first place. It was either you or Steve (fissure).

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http://fracstar.com/pics/rhodactis.jpg
Rhodactis are becoming my new weed. They are very hard to get off a surface. They keep splitting.
Penelope has to ham it up for the camera.

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I so miss our sail fin tang. I wonder if a new one would get along with our yellow tank? They're so mellow, I can't even imagine them fighting.

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Last night after lights out I fed my corals in the dark. I dumped a bunch of Phyto and some brine shrimp in there. I figured that'd also benefit my copepods which seem non-existant aside from tons of bristle worms (assuming they qualify as copepods).
I did it because I already had another 20 gallon water change ready, and I'm feeding pretty agressively as stuff is really getting a foothold and responding well.
I had been feeding frozen food and phyto every other day, and had completely stopped flake. Then I eased way back on feeding and the fish helped with the brown hair. Now I ramped the food and am continuing water changes.
I've replaced 60 gallons of water now in a very short time, and still plan to do regular 20 gallon changes until the brown hair is completely managed. It's almost completely under control already, but I still hair a little green algae growth on the glass that I'm okay with. It's a very small amount.
I've moved some corals up in the water column and they're doing well with the light. I glued some fast, and a couple are ready to be glued.
Friday we go to Washington and we'll probably go to my fish store down in Pittsburgh and get some corals. Just a few simple carpeting things. Mainly I want to snag some pulsing xenia's, yellow polyps, and maybe some other easy cheap stuff that catches my eye.
I'd love to grab a couple fish, but they'd have to be super special and super small to make me consider it. Mostly I'd like to find a couple cool shrimp and reef stars.
I should probably just stay home. :D

Re: The Official Asylum Reef Tank Thread
 

yellow tangs can be territorial. Not nearly as bad as the purple or black tangs but is let the new guy float for quite a while.

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Believe it or not, black are more docile. Mine is a nice guy.
Purple is the worst.

For acclamation, what I always did for customers and myself is use a large enough plastic container, with holes drilled all over it, with a lid.
Place the new fish in the bottle as it sits in the tank (as otherwise you won't have water in it with the holes).
Place the container in a corner or behind a rock where the fish is less stressed.
Aggressors will see him and think he is free and about to beat up on and they will stare him down a while.
Leave him in there overnight or until you no longer see aggression towards him but best at least one overnight.

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Diddnt you have to put your black tang in the time out container to allow another fist to become acclimated?

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I may have had to perhaps once. Don't recall. Certainly not more than that. Then agsin, he was much smaller the last time I added any fish, which is years now.
He is actually one of the most peaceful tangs I ever recall. I only have two in the tank with the other being a very large Red Sea Blonde Naso.

99% of the time, the new one did the time in the container.
Seems to have always worked well with a rare exception.

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I was hoping you would chime in, Carlos. I remember that procedure from somewhere earlier in this thread.

Re: The Official Asylum Reef Tank Thread
 

Also, what always goes a long way is to also shuffle some rocks around if possible.
Difficult to do with well established reefs but if possible, what it does is confuse the current inhabitants and they spend their quality time finding a new home rather than bothering the new inhabitant.
This clearly works much better with non reef tanks with bleached corals as my tank as easier to shift things around.

Re: The Official Asylum Reef Tank Thread
 

I feel the need to add some more fishies to my 90 now :(

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Awesome analogy!!

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Just like condoms for sex, Quarantine is a must if adding new fish.
What a freaking analogy. :r

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I just traded some rhodactis and other frags for a frogspawn. Bought a few more hermit crabs and snails while I was there. I saw a candy coral called kryptonite that was extremely bright fluorescent green. My tank is too full right now.
I think the frogspawn will be able to fight back the rhodactis. This will be easier than trying to kill it.

Re: The Official Asylum Reef Tank Thread
 

Very nice! :banger

Sounds like a green nepthea (sp?) in the picture the polyps are closed.

http://home.comcast.net/~jbrigman/pics/nepthea.jpg

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Same color but it was large polyp. Looked just like candy coral.

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Another $50.00 down the reef chute. :D
I broke a canopy the other day. I went to the pet store here and picked one up, it's too short so I have to take it back. I found the exact replacement at Foster & Smith.
Why I don't just shop there in the first place, I'll never know. I absolutely love that outfit. :tu
I was gonna get new t5 bulbs too, but I don't know if I'm ready for them yet. If the critters are any indication of whether they're okay or not, they're great. The ends of the tubes look good, too.
I think I just changed them when I moved here because I had an extra brand new set.

Brings me to a question...
Where can I get t5 bulbs on the cheap, or do I just order them from Foster and Smith? I have this light. It's the 48" model. Everyone tells me these lights last 8 months, but Foster Smith says 18 months to two years. What should I think?

Re: The Official Asylum Reef Tank Thread
 

My fixture is actually a 432 watt 8 lamp fixture, but it's the same one shown in the link I put up there. Not sure why it's different, I got it quite a few years ago.
I just looked at the tubes, they definately need replaced. I am not excited about paying $170.00 for lightbulbs. Really. *barf*

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Unfortunately thats what I pay for bulbs too. Hopefully somone will have a better source. I m stuck using 6 54 watt t5's

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I am not sure there IS a cheap lamp place that I would trust to actually sell what they claim to be selling.
While it has no crushing effect on the corals per se, it will encourage algal growth which no one wants.
So Foster and Smith are telling you about the "lifetime' of the lamp, you want to stay focused on the actual
spectral-accuracy life of the lamp. Which is about half of the actual life of the lamp. If it was just for room light,
who would care? But of course it's not. And of course, you KNOW this, I am just reminding you. How was
that last algae outbreak, lol. You KNOW reef-keeping is ridiculously expensive. Pouring perfectly good salty water
down the drain, lamps, replacement corals and fish for all the ones we kill. It's hell, :r

Sadly it's just about time for me to have to change out lamps, too. I save them though, in case I ever need to
grow weed.

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What he said!

Time for new lamps here too. I haven't found a better place than Drs. Foster & Smith yet.

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"The average life of T-5 tubes is 2 years, with the blue/actinic spectrum lamps lasting up to 18 months. 12000°K." are Dr Foster and Smith's words.
Your "spectral accuracy" comment is what I was looking for, Brad.

I guess I just kind of doubt the half-life idea. I tipped back my light to find a couple lamps with crusties floating around, and one actinic dead. Others looked new. Maybe I replaced half of them?
My doubt comes from:
1.) Dr. Foster and Smith are real straight shooters. If the lights were half good in half the time, they'd say so.
2.) Reef Keepers are even more painfully anal than cigar keepers, and Lord knows we have tons of rules we follow about ten steps past reasonably necessary.
3.) My corals are doing great, and are growing out of control.
4.) The corals I bought from other folks have totally changed from listless and colorless to colorful and full in no time.

My brown hair problem is all but solved. It was my fault. I had unhooked my ro/di unit and let it sit around for a couple months. That wrecks the membrane. It's even in my literature, I just never read it. :D
All I needed to do is fix my water, and that fixed the problem.

If my lights are 8x54w. that's be 432 watts or 4.8 w/gal. if my lights are at half the efficacy at half the life (let's say 8 months to a year), I'd probably be looking at 2.4 watts/gal, although I'm sure they don't curve down evenly.
Heck, it'd be worth wasting the money on one of those luminometers ;) or whatever they call light measuring devices for the tank. You'd pay for it in no time with bulbs.

Based on my poorly informed argument, and knowing you've likely read volumes of painful tests and tech specs on this stuff, and knowing you're not gonna accept any suggestion that costs lots of money without a fight, how'd you get okay with the "bulbs are shot in half the time they say so" thing, Brad?
Know that this is a big leap for me. Normally I'd not believe anyone without doing the due diligence, but I know you're just as mental as I am, so I find it hard to believe you've accepted this without a fight. I can be okay with that. :D

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I suppose another questions is "what brand are you t-5er's using?"
I continue to use Current, which was SlimPaq, which is now TrueLumen.

Bulbs are right here if you guys wanna shop.
Mark, you and I are using the same bulbs. My fixtures uses 8 54w t5's.

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I just ordered two 400w 14K HIDs and two 65w actinic CFs for $160.

I read somewhere on the webz where someone measured the spectrum over the life of an HID and found it stayed pretty constant for a while and then shifted quickly long before the intensity dropped significantly. I have no recollection of anything like that for CFs or T5s but you can see the ends blacken on them so you know something is changing.

Re: The Official Asylum Reef Tank Thread
 

See, mine aren't blackened at all, and I've never let them get that far. I don't even know if t5's will blacken on the ends.

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My CFs take about a year to blacken. I have T5s on the freshwater tank but don't pay attention to them.

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Found this.
Maybe I'll convert my system to T5s.

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After a little pricing things out I think I'm O.K. with my setup.

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I worked at Sylvania in St. Mary's, PA a number of times over the years. Lots of time it was for long periods. They made me say "lamp" and it still gets me. No one knows what I'm talking about when I say lamp. :D

I'm very inclined to believe the email verbatiim. I can't even begin of a reason why someone would make all that stuff up, especially if they have nothing to gain.

If you wondeer if Sylvania really tests bulbs, I can tell you that the right rear of the St. Mary's plant has a GIANT area devoted solely to burning and testing lamps. I can't even take a guess at how many lamps are in there, or how many hours they've been burning, but there's also guages and dials everywhere. They burn lots of lamps there that they don't even make at that plant, so they must be a regional tester? Don't know.

I think I'll pull my hood off tonight and work on it a bit. Lisa agreed to help me. I'll replace what tubes look like they need replacing, and put a label on the hood so I know what I changed and when. I might just go ahead and replace everything if enough are rough looking, and get a fresh start. :tu

Pending Brad's input. :D

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lol ;)

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I decided to go ahead and replace all my bulbs, throw away the two that are shot, and keep the rest. I'm going to make use of the awesome packaging F&S sends to store the old bulbs.
I think what happened is last time I replaced 6 of the 8 lamps cause I checked online and that's what it said the light used, I never even looked. That'd make sense as to why two are shot and 6 look great. (Online it says my fixture uses six bulbs, so I imagine that's what I ordered.)
Lisa says she thinks I replaced the bulbs last year around Christmas. I seem to think that's about right.

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Haha, you know me, got to SOUND superior if I can't BE superior. I always used the term lamp, cause in TV
we are always replacing tungsten lamps in our fixtures when someone trips over a wire and drags a light stand
to the floor with a crash and a pop and a flash of light. I ought to know I have blown up more than my share.
When you pay 3 for a dollar it's a bulb. When you pay 45 dollars for one, it's a LAMP, lol. But hearing that,
I would imagine that it could well be true that the last time I was actively buying lamps it was in the HO SHO days,
and I got my knowledge from that time of the hobby. Now I need to update my BS to match the reality, although
it would stand to reason that there was spectral shift if all of a sudden out of nowhere you are growing hair algae
like a hermit. Of course, there are 10 other reasons that could all be in play, lol. I DO save all my old lamps,
cause in my heart I do not believe a lamp is dead til you drop it or it gets a flicker and a black end on it. :r

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Oh and Scott, just because I spout something doesn't mean I ACCEPTED it, hahaha.
I have a reef cycle that makes me one of the bad people. I have a great reef until
my laziness just gets out of control and everything degrades. Same is true with lamps.
I HAVE three changes of lamps, cause I bought them on closeout. BUT I will replace
them all after one year. Then in three years, I am just gonna put the first set back in, hahaha.

Re: The Official Asylum Reef Tank Thread
 

Thanks, my brother. :tu
I still didn't order lamps, I was waiting for you to weigh in.
My hair algae bloom was due to moving, plus I let my ro/di unit lay around for a couple months all full of water and it wrecked the membrane. All I did was order new guts for it and replace 60 gallons of water (so far) and my hair algae problem is gone.
The brown diatom goo is almost history, too.

I talked to Lisa and we figured we'd get all the bulbs, then keep the six that are still fine. It makes sense since we have a fresh start on everything. If I have a burnout, I'll just replace it with one of the lamps I put in storage, I figure.

I'm absolutely amazed at what my corals are doing now that I've righted all my screwups. My tongue coral is ready to crawl out the tank. It's HUGE. Everything else is just going wild. If I improve the lighting, it'll only get better.
My new glass top is coming today, too. It'll replace the one I broke.

So all is well in fish land once again.
Thanks for all the help, Brad. I genuinely do appreciate your input and your knowledge, it means a lot to me. It helps to know how it used to be done, and why. The "why" is the biggest part. If I know why I'm doing what I'm doing, I can make anything work. You're where I get my "why?" :tu

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Well then you are FU@#*& son. :r Fish killer, lol. I am not sure how I killed my last outbreak of hair and
purple slime. I DO know that changing over to the 20 long made it necessary to replace 95% of the
water, derh, maybe that had something to do with it, lol. I swear I took my lettuce coral from one
barely living polyp to almost being back to full size. I was shocked that it re-encrusted the old skeleton
like that, I am sure it's not using the old holes, but who knows. I hate having this albatross
around my neck, especially as I get close to wanting sdesparately to move out of this town.
But I look at the various items still with me and think, "ehh, they're worth it."

Re: The Official Asylum Reef Tank Thread
 

'Zackly!
In electronics it's always a lamp, a bulb is an envelope. :D