My Reef in a Box

A Place for Rare Zoanthids

noreply@blogger.com (Wei) — Thu, 09 Oct 2008 12:52:00 +0000

If you're interested in zoas like I am, you should check out Rare Zoanthids, a website dedicated to showcasing rare zoas and possibly helping you find out where to find them. Even though I am taking a temporary (yet extended) break from the hobby, this site really brings back a lot of memories for me.

In addition to the colorful pictures, there's also descriptions on how to ID the zoas as well as how to care for them. It's definitely a cool resource if you're new to the hobby.

More Pictures of the 29... Close-ups!

noreply@blogger.com (Wei) — Mon, 10 Dec 2007 18:13:00 +0000

Contents of the 29 Gallon for Sale

noreply@blogger.com (Wei) — Sun, 02 Dec 2007 14:54:00 +0000

I'm not sure if these pictures will help or hurt the sale, but a bunch of people have been asking for them. Basically, since work and chores have gotten in the way of the hobby, I am now forced to get out of it completely for awhile.

The photos below show the tank as is today. Even though the pics suck, there are certainly some diamonds in the ruff in this tank.

Among some of the zoas that are in there, green death, purple death, peach rainbows, AOG's, reds, blues, galaxies, etc. There are also some nice ricordias with neon green mouths in there. Their coloring have changed somewhat in the 20K bulb... I think my preference is still 14K but I wanted to test it since I didn't have actinics over this tank.

Anyway, I'm asking $240 OBO for everything inside the tank. (Which also includes 2 clowns, a well behaved damsel, an urchin and all the live rocks) I think if better cared for, these things should bounce back bigger and better within a couple of months.

The end of an era... or was it just a year?

noreply@blogger.com (Wei) — Sat, 21 Jul 2007 21:04:00 +0000

Well, the wedding has come and gone and now we are on the hunt for our next house with a yard. We decided on a place in East Atlanta that has pretty much everything we're looking for so we're now in the process to clean up the house and hoping that both the offers and the timing will work to our advantage.

The condo market right now isn't too great in Atlanta... so to help sell the house, we are looking to get rid of any access furniture that we don't need and unfortunately, I've decided that the fish tank is one of these things.

So while it's sad to have to sell off my 90 gallon tank... I'm hoping the next upgrade will be bigger, badder and less expensive. I'm pretty sure it won't be less expensive but one can dream.

Some good have came out of this though... I got some money to help pay down wedding debt and this will be one less thing to worry about in the coming months as we get ready to move. Also, it was good to get a bunch of people seeing the tank and all of them only had positive things to say about it. *Whew*

In the end... if it only took me a year to get all these awesome corals, the second time around should be a lot easier.

Bacterial Bloom and another new fish!

noreply@blogger.com (Wei) — Sun, 24 Jun 2007 03:27:00 +0000

A couple of days ago my tank randomly turned very cloudy... besides for the tang, I didn't really add anything else over the last few days. Needless to say, this is strange. The last time the tank turned this cloudy, we were cooking something in the house that smoked up... carbon took care of it last time in a day, but again, it did nothing for the tank this time even with two bags.

After much reading, it seems like I have a bacterial bloom. Since the haze is gray/white and not green (algae) or yellow (ammonia?) that seems to be the only logical conclusion. I guess to back track just a tad bit, I even took my water to the store to get it tested and everything came back and I quote: "perfect!"

Ah well... with perfect but cloudy water, this was good enough for me to add yet another fish. Although my first two tangs suffered ill fates maybe due to high nitrates or bad collection habits... I was REALLY glad to see that my Mimic Tang was healthy, eating, and not fighting with the existing inhabitants.

Well, I wanted to push my luck and decided to add a Clown Tang into the tank. I've always loved the colors and the patterns on these fish and so fargood to see that he too is getting along with the other ones in the tank. Now all I have to do is wait for the haze to be gone and I'll be back to my happy self again.

Tang Attempt #3

noreply@blogger.com (Wei) — Sat, 16 Jun 2007 18:26:00 +0000

I went to the Buckhead fish store after work yesterday to pick up a couple of clowns for my new tank. Yeah, I realize it's a bit soon but the cycling time for my tank has been minimal mostly due to me filling the tank with dry rocks and live rocks from my 90. Well, I ended up not getting the clowns but walked out with some more rocks and a mimic tang.

My favorite tangs thus far have been the red sea sailfin desjardini, achilles tang, the purple tang and some of the powder blue and browns. Most of the others have not been of interest to me but for whatever reason, this one REALLY caught my eye. Apparently, according to the store owner, this particular Mimic Tang was mimicking a Eibli Pygmy Angel like the one pictured below... which must have been it cause I remember liking those as well.

Well, the crazy store owner quoted me $110 for this fish... after much MUCH debate, I ended up getting him. This was probably a bad decision b/c the two tangs I've tried before had not fared well at all. The purple tang died. The hippo tang also died mysteriously after a week due to not eating.

Also, the flame angel I bought was terrorized to death by the Potter's Angel and MUCH to my dismay, didn't make it through day two.

So here I am, buying a tang which doesn't stand much of a chance living (apparently)... as well as mimicking another dwarf angel which may cause issues in itself... I dunno; almost everything about it smelled fishy to me.

But the funny thing was... while I was worrying about this fish, the owners were worried about this tang terrorizing my current tank mates. I guess we were on different pages.

Well, I'm glad to say this story has a happy ending so far... when the fish finally rang up, it was only about $55 w/ the ARC discount. At first I thought I got a killer deal but I was just misquoted the price. Also, since the introduction to the tank, it seems like it has taken on the dominate role. The other fish are cautious, but no one has even tried to harass the tang yet (which I guess they didn't harass tangs before either). Vice versa, the tang hasn't decided to pick fights with anyone yet. I'm not sure if the colors will continue to stay as the Eibli, but I hope so... I really like the way this one looks... but I guess time will tell.

Can anyone ID this?

noreply@blogger.com (Wei) — Sun, 10 Jun 2007 16:20:00 +0000

Could this be a new baby plate coral about to form? It looks awesome but I have no idea what it is. Can any of you ID it?

From Hobbiest to Addict...

noreply@blogger.com (Wei) — Sat, 09 Jun 2007 23:00:00 +0000

I'm not sure if I've been trying to avoid wedding planning or if it's something else that's urging me to procrastinate and not think about work... but these past 2-3 weeks I've been on a craze looking up new zoas, new corals, new deals to trade, etc. Nevermind the fact that my tank is SOOO crowded right now that I'm actually a little pissed at it. Believe it or not, there actually is a fine line between looking like a true reef to looking like a junkyard for corals and I'm pretty sure I crossed over onto the dark side.

So what would a sensible person do? Probably sell off some frags, rearrange the tank so every piece would have a good chance to grow out, etc. What did I do? Start looking for the next tank that's under 75 gallons and trying to find a place for it. At first it was a 40g breeder... then maybe a 58 gallon (I think I saw a good deal on Craigslist) then progressively it got bigger and more expensive and so on... ACK!

Alright, so my senses compromised a bit. I went downstairs into my garage where the unsold 29 gallon is still chillin, cleaned it up, painted the back, and I'm now going to put it to work. So far, luckily I have yet to spend a dime besides for more black paint. I guess lucky me I just happened to have a spare tank, stand, 150w MH light, heaters, sand and of course salt and water. I will need to get some more rocks I think but I haven't quite figured out how this new frag / zoas and ricordias tank will be aquascaped.

So now that I'm finally jumping over from just having one tank to two tanks, I'm now officially an addict. The sad part is... I'm setting up the second tank in the guest room, a room that I maybe visit once a month. If anything, this just screams MORE WORK!

Coral Pics! (mostly Zoanthids)

noreply@blogger.com (Wei) — Wed, 30 May 2007 03:25:00 +0000

It's been awhile since I've taken and posted pics so I figured I'll give you guys an update.

Superman monti... finally growing bigger

Supergirl? Rainbow monti...

Zombie Eyes in the back... birds nest in the front

Armageddon Frag

Armor of God... mmmm armor

True Eagle Eyes, not dem fake googly eyes

Possible Golden Eye? These are VERY orange in my tank though...

Jade Sumthin... or Miami Hurricanes

Fire 'n Ice Zoas (classic)

Blue Zoas!

PPE's

Zoa disease part 3

noreply@blogger.com (Wei) — Wed, 30 May 2007 03:19:00 +0000

It's been about a month since I last updated... everything in the tank has matured but more importantly, the colors of my Armageddons are now coming back! I can't say I've successfully treated this disease because I honestly haven't really done anything to this colony other than fragging away some of the healthier polyps prior to the disease taking over completely. In the picture above, you can actually see one polyp in the lower right that was not infected originally.

Anyway, it's good to know that DNA is working and that this didn't morph into some dull looking brown polyps. These should recover completely in about another month.

Zoa disease part 2

noreply@blogger.com (Wei) — Fri, 20 Apr 2007 22:07:00 +0000

Sooo... since I last posted. I fragged a few polyps off of the dying colony only to have them fall between the cracks of some rocks and disappear somewhere in the tank. Some others are still around, but it'd be nice if I can find the missing frag. Anyway, the zoas seemed to have recovered from whatever they were suffering from except that some of the more damaged ones seemed to have lost their mojo and colors. I'm still not sure what the disease is or if this has been observed before but this is definitely not one of the more common issues where zoas get irrated by flow and decided to close or if they were bothered by nudi's.

Here's the before pic.

Zoa disease?

noreply@blogger.com (Wei) — Sun, 08 Apr 2007 17:50:00 +0000

Not sure what this is... but over the last couple of days, my Armageddon zoas started closing up, thinning its stalks and look like it's throwing up or something. It started with a couple of polyps and proceeded to turn the whole group like it.

I fragged a few healthy polyps out but I'm not sure if the rest are doomed or if it's something they will get over. Right now only two other small colonies in the tank seem irritated but everythig else is opening fine and there doesn't appear to be any nudibranches or other stuff eating it.

Have any of you seen anything like this?

Frag tank from GlassCages.com

noreply@blogger.com (Wei) — Sun, 01 Apr 2007 16:29:00 +0000

So about a month ago, I ordered a frag tank from GlassCages.com. The tank is 24x18x12" and has a hole drilled on the side. While my 90 gallon still basically looks like a frag tank, I am hoping to actually grow some colonies in there as the tank matures. Part 1 of that process is to clean up my sand bed and move the frags on the plugs over to a separate propagation tank.

The tank finally came after about 3-4 weeks of wait time. All in all, I had the tank made for about $150 drilled and delivered. Funny thing is... a pre-made 90 gallon tank for them is about the same price before delivery.

The tank looks pretty sturdy but I haven't filled it with water to be sure. Looks wise, the trim for this custom tank looks pretty ghetto. I want to reiterate custom made since this is probably the reason why the black trim looks homemade and ghetto... but I'm honestly not sure how it would have looked had I ordered one of the more standard sizes.

My next steps are to build a stand and get this puppy plumbed and setup. I really hope that process won't take another month but I guess we'll see. Overall I am happy with the order but I'll write another post about once it's actually setup with water in it.

Feelin Clammy

noreply@blogger.com (Wei) — Sat, 31 Mar 2007 15:20:00 +0000

Ack... so less than a month from the day I purchased my first clam, it has for whatever reason deteriorated and died. On its last day, it pretty much closed up shut and was holding the position for at least a full day.

I don't think water parameters were an issue but maybe lighting was? Maybe something else was irratating it as well, I can't pinpoint it quite yet. I guess I'll hold off on the next one until I upgrade my lights or see if I can do some more research on what may cause the problem.

I do have potentially harmful snails in the tank but I feel like if they were indeed the harmful kind instead of the look-alikes, they would have eventually migrated into the clam instead of staying on glass like they have been even after introducing the clam into the tank. *Sigh*

When Ideas Backfire...

noreply@blogger.com (Wei) — Sun, 25 Mar 2007 02:58:00 +0000

I'm REALLY trying to go for a colorful tank in my 90. After seeing some pictures of brown tanks from some of the local sell off threads, I'm starting to appreciate my tank more seeing how my corals for the most part haven't browned out on me yet.

I wouldn't say I have the most exotic fish collection, but the colors do cover a wide spectrum between my 9 fishes. Also, while I'm not sure if this is right or wrong, I now have three (blue, orange and purple) lankia stars in my tank.

So anyway, after going on Reef Central and seeing a number of tanks with multiple angel-fishes in a tank, I thought it'd be a great idea if I got a flame angel to add some red to my fish population. My main concern was that my Potter's Angel wouldn't be happy but I figured if they can co-exist for a day, then things would be good.

Well, my thought process pretty much mirrored Homer's thought process when he thought he was smart in the following episode...

Let's just say the Flame angel is the most expensive sushi I've ever bought for my Potter's. Maybe next time when I have a 500+ gallon tank and I learn to put all the same kind of fish in at the same time, I'll try again.

More Coral Pictures!

noreply@blogger.com (Wei) — Mon, 12 Mar 2007 03:45:00 +0000

So this weekend I pretty much did nothing except for chillin, partying and learning how to use the camera. (Oh, we bought a cake too; just because.) By learning the camera, I mean reading the manual and pretending to understand and taking a whole bunch of pictures until a sharp one came through... below are some more pics from the cam and my collection.

Red / orange / pink monti cap from Big D. More orange now than the other two colors.

An acro that's slowly turning from brown to green and purple.

My red zoas. I just like the mix in this shot.

My peach zoas. Possibly rainbow? I dunno.

My tri-color tort from Kayla. This is a good one. I've been trying to get the tri-color in the pic for like 2 weeks now. All the pictures thus far have been all blue but I'm getting closer to capturing how cool this piece is.

My new clam from Capp Bay.

Artist (wedding day style) pic of the dog.

Ahh... and here's my favorite, the Mandarin.

Pics from the LFS (Cappuccino Bay Aquarium)

noreply@blogger.com (Wei) — Sun, 11 Mar 2007 17:21:00 +0000

One expensive hobby into another... *sigh*

So I recently bought myself a Canon Rebel XTi. With the new website launching and me trying to sell and trade frags of my stuff, I just got tired of not being able to take nice pictures of my collection to show the world. So yes... after a quick research into what's new in the world of DSLR cameras and getting recommendations from local reefers who are MUCH better at taking pictures than me, I opted for the Canon one due to their reputation in the industry for good equipment as well as cost vs. other cameras in the market.

Anyway, I'm still trying to learn the whole white balance, focus, light, aperture and yada yada things... but below are some pics I took from one of the LFS in my area whose been known to have great selection in terms of corals and clams. Don't let the poor pictures take away from the quality of the corals. The pieces here are amazing...

A pic from their baby clam section.

White balance is off, but still a nice piece!

The owner told me what this was... but I forgot. It's kind of like a goniopora I think. (I should have bought it!)

Blue zoas... though these didn't look like they were for sale.

I REALLLLY want this one. (Anyone know what it is?)

This pic doesn't do the acro justice... the tips are almost tiffany blue.

Anyway, hopefully I'll learn to take some better pics in the near future as I figure out the 140,000 buttons and settings that are on this camera.

Frag tank ordered!

noreply@blogger.com (Wei) — Tue, 06 Mar 2007 14:49:00 +0000

"Cheddah comin!"

Hopefully that's what I'll be saying in a few months... I just ordered a new custom tank from GlassCages.com; it's a 24x18x12 frag tank. I think they recently got a new customer service woman to help make the business more friendly. If I remember correctly, the first time I researched the company the general consensus on the forums were that the tanks were decent, but customer service could be better. I guess they're working on it.

The tank should be here in a couple of weeks... luckily they just happened to have an Atlanta delivery scheduled 2 weeks from when I want the tank. I will do another review once it actually gets here.

Water changes... what are water changes?

noreply@blogger.com (Wei) — Sun, 04 Mar 2007 22:51:00 +0000

I admit, when I only had a couple of fish and my bio-load was way low... water changes came as common as a lunar eclipse. However, having recently added a couple more to my list, I now do them about once a week. If you cringe when hearing the phrase "water change" but like your fish and your investment, then this picture is for you. Can you see which one of three buckets below is used water?

This is your water in five gallon buckets.

This is your water after your fish have peed and poo'ed in it.

Any questions?

How To: The Tunze Nano Stream Mod

noreply@blogger.com (Wei) — Sat, 03 Mar 2007 16:40:00 +0000

As mentioned previously, I recently picked up a pair of Tunze Nano Streams (model 6025) to add some flow to my tank. While these power heads have been troopers so far, reefers are always looking for ways to improve a situation if anything can be done. Much like the iPhone, I think Tunze really did themselves a dis-service by announcing new models of the Nano Stream but failed to meet the demand of the public at the peak of our interest. What I mean is... the 6-8 months between the iPhone announcement and when they will become available, the idea will most likely be copied a few times and as a result sales will suffer. The same goes for Tunze... we are shown three versions of the product so we now know the Nano Streams can in theory, pump out so much more. However, so far we've been watching the carrot dangle in our faces and can only sporatically (at best) find the base version; guess what? Sales will suffer or mods will be done!

So what do you get when you combine a bored teenager with some tools and some free time to break things? You get the Tunze Nano Stream mod. I can't take credit for this since some guy with much more free time than me thought of this... but I do thank him for it.

So basically the idea behind the mod is simple. Chip off a part of the inner tube so more water can be sucked up at one time to be propelled through the tunnel. Sounds simple enough. While Tunze claims the inner tube is needed to prevent the propeller from breaking or starting up backwards, no one who has attempted this mod thus far has had any major issues.

The easiest way to cut out the inside is to use a Dremel tool. For this project, I used the saw attachment.

While cutting the inner tube away, you can try to smooth it out so that the curve matches the inside of the sphere and that no misc. plastic bits are still half attached to the protective sphere.

This is what it looks like after you cut away the big pieces and smooth out the inside. It's nothing spectacular to see but the results are phenomenal! Most people that have done this mod (including myself) are seeing about a 50-70% increase over the designed flow output. Seeing how my Nano Streams don't have a permanent restarting problem, I do highly recommend doing this mod if you own the Nano Stream. If you mess it up or end up not liking the mod, you can buy a replacement cover from Tunze for $10. Also, since the mod will generally give you output of the mid-tiered model, you've just saved yourself $30 and the anguish of waiting for the release 6045 model. Want to see the original thread that started it all? Have more questions? Let me know.

DOH! Disturbin the peace! Zoa eating nudibranches

noreply@blogger.com (Wei) — Sat, 24 Feb 2007 17:32:00 +0000

So this past week I've noticed a few of my zoas were not opening like before... by before, I mean last week when they were open pretty much 18 hours a day. At first I thought maybe some of my levels were off and that the weekend water change would fix it, however, it seems like the issue is actually a lot worse.

I'm not sure if you can see it in this picture... but there is a nudi crawling over the closed zoas that it's disturbing. Not only has these nudi's mysteriously appeared, their ruffles or feathers have started to take on the metallic florescent colors of the zoas they've been eating! It's kind of weird but I guess it makes sense. The nudi's on my dragon eyes have a yellow glow to it while the ones on my orange zoas shine orange. If you click on the picture to get the bigger version, you can actually see a yellow nudi on the red zoas. Stupid nudi who thinks he can grab and collect all the colors of my collection...

Reading online, it seems that people have been successful getting the population under control via fresh water dips but I don't think I want to go this route. First of all, it's a lot of work and I'm personally just not a fan of taking something out of its element for dips. Can you imagine a higher being saying... hey, that girl over there has pimples, I'm pretty sure we have to pick her up and put her in space so the pimples will pop. Yeah... I guess that's a viable solution... but the zoas have already been stressed, there has to be a less stressful way. However, this is my personal preference and I'm sure most if not all of you will prefer the dip over doing nothing at all. Secondly, many of my zoas are on large pieces of rocks that make up the foundation of my rock work, I'm not rearranging the house to get a couple of pests out...

Other solutions I've read online included getting a certain types of wrasse that may hunt the nudi's and possibly using flatworm exit to poison it. I searched online for a bit for more information on the Sea Grass Wrasse and that seemed to have worked for a few people... (Blue Zoo Aquatics was the only online store I found that sold it) but I haven't found any locally, so I guess that will be my plan B.

So today I'm testing out plan A: Flatworm eXit by Salifert. (By the way, why is it cool to type it eXit instead of Exit? SAiLfERT, YOU gOT iSSuES.) Anyway, I took the carbon out of the system and poured some of this stuff into the system. Surprisingly, I saw some flatworms floating in the water columns now... very interesting... I did not know I had a flatworm problem... but can't worry about that for now. I'm still monitoring the nudi's that are crawling around and unfortunately they still seemed fine; hopefully things will change in a few hours.

On an unrelated side note, if you try to pick up a nudi with your bare hands, you could rub some of this glowing stuff on your hands. It's kind of cool, assuming I don't have to go to the ER in a few minutes. =P

Christmas in February!

noreply@blogger.com (Wei) — Thu, 15 Feb 2007 02:16:00 +0000

Whether it'd be some prized rainbow tort or just some plain xenia, the best frags in the world are free frags... Ever since last year when I joined Atlanta Reef Club, February has turned to my holiday season. (Yes, forget December!) Last night at our club meeting, it was our annual fragging demonstration meeting, a.k.a. free frags for everyone! The turnout was crazy and even better, the corals that were being fragged were awesome.

Even though I went to the meeting not expecting anything too fancy, I still walked away with like five or six frags of various zoas, chalice, maze brain, acro's, etc. Alright, so what if my tank is stacked? Now, they're stacked even more.

If you are currently in the hobby and do not belong to a local club, I highly recommend you look one up, join, and then tell them to do a similar frag demo meeting. I think a huge part of my tank's success this past year has been due to my interactions with the community to learn and dispense advice on things I've picked up. If you guys only knew me three years ago back in college... you'd be shocked at the stupid things I've done to get my tank going... (but that's another post.)

Anyway, in the pics here, you can see the sea of frags, and not just frags, FREE frags! Needless to say, all of us are happy campers right now.

Anyway, thanks Chris for taking these photos and thank you ARC for the free frags!

Tank Flow 201 - Maintenance & Upgrades

noreply@blogger.com (Wei) — Sun, 21 Jan 2007 18:50:00 +0000

We all know tank flow is important especially in reef tanks. Actually, tank flow is important in all tanks. You can't very well imitate a river in a tropical tank if all you have is some bubbles floating through carbon. Likewise, you can't very well imitate an ocean if you only have a couple of weak powerheads in the tank. In the world of reef tank keeping, water body movement is more important than having a tiny focused jet stream aimed in one direction. Because of such, many reefers like using Tunze and Seio powerheads due to the way these powerheads propel water vs. the traditional pumps that shoots them like a firehose. (But you already know this stuff... so why am I writing about it 9 months after my tank is already established?)

Well, as a budget reefer, I opted for the Seios when I first started. Being that my tank is only 90 gallons, I didn't feel the need to splurge on a wave maker or controller based Tunze's if this is what I have to live with for a few years; of course, some people like to get the right equipment the first time around, which is also a good thing to do.

Welp, over the last few months, my Seios have slowly built up gunk and various debris in the intake valves such as chaeto, algae and baby snails have found their doom in the intake... This on top of me initially running them at half capacity due to not wanting a sand storm lead to a visible degrade in the tank after 9 months. Before I know it, the flow dropped drastically and the results were black and maroon cyano algae patches in the tank, droopy corals and some corals even stopped opening up. I knew my setup worked before the clogs so something had to be done.

Part 1: Maintenance

The first thing I did which I've put off for about a month is taking the pumps out and cleaning them. People say you should clean the Seios as often as once a month... but I say it really depends on how they look. Mine had coralline algae growing on them and some intakes even had bubble algae clogging up the holes. Many others had baby snails stuck in the vents; all of this was brushed away. Then, after that was done, I ran each pump in a heavy solution of vinegar and RO/DI water to get build up and the salt out of areas I can't reach with the brush. I don't know the science behind it but think of it as mouth wash for your pumps.

Once the pumps were cleaned and placed back into the tank, improvements were immediately noticed. The pumps worked as well as they had previously and over the next few days, coralline deposits that were previously on the powerheads either fell off or were disposed by the snails.

Part 2: Upgrade

While the clean up revived the old pumps, I wanted to also upgrade the tank to have more flow. While the Seio's are nice, if I had wanted some major upgrade, I would have needed to buy the large ones, which I don't like due to them creating whirlpools and bubbles every so often. Tunze recently came out with the Nano Streams which upon further research proved to be one hellova substitute. I order 2 of the $62 version from My Reef Creations and plugged them into my system as soon as they arrived!

So far, I must say I am happy with the purchase. The Nano Streams are well designed and their sphere shaped casing allows you to pretty much aim the stream in any direction you like. The included magnet mount is also a bonus as it allows you to place the power heads as high or as low as you would like in the tank without worrying about the mount's distance in relations to the top of the tank. Due to the intake area being 4-5x bigger than the Seio's, you also don't get the whirlpool effect as you would with the Seios which are annoying during water changes when the water is low.

I would say right now, my tank's flow is in the best shape it's ever been and with five power heads in my tank, the flow do bump around and cause some chaotic currents. If for some reason I feel this is still not enough, you will probably see a third installment of this article where I upgrade the Seios and get a controller for variable output. Hopefully that won't come until after the tank upgrade though... (date TBD).

Hippo Tang no more...

noreply@blogger.com (Wei) — Sun, 21 Jan 2007 18:42:00 +0000

The hippo tang mysteriously disappeared a few days ago after the (non-related) party I had. Either I'm not feeding enough seaweed or the ones I'm buying are too small to get along with the current inhabitants of my tank. Either way, I think that will be my last attempt on tangs until I upgrade to a new tank. Losing hundreds of dollars in live stock sucks... and that's all I have to say about that.

R.I.P. - You will be missed...

Still Alive!

noreply@blogger.com (Wei) — Tue, 16 Jan 2007 05:23:00 +0000

Good things today... I thought my sea urchin had died even though I never found remains, and the same goes for the tiny emerald crabs that I had purchased a few weeks back, but as of this past week and today, I spotted both groups alive and well. The sea urchin only comes out at night when it's pitch black and it only stays in one spot... this seems unusual for me since sea urchins can be spotted near sea sides during the day but I'll take it!

As for the mini crabs, I guess as long as they're doing their jobs, I won't complain even if I don't see them around. I just wanted them to be okay.

Thanks to Tony, I also bought some more stuff shortly after the new years. Since I still had worries about the red cotton algae, I went ahead and ordered 15 Mexican turbo snails to resolve the issue. Luckily, they are actually doing something this time around unlike the lazy batch I got last time. I also replaced my yellow clown goby with a baby one, who has been very entertaining to watch. Pictures to come soon, I promise.

Edit: Here's a pic I grabbed.