New Aquapod

Laura and Jim will be hosting the May meeting this Saturday the 12th and it will be the usual of food, drinks, raffle and fun.
 
Doors will be open at 6:00 pm for social talk and the meeting will start at 7:00.  Parking gets a little tight and the city says you can't park on 4th but there is a parking lot a block away.   Meeting is usually held in the backyard so feel free to bring your favorite lawn chair, weather permitting of course.

If you need address/directions, contact a club member.

Best if you park at Mini Mall (where the spaghetti establishment use to be)
 
You will get to see his new frag tank set up in the making.
 
Hope to see you there!

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[rmcconn]

Hi all,

   O.k., well I was hoping that Santa was going to bring me MH lights for my 55 gal but instead I now have a 24 gal Aquapod with a 150 MH lighting system.  So now I have a clean slate to start building a reef for the first time.  I meant to talk with the club members at the Feb meeting but I missed it  .  Bear with me a little as I want to make sure I don't mess this up and plan on going slow.

   A little about the tank.  It has a built in filter area at the back of the tank and includes some bioballs and foam prefilters.  Basically the filter area is split into two compartments (overflow on one side of a partition and pump on the other) that can be used for a heater and any mechanical, biological, and/or chemical filtration media.  May even be able to hang a skimmer off the back.  Though for now I have a Fission nano skimmer that came with the package, it may get replaced with something bigger.

   First thing I need to do is solve the water movement issue.  It has a 290 gph pump in the return area of the filter, which seems fine, but I need to add some wave capability using another pump.  There are a couple commercial products that I am considering, though not the Zoomed power sweep pump.  One they're a little big and two not terribly reliable in my experience.  I have one in my fish only tank and I really need to keep it clean, more so than typical pump maintenance, for it to work properly and the rotation mechanism is tough to clean.

   O.k., for the substrate I plan on using aragonite sand to get that ocean bottom look.  Probably go with 3" or better.  I haven't seen much in the way of preference here but I could be wrong.  I actually have some but am still considering options.

   Then there's the live rock purchase.  Now this is the first truly new territory for me, having never used live rock.  Where should I get it from?  I was going to go to Amazon Bay and chat with Eric and see what he has.  I know Petco has some but that kinda scares me even though I've gotten fish there before.  Then there's the curing process which seems to hinge on knowing more about the rock.  I've read about it but never done it, as with anything marine slow is the pace.

   Well those are the major hurdles at the moment.  I so want to get this tank moving forward.  It's been sitting dry for WAY too long.

   Any and all advice is welcome.  As I said I have been doing marine fish for many years now but this is my first attempt at reef.

Later,

   Ron



   

[colleen]

Hi Ron,

Check out this site, they have good info. on live rock and the curing process. http://www.vividaquariums.com/Liverock.asp
In addition to the liverock info, they have links with a lot of other really good descriptions and info. on tank setups, etc.

Their Kaelini rock looks nice, and they have pretty decent prices on the rock itself, only catch would be shipping cost.  I bought a bunch of corals from them recently and was impressed.  Their livestock isn't cheap, but it is top notch quality and they were very nice to deal with when they called me to tell me one of the items I requested wasn't available.  If you read the 'Hobbyists Rave' reviews on their web site they have loads of positive feedback regarding cleanliness of their LFS and the care they take with their livestock.  Wish we were closer to their retail store (or perhaps it's a good thing we're not)!   

If you don't mind a road trip to the west side, Eric at The Shark Reef (www.thesharkreef.net) in Silverdale gets some really beautiful coraline encrusted live rock shipped directly to him from the source.  Most west coast LFS get live rock that's been shipped in to California and it sits around and is in transit for at least a couple weeks.  Eric's is so fresh it is still truly 'live', you can tell by the fresh smell and the amount of life in the boxes when they're opened.  We didn't even cure it, we put it in our tank with a sand bed and detritivore kit and it didn't even do a full cycle, just a slight spike in Nitrates for a couple days.  NOTE:  We were lucky, this is NOT a recommended practice because you could potentially introduce evil crabs and other unwanted critters, but I think that is where we got a lot of the varied life we have in the tank -- we even got a few new zoos on one of the rocks.  I recently read that if you get live rock from the pacific you don't have to worry about the dreaded mantis shrimp.    

The Shark Reef usually has a good-sized tank of rock in their store, but when we were close to being ready for rock we called Eric to find out when his next shipment of rock was coming in and I went over to the store that weekend and helped him unpack the 6 large boxes of rock and hand picked the pieces I wanted right out of the box.  It felt like Christmas! 

I've been told that Barrier Reef (www.barrierreefaquariums.com) in Renton gets their live rock from the same source, but we haven't been there yet -- planning on stopping in there and the Shark Reef next weekend (23rd).  There are good reports on the seattle thread on the quality of their rock.  Ed H. may know more on that since he's involved with the Seattle club.

Hope this helps... I better go now before you go blind!   

Colleen

ps -- Hope you can make it to the meeting at our house next month, you can check out our rock from The Shark Reef.

[MartyK]

Ron - I recently bought a Koralia 3 pump. I can't speak to its reliability, since I haven't had it that long. These pumps have a very nice magnetic mounting system - installs easily and it hasn't moved. Its not a wave maker per se - you have to cycle it on and off for varying the current. Overall, I like the pump much more than the powersweep type pumps I've been using. It moves a lot of water!

Not a particularly small sized pump...

Marty

[rmcconn]

O.k., just wanted to share a couple pics of the aquapod ready for live rock.  I'm going to Spokane to Aquatics Dreams on Saturday to get the rock.  Today I added a maxi-jet 900 with flow rotator to give me some turbulent flow.  Set it opposite from the filter return for counter-current pattern.  Now just have to see how this all comes together.

[psa]

Looking good there.  What do you plan to keep in the tank after it's cycled?

[rmcconn]

What I plan to keep is an open question at the moment.  I'm a little worried about the amount of light I have and how it might be too much for some corals.  Water flow is something else I'll be watching.  I've been surfing the various online stores looking at requirements but I'm still not sure.  Also I'm new to reef, though not fish, and want to start out with something easy.  I any case I'm still researching and will be getting opinions from club members.  Bottom line is to take it slow.

Later

[rmcconn]

O.k., went to Aquatics Dreams on Saturday and picked up rock for the aquapod plus a little extra for the fish only tank.  So wanted to share pics of the current aquascape.  Not sure it'll stay like this but we'll see.  This arrangement allows for water flow through the rock and placement of corals at different levels in the tank.  As always opinions are welcome.  Now we wait for the cycle to complete.  Stay tuned.

Pic1 is the rock from the front view
Pic2 is the rock from the side view
Pic3 is the rock from an offset front view

[Ed]

Ron,
   I would just be concerned with keeping everything centered so flow can go around it as easily as possible.   It looks pretty good.   I am curious what type of return pump you have for surface water movement.    If it were me I would add one more Maxi jet to other side.   Chauvet makes a timer to occilate the maxi jets if you are interested.  They are on Ebay quite often. 

[rmcconn]

Ed you're absolutely correct, I was worried about flow around the rock, and by extension the coral, as well.  I changed the setup a little, mostly for stability and ensured that I had clearance to clean the glass.  This resulted in more flow around the coral as I did have a mini-jet (160 gph) to provide flow around the backside.  I also added a small 50 gph jump counter current in the front for a lower flow region. 

I got my little skimmer up and running, have done all the tests, and am now ready for coral.  Which brings me to the next question, where to start.  I've read that mushroom corals are good for beginner's but am worried I have too much light.  So any suggestions?  Ultimately I'd like to keep stony corals but need to work up to that.  Also suggestions on sand sifters/shifters is appreciated.

Oh that photo is my final setup before adding coral.

[Ed]

Ron,
   I see a  film build up on water surface in picture.   If it were me, I would get another  powerhead to keep water surface tumbling for good gas exchange.   

[rmcconn]

   Ed's point is well taken, though I should point out that there is a piece of glass causing at least some of the reflection.  Still I wanted more surface movement as well and have got another maxi-jet to add more movement.  I rearranged a little more to promote more flow through and to add some ledges for varying light and flow.  I know it's a small tank but at least I'll be able to have appropriate venues for the new inhabitants.

   It's funny even though the tank is "empty" I've been watching the critters crawling on the rocks and noticed I have an anemone, my guess anyway, that came in on the rock.  Now to get add some coral to the "empty" tank.  No more rock movement only add that other pump.

   Keep the advice coming.

[Rico]

Ron,

That anemone is very likely an aptaisa which is a pest.  I would kill it before it propagates.  They spread like dandelions.

Rick

[Ed]

Ron,
    Paul Hamby has a pretty nice Aqua Pod.   If you pm me I will give you pictures of it.   I am sure Wayne, Colleen and Nate saw it on the 19th.    I have not learned how to post pictures on here yet.

If you go to Reef Frontiers and look in PSAS forum for April 19th Bob Moore Frag Swap, you will see a Nano Like yours in the Kitchen.   Paul uses LED lighting also on this tank.   I am sure you have a advantage with MH lighting.   

Paul has clown shrimp in it, cleaner shrimp, small anenome shrimp, a rose bulb anenome with two occilarus clowns, neon gobies,    Yasho Hashe Gobies (pair), pistol shrimp, Hammer, zoos, Frogspawn,etc. 

Everything is picture perfect.