reef tanks

just wondering if anyone else keeps coral tanks?
a lot like bonsai ...a miniature world complete with propagating /pruning/care/time......and money
this tank has been growing for nineteen years
andy

Yes, I did, past tense. I had a full on sps reef with primarily acros. The display tank was 135 in the living room with an additional 200 gallons of sump in the basement, and 1300 watts of light. With the additional 250 gallons of fish only tanks in the bedrooms we needed 2 large dehumidifiers full time to keep condensation from dripping from the ceilings. Upkeep got to be too much, and travel for work pretty much stopped it and I sold everything off a few years ago. My electric bill went from $220 to $80 per month. I have recently revived the reef tank as a fish with live rock. Much much simpler system. They are great fun tho, incredibly interesting, challenging, and very similar to bonsai in many ways. The aesthetic principals are similar, or should be. I found many reef tanks to be not much more than display cases for coral specimens with very little shown in the way of making the aquascaping interesting or natural.

Nice zooanthids! And valonia ;-). You have any overall shots of the tank?

thanks
this tank is as easy as can be!!
zoos leathers mushrooms and damsel fish
it pretty much takes care of itself
andy

Andy, that is an absolutely marvellous sight! I have never seen a reef tank and your post has truly made me think about the wonders Nature conjures up just when you thought you'd see it all. That sounds so hideously gushy and slushy but you probably know what I mean.

Oh lord! I'm gonna get caught up in this stuff! No, No and thrice No! I haven't got the space!

andy mcconnell wrote:thanks
this tank is as easy as can be!!
zoos leathers mushrooms and damsel fish
it pretty much takes care of itself
andy

Yes, moderation is the key to longevity there. I went too deep and burned out lol. Very nice coverage it appears.

Have you seen Avatar? If so did you notice how much of the flora on Pandora (hmmmmm, or the rain in Spain?) was copied straight from marine inverts?

fiona
quite right ..a wonderful thing a whole different world..

velodog
avatar borrowed heavily from the coral reef
the whole tank is covered from glass to filters
andy

Hi Andy.

I used to keep marines about, oooh, 20-odd years ago. Keeping corals alive back then was nigh-on impossible, very expensive, and something only attempted by professionals. It makes me sick when I see corals, sponges, anemones etc thriving in almost every marine tank I come across these days.

You've certainly got yourself a nice set-up. I'm positively green with envy.

If you think bonsai is a nice relaxing hobby, try sitting in front of a tank full of fish, shrimp, crabs etc for a couple of hours!

harleyrider
thanks..you are right very relaxing, watching the tanks inhabitants going about thier daily business
better than tv
anyone else out ther have any pics
andy

And andy you can be fishing indoors,.....GOOD thing!

you bet
i have had to get troublesome fish out of the tank sometimes!!
not an easy thing to do

andy mcconnell wrote:you bet
i have had to get troublesome fish out of the tank sometimes!!
not an easy thing to do

Noooo it's not! I had a 3 striped damsel that had to go once! I finally nabbed him by stringing the hair netting that lunch ladies wear across the entrances to his favorite caves and chasing him until he got snagged in it. The stuff is essentially invisible under water. This kind of creative problem solving is what I enjoy most about this hobby. I spent many many happy hours creating solutions to problems and building systems back then.

I also first tried keeping marine tanks when I was a kid over 30 years ago. Back then even keeping fish alive was quite a challenge. We have come so incredibly far in our knowledge since. Now even keeping some of the easier corals is really dead simple. I can't even find a reference to corals being photosynthetic symbiotes in books from those days. It's just a matter of knowledge. In fact I think that the simpler the tank setup the more likely it is to be successful long term. As you would be well aware Andy, when you are talking life support over a matter of years time, it all comes down to having fail-safe systems. You quickly learn that anything that can fail, eventually will, and to plan your systems with that in mind.

For several years I've had a micro reef in a 30-gallon hexagon tank, due to several household moves. My orange clownfish ("Nemo") has been with me for 11 years now; two yellowtail blue damsels for 4 and 5 years respectively. About 40 pounds of live rock, a number of small sea stars and puffball-like sponges, numerous small featherworms, a few snails, clear unidentified Hydrozoa usually in the shadows, and pink coralline algae on the glass. Not enough light for corals to be sustained. Started back in '98 with an ex-spouse who, when hearing my passing remark about my having wanted to do saltwater aquaria years earlier, promptly bought us and helped set up a 70-gallon reef tank and 90-gallon swim tank. When we split up a year later I got two 20-gallon rectangular tanks' worth of livestock. These were combined down to the hex tank within another year.

Part of me looks enviously at larger set-ups also, however, my nearly year-old granddaughter enjoys the fishies just the way we have them.

I had decades of modest freshwater experience. That ex and I went through a lot of marine fish and critters learning the ropes.
Most tenacious was a domino damsel that stuck into a piece of liverock when I wanted to get him out of the tank for some reason. Shaking the piece of rock in the air wouldn't dislodge him, so we resigned and put it in a separate pail of salt water until he was later good and ready to come out on his own.

I have been reading about a breeding population of escaped lionfish along the east coast of the United States. Does anyone know if this has affected the price of lionfish in the aquarium trade? Is there now a glut of lionfish on the market?

Interesting thought William but I haven't heard about Lions being collected in the Atlantic yet. Last I heard they were still somewhat further north than where the collecting industry might typically operate. They have always been pretty common and cheap in the trade anyway, so a special collecting effort may not be justifiable. But if you were to eliminate the transport costs from the South Pacific you would think it might still have some effect on pricing.

Tropical’s can never compete with marine fish for colour vibrancy. Lovely set up you have.

I just tore down my prop tank it had bubblegum monster chalice,hohlgram,dog star, hollywood stunner, hot lava,aileneye,5 diffrent watermellon,purple pimpin,lime in the sky,and a ton more I cannot remeber at the moment. I also had a ton of acans like agent orange, yuki perfect 10, zippers,manhattan project , acan #5,highlighters, yellowjackets,ect ect.As well as acros like hawkins,garf bonsai, ora redplanet,blue voodo,green slimer, bali tri color, ora birds of paradise ect ect.And zoos out the nose like purple people eater, darth maul purple death, magneto,bleeding heart, fire and ice,keds reds,daytrippers,halo,radioactive eagle eye and rad dragoneye,whammin watermellon,purple hornets, ect ect As wel as ultra geade ricordias and yumas.Now I have a 8 gallon biocube with a few of the special ones for memory sake.The rest now reside in a 280 gallon display only tank at my sat job my friends fish store.I will get a pic and post it up after this weekend.

Ah a devotee of the named coral variants. For the unitiated this is biologically analogous to cultivars of Japanese Maple, but culturally has a lot in common with the long past tulip craze, including pricing. Most types of coral can literally be grown from cuttings, just like trees.

just took some more pics
andy