id have to agree with doug, i dont think a whole lot of pods make it to the display at least none that are considered big enough for food, now if you had a couple hob fuges like pat the chances would be better as it spills its water into the display not pumps. ive made my fuge viewable and pleasing to the eye and even though the tank has been running for years for someone else and the fuge is overran with life ill wait untill next year or more and ill add a mandarin directly to my fuge and he will be the only fish there:):) (i have a large fuge about 30g)

one of the cleanest tops i seen was when someone had built there tank they had little glass shelves installed around the top of their tank and an eggcrate sheet just rested on it and was flush with the top of tthe tank, when looking at the tank you couldnt tell it was there.:):)

I love the glass cardinals as well. My school of seven stay close together and are always in the open helping other shier fish to come out. I was skeptical of them at first because there is not a lot of color but the blue streaks show up amazingly under the right lights.

Thanks for all the great feedback! Since my original post i've been having my concerns about food supply for the mandarin considering the existing canary wrasse. And sadly i am also beginning to feel that other than acting as biological filtration an in-sump fuge isn't good for much.

I agree that any fish can be a jumper if it is spooked. Of course i want to avoid the ones that are the most prone to jumping though.

As for the Azure Damsel, it did have a spat with the royal gramma when the damsel was added to the tank, and then a little standing off with the canary wrasse but the only one who was actually injured from all of it was the azure damsel at the hands of the gramma! So on relative agrresiveness i'm not super worried about the damsel if it's gettin it's a$$ handed to it by a gramma :wink: Once settled in though everybody plays nicely asside from the occasional reminder who's home is who's.

Egg crate works but it blocks a lot of light. Believe it or not. I used to do that.


This pic is my canopy that I built. Closed all sides open top. Hides lights perfectly and stops light spilling into the room.

Better than full top as allows gases to escape and does not trap heat. If you go this route you could stop worrying about jumpers. I have not lost a jumper in Probably 4 years since building tops like this.

http://i653.photobucket.com/albums/u...b/6f717f8a.jpg