Dez' Tank Journal

[Dez]

Hi guys....it's been about 4 years since I've been active on the board. I guess I'm pretty old school by now and trying to learn all the latest stuff. I used to have about 600 gallons of salt water aquariums in my condo....but we moved March 1, 05 and before that I sold everything and all my tanks and livestock kept some equipment because I was going to set up a tank right away in my new house. I still have a whole box of new VHO bulbs (I hear those are super old school now) I've kept some live rock in the basement of my new house and the live rock is still in salt water running (and has been running for the last 4 years without a water change...ugh). Doubt that the rock is live any more.

During this time, we've developed the basement and had to move the stupid temporary rock tank a few times while developing the basement. We got our builders to beef up a wall and there was a custom opening in the wall to fit our 150 gallon 5 x 2 x 2 tank. I have a hole pre - drilled in the floor inside the wall to run my sump in the basement.

My wife has recently told me that I have to sell the tank (that has been sitting in my garage for the last 4 years) or to set it up. Or that if I sell the tank, I could buy another Mini (I drive an old school Mini now and want another for my summer car). I have chosen to set it up.

The main reason that I haven't set it up is that 2 months after we moved, we had a baby boy, and then 14 months after we had a baby girl. Life gets busy with kids and to me, my family is more important than a fish tank.

However, now I find myself taking the kids to the fish store all the time and they want to buy fish but we don't have a tank. They love the coral and all the livestock in aquariums. We take them to the Vancouver aquarium once or twice a year. So Now I figure it's a good time to set up the tank so that my kids can be involved with me and make it a hobby together.

Today I started drilling my tank. I will post pics in the next posting....

Cheers and I welcome suggestions as I am super old school now in the hobby.

Dez

PS - this might be a super slow tank build but hopefully I'll get it done before Delphinus