New Wife, New Life, and The tank I've always wanted! - Part 1

[Siderjan]

Originally Posted by Delphinus

Looks like things are coming together nicely! That spot where you have the screen over the overflow, keep an eye on that, looks like a pretty tight weave and I see that getting clogged pretty easy. If it proves to be a problem down the road you could consider some gutter guard, the holes are more like 1/4" so less prone to clogging (although not immune to clogging).

Thanks Tony. I was wondering what I was going to use, and that was the best I could come up with on short notice. I thought I had everything thought out til I saw the gapping hole.

[cuz]

and the wire ty as well on the screen...no one want to see rust..lol

[Siderjan]

Originally Posted by cuz

and the wire ty as well on the screen...no one want to see rust..lol

Thanks Cuz. I made sure the wire tie was all plastic. The little tab that holds it in place is plastic and not metal. The kid at Canadian Tire was not too impressed when I made him open a few jars so I could find ones that didn't have the metal tab. LOL! They hate me in there!

[Siderjan]

Picked up my livestock today from the babysitter along with a little bit of rubble lr, and some cheato.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CLozJ2qRvm0 <- 24 Megs

[Siderjan]

More updates;


New Urchin - Pokie


Lawnmower Blenny - Cashews


3 lbs of rubble for my refugium


I took my lights off the top of the tank and hung them from the ceiling.


Cashews out of the bag


Pokie enjoying his new home


Cashews like to have his picture taken. Popped his head out for this one.


My Sump/Refugium


3 more Astraea Snails


5 Nassarius Snails


$5 frag of some kind. Just wanted one so I bought it


Frag open


Blue Tang my wife bought named Ariel



Ariel and Prince Edward are best of friends


Snicklefritz, my pink urchin, kept moving my frag so I wedged it inbetween 2 rocks until I can get it glued down.

[Siderjan]

WOW! It's been a month since my last update and a lot has happened since then. Christmas Eve I picked up 4 Nerites Snails for my sump. It's looking kinda gross in there.


I also picked up a Blastomussa Wellsi and was given a badly frag'd Zoa for free.



Ariel came down with a nice case of ICH and I had to setup a hospital tank for the fish. It's a 10gal. Only thing I could find cheap. Never thought of a rubber maid container. I did throw a couple of ugly pieces of LR in there that I'll never use again. I was going to put them in my refugium.




Ever since there weren't any fish in the tank I decided it would be a good time to remove everything from the tank and give it a good cleaning and to glue my frags down. Feb 24th will be 8 weeks and I can put the fish back in my DT. All the LR has been removed. Only CUC is still in the tank.


The CUC has all been caught.


The tank has been rescaped. I removed a lot of sponges that were taking over the rocks and also scrapped off the last of the manjos anenomies. I glued down my 3 frags. I also put the CUC back in the tank. I did notice I needed a few more snails, and hermit crabs. I'm waiting on a Emerald crab that seems to be taking forever to come in.








A couple days after I got the tank all cleaned up, I had my first fatality. Ariel died from ICH! It was a sad day as my wife lost a fish, and I literally flushed $80 down the toilet.

R.I.P. Ariel.

More to come in the next post.

[Siderjan]

I thought for sure my Emerald crab came in. But it's not. I have no idea what kind it is but I bought it anyways. Looked kinda like a porcelain crab. If any one knows what it is, please let me know.



Since I've been bored outta my mind with nothing to look at in my DT, I decided I needed some more colour in my tank. I was sick of looking at green and brown. So I began looking online for Coral retailers close to me. I found 2. Frag-a-lot, and Coral Crazy. Since I was going to be home for a week inbetween Christmas and New Years I thought I'd take a drive to these places and see what they had. I sent a message to each from their contacts page on their website. Coral Crazy got back to me in less than a hour saying they were just starting out and if I wanted anything to check out Marine Authority, unless I could wait til the 26th of Jan. I wanted my wife, Kim, to go with me so I thought I'd wait and see what Frag-a-lot had. I sent them another message a couple of days later via the contacts page, and to this date still haven't heard anything from them. Coral Crazy on the other hand I feel like we are family. We were emailing each other almost everyday. I was going to go up on there tomorrow, but they were going to pick up an order in Toronto on the 22nd so they offered to meet me at Timmie's off the 401.

Here's what I ordered;
1-Eagle Eye Zoa Frag
1-Red Zoa Frag
1-Blue Paly Frag
1-Green Stripped Mushroom
1-Orange Ric
1-Pink Ric

Here's what I got for $90 taxes included!

3 Eagle Eye Zoa Frags (for the price of 1) & Pink Ric that's ready to split. They gave me 3 Eagle Eyes because the one I picked wasn't looking too good and wanted to make sure I had one that lived.


Red Zoa Frag. Bigger then what was listed.


Blue Paly Frag with some zoas mixed in with them (same price) and the Green stripped mushroom


Last but not least my Orange Ric.


I stopped on my way home to show off my corals to Lyle and my Emerald crab finally showed up.


Let the acclimation begin and end. Ready to start glueing frags.


Here is everything 20 minutes after I got them all glued down and finished a water change. Going left to right in the tank.















And here's Emm eating as soon as she hit the bottom of the tank.


I sat down watching Emm until she went and hid in the rocks and I got this great picture of a hermit crab that had just changed his shell.


Angie & Jim at Coral Crazy didn't have to worry about those Eagle eyes dying. After a week in my tank, everything they sold me is doing very well. The pink Ric is so close to spliting it isn't funny. They are great people to deal with and very helpful. I would recommend them to anyone! You can find them at www.coralcrazy.com Tell them Barry sent you if you want.

I did notice one morning while I was looking for Crabbie Joe that some how I picked up a feather duster worm. (before my order from Coral Crazy) It's added 2 new rings for it's tube in the past 3 weeks. Hope the space it's growing in isn't too small for it. I can't get a good picture of it cause it takes 3 hands. 2 for the camera and 1 for the flashlight. LOL!

[Siderjan]

Freshly frag'd Frog Spawn. $30 if it lives. Just waiting 1 more week to make sure it survives fraging.


Not being able to buy fish for another month is sure fun. I don't think I would be adding all these corals as I'd be spending my money on fish instead.

[Siderjan]

New Video of my tank.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Za70361pkcg <-100 Megs

[Siderjan]

Here's the frags I pick up from http://www.coralcrazy.com a week ago.