6 Things that have disappeared from the hobby...

[uniquecorals]

In the summer of 1968, my Dad cleared a space in his fish room (he had a huge collection of African cichlids) and told me we were going to have a 25 gallon saltwater aquarium! He built the tank in the garage, added the undergravel filter and some bleached coral from the Shell Shop in Morro Bay, California (he paid extra for a small piece of Blue Ridge Coral - some color for the tank) and added the water we collected from the trip to the beach. A couple weeks later he added a half dozen "mixed damsels" special ordered from the LFS. The resulting damsel battle for supremecy made the chichlids pale in comparison. As I recall, we ended up with one blue damsel - Dad kept that nasty little beast for years, mostly alone as it killed anything you added to the tank. He kept a couple of pennies in the tank to "prevent icy".

I've never been able to let go of the hobby. I only wish I had kept all of the crazy "newest & best" equipment we added and discarded over the years - we could open a Museum of the Saltwater Hobby. Before my Dad passed away in 2011, he had a great little nano in his office, with some crazy corals that we only imagined back when he started. I still have the Blue Ridge colony he grew from a tiny frag. He loved that plain brown "softie", said he owed it to the bleached ancestor that graced our first tank...

Thanks for sharing that cool story..Touches a harmonious chord with me, as my father started me with fishes about the same time...Like you, it was my destiny to be a reef geek! And I love the collection of cool old equipment and stuff..!

-Scott

 

[soutzee]

How did the scolys turned out?

 

[AJsTank]

I remember my first tank had an underground filter, bio balls and an algae scrubber. I see algae scrubbers and bio balls here and there still, but it seems like the masses have gone away from them.

 

[Nano sapiens]

I kind of miss the 'old days' when the first reef tank attempts in the US were built from scratch from European article information. From the articles, one could get the concept, but execution was totally up to the aquarist's ingenuity and resourcefulness.

Needed something for bacteria to grow on? Hey, the wife has these lava chips around her potted plants and they certainly look porous enough. Need something to bring water from the sump to the display? Eureka, that FW canister filter should do the trick. Need an overflow box? No problem, cut a few slots in that Tupperware container and glue it to a corner.

Nearly 35 years on, I am tempted to recreate my first reef tank system (which, with an 8g long display and a matching 12g long sump, happened to be a Nano in the true sense of the word before the term was coined) with all it's quaint idiosyncrasies. Based on past experience, it would grow Zoanthids and 'Shrooms in copious quantities!

Wouldn't it be crazy, as the the hobby gets older, more mature, more complex and expensive, if we were to one day see a 'retro' tank subculture spring up harking back to a simpler time...?

 

[Eckolancer]

I agree with the fact that you used to be able to buy 100 polyps of zoas for next to nothing. Now your lucky to find a goo deal on 10. Heres a couple pics of my zoas that have been growing for about a year now with no plans to sell any of them. All of these started from a small frag maybe 2-3 polyps

 

[turbo21]

You mean my 75 gal tank from 1999
With dual hang on filters an in tank air stone skimmer PC lighting and colt corals isn't cool anymore. Come on man look at the colors!!!
Lol

 

[jdl513]

You mean my 75 gal tank from 1999
With dual hang on filters an in tank air stone skimmer PC lighting and colt corals isn't cool anymore. Come on man look at the colors!!!
Lol

I think I hear the tang police warming up their sirens!
Oh wait that is 1999.........

 

[turbo21]

I think I hear the tang police warming up their sirens!
Oh wait that is 1999.........

Haha

A few months after this pic he went into a 390 gal fowlr that I bought from a local store that closed. Unfourtanetly I don't have any pics of that tank. I had them posted on another forum swf and monster fish. But after years the threads are there but no pics

 

[reeferaddict420]

I love this thread lol.. When I got into hobby in 08, my friend helped me set up my 40 gal and we drove around until we found an under gravel filter that I needed.. Then set up a half working fluval canister filter that gave me nothing but issues.. Wasn't long before I talked to a few people that worked at lfs and got myself a hob skimmer.. Love all the stories on this thread especially the penny in tank to keep ich away

Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Tapatalk