H2ONUT
New Member
Hello and thanks to everyone!
I have been out of the saltwater aquarium world for about 15 years because I was traveling for work. Prior to that I had a saltwater aquarium from the time I was in college, which was in the days of under gravel filters. Always caught my own fish and got water at the beach.
Now I’m retired and when covid hit it seemed like the perfect time to dig in to something I love ... so the local fish store LFS - these acronyms are growing on me - advised me to spend $6k on a Red Sea set up.
Thanks to Jeff at Treasure Coast Aquariums I saved a lot for my future learning ... Jeff inspired me to begin with ... showed me some aquariums he was rebuilding, taught me a little about refugiums and gave me the confidence to start from scratch. I bought a setup on FB marketplace (don’t hold it against me), recaulked the 90 gal tank, reworked the sump (think I’ll make a better one) refinished the stand, conditioned the dry rock, traded in the 2 pump skimmer made for a 300 gal for an appropriate sized skimmer and a reactor and some store credit. By this time it’s been a couple months so I’m ready to add water so to speak. I bought some live sand, an ro/di unit for $60 and set her all up and left town for six weeks. I knew that by the time I returned from the Bahamas the tank would be cycled and ready for inhabitants.
That’s when I went nuts. I always had anemones in the past so I brought a Condy home as well as a gorgonian and a hardy little slipper dick (no smart remarks - that’s his real name) and the saga of over excitement continues. I was somewhat patient for the next six weeks or so during which time the system maintained balance and am, nitrite, and nitrates remained at zero, I learned more and more about what I needed to be doing as far as testing and started adding a CUC since diatoms began right after I decreased flow, can’t recall why ... increased flow and started testing phosphates, got the phosphate reactor going, discovered the Condy has an anemone crab - cool, then I went to the LFS and got a couple fish - oops ... no QT tank and here we go ... they came with ich ... which I am familiar with from the old days but alway took care of with copper ... now I have UV steralizer and will soon have a QT aquarium. Good thing I saved 5k Looks like I’m going to need it!
The high temp (always bumping 82 when it’s 77 in the house) is probably a good thing for ich control. I keep learning ... the hard way of course ... Meanwhile I feed the fish with a dropper so shouldn’t have too much trouble catching them at feeding time ... For the 70 odd days of QT ... good grief!
GHA has begun but now that all the kids are eating well and feedings are reduced the crew (including a tuxedo urchin, and fox face rabbit fish - can’t pass up a fish with that name) and Vibrant are taking care of it.
Thanks again for all I have learned and hope to learn from reef2reef contributors! You are so much kinder to new comers screw ups than some of the forums I read so I’m glad to join.
I have been out of the saltwater aquarium world for about 15 years because I was traveling for work. Prior to that I had a saltwater aquarium from the time I was in college, which was in the days of under gravel filters. Always caught my own fish and got water at the beach.
Now I’m retired and when covid hit it seemed like the perfect time to dig in to something I love ... so the local fish store LFS - these acronyms are growing on me - advised me to spend $6k on a Red Sea set up.
Thanks to Jeff at Treasure Coast Aquariums I saved a lot for my future learning ... Jeff inspired me to begin with ... showed me some aquariums he was rebuilding, taught me a little about refugiums and gave me the confidence to start from scratch. I bought a setup on FB marketplace (don’t hold it against me), recaulked the 90 gal tank, reworked the sump (think I’ll make a better one) refinished the stand, conditioned the dry rock, traded in the 2 pump skimmer made for a 300 gal for an appropriate sized skimmer and a reactor and some store credit. By this time it’s been a couple months so I’m ready to add water so to speak. I bought some live sand, an ro/di unit for $60 and set her all up and left town for six weeks. I knew that by the time I returned from the Bahamas the tank would be cycled and ready for inhabitants.
That’s when I went nuts. I always had anemones in the past so I brought a Condy home as well as a gorgonian and a hardy little slipper dick (no smart remarks - that’s his real name) and the saga of over excitement continues. I was somewhat patient for the next six weeks or so during which time the system maintained balance and am, nitrite, and nitrates remained at zero, I learned more and more about what I needed to be doing as far as testing and started adding a CUC since diatoms began right after I decreased flow, can’t recall why ... increased flow and started testing phosphates, got the phosphate reactor going, discovered the Condy has an anemone crab - cool, then I went to the LFS and got a couple fish - oops ... no QT tank and here we go ... they came with ich ... which I am familiar with from the old days but alway took care of with copper ... now I have UV steralizer and will soon have a QT aquarium. Good thing I saved 5k Looks like I’m going to need it!
The high temp (always bumping 82 when it’s 77 in the house) is probably a good thing for ich control. I keep learning ... the hard way of course ... Meanwhile I feed the fish with a dropper so shouldn’t have too much trouble catching them at feeding time ... For the 70 odd days of QT ... good grief!
GHA has begun but now that all the kids are eating well and feedings are reduced the crew (including a tuxedo urchin, and fox face rabbit fish - can’t pass up a fish with that name) and Vibrant are taking care of it.
Thanks again for all I have learned and hope to learn from reef2reef contributors! You are so much kinder to new comers screw ups than some of the forums I read so I’m glad to join.
