How do you learn marine biology as a hobbyist?

[austinsreef]

hi everyone!

hoping this is the right forum to post this.

so, i watch quite a bit of reef relate youtube, and am always in awe of people like Jake Adams from reefbuilders & Than from tidal gardens who know the specific scientific names and how each species relate to each other.

i'd really love to learn how to do this in an effort to learn more about the actual biology of my coral & fish. i feel like this can be often overlooked in the hobby in exchange for just chasing numbers. my theory is that knowing the biology will help me to make better informed decisions about how to care for & troubleshoot problems with my corals and fish.

so r2r, if you know any of this stuff, short of a marine biology degree, how can i learn this? i'd love some book recommendations that i can order. most of the ones i have found so far seem to be out of print or super expensive.

 

[mdb_talon]

I have read some really good books i will see if i can find them and get the details.

 

[austinsreef]

I have read some really good books i will see if i can find them and get the details.

that would be awesome - thank you!

 

[Klyle]

The modern reef aquarium vol 1 2 and 3. Julian Sprung and Charles Delbek? I think...I had them back in the 90s and I'm sure the aquarium info side of things is way outdated but there is great information in those books. I'm sure you will get better, more current responses but it's definitely something to look into!

 

[Yeet.Reefing]

I would say learn from the guys you mentioned, watching videos and reading blogs from people like jake adams and than from tidal gardens.

A lot of the reefing hobby is chemistry and understanding why you test for certain things. For example, pH had a strong correlation to dissolved CO2 and that has a relation to the carbonate within the water that affects coral. There’s a lot of information out there that’s false or wrong so definitely do your due diligence. In terms of scientific names and taxa, you can look up the common names and generally find the scientific ones included and from there in out its mostly memorization.

diving into books only does so much as well, it’s more about having a strong foundational knowledge in chemistry and biology and being able to apply it specifically to marine life. Common problems with fish are diseases understanding the types of diseases whether it’s bacterial parasitic or fungal and the cures associated where an antibacterial medication won’t work with a parasitic infection, realizing that bacteria do have mutations and develop antibiotic resistance. For coral it’s keeping up with the correct levels of nitrates, phosphates, kh, ca, and mg. Realizing that coral is a symbiotic animal with tiny algae that require nutrients and light. I would say skip the books and if you hear one topic enough form the community it can be considered general accepted knowledge. The science is always changing and I would say note the dates of when things are posted and or published and realize information 10 years ago may not be reals any anymore.

background on me, almost done with a biomedical engineering degree. First reef tank was 8 years ago, got out and got back in about 1.5 ytd. Currently run a Nuvo 10 and reefer e170 and setting up a frag system. By no means a reefing expert or have a marine biology degree but I can tell you when I first started some of the knowledge and technology sure have changed. The stance on live rock vs dry rock and keep ultra low nutrients are a couple examples of changes over the years.

 

[jjencek]

It depends on at what level you want to learn. I have used "The Great Courses" DVDs before on different topics. These are courses taught by university teachers. I have never done their biology courses, but I have taken over 20 of their history classes. I can highly recommend the program.

You can buy the DVDs or sometimes your local library will have them.

 

[squatchaquarist]

Tons of cool ideas already to get you started here. Look for Open Source journals and get reading. Chemistry, food chains, ecosystems are all good general areas to start in. After your foundation is built, you may want to focus on one or two specific areas that interest you most. Photosynthetic organisms? Macroalgae? Inverts? Microbial life in the substrate? Deep water corals? And go from there.

If you use Facebook, the marine biology-centric groups are pretty neat.

It will be a life-long endeavor, so enjoy!

 

[Mark]

I say start with learning about different reef zones or habitats, and get curious around which corals can be found where(that's never ending but fun to start correlating). From there, I think it is fruitful to be able to ID a coral by Genus at least. Getting species specific gets rough at times. But knowing how an Echinopora and Echinophyllia differ, even if both are called "chalice", matters.

The books linked below are a bit dated from a hobby perspective, but I've always appreciated that they dove into the biology aspect of coral reefs. Where things are dated are equipment and some taxonomy changes that have occured. They are expensive books, but if you click on 'used' options you can pick up a copy cheap. It's a bummer that books in general are sort of out of style, because the long form of books offers that perspective of tying a lot of elements together.

www.amazon.com/Modern-Coral-Reef-Aquarium-Vol/dp/3928819291/ref=sr_1_1?dchild=1&keywords=modern+coral+reef+aquarium&qid=1616682106&sr=8-1

www.amazon.com/Reef-Aquarium-Comprehensive-Identification-Invertebrates/dp/1883693128/ref=sr_1_2?dchild=1&keywords=sprung+the+reef+aquarium&qid=1616683926&sr=8-2

For coral taxonomy, you can't go wrong with Veron(and some good ecology writeups under 'Resources' tabs):

http://www.coralsoftheworld.org/species_factsheets/

Lastly, take your time and enjoy the journey.

 

[College_Reefer]

My grandfather always says "That's how ya learn stuff, you read!" and honestly that is my advice. I have taken college courses in marine biology even though I'm a marine geology major. Most of what I have learned was reading and memorizing scientific names, etc. There are great books out there. If you want even more in-depth looks, you can buy college textbooks and read those. There is almost too much information in them.

 

[KrisReef]

hi everyone!

hoping this is the right forum to post this.

so, i watch quite a bit of reef relate youtube, and am always in awe of people like Jake Adams from reefbuilders & Than from tidal gardens who know the specific scientific names and how each species relate to each other.

i'd really love to learn how to do this in an effort to learn more about the actual biology of my coral & fish. i feel like this can be often overlooked in the hobby in exchange for just chasing numbers. my theory is that knowing the biology will help me to make better informed decisions about how to care for & troubleshoot problems with my corals and fish.

so r2r, if you know any of this stuff, short of a marine biology degree, how can i learn this? i'd love some book recommendations that i can order. most of the ones i have found so far seem to be out of print or super expensive.

The best source of real information that I have found are the links to articles supplied by people on here. Some people who hang out on this site are highly book knowledgeable. It pays to check out the journal links that they often post in these pages, especially if there is a debate on a topic with collegial disagreement. Or is that debate?

Science isn't settled by consensus, but by hypothesis rejection or acceptance. The links to research on Reef2Reef are a good place to hunt for information. Use the search to find threads on topics of interest and scan for links. Not all of these are useful, but like most things you will have to spend some time scouring and reading to glean helpful insights into what is going on in the hobby.

Buyer Beware: There is a lot of popular literature that is junk science or political science thrown into the mix. I just purchased a recommended book on reef communities that is 98% activist junk science and I'm not certain i will read it to try and find the useful information amongst the 'world is dying' drumbeat junk. (I don't need a lesson on what-if entropy.) Read the literature and you can get a good grasp on what we think is going on and on what we understand to be true.

Edit : There are also a lot of folks who are publishing results on this site that are leading edge for scientific discovery. @AquaBiomics
Here's a good one!

 

[fish farmer]

Dynamic Aquaria

Dynamic Aquaria | ScienceDirect

www.sciencedirect.com

 

[brandon429]

Here is one reason I'd vote r2r above books as a place for aquarium biology

what is happening here in this thread cannot be found in a thread or a book

Reef tank cycled? never seen Ammonia spike

I set up a 75g 4 weeks ago with wet rock I picked up from a reefer abt 8 moths ago and had it in a bucket of water with pump but no heater ever since. Then added the sponge and filter floss from my 30 gallon established tank back in forth for abt 3 weeks added 2 Molly’s 2 weeks ago. Ive been...

www.reef2reef.com

in fact show me on any other forum where 100% skip cycling is accepted without fear, hesitation, or purchase.

you will get the most cutting edge material live time from the sources where the data is mined, here. live.

that thread above is a discussion on marine microbiology though its not labeled that way, its content shows it to be.

hidden details from free web post data. gold nuggets of procedural knowledge

books are very good training for coral ID/backbone concepts but the nuances, the new ways....ability to have others give you tank feedback for action X/priceless

all at rtr. freee

 

[Cory]

If your trying to learn how a reef tank works marine biology is more biology and anatomy no? Id think a good start would be learning about ecosytems, food chains etc.

 

[reefer415]

hi everyone!

hoping this is the right forum to post this.

so, i watch quite a bit of reef relate youtube, and am always in awe of people like Jake Adams from reefbuilders & Than from tidal gardens who know the specific scientific names and how each species relate to each other.

i'd really love to learn how to do this in an effort to learn more about the actual biology of my coral & fish. i feel like this can be often overlooked in the hobby in exchange for just chasing numbers. my theory is that knowing the biology will help me to make better informed decisions about how to care for & troubleshoot problems with my corals and fish.

so r2r, if you know any of this stuff, short of a marine biology degree, how can i learn this? i'd love some book recommendations that i can order. most of the ones i have found so far seem to be out of print or super expensive.

This book is an amazing primer. Expensive as it's a text book but I learned a lot and gave me a great foundation. I'm looking for a similar chemistry book.

 

[Imaexpat2]

hi everyone!

hoping this is the right forum to post this.

so, i watch quite a bit of reef relate youtube, and am always in awe of people like Jake Adams from reefbuilders & Than from tidal gardens who know the specific scientific names and how each species relate to each other.

i'd really love to learn how to do this in an effort to learn more about the actual biology of my coral & fish. i feel like this can be often overlooked in the hobby in exchange for just chasing numbers. my theory is that knowing the biology will help me to make better informed decisions about how to care for & troubleshoot problems with my corals and fish.

so r2r, if you know any of this stuff, short of a marine biology degree, how can i learn this? i'd love some book recommendations that i can order. most of the ones i have found so far seem to be out of print or super expensive.

The same way I did when I first started! I read everything I could get my hands on! I tried to rub shoulders with the greats in the hobby in the early 2000's, like Mike Paletta, Julian Sprung, Tyree, Sally Joe and Leroy Headlee over at GARF every chance I got. It was rare I got to be in their presence but I took advantage of it every chance I could. And I will be honest with you right now, the more I learned, the more I realized I DIDNT know!!! Here we are 21 years later and I am still learning like I was a newbie just getting started! With the internet there are way more sources of information out there than there ever was back in the day when we still had dinosaurs still running around. Take advantage of it!!!

 

[austinsreef]

I say start with learning about different reef zones or habitats, and get curious around which corals can be found where(that's never ending but fun to start correlating). From there, I think it is fruitful to be able to ID a coral by Genus at least. Getting species specific gets rough at times. But knowing how an Echinopora and Echinophyllia differ, even if both are called "chalice", matters.

The books linked below are a bit dated from a hobby perspective, but I've always appreciated that they dove into the biology aspect of coral reefs. Where things are dated are equipment and some taxonomy changes that have occured. They are expensive books, but if you click on 'used' options you can pick up a copy cheap. It's a bummer that books in general are sort of out of style, because the long form of books offers that perspective of tying a lot of elements together.

www.amazon.com/Modern-Coral-Reef-Aquarium-Vol/dp/3928819291/ref=sr_1_1?dchild=1&keywords=modern+coral+reef+aquarium&qid=1616682106&sr=8-1

www.amazon.com/Reef-Aquarium-Comprehensive-Identification-Invertebrates/dp/1883693128/ref=sr_1_2?dchild=1&keywords=sprung+the+reef+aquarium&qid=1616683926&sr=8-2

For coral taxonomy, you can't go wrong with Veron(and some good ecology writeups under 'Resources' tabs):

http://www.coralsoftheworld.org/species_factsheets/

Lastly, take your time and enjoy the journey.

whoa that veron website is incredible. thanks for sharing everything!

 

[austinsreef]

The same way I did when I first started! I read everything I could get my hands on! I tried to rub shoulders with the greats in the hobby in the early 2000's, like Mike Paletta, Julian Sprung, Tyree, Sally Joe and Leroy Headlee over at GARF every chance I got. It was rare I got to be in their presence but I took advantage of it every chance I could. And I will be honest with you right now, the more I learned, the more I realized I DIDNT know!!! Here we are 21 years later and I am still learning like I was a newbie just getting started! With the internet there are way more sources of information out there than there ever was back in the day when we still had dinosaurs still running around. Take advantage of it!!!

That's awesome! Do you know if many of their books are still available? Been trying to find some stuff by Sprung, but haven't had a ton of luck

 

[Dabcrusher]

It doesn't seem like there is alot of new books out there. I think doing the chemistry and organic chemistry course on khan academy has helped understand some of it I really good book on clams if you interested is " The giant clams of the sea and the aquarium" by James Fatherree if your interested in tridacnid clams and I believe he justvreleased a new revised edition just about the aquarium

 

[Imaexpat2]

That's awesome! Do you know if many of their books are still available? Been trying to find some stuff by Sprung, but haven't had a ton of luck

Man it would be tough to find things like that today and there is a lot of info in them that would be dated due to new knowledge we know and the differences in equipment now vs then is like night and day. Most of what I know I know through meeting them, talking to them and listening to speeches at conferences in the early 2000's. Today your best bet is videos on You Tube and internet searches on research papers at colleges and aquarium Biologist like at Scripts Aquarium or folks at places like GARF (Geothermal Aquaculture Research Facility). There is way more info out there today than there ever was back then. Something I have found really good of late especially when it comes to equipment reviews and how to use the equipment on your tank is BRS TV! Back in the day we had to learn from other reefers locally or just test things through trial and error. BRS TV has taken a lot of the guess work out of the equipment and can give you some great info on reef keeping in general anyways. I would highly recommend looking at some You Tube videos with Julian Sprung, Ly Seng (hope I spelled that right but probably not!) Mike Palletta and I think there is one other whose name escapes me that I have found to be awesome. They are just some of the more well known legends in the hobby who are walking gold mines of information. Forums have been another great source of info. I dont post too much unless I am bored but I do read through 1000's of threads a month looking for bits and pieces and tips and ideas. It gives you a good feel for what works and what doesnt work so well. Learning from others mistakes and successes is one of the cheapest ways to gain insight.