KenRexford
Active Member
I don't have the absolute top tier of lighting, but my AI Primes work just fine. That said, having been in this hobby for over 20 years now, I was just remembering how truly awful my lighting used to be. I started with lay-on-top basic hood lights on my 125, the ones like you get in a kid's instant tank for goldfish or guppies at Walmart. Maybe something like the Marineland perfect-a-strip. That was actually recommended by a lfs. Then, I went all in and got a second set. Then, I had some left over from some other tank and had three rows on top of my glass aquarium top, all producing nearly useless light. While it was bright, sort of, it was really yellow, and nothing survived. Green star polyps lasted a week before melting. Fish were fine, except for their eyesight.
Then, I found out about compact fluorescents and grabbed the big old unit with all of the above in one unit, precariously perched on my tank with stupid "legs" that wobbled and often broke. I was at least able to switch to screen top, but I was constantly afraid that this thing would fall in the tank. Removing it for any reason was crazy difficult. But, I at least managed to keep those cute little glass anemones alive. I still haven't fixed that mistake.
Finally, on to real lighting, with softies all the way to sticks thriving (along with those old friends that just won't leave).
So many insane mistakes from the past, from horrible pet store protein skimmers, to adding a lunare wrasse with about eight fire shrimp (expensive meal), to a sump I didn't know why I had, to spaghetti monster wiring dangling into that random tiny sump, to dosing tons of kalkwasser despite having no corals, to buying a cute little unicorn tang that grew to ridiculous size, to a million other insane things. So many overflowed tanks. So many murdered invertebrates, corals, and wrong fish. So many "Why is Daddy yelling and swearing, Mommy?"
It feels good to finally have this thing figured out.
Then, I found out about compact fluorescents and grabbed the big old unit with all of the above in one unit, precariously perched on my tank with stupid "legs" that wobbled and often broke. I was at least able to switch to screen top, but I was constantly afraid that this thing would fall in the tank. Removing it for any reason was crazy difficult. But, I at least managed to keep those cute little glass anemones alive. I still haven't fixed that mistake.
Finally, on to real lighting, with softies all the way to sticks thriving (along with those old friends that just won't leave).
So many insane mistakes from the past, from horrible pet store protein skimmers, to adding a lunare wrasse with about eight fire shrimp (expensive meal), to a sump I didn't know why I had, to spaghetti monster wiring dangling into that random tiny sump, to dosing tons of kalkwasser despite having no corals, to buying a cute little unicorn tang that grew to ridiculous size, to a million other insane things. So many overflowed tanks. So many murdered invertebrates, corals, and wrong fish. So many "Why is Daddy yelling and swearing, Mommy?"
It feels good to finally have this thing figured out.
