- Joined
- Jul 27, 2018
- Messages
- 105
- Reaction score
- 175
I'd like to start by thanking the members of this community for the wealth of knowledge and advise you so generously give.
I am returning to the hobby after being away (dormant really) for 16 years. I had considered myself an advanced beginner back then. I had a beautiful (IMO) 75 gal. almost 5 year established LPS and softie tank with premium equipment. Then in the summer of 2003 (August 14th to be exact) the east coast of the United States experienced a blackout, during the middle of a heatwave here in NY. The outage lasted for 25 hours in my area and I could do nothing but watch the water temperature rise. Once the power was restored the fish and all the livestock seemed to be OK and since I had performed a water change about a week prior to the power outage I thought I was safe. Had I truly been an advanced beginner I would have had water ready for a water change anyway. My tank is located in the basement of my home. 2 days later my wife and I were returning home and as soon as I opened the front door we were hit with a terrible stench (like rotting fish). I ran downstairs but even before reaching the tank I knew I'd be met with a catastrophe. Everything was dead, many hundreds of dollars worth not even a snail or copepod had survived.
I immediately began to empty the tank and clean all the equipment. I put the live rock into bins and began the curing process with multiple water changes. I knew that the curing would take a couple of months so I went to an iron shop and had them build a wrought iron open stand like the one it replaced only about 9" taller than standard for better tank viewing. I like the open stand, to me the sump, plumbing, and equipment add to the viewing experience and does not distract from the Mod 60's (paneling) basement decor.
So after about 2 years of an empty tank in the same spot and 2 brute trash bins with live rock in water (about 90-100 lbs.), my wife began urging me (about every other day) to sell off the tank because I was never going to start it up again. Knowing that she mostly went down to the basement to do laundry I started to do the laundry (I think she played me).
Now that I have been retired a couple years (and less income), I walked into an LFS and showed pictures of the equipment I have and was told that I could still use most of it but there have been many improvements and I should do a lot of research on youtube (there was no youtube when I last owned a reef tank) and on reef2Reef.
So here I am about 15 months later $3,000 later ready to give it another try.
Sorry for the long post (hey I'm old). Thanks for all the info. and I'll try to keep you posted.
I am returning to the hobby after being away (dormant really) for 16 years. I had considered myself an advanced beginner back then. I had a beautiful (IMO) 75 gal. almost 5 year established LPS and softie tank with premium equipment. Then in the summer of 2003 (August 14th to be exact) the east coast of the United States experienced a blackout, during the middle of a heatwave here in NY. The outage lasted for 25 hours in my area and I could do nothing but watch the water temperature rise. Once the power was restored the fish and all the livestock seemed to be OK and since I had performed a water change about a week prior to the power outage I thought I was safe. Had I truly been an advanced beginner I would have had water ready for a water change anyway. My tank is located in the basement of my home. 2 days later my wife and I were returning home and as soon as I opened the front door we were hit with a terrible stench (like rotting fish). I ran downstairs but even before reaching the tank I knew I'd be met with a catastrophe. Everything was dead, many hundreds of dollars worth not even a snail or copepod had survived.
I immediately began to empty the tank and clean all the equipment. I put the live rock into bins and began the curing process with multiple water changes. I knew that the curing would take a couple of months so I went to an iron shop and had them build a wrought iron open stand like the one it replaced only about 9" taller than standard for better tank viewing. I like the open stand, to me the sump, plumbing, and equipment add to the viewing experience and does not distract from the Mod 60's (paneling) basement decor.
So after about 2 years of an empty tank in the same spot and 2 brute trash bins with live rock in water (about 90-100 lbs.), my wife began urging me (about every other day) to sell off the tank because I was never going to start it up again. Knowing that she mostly went down to the basement to do laundry I started to do the laundry (I think she played me).
Now that I have been retired a couple years (and less income), I walked into an LFS and showed pictures of the equipment I have and was told that I could still use most of it but there have been many improvements and I should do a lot of research on youtube (there was no youtube when I last owned a reef tank) and on reef2Reef.
So here I am about 15 months later $3,000 later ready to give it another try.
Sorry for the long post (hey I'm old). Thanks for all the info. and I'll try to keep you posted.