Tank birthday, 47+ years

  • Thread starter Thread starter Paul B
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@Paul B , I collected those eels as a boy. Meanwhile, have you ever walked toward Wading River as far as the 'rock' on our old property-- you can't miss it... (You can see how flat the top is; I slept on it many, many nights growing up.)

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I once was officiating a funeral for an army veteran who fought in Alaska during WW2. He was a very kind and quiet man that never talked about his service. I was unable to contain myself completely when they played taps...this is the appropriate response for all of the fallen. The many owe much to the few.
 
For 2 days I couldn't find my Janss Pipefish so I said OOOOooNNNooo, he must have croaked so I stopped target feeding small mysis to the back of my tank in his cave. Whats the sense?

I was back there today and low and behold, there he is all smiley and all hanging out with the bluestipe pipefish.

They are best buds. He found a new hiding place and so far I can't find it but I know he is fine. I just need to see where he hangs out so he is easier to feed.

 
For months I thought I only had one of these guys because I never see two of them. Then today I saw one out in the front so I gave him an earthworm that he jumped on. Then the other one came out and sat next to him, so I also gave him a worm.

I guess I still have two of them. I bet if I wait long enough, I still have 3 of them. 😁

 
I took a very long beach walk this morning. I go before it gets too hot and it will be 90 degrees today.

Beach.jpg

The tide was such that I didn't have to do any gymnastics to get across the thin portions of the shore next to the bulkhead that holds up the 170' dune.



There was 4 or 5 different types of seaweed that I sometimes throw in my tank. It doesn't last long because my urchin likes to snack on it for lunch.

Tomorrow I will bring something to carry some seaweeds home in.

This is codium.
Codium.jpg


It sometimes , stupidly grows on chitin shells and when the chitin dies, the stuff floats to shore where a fish Geek like myself could collect it. Although I'm sure there isn't another guy collecting this stuff for hundreds of miles.

I only rescued one horseshoe crab in the surf who was having trouble turning over and was soon to become seagull food.

Horseshoe crab.jpg
 
No sunrise to see here! It is so smokey here in north idaho that it looks like a solar eclipse outside yesterday and today. We have a lot of fires 1.5 hours away in Spokane Wa. Area which is where our weather usually comes from. Sometimes the wind patterns shift out of the north and we get Canada's smoke too!
 
No sunrise to see here! It is so smokey here in north idaho that it looks like a solar eclipse outside yesterday and today. We have a lot of fires 1.5 hours away in Spokane Wa. Area which is where our weather usually comes from. Sometimes the wind patterns shift out of the north and we get Canada's smoke too!
I feel you l. Same here 100 miles south of Spoksne on the Washington/Idaho border.
 
You can't tell from this picture because it is a little old, but all the corals on the left side of my tank grew about 3 times the size shown here. As a matter of fact, all those green slimer corals and gorgonians grew 3 or 4 times the size here and many are up against the front glass.

It is hard to clean the glass so when I get time, I will remove all the rock and corals on the left 18" of tank and move it all back as far as I can.

It's a real pain to do that because the rocks on the bottom of my tank I built and they are about 18" or longer so quite large and entangled with all the other rock most of which I built.

 
I have been re-doing our guest bathroom. I hate builder stuff and after 9 years I tore it out.

I don't like anything anyone else has or anything you can buy in Home Depot or a furniture store, so I have to build it myself.

This was the original vanity and the hole I made in the wall for the new 6" deep medicine cabinet. I had to move that 3" vent pipe out of the way.
That old vanity I will throw out.

Open wall.jpg


I wanted a hammered copper vanity top so I got a large sheet of pure copper and heated it with a torch to give it a nice color and pattern. This also softens the copper to make it easier to hammer.
Heating copper.jpg


Here I am hammering the copper with a ball peen hammer
Hammering copper.jpg


I built the thing in my workshop out of solid oak, no sissy plywood.
Sink in copper.jpg



Vanity in workshop.jpg


The sink is made of cement. (I didn't build the sink)

Here is the thing finished, before painting the walls.
Finished vanity.jpg




Sink.jpg

It also has lights under it, not on here. The entire thing is suspended and doesn't touch the floor so it is easier to clean the floor. I also had to install some wall tile behind it as it was missing.


Drawer.jpg


Now I will work on the remaining walls which will be oak slats with lights sporadically installed in it. The shower glass I will also replace with a black, barn door framed glass.

Finished vanity.jpg
Looks great
 
Thanks, most of those corals grew back after I had to cut them down to almost nothing to get rid of that encrusting sponge. It's almost back to what it was 3 years ago. 😃

I don't have the time I would like because my wife is getting worse and experiences a lot of pain most days. Her hands are getting number, and her left leg and foot doesn't move at all.

It's very depressing seeing her going downhill like this.
 
Thanks, most of those corals grew back after I had to cut them down to almost nothing to get rid of that encrusting sponge. It's almost back to what it was 3 years ago. 😃

I don't have the time I would like because my wife is getting worse and experiences a lot of pain most days. Her hands are getting number, and her left leg and foot doesn't move at all.

It's very depressing seeing her going downhill like this.
So sorry to hear that Paul. It must be very frustrating to say the least not being able to do much in the way of a cure for your wife. Bless her.
 
Today I removed about a third of the left side of the tank and re-aquascaped. I had to push everything back away from the front glass. Now it is very "lacy" with large passages all the way to the back. It was too piled up before. I like it so much that soon I will tackle the right side.

The corals didn't wake up yet and are not happy with the move to a vat, then back to the tank.
Redone.jpg
 
This morning I went down to the beach armed with a plastic bag to collect seaweeds. I didn't bring a bucket for amphipods because tomorrow morning at 6:15 will be dead low tide and perfect for amphipod collecting.

The tide was lower than I expected so I turned over some rocks at the breaker mark and to my surprise it was loaded with amphipods. Big ones, babies, teenagers, you name it. I also found a couple of baby eels and crabs but I didn't take those as the eels grow like a foot an hour and the crabs like to eat fish for lunch..

I also got some nice Codium seaweed. I wanted to bring home some Bladderwrack seaweed of which I could fill a pick up truck with it but I didn't find any with a decent holdfast so I will try again tomorrow.

I got 1,374, 869 amphipods today. They are easy to collect but time consuming to count, separate them by sex, eye color, political affiliations, hobbies etc.

I dumped them all in my tank along with the mud. Unfortunately, now I have pieces of seaweeds all over the tank which will get stuck in all my strainers, but the crabs should be able to handle that. 😆

Of course, before I put them in my tank I dipped them in fresh water along with tree stump remover, copper, prizeapro, iodine, hydrogen peroxide, (3% so I didn't burn their eyelashes) Then I exposed them to UV light, Ozone and radiation from Bikini Atoll 😳

If you are the type of person that quarantines and calls the nearest hospital if you see a spot or piece of cyano, don't do this, as a matter of fact, don't even read this. 😬


 
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WHAT PART OF LIVING WITH A REEF TOOK YOU BY SURPRISE?

  • How much space the supplies and equipment take up

    Votes: 6 50.0%
  • Salt creep, spills, and cleanup outside the tank

    Votes: 1 8.3%
  • Planning trips or finding someone to care for the reef

    Votes: 5 41.7%
  • How attached I’d get to individual animals

    Votes: 2 16.7%
  • Making decisions when there’s no clear right answer

    Votes: 2 16.7%
  • How much the reef affects everyday household life

    Votes: 3 25.0%
  • Nothing in particular, I felt well prepared

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • Other (Post in the comments)

    Votes: 1 8.3%
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