Tank birthday, 47+ years

[Paul B]

Reminds me of when the sun used to shine through my hair,:nod:

 

[Paul B]

Just hanging out at his feeder.

:becky:

 

[MrDJeep123]

Reminds me of when the sun used to shine through my hair,:nod:

Ugh, it is extremely annoying to be losing it on top and be able to grow it on the face like it's nothing.

 

[Paul B]

Just remember, before your hair grew on top of your head, it was all cramped up inside your head, taking up space where your brain should be. After it all falls out, there is much more room in there for important things. :loco:

 

[gordonj1]

Hi Paul,
This is Jess, the zoanthid researcher who just moved to Okinawa. I was wondering how old your oldest colony of zoanthids is. We have been discussing in the lab about how long zoanthids can survive. We think that a colony has a long lifespan; however, individual polyps may not.

Also, just out of curiosity, how old is your oldest coral and fish? if you have already covered this, I apologize.

Thanks,
Jess

 

[SpartaReef]

Hi Paul,
This is Jess, the zoanthid researcher who just moved to Okinawa. I was wondering how old your oldest colony of zoanthids is. We have been discussing in the lab about how long zoanthids can survive. We think that a colony has a long lifespan; however, individual polyps may not.

Also, just out of curiosity, how old is your oldest coral and fish? if you have already covered this, I apologize.

Thanks,
Jess

Paul's tank is definately worth researching! I hope you find lots of good info to share with the hobby!

 

[Paul B]

Also, just out of curiosity, how old is your oldest coral and fish? if you have already covered this, I apologize.

Jess I am not sure about the age of the zoanthids as they kind of grow wild and I don't remember ever buying any of them. Right now I have very few of them in the tank as the tank goes in cycles that can last a few months to a few years, I am not quite sure why. Sometimes leathers and elephant ears grow like crazy and take up most of the tank, then maybe after a few years they shrink and maybe acropora or montipora will grow like crazy. Some years algae grows and now there is no algae. Most tanks are not running long enough to notice these cycles but mine does. I think it is time for montipora's to grow as they are getting large. Some years everything was covered in green star polyps and now they totally disappeared. I think this is all due to what the corals exude but you would know more about that they I would. I think my oldest corals would be gorgonians as I like those and sometimes they grow wild all over the tank, now there are just a few. The original one may be 12 or 15 years old but I have no idea. I lost some really nice old and large acropora's when I went to Germany and the tank sitter let the water level drop by 7" so everything near the top of the tank died. But there are some old corals in there. The oldest fish is a 24 year old fireclown who is still spawning. My fish generally don't die unless they jump out or die of old age. I think all of my paired fish are spawning and spawning fish don't die.
Here is that clown

 

[SpartaReef]

Awesome Paul!

 

[Paul B]

I picked up a new torch today, I couldn't help myself.

 

[Paul B]

MrDJeep, I used to have no problem growing hair on my head, face, back etc.

 

[MrDJeep123]

MrDJeep, I used to have no problem growing hair on my head, face, back etc.

Ha! No problem with the snow plowing either, I bet.

 

[Paul B]

I bought that Jeep for $700.00 and it helped me buy my house. In the early 70s there were no 4 wheel drives except me. I had no competition so I would get $52.00 to plow a Mc Donalds. To put that into perspective, I earned $52.00 take home pay a week as an apprentice electrician. I would plow all day and night. The first time it snowed I made $1,800.00 in one day. That was about 3 months take home money in one day. One day we woke up to 18" of snow that wasn't predicted, New York City was completely stopped. I plowed the Grand Central Parkway from my house in Queens about 18 miles to the Chrysler building where I was working. All of Long Island followed me in. I parked right on the sidewalk and called my office from the "Pay phone" in the lobby. They sent me home and I plowed that highway all the way home. I drove right through the Worlds Fair grounds as it was a short cut and no one could follow me. I made a lot of money with that Jeep and I sold it for $750.00 about 8 years later. I never had a problem making money because I was always a little bit ahead of my competition.:biggrin1:

 

[fishroomlady]

THAT is impressive :)

 

[gordonj1]

Thanks! That is really interesting; your corals must be competing with each other. its amazing that your fire clown has lasted that long. you must take really good care of it :) I just started a tank here in Okinawa. I dont really know what I am going to keep in it at this time, because so many hard corals are outlawed in Japan. It will probably be mostly zoanthids. The other day I went snorkeling with a class, and a few of the undergrads pulled up a giant clam about 10 inches across and brought it back to the cabin. they made sashimi out of it! I was astounded. I would have gladly put it in my aquarium! lol!

anyway, I have been following your tank posts on and off for the last year or so. I love your aquascape and I love the "trash" in the tank :) neat story about the jeep!

 

[Paul B]

Thanks Gordonj1. I saw those giant clams all over Tahiti, sometimes it is hard to walk because there are so many of them.
This was a tiny Island near Bora Bora, in the lower picture those "rocks" in the water are giant clams.

 

[Paul B]

I have a slight tank problem. Last week I bought a torch coral with a bunch of heads on it which is very cool as I have quite a few of them. Yesterday I noticed one head croaked, that is not supposed to happen so I broke down and tested the water for PO4 and nitrates. The two kits I have are very old and I have no Idea when I got them. They could be from Columbus so I am not taking the readings to seriously. The PO4 reads practically zero (which I doubt) and the nitrate is hard to read because it looks like ink so according to that kit it is like 4 million. It probably is 50 or so which is higher than I would like as I would rather it be near 25 or so. I am thinking this may be the cause of that coral dying but it could have been damaged when I got it as the rest of my corals seem fine. But The tank is way overloaded, the fish got to big, I feed like an all you can eat buffet because most of them are spawning and I can't do my normal maintenance because of the five pipefish. Every ten years or so I like to remove much of the rock and stir up the UG filter, but whenever I do that, I lose the pipefish. I think their tiny gills get clogged so I can't clean the gravel and it is over due. I also can't catch the pipefish. If I try to remove the rocks I would have to break many of the larger corals as they have grown across everything. I don't see this as a problem but an interesting situation that makes me think. I have a few plans, none of which are good plans but plans none the less. One scenario I will build tank dividers out of plexiglass and section off one quarter of the tank after removing the rocks. Then I would clean that and try to move it to half the tank. Then take all the rock and corals from the remaining side and put that on the clean side, then do that side. This of course would be a night mare. The other plan involves removing everything except the gravel to large vats which I don't have enough. I would break the corals very gently but they would not be happy. Then I would remove the fish and stir up the gravel. If I did this I have interesting ideas on what I want to do with the rock. I want it completely off the gravel and the entire reef would be suspended from above on nylon lines that you would not see from the front. I have been wanting to do this for years but the amount of disruption to the tank would be quite a bit. I love the aquascape I have now as very little of it is actually touching the gravel because I built long fake rock that spans large areas without hitting the bottom. In the mean time I re built my denitrifier coil. It used to be on the tank but during Hurricane Sandy the power went off and that thing was not high on my list to keep going so it stopped and I didn't want to turn it on again until I ran bleach through it. I wanted to try a different model anyway. It is now running in my workshop as I will seed it with bacteria and get it going again. These things excite me and get me thinking other wisw, I get bored.

 

[SpartaReef]

Paul this is awesome... your coil thing, I read about it before when you posted about it. I like your idea of removing everything... and breaking the corals I would imagine would only inspire new exciting growth in different patterns all over the tank...

If you end up with anything extra I would love to make a purchase from you! maybe even a trade...

 

[Paul B]

That coil thing is now changed. There is now an inside coil and an outside coil. The entire thing fits inside that blue tube that gets sealed and just makes it look cool. The tank is running well but I surpassed the ability of the bacteria to process nitrates. It will be fine if I could stir up the gravel as it has been to long and some areas clog. My pistol shrimp are not helping because they piled up the gravel in the center of the tank about 8" high so there are places with no gravel and you can see the UG filter plates. I also have to stop adding livestock and feeding so much but that is the consequences of having the fish spawning. They require a lot of food and I feed the pipefish herd a few times a day. All the fish are twice as large as they were when I added them and they eat twice as much. But it's all good

 

[SpartaReef]

all signs of healthy tank Paul... I hope my clowns breed soon

 

[shornik]

Hey Paul,

I only need like 43 years of reef keeping to catch up to you but I'm suffering from one of your problems too. Overfeeding my fish, I can't help it. I like to see them happy and fat too. So of course my Nitrates and phosphates are spiking and the poor bacteria I have in my tank just don't seem able to keep up. So 1 week ago I started to dose vodka, from what I understand this will help the bacteria to process the Nitrates/Phosphates and I can continue by feeding indulgence. Truthfully if it wasn't for the stupid water testing I do weekly I wouldn't think anything was wrong with the tank because all the fish and corals are doing fine (save a few Acros, but from what I understand they are a pain in the you know what).