What's your favorite part of the reef keeping hobby?

[Morbo]

What's your favorite part of the reef keeping hobby? (Choose 3!)

For me I'd have to say the building phase of the things is my favorite part. Looking for the new equipment, designing it in my head and on paper, thinking about what I'd put in it.

The almost DAILY arrival of boxes! It's like <insert your favorite holiday where you get stuff here> every day!

 

[ZoWhat]

BUYING NEW STUFF. like Christmas morning for Adults year round

 

[Goaway]

What? My favorite option isn't on here. I love observing hitch hikers and finding ID's on the ones I haven't seen before. Research falls into that I guess.

 

[kzenoni]

Love the excitement of stocking, going to reef stores and seeing the new stuff in the tank

 

[MediocreAtEverything]

The conch I just got. Absolutely the funniest creature I've ever witnessed. It learned to climb my NSA aquascape somehow and just carries on vacuuming everything and falling down.

 

[Screwgunner]

At the end of the day when I get home from work I enjoy going over my reef what has changed . Is everything looking good . Is everything growing . What will it look like in a year. Yes I control all of this by keeping water.

 

[sp1187]

my favorite part of the build was designing and making the aquascape with zero rock.
pvc and two part putty.
tops out at 30" tall.
then watching everything fill in on it.

 

[Kfactor]

The build Forsure I love making my own stuff and seeing it come alive

 

[SuncrestReef]

Some of my favorite aspects of the hobby aren’t listed:

1. Coral photography — I love seeing the extreme details of corals using my 200mm macro lens:

2. Automation with my Apex — I voted for “teaching others” above because I get a lot of gratification from helping people solve problems with their Apex programming. See my series of Apex tutorials for examples:

Articles by SuncrestReef

www.reef2reef.com

 

[roosterreefer]

Some of my favorite aspects of the hobby aren’t listed:

1. Coral photography — I love seeing the extreme details of corals using my 200mm macro lens:

2. Automation with my Apex — I voted for “teaching others” above because I get a lot of gratification from helping people solve problems with their Apex programming. See my series of Apex tutorials for examples:

Articles by SuncrestReef

www.reef2reef.com

Gorgeous photos!

 

[roosterreefer]

For me it's the biology and chemistry. Endless depth, you'll never run out of more things to learn.

Cryptic fauna would be a close second. Back when you could get ocean rock, I spent my first 4 months of the tank just watching what moved and came out of the rock, in the light, in the dark, etc. So much more interesting than the corals or fish IMO. And inverts - super entertaining for me.

 

[Screwgunner]

Serenity, I love to sit and watch and drift off of all the worry of the day.

 

[mjszos]

My absolute favorite part is the community aspect of it. It’s such a niche hobby, and it seems most people who are part of that community are on the same wavelength despite coming from different backgrounds. I love watching my tank grow, but seeing what others are doing is awesome too!

 

[Tannermule]

I love learning new things and different aspects of the hobby. I culture phyto and copepods. It was a great learning experience. Now I'm trying to culture nudibranch. Always looking for something new.

 

[G Santana]

Most of the above!!!
The interaction here on R2R is one of the main reasons my tank is maturing.
The help, knowledge and encouragement is a huge driving force behind my involvement, we had NOTHING like this in the 80s.
If I can DIY it and save, I will. That gives me huge satisfaction.
The equipment and testing make life so much easier.

 

[arussellnsg]

At the end of the day when I get home from work I enjoy going over my reef what has changed . Is everything looking good . Is everything growing . What will it look like in a year. Yes I control all of this by keeping water.

I feel the same, watching mine mature

 

[William Toohill]

Just getting tired of the maintenance lately. Water Changes / New filter socks every couple of days / Cleaning skimmer every couple of days / Cleaning out my Algae Skimmer, its just getting to me. Any suggestions

 

[TXislandreef]

Some of my favorite aspects of the hobby aren’t listed:

1. Coral photography — I love seeing the extreme details of corals using my 200mm macro lens:

2. Automation with my Apex — I voted for “teaching others” above because I get a lot of gratification from helping people solve problems with their Apex programming. See my series of Apex tutorials for examples:

Articles by SuncrestReef

www.reef2reef.com

These photos are amazing.

 

[ForTheLoveOfCoral21]

For me its being able to have a piece of a huge eco system in my house. Planning each addition, to watching them all mature and grow and interact.

Its really magical when you think about all we do and recreate in our homes.

 

[MaxTremors]

Just getting tired of the maintenance lately. Water Changes / New filter socks every couple of days / Cleaning skimmer every couple of days / Cleaning out my Algae Skimmer, its just getting to me. Any suggestions

I kind of don’t. Even after 20 years, I still enjoy doing these things. I intentionally got rid of my bigger tanks a couple years ago and only have a 28g these days because health issues caused be to be unable to keep up with the maintenance on 4 largish tanks, but I’ve never disliked the maintenance. But I’m a tinkerer, I like to get my hands in the tank (probably too much). I guess I would just say automate what you can, be observant so you start to know where your tank is at without having to test, make water changes as easy as possible with pumps, brute trash cans on wheels, siphon tubes long enough to reach a drain/outside (or another brute w/wheels). I go through phases where I slack a little bit, life happens, but I love the hobby, I am still just as obsessed as I was when I was a teenager getting my first tank, so this is a hard question for me to advice for.