Manhattanreefs - Educator, Friend and Support Network

[House of Laughter]

The evolution of an addiction . . . . Manhattanreefs.

I thought this would be a fun thread to keep track of.

On February 16th, 2001, Mister Blik and I started as saltwater reef hobbyist. We made all the typical mistakes including (but not limited to) seaclone skimmers, under gravel filters, bubble tubes with carbon blocks at the top, venture power heads, Condi anemone’s, Penguin bio wheel filters, crushed coral substrate, yellow tangs and blue lobsters in 30g and 55g tanks respectively . . . . . .

The purpose of this thread is to pay tribute to evolution of Manhattanreefs and the friends, growth and education it has provided us allowing the reef progress documented below by its members. Please refrain from posting 50 pictures of progress or posts with quick “Thanks Manhattanreefs”. Please take the time to post on this thread documenting your education as nurtured/enhanced by this board.

The first picture is of my first 30g tank. Take note of all the equipment inside the tank – biowheel, seaclone skimmer, under graval filter, glass tube heater normal output lighting, blue damsel for cycling (RIP Nov. 2006) etc.

The second picture is of that same 30g tank when I though I knew a lot about reefing. Note the upgrade in lighting to dual 96w PC’s, clams and even started keeping SPS in this tank – many of you have the purple digitata with chocolate polyps that came from this tank. Take note of the yellow tang – named T3. Only because I lost 2 others to ich (go figure :grumpy: ). T3 now resides comfortably in his new 240g tank with Randy at Pratt.

The third picture is of my 92g corner that has been floating around most recently in other members’ tank threads. I really thought I had it down-pat with this tank. Nice, yes, but nowhere near the scale of its successor. Dual Halides, the famous green with purple rim cap, leg sy, upgraded flow etc

The forth is the tank I’ll be breaking down in the next few weeks and was the November 2006 featured tank at Advanced Aquarist. I can only hope that the next one I’ll be setting up in our new house will provide as many learning experiences and as much beauty.

In closing, my sincerest thanks to Manhattanreefs, the membership, administration and the educational network it has created. I am not sure I would have been able to learn as much and create such a beatiful tank without this place!

GO MR UNIT!

Thanks,

House

 

[nanoreefer22]

Well I guess I'll be second to keep this thread going . I'm not sure when I started reef keeping but I'm pretty sure it was around 2001 and sadly I started without this board. I only discovered the board after having Spykes show it to me, when I met him through Reefcentral. I joined MR in January 2005, thankfully. At that point I believe a had a 15g and the rest is history.

Just like Jim, I was trying to keep Condis and even trying to keep LTA's and Sebaes under my Flourescent lighting. Needless to say almost everyone died shortly after entering my tank, sometimes because I constantly moved it to get it in a position I liked. I used a fluval to the fullest and a Emperor 280 with Bio-wheel, as recommended by LFS's. Was never a crushed coral user (I think), but I did use Silica based sand ALL the time.

The first picture is the only one I could find of my 15g. This tank probably lasted less than a few months cause of my relentless upgrade/downgrade habit. It did look good, to me, but I still had problems with cyano because I was still determined to use tap water. At this point I was still endlessly fiddling with the tank. This tank had two 65watt PC's, a couple powerheads, and a HOB fuge from marrone.

The second tank is a 55g, which was a HUGE upgrade and happened almost overnight because of impatience. The tank has no where near the amount of LR it needed and barely had any light. I started off with just two 65watt PC's that I had used over the 15g. I later got a 175watt Ballast from DRZL, that later went to jhale. I had half the tank lit with a 10k XM and the other half with the two 65watt PC's. Also had the HOB fuge and GIFT Wrap as my background.

The third tank was a downgrade from the 55g to a 30g. I wasn't happy with the lighting scheme and that was enough to make me want to change. So I went ahead and downgraded. It had a single halide, along with URI Superactinic VHO's(Thanks Rich) and a couple misc. powerheads for flow. This tank also eventually had a Remora put on it(Thanks Rob) and it actually helped things along, but at this point I was still using tap water so nothing did as good as it could.

The fourth tank I had was a 65g(Thanks Rich) that was lit up by 2x 250watt Hamilton 14ks(Thanks Kasei for the Ballast). This tank had a ton of little powerheads in an attempt to have enough flow for what had become an overcrowded SPS tank. This tank had it's up's and downs and started off BB. This tank lasted a few months at most.

The fifth tank was a 65g RR, which I liked the most out of all. The lighting was still 2 x 250 14k Hamiltons, that I changed out to 10K reeflux. This tank got much better treatment from me. I had Ro/Di for water changes, had a tunze 6060(Thanks Jim) and a seio 1500 plus other Powerheads to keep detritus off the BB. Overall this tank was doing great, had a CA reactor as well and I was dosing Kalk. Reason for taking this one down? I was Stupid, plain and simple.

While I had this tank running I had a 10g nano set up as well. Powercompact 96watt Quad over a 10g. This tank was nice as well but didn't last long, as no tank does when it's in my care .

Almost forgot my 6th tank a 40g breeder. Lit up by a single 250 14K hamilton(Thanks T). Tank didn't last long, becasue I ran into early problems and got discouraged. Euroreef ES 5-2 skimmer it and flow was provided by a seio and a few little powerheads. Feel like I had taken a few steps back with this tank.

Now there's no pics of this tank yet, but currently it is in the works. It's a 20g with 29 sump . Soon enough it'll be public. Now on with the pictures.

Jim said it best "In closing, my sincerest thanks to Manhattanreefs, the membership, administration and the educational network it has created. I am not sure I would have been able to learn as much and create such a beatiful tank without this place!" MR UNIT FO' LIFE :lol2: