Recent content by robbinson

If you have a reef tank and can't catch and remove all your fish and Quarantine them (I could not in my 120g reef), then soak food in garlic (either natural garlic or something like kent garlic extreme), us UV 24/7, add biological cleaners (several cleaner shrimp and consider neon gobbies) and...

Well - thats ideal - but in a moderate to large reef (mine is 120g) with lots of rock work, good luck catching the fish. The best approach I've come up with is the addition of biological cleaners (e.g., cleaner shrimp, neon gobbies - cleaner wrasses are great - but short lived), the use of UV...

Assuming compatability with other inhabitants 1 or more pacific cleaner shrimp and/or neon gobies. Cleaner wrasses will immediately pick your fish clean - but they have a miserable long term (even short term) survival rate in aquariums. Soak your food in garlic (either natural garlic, with...

In the past several weeks, I've started getting brown algae on top of my pink somoa sand (its not thick, almost looks like rust). mixing the sand seems to provide an immediate cure, then hours later it is back and it does seem to cause the sand to clump a bit. Tank is 3 years old (reef) - all...

Its a killer - I've fought the battle, thought I had it won, but the hair algae grew back in my 120g reef. Heavily skimmed with a gemini 800 ETS skimmer - nitrate 5.0, phophate .025, ph 8.3, temp 78, amon 0; nitrite 0; alk 3.5; calcium 400. I do 18 gallon water changes weekly with R/O water -...

I have good experiences with FFexpress in the past. Given the high box charge, its disturbing they would ship anyway without some of the fish you had ordered - thereby forcing you to incur another charge for a reorder when the fish is in stock. They probably should ship you the fish for free...

Yes - I had a similar problem in my 120g reef (notwithstanding frequent water changes and vigorous skimming) and upted to replace my entire cc sandbed with a thin (less than 2") layer of pink somoa sand. My nitrates are now less than 5.0. The alternative would be to use a DSB and rely on...

I use the modified durso approach (to eliminate the waterfall effect in the overflows) and then have the output of the water flows flow through a pipe that comes out under the water level in the sump - that keeps it very quiet (but my pumps and chiller are not quiet)

Your water should circulate 24/7. Regarding noise, you can either keep your equipment in another room (rather than under the tank stand) or use quiet pumps. The lifeguard quiet one is a virtually silent pump that is appropriate for non-pressure rated situations like a return. The T4 is a...

Help - it looks like I have a growing ich outbreak in my 120g reef. It all stared about 4 days after adding a new kole tang to the tank - he had been quarntined for about 10 days in my dealers cooper treated tank and looked fine. About 2 days after being put in my tank (water parameters are...

My dealer uses it - but I prefer instant ocean.

You should consider a rectangular sump, rather than the vertical garbage pail for better air exchange and more accessory options (i.e., plumbed skimmer, mechanical filtration, etc). In terms of a pump (or pumps) - if you want to use an external pump, an iwaki 100 rlt would be very good and...

How much and what do you feed your corals. I've been using esv phytoplankton, but I've heard different views about how much and when to feed (the label suggests daily feeding). I have the following corals in my tank (mushroom, elephant air, dome brain, carbet brains, leather, devils hand, pink...

I'm in the process of looking for this myself. Championlighting.com adverstises one for about $120.00, but there is no picture or full description of the unit. I plan to call them.

red legged hermits and scarlet reef crabs are reef safe crabs and commonly used in the hobby to control algae on live rock. Blue legged crabs have a reputation for eating snails. Mitrex (emerald) crabs are also reef safe. Sallylightfoot crabs have a mixed reputation.