pledosophy

I never ID'd mine either, have the same zoa. It is a fast grower and a very interesting zoa to look at. I think any buyer will be happy with it.

Wow I missed this. Thanks for the sponsorship Rod's food. Very nice. I have enjoyed your product for some time. So nice to see you showing support to our club. In addition to Waves and Rose City, Aquaticus also carries Rod's.

Come over. These mint green paly's have killed two of my other colonies and now that they have taken over the whole rock have blown off the rock and spread to the rest of the tank. I'm certain one even crawled across the carpet and into the living room tank, because I never put them in there. (whistle)

Mh's have the shimmer, T5's have the even spread. Hard choice. I just took down my 150w HQI and replaced it with a Sunlight 4 bulb T5 fixture that is 96w's. The tank looks brighter for some reason. I think two MH's would do better so you could have a more even spread, but the shadow drop off from MH's bugs my eyes. Then the crossing of multiple MH's does the same. I tend to like the more even distributed look myself. Then again, I love watching the shimmer. How's that for decisive?

I was hoping this was a way to get rid of my mint green paly's, but now I can jst inject them with colors from my others zoa's and have rainbow rocks . . . maybe.

1. Yes 2. Yes 3. $30

No, do say it, keep saying it. Keeps me in business. (laugh) On the kit thing, IME at this point in digital camera's it is often more about the lens then the camera. Even the older cheaper cameras are still good, we all thought they were incredible 4 years ago, they still are. I've sold hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of prints from a camera that sells for a few hundred bucks these days. It's still a great camera, if you put a good lens on it and know how to use it. JMHO. I have customers that have much nicer camera's then me, but still come to me for quality shots. I use cheaper DSLR's in the studio. When your taking up to 10,000 pics a week from a camera, the wear and tear alone will make you want to go cheaper, and they still work great. The great thing about lens's is they don't wear out if you treat them right. My lens cost more then my camera, well, it costs more then my car too. No knocks on the car. JME

I got one in those bins of extra crap in my garage. You wouldn't want to trade anything for it would ya (naughty). Either way it's yours if ya want it.

Your not gonna have any room left in your tank by then bro.

Figures. I knew those would go fast.

You still got them bud? I'm all over it. PM me if they're not already sold and I'll come by.

These work well http://www.grainger.com/Grainger/items/3X670?cm_mmc=Google%20Base-_-Welding-_-Gas-_-3X670

I think the guy just saw the prices on the little colored sticks and had a heart attack. The rest is a cover story.

In So Cal it is Reef a Palooza, I was at the last one. Down there it started very grass roots. A BBQ at a guys house with lots of people bringing coolers with corals. The one a few months back was at a large fair grounds with many many people, speakers, and many sponsor tanks. I think I have pics if they would help. It was big. Vendors bring there own tanks and lights, pay a fee for the booth. Company's like Dr Fosters and Smith, Reed Mariculture, PFO lighting, Aqua C, Ecosystems,Boyd, etc had booths with impressive displays. There were many local frag farmers that had booths open as well. Dr Fosters was just handing out shirts and bags of salt, not selling anything. Many of the vendors were promoting products not on the market yet. It was a three day event. Companies donated items like Tunze waveboxe's, there was at least 10 skimmers some large, a complete Red Sea System, RODI units, an insane amount of stuff for the raffle. They sold hundreds of tickets between $1 and $5 dollars to help pay for the event. It was kind of sad when the Tunze wavebox had hundreds of tickets in the box and the Remora had only one, but paying $5 for a Remora is still a deal for some dude. If someone really wants to organize it and speak with the reef a palooza organizers, I can make that happen. I was a SoCal reefer at one time, before I moved here. I say start small, work big. Reef a Palooza started in a backyard, as the draw increases so can the event. IMHO starting to big with too big of immediate ambitions could kill the whole thing. JMO

According to Leng, nothing is like his. He has a special place he harvests from in the ocean and then a large grow out facility where he cultures the stuff. His facility is pretty high tech to my lame eyes. Some people say it's a farce, I don't think they would put all the money into that setup if it was just a farce. I have no experience with the carib sea product, for all I know they are similar. I have heard Leng talk about his Miracle Mud product with great passion. He sold me on it, when he wasn't trying to. He's a smart dude, kinda crazy insane smart, but I believe him FWTW.

I saw no ill effects from raising the Mg myself. If you read the thread on RC few have had problems. I would not use epsom salts, it is incomplete. I use a bulk product for Mg now that I got at Waves, I used the TechM for the Mg boost. Raise it slow, in 50ppm or 100ppm intervals depending on how conservative you are. Tweezers will pull the algae IME.

Miracle Mud is the bomb. It's pretty cool. Ya, I know Leng Sy he helped me out when I was a newb and we have a mutal friend, he's a swell guy. I used it for many years, then I moved up here and there were no local suppliers for any Ecosystem products so I tried some other brands. All I got was hair algae. If your going to do it, I'd spend the cash and go with Miracle mud, if not, I just use sand and rubble rock now, it's cool. Took a bit longer to get the pod growth, and I don't test for trace elements so how would I know. I did like the product.

IME raising the MG to 1500 did nothing to harm the algae. I got above 1800 before I started seeing any effects. Some people report better results with Kent's Tech M as the magnesium addative, but there is no real reasoning behind this and even the chemist at Kent thinks it's odd, but does state there magnesium is probably more pure. There is a very very long thread about using magnesium to remove bryopsis on Reef Central titled, "Finally an easy solution for bryopsis" or something to that affect, if you care to read a few thousand posts on it. Personally I don't think you have bryopsis. Getting an exact ID is not important, most all algae respond the same way, and are treated the same way. Some fish will eat, some they will not. Sometimes it depends on the individual speciment of the fish. Your foxface might mow it down, mine won't touch the stuff. Personally I would not get a fish to control it in a tank that size. IME tangs do not eat that kind of algae, I have had it before myself. My foxface also ignored it. Emerald crabs pulled at it a bit, but they were no real cure. JME The no light thing does work well IME. I would pull as much algae as you can out. Really get it all. The take a brush to the rock. You can do this out of the tank if convient, but you can also do it in the tank as well. Kill the lights for three days, watch your skimmer (skim wet if you can) then do as large a water change as possible. 50% is a good start. When the lights go off the algae dies back, but it also releases many of it's stored nutrients and it's spores back into the water. Doing a water change you can kind of vacuum the rock and remove as much of this as possible, but there is going to be some left. Not doing the water change after the light break is just helping the algae spread about the tank. Algae spreads out of direct growth or be releasing spores and then growing. JME If you fixed the cause of the problem, then no lights can significantly give you a leg up on the algae but it's just a good start, it will take a bit of good husbandry and some patience to beat it. Once you do though, it's a nice life.

Would you sell the Icecap ballast by itself?

You can take your ball of chaeto and tie it to the rock with the offending macro algae on it. Leave it there for a week or two. You are effectively doing a lights out on the macro algae rock, but while giving your corals light at the same time. Pruin as much off as you can first. A pic is worth a thousand words here, one pic and you can get a pretty good ID and perhaps a better place to start from. Some macro's are easier to get rid of then others IME.

I have a 20" or so long scratch across the front of my tank from a snail who decided to get a barnacle as a friend on his snail. Not a little scratch, a deep scratch across the front of the tank. They scratch that easy. I have two acrylic tanks, I will never pay for another one. I am so careful, but I do miss being able to use a magfloat as I could on glass. Acrylic has a lure that you can drill holes anywhere to set it up, but in the long run, a LFS will drill a hole for pretty cheap. I'll only buy glass from here on out. JMO

What things are you looking for in trade?

Many species are illegal in many countries. Still it is not really regulated. There is no FBI office I know of. There was an attempt to ban the import of liverock and many snails for fear it would contain such species, but it failed. In selling the macro calling it fern, or green grape is a bit safer then taxifloria and racemosa. JME I would not worry.