ThePremiumAquarium

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Your setup is looking awesome! I like the clean look of a fixture myself. I have found it less expensive to retrofit most of the time or I would run fixtures over my tanks. Of course I am usually buying slighitng used which helps there. You may have already answered this but, is all of your rock Marco rock or is some of it live?

That is amazing! LOL never get distracted by the shinny objects.

LOL no pics are horrible with beautiful coral such as these specimens! Nice corals!

Glad you could keep your zoas.Though I would have probably waited to post them up for sale until you knew for sure that you had to get rid of them. You have some nice looking zoas.

I would definately have risked some toxic for those bad boys. Plus I would have bought you your fish! lol

Thanks! Its good to be back. Can't wait to get some stock in my tanks!

I just ordered a Aqua Medic Aquastarlight Future 2 x 250W + Moonlight fixture used on ebay. We will see how it does. The ballasts are all built in so that should be interesting. I also plan on running another 2x250w MH(the pfo ballast I got from you) with lumenmax reflectors. So in total I will have 4x 250w MH and 2 6ft 4 bulb PFO VHO fixtures. I may also do 1 400w and 1 150w over a couple of tanks each to allow for some different lighting options. Lighting will go up after I get the water circulation going and get some sand and rock in the tanks. I will only run lights on the tanks that have livestock in them to cut back on power. Over time all of the tanks will fill up and more light will be needed which is why I will have all of the lights up and ready to go. I imagine it will take a while for the livestock to be built up. Cutting back on power means extra money for critters which is what it is all about.

I have heard of that experience with a few people, but I had a pair of sand sifting stars that lived in my tanks for 3 years and are likely still alive today. I haven't ever lost one and they have always done wonderful at keeping my sand bed clean. Plus they are fun to watch. I remember one sand sifting star that I got when it was 3" or so across. By the time I removed him from the tank he was about 7" across. A pair of clowns, A shrimp goby and pistol shrimp combo, some kind of blenny, and a small tang would definately be my first 5 fish. I always try and load up on inverts. Garrett

The system is almost completely pumbed and ready for water. I have to finish drains from 2 of the tanks into the sump and then I will be ready to fill it up and test it out. Looks pretty sweet and I think it will function pretty well. Pics to come hopefully Monday. Left the camera at the parents house and wont be over until then. Garrett

Happy Easter! (clap)

That looks pretty [language filter] hot! Great job on the rack. I am going to have to do a similar design in a couple of my tanks. (rock2)

To keep them happy I wouldn't go less than 8 hours. 6 minimum with main lighting 8 with actinic. Temporarily they will do fine on less but in the long run 8 hours is minimum I think. I never run less than 10 hour photo periods for my corals unless very temp.

Big pimpin! I wish I could sport that but I just don't think chrome is for me. Ryan, I might just order a bunch soon. I will let you know when I place the order. Maybe a few people will wont in on it. If not, extra black eggcrate never hurt

I have a few sites and am thinking of doing just that. Shipping is a killer though and you have to order 15 sheets usually to get a decent price. LOL I may need that many though. Garrett

There are disadvantages and advantages. In my case I will be growing macro algae varieties in several of the tanks. I would like to keep each species seperate as it will be both easier to maintain as well as harvest. Also, alot of critters don't get along too well with each other. For this, the individual tanks will be really nice. Flow and water turbulance is another concern that can be easily address with many tanks. Some corals like alot of flow while others do not. Having smaller tanks will allow me to grow species to meet their individual demands. In theory, I will be able to create niches for most of the critters I would like to keep but have been difficult or required specific placement in the past. Catching inverts and fish will be much easier in smaller tanks. Premade glass tops will be nice for jumpers. In glass tanks vs. acrylic custom tanks, cleaning the panels will be far easier and will not require as much care to avoid scratching. Alage will grow less on the glass than on acrylic. If there is a problem in one tank, closing that tank off from the system will be easy and will mean that I don't have to close off a large amount of realistate or water volume. The disadvantages are also numerous. It is really nice to look at a larger display and see everything in one tank. Smaller tanks make this a bit harder. Plumbing so many tanks can get a bit tricky. The 10g tanks are far more fragile than larger ones. Large fish will not be able to be housed in this system. Lighting will have to be strategically placed to get a full spread. Cleaning could be a bit more difficult in some cases and a bit easier in others. Idealy I would have customer 72"x18"x10" glass tanks with customer partitions built. I would probably do a couple in a 14" deapth for larger fish and corals. The problem comes in both how expensive this is to achieve as well as finding the craftsmen to built such a tank close to home. I would have it done in acrylic but I would rather never deal with acrylic displays again! I hope this answers some of the questions as to why I am setting it up the way that I am. There are really alot of options and my guess is that the system will evolve over time depending on the needs of what I would like to house. Garrett

I would have to see the skeleton to be sure;), but I definately think we could have a nice hybrid here lol.

The mouths are what got me thinking Psammacora sp. It really could be a pavona coral though. Psammacora usually has "hairs" like pavona, but pavona tends to have longer ones. Tough call but between those two I would think.

For the most part yes. Before coraline out competes all the unwanted lesser algaes, black eggcrate looks far better. Brown and green algaes don't show up as noticeably on black either. Where the coraline doesn't encrust the black eggcrate looks much better IMO. Even the coraline looks better on black eggcrate. All the colors just seem to POP.

Did you use Krylon spray paint on the frag racks? I was thinking of ordering black eggcrate but may just do it this way. Garrett

Most likely a Psammacora sp. Not an incredibly common coral, but very cool! Also could be a Merulina sp. but I would probably go with the other one. Garrett