my little ocean - nano reef

[scopinox]

Wow Fren. That is absolutely spectacular. I can't believe that you did that in 5 months. I know introducing anything into an aquaurium takes forever.

Just looking at the screen, I can imagine the whole system throbbing and swaying. That goby's tail against that purple/blue ?coral?? is gorgeous.

Is it possible to take a photo of the inner workings of the tank, seeing as you have a nano and pico. With all the junk on other forums, I just can't visualize it, especially for nanos and picos. I would really love to start reef keeping but lack of $$ (or should I say RR), and off course knowledge prevents me.

[smartie2000]

Wow Fren. That is absolutely spectacular. I can't believe that you did that in 5 months. I know introducing anything into an aquaurium takes forever.

Just looking at the screen, I can imagine the whole system throbbing and swaying. That goby's tail against that purple/blue ?coral?? is gorgeous.

Is it possible to take a photo of the inner workings of the tank, seeing as you have a nano and pico. With all the junk on other forums, I just can't visualize it, especially for nanos and picos. I would really love to start reef keeping but lack of $$ (or should I say RR), and off course knowledge prevents me.

I know it was put together faster than the normal (not good usually). My nightmare is if it self destructs... The coraline algae is growing well including the more sensitive red ones (a good sign), and the Euphyllia (the corals that have long tenticles) are water quality indicators. I won't be putting another fish in there just in case the system goes off balance. I do have to take off some of the green algaes from aesthetic reasons, but these algaes go away as the tank ages. During initial set up nasty algae (like cyanobacteria) of all sorts took over.

It's hard to take photos of the back because the tank is inside a cabinet. Also feather duster worms decided to make babies and have encrusted the back of the tank. Basically I have a pump with a swaying head for water circulation (on the left corner) and a hang on Rio protein skimmer (on the right side)(It's somewhat noisy b/c it blows air into the water to collect particles but it is really helpful), two heaters (in case one fails and I had a extra one anyway) behind all the rock. I've kept the tank simple though the are all sorts of expensive tools I could get.

The goby is on a blue mushroom. The blue mushrooms far too over priced locally so I had this one imported from USA with zooanthids (impossible to kill) before the weather got cold as divisions of another reefers collection. They are not quite a coral and not quite an anemone. It is one of the first things I put in as they are hardy and clones themself fast. I think the 2.5 will have mostly mushrooms because they like nutrient rich waters too and low lighting. My 2.5 is even simplier in design, just a protein skimmer and heater and a 9W reef bulb. And cheap reef rubble (broken chunks of live rock that is left over in the live rock tank) as the base

I agree I had to read through a lot of crap on the reef forums. I barely visit them now