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[b]My Reef - Setup[/b]

30 gallon long aquarium - drilled out

Emperor Aquatic skimmer

SpectraPure CSP-DI r.o. unit

150 watt 10,000k metal halide lamp with two 9 watt actinics

60 pounds Indonesian live rock - bought while still legal

10 Gallon tank as sump.

[b]Fish[/b]

Percula Clown

Royal Gramma

Coral Beauty

Blue Damsel

Fox Face

[b]Coral[/b]

Hammer

Leather - reproduced!

Mushroom

Bubble

Xenia

*These pics were taken shorly after the halide lamp came on for the day.

The Big Admission

Until not so long ago, this tank had been with me for many years. I never lost anything with this tank. And that was a first for me. Well, wait a minute, I do remember a Goby jumping out once. That was pretty much it though. The whole thing even survived a 2 day road trip in a Honda Civic when I moved from Manhattan back to Chicago. I will never forget what it felt like to finish that trip only to realize that I had to assemble a stocked reef tank right away!

Then a year later, I made a decision I would regret to this day -- I decided I would give it away to a local fish store! Can you believe it? At the time I was working a lot and I just didn't want the responsibility anymore. Seemed like the right thing to do at the time. But now it makes me angry if I think about it. I want it again, but it's gone. What a dumbass! So, if you are just thing thinking about getting a reef tank, or any aquarium at all, ask yourself where you think you will be in a few years and how many moves that will be. And at least have a good backup plan.

So now this is where you come in. You are going to help me build my next tank. Key decisions on hardware, fish and coral will be discussed on this site in the forums section so check in and let me know what you think I should do. And I will post avi's of the progress on the site as well. That should be a lot of fun.

There are a lot of things I want to do differently now. I want a layered sand bottom, homemade surge devices, better lighting and my r.o. unit connected to my water line among other things. Let's just hope I won't have to move soon!

I was working at a fish store in Manhattan when I started this tank. I took advantage of the situation and got everything wholesale. That helped!

That store had a big custom business and we drilled out my tank there. The store was called 'Age of Aquariums' and doesn't exist anymore. Anyone remember it? I have a lot of stories about that place.

I had a five gallon reservoir of fresh water near this tank mixed with Kalkwasser on a float valve. I used a bag of Chemipure and occasionally dosed Strontium and Iodine with an I.V. bottle. All my fish were fed either 'Formula Two' or 'Formula One' frozen food thawed in a shot glass. I occasionally had to 'harvest' plants growing on the rocks. Once I over-harvested and undesirable algae got a foothold for sometime.

Leftover from my days as a 'Grip,' a rugged movie light 'c' stand held the halide lamp. All though I got rid of everything else, I still have this stand and lamp.